Inside, everything was crazy. Kids milled around, their voices carrying in the vast space. Bleachers were set up along one metal wall; even though they could hold many more people than were present, they were dwarfed by the immensity of the room. Bright blue tape marked x’s and circles along the concrete floor.
Across the other side, in front of a set of hangar doors that would once have opened to let airplanes taxi out onto runways, were the mages.
CHAPTER TWO
THERE WERE ONLY about a half dozen mages, but they seemed to fill the space with their presence. Call wasn’t sure what he’d thought they were going to look like — he knew his father was a mage and he seemed pretty ordinary, if tweedy. He figured most of the other magicians would look much weirder. Maybe pointy hats. Or robes with silver stars on them. He’d hoped that someone would be green-skinned.
To his disappointment, they looked completely normal. There were three women and three men, each wearing loose-fitting, long-sleeved belted black tunics over pants of the same material. There were leather-and-metal cuffs around their wrists, but Call couldn’t tell if there was anything special about those or if they were just a fashion statement.
The tallest of the mages, a big, wide-shouldered man with a hawkish nose and shaggy brown hair shot through with threads of silver, stepped forward and addressed the families in the bleachers.
“Welcome, aspirants, and welcome, families of aspirants, to the most significant afternoon of your child’s life.”
Right, Call thought. No pressure or anything.
“Do they all know they’re here to try to get into magic school?” he asked quietly.
His father shook his head. “The parents believe whatever they want to believe and hear whatever they want to hear. If they want their child to be a famous athlete, they believe he is getting into an exclusive training program. If they hope she’ll be a brain surgeon, this is pre-pre-premed. If they want him to grow up to be wealthy, then they believe this is the sort of prep school where he’ll hobnob with the rich and powerful.”
The mage went on, explaining how the afternoon was going to go, how long it would take. “Some of you have traveled a great distance to give your child this opportunity, and we want to extend our gratitude —”
Call could hear him, but he heard another voice, too, one that seemed to come from everywhere and nowhere at once.
When Master North finishes speaking, all aspirants should rise and come to the front. The Trial is about to begin.
“Did you hear that?” Call asked his dad, who nodded. Call looked around at the faces all turned to the mages, some apprehensive, some smiling. “What about the kids?”
The mage — Call guessed he must be Master North, according to the disembodied voice — was finishing up his speech. Call knew he should start down the bleachers, since it was going to take him longer than it would take the others. But he wanted to find out the answer.
“Anyone with even a little power can hear Master Phineus — and most of the aspirants will have had some kind of magical occurrence before. Some have already guessed what they are, some already know for sure, and the rest are about to find out.”
There was a shuffling as kids got to their feet, making the metal stands shake.
“So that’s the first test?” Call asked his father. “Whether we hear Master Phineus?”
His dad barely seemed to register what he was saying. He looked distracted. “I suppose. But the other tests will be much worse. Just remember what I said and it will all be over soon.” He caught Call’s wrist, startling him — he knew his dad cared about him, but he wasn’t touchy-feely most of the time. He gripped Call’s hand hard and released it fast. “Now go.”
As Call made his way down the bleachers, the other kids were being corralled into groups. One of the female magicians waved Call toward a group at the end. All the other aspirants were whispering to one another, seeming nervous but full of anticipation. Call saw Kylie Myles two groups over. He wondered if he should yell over to her that she wasn’t really here for ballet school tryouts, but she was grinning and chatting with some of the other aspirants, so he doubted she would have listened to him anyway.
Ballet school tryouts, he thought grimly. That’s how they get you.
“I am Master Milagros,” the female mage who’d directed Call was now saying as she herded her group expertly out of the big room and down a long, blandly painted hallway. “For this first test, you will all be together. Please follow behind me in an orderly fashion.”
Call, almost at the back, hurried a little bit to catch up. He knew that being late was probably an advantage if he wanted them to think that he didn’t care about the tests or didn’t know what he was doing, but he hated the stares he got when he lagged behind. In fact, he hurried ahead so quickly that he accidentally banged into the shoulder of a pretty girl with large, dark eyes. She shot him an annoyed look from underneath the even darker curtain of her hair.
“Sorry,” Call said automatically.
“We’re all nervous,” the girl said, which was funny, because she didn’t look nervous. She looked completely composed. Her eyebrows were perfectly arched. There wasn’t a speck of dust on her caramel-colored sweater or her expensive-looking jeans. She wore a delicate filigree hand pendant around her throat that Call recognized from antique store visits as a Hand of Fatima. The gold earrings in her ears looked like they had once belonged to a princess, if not a queen. Call immediately felt self-conscious, as if he were covered in dirt.
“Hey, Tamara!” a tall Asian boy with floppy razor-cut black hair said, and the girl turned away from Call. The boy said something else that Call couldn’t hear, sneering as he said it, and Call worried it was about how Call was a cripple who couldn’t help lurching into people. Like he was Frankenstein’s monster. Resentment bubbled in his brain — especially since Tamara hadn’t looked at him like she’d noticed his leg at all. She’d been annoyed with him, like he was a regular kid. He reminded himself that as soon as he failed the exams, he’d never have to see any of these people again.
Also, they were going to die underground.
That thought kept him going down an endless series of halls and into a big white room where rows of desks were laid out in lines. It looked like every other room Call had ever taken a standardized test in. The desks were plain and wooden, attached to rickety chairs. Each desk had a blue book labeled with a kid’s name and a pen laid on top. There was a hubbub as everyone went from desk to desk, searching for his or her place card. Call found his in the third row and slid into the seat, behind a kid with pale wavy hair and a soccer team jacket. He looked more like a jock than a candidate for mage school. The boy smiled at Call as though he was genuinely happy to be seated near him.
Call didn’t bother smiling back. He opened his blue book, glancing at the pages with questions and empty circles for A, B, C, D, or E. He had been expecting the tests to be scary, but the only apparent danger was the danger of being bored to death.
“Please keep your books closed until the test has started,” Master Milagros said from the front of the room. She was a tall, extremely young-looking Master who reminded Call a little of his homeroom teacher. She had the same sense of awkward nervousness, as if she wasn’t used to spending a lot of time around kids. Her hair was black and short, with a streak of pink in it.