The morning the wall went up, the city began to change. Looking back, this was rather inevitable.

It was not the wall itself, though three hundred feet of stone rising in a single day was enough to make anyone pause. It was what the wall represented.

A portion of the lower districts had been sealed, yes. A hundred thousand people were trapped, yes. But there was not much panic in the city because it had been brutally suppressed.

On normal days, it was easy for the people to forget that the society of Siphons was one where the strong eat the weak, and might make right, but it was on days like this that people fully understood that their existence was controlled by the strong.

Entire families were imprisoned with monsters, and no one protested; they were promised salvation, and that had to be good enough.

Already, the Guilds were beginning to organize expeditions. The Academy would be sending its best, even the Royal Families in the upper districts would be releasing their children to enter the lower districts to hunt the monsters here.

There were even rumors that the mysterious Commander of the Stoneward Asylum, in order to encourage the youths who would be risking their lives to eradicate all of these monsters, had promised a prize to the one who would end this calamity.

This was the final straw, and the city began to boil with anticipation as young geniuses from all corners of Stormfall gathered toward the wall.

They came from the upper districts, where the old families had been waiting for something like this for generations. They came from the Guild halls, where the masters had been testing their apprentices against each other for so long that they had forgotten what a real fight looked like. They came from the Academy, where the instructors had been preparing their students for a war that never came. They came from the barracks, from the training grounds, from the quiet places where the old soldiers went to remember what they had lost.

There was a silent agreement that only the best of the best were to be chosen for this trial, and a week was not a long time to sort out the wheat from the chaff; nevertheless, three thousand young Siphons ended up being the final number chosen.

Three thousand who thought they were ready for the monsters within the walls and the countless benefits of standing above their peers.

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Her name was Elara Vane, and she was a thief, although she did not like to think of herself in that manner; nobody liked to be called a thief... even a thief.

She was fifteen years old, small for her age, quick in a way that had nothing to do with her attributes and everything to do with the years she had spent running through the lower districts, learning which shadows could hide her and which would betray her.

Her hair was dark, cut short, with grey eyes, and her face was the face of a hundred girls who had grown up in the alleys and learned to survive.

She had been tested at fourteen, late, because the lower districts did not have the luxury of testing their children early, as they were too busy surviving to think about what came after.

Elara had opened five pools, more than anyone expected, more than anyone in the lower districts had opened in twelve generations.

The Guild had found her and taken her in. They had also given her a name, a purpose, and a place.

She had been training with the Alchemist Guild for a year. However, it was not the training she had expected.

Elara had thought she would learn to brew potions, mix reagents, and create the elixirs that the upper districts bought with gold and the lower districts bought with blood. Instead, they had taught her to see.

To see the Lumina in the air, in the stone, in the blood of the things she killed. To see the patterns that others missed, the weaknesses that others overlooked, the paths that others could not find.

Her talent was light. However, it was a light so strange that only her master recognized its root.

She was not told everything about her talent, but she knew her light came from what lived in the spaces between.

Even without understanding the full ramifications of her powers, Elara could bend the light, shape it, and make it do things that light was not supposed to do.

She could blind, hide, and make the shadows themselves betray the things that hid in them.

The Guild masters said she had a gift, and she could be one of the greats.

However, Elara did not want to be great; she just wanted to be alive as long as possible, because most people in her position did not live long.

Although her master hesitated to allow her to come for this trial, she had insisted, and the rest of the Guild Master would not be satisfied unless she came with their team, not after they learned that the Angel of Stoneward Asylum would be giving out a great prize.

She stood now at the edge of the Guild district, watching the wall that had cut off the lower districts from the rest of the city.

This was the place she was born, and where her mother still lived, if her mother was still alive.

Elara had no choice but to come to this trial; she needed to be sure that her mother was still alive and rescue her if possible.

Her armor was light, leather and cloth, made for speed, and for silence.

Elara brushed her palms over the short blades at her waist, hidden from sight. They were special, and while others around her had mounts, she did not need one, not when she had her feet and the years she had spent learning to run.

Behind her, the Guild had assigned her a squad. Seven young Siphons, all from the Alchemist Guild, trained in the same halls, taught the same lessons, and all more arrogant than the last.

They did not know her, nor did they trust her. They had just been told that she was special, and they should follow her lead.

Originally, they should not have known that she came from the lower districts, but Elara had noticed the way they were looking at her; it seemed they must have found out.

She sighed in irritation. This may cause unnecessary conflicts ahead, but if any of them thought they would cause an issue for her to jeopardize the safety of her mother, they would not know when they died.

She was here for her mother and the people who had been sealed away like animals.

Elara would have gone in alone, but the Guild would not let her.

She looked at the wall, and she thought of the hundred thousand trapped behind it, and thought of her mother’s face, as she remembered the way she had looked the last time Elara saw her, "Go. Be something, come back when you are, but if you don’t return to this place, I will still be happy, Elara. You are my pride and joy."

Well, she was coming back.