Chapter 3 Flicker of the Impossible
Serafina
Morning came too quickly.
I woke to the pale gray light leaking through the slats in the wall, slicing across Lio’s sleeping face. His breath was uneven—too shallow, too strained—and for a moment I forgot how to breathe myself. The fever had left his cheeks flushed and his lips dry. I pressed the back of my hand against his forehead. Still burning. Still getting worse.
I swallowed hard. Today had to go well. It had to. If the Rank Test changed my caste, even by one step, our lives would be different. Spark would get me a real job. Coal, even. Anything higher than Dust. Anything that would get Lio medicine that didn’t taste like dirty well water. Anything that gave us a chance.
I dragged myself to my feet, splashed my face with cold water, and braided my hair tight—each pull deliberate—before tucking it away beneath my trusty bonnet. Then I put on the only dress I had that wasn’t patched beyond recognition. It hung loose on my frame, the collar still stretched from where the Collectors had magically tightened it. I forced myself not to think about them. One crisis at a time.
After I tucked the coin pouch Mira gave me under my pillow, I knelt beside Lio again and tucked the blanket around him. He stirred, eyes fluttering open. “Sera… are you leaving?”
“Yes,” I whispered. “It’s Rank Day.”
His fingers curled around mine, small and fragile. “You’ll do great,” he said, though his voice was barely a whisper. “You always try the hardest.”
A smile wobbled across my lips. “Trying hasn’t gotten me very far.”
“Maybe today will be different.”
Something in his voice—thin, hopeful, desperate—made my throat tighten. I kissed his forehead, ignoring the heat radiating off his skin. “There’s some leftover soup in the bowl and some water in the cup. Stay in bed. Pray I come back with good news."
He nodded, closing his eyes again. I slipped outside before my courage had time to waver.
The Dust District streets buzzed with more activity than usual. Rank Day was one of the only times anyone from outside our district bothered to come near us. The Square towered in the distance—its white stone platform raised high enough that even the poorest among us could see our fates being chosen. Or, in my case, repeated.
People streamed toward it in a ragged procession—Dust families in threadbare clothes, Spark merchants trying to look superior, Coal workers being herded through like cattle. I kept my head down and merged into the line.
Mira stood near the steps of the platform, waving frantically when she spotted me.
“You made it!” she said, pulling me into a quick hug.
I almost winced—she smelled clean. Fresh. Expensive.
“I said I would.”
Her eyes searched my face. “Are… the Collectors bothering you again?”
My silence was answer enough.
She sighed. “Just get through today. If the orb so much as flickers above Dust, you’ll receive a scholarship from the Imperial fund—enough to settle whatever debt you carry.”
“Flickers above Dust,” I repeated, my voice flat. “That’s optimistic.”
She nudged me. “Let me have hope for you, okay?”
Before I could answer, a guard barked, “Next group! Up onto the platform!”
Mira squeezed my hand. “I’ll wait down here.”
I fell in line and walked up to the edge of the platform. Six examiners sat behind a long table, each wearing the glowing white mantle of Ember Class—three ranks above Dust, but still below Imperial. They looked bored, irritated, and vaguely disgusted by the mere fact that we existed.
At the back, overseeing it all, stood Warden Elara Voss. She was impossible to miss—a tall, middle-aged Black woman with skin like polished ebony, her dark hair coiled into an elegant knot at the nape of her neck. Her honey-colored eyes—sharp, cruel, unnervingly bright—swept over the crowd like a queen surveying her subjects.
Her lips, painted a deep, blooded red, curved faintly, as if our desperation amused her. She wore a fitted black coat edged in silver, and at her collar gleamed the insignia of the Dust District Warden: an obsidian eye set within a broken circle of gold.
She didn’t speak. She didn’t need to. Her presence alone crushed the murmurs into silence. Everyone knew her. Everyone feared her.
The great ranking orb sat on its pedestal before the examiners—a perfect crystal sphere, clear as glass yet throbbing with a faint inner light. Harmless, it seemed… and yet every life in Aetherion was measured by it—weighed, judged, and sealed.
A tall examiner with sharp cheekbones flicked through his list. “Sera Bale,” he called.
My legs felt like lead. I stepped onto the platform and the murmuring crowd below fell into an uneasy silence.
One examiner, a woman with lips curled in permanent disdain, leaned forward. Her gaze pierced me, sharp enough to draw blood. “State your name for all to hear,” she instructed.
“Sera Bale.”
A few people in the audience whispered.
“Bale... like hay—”
“—pitiful—”
“—Dust forever—”
The woman smirked. “Ah, yes. The orphan.” She clicked her tongue. “You again?”
I clenched my fists until my nails dug into my palms. “I’m here to test like everyone else.”
A young examiner, black hair slicked back, scoffed, his words cutting through the Square. “You should stop coming. Your results never change. You are Dust—and you will remain Dust. Forever.”
Heat flared across my cheeks. The world shrank to the weight of their eyes, the pulsing orb, the hiss of every cruel word. I forced my gaze ahead, locked on the crystal sphere, drowning out the chaos around me.
Before he could continue, an older man at the end of the table raised a hand. “That’s enough,” he said. His hair was long and silver-white. His eyes—sharp, intelligent—studied me with curiosity. There was something oddly familiar about him. “Step forward, child. Place your hands on the orb.”
My heart thudded painfully. I stepped up to the pedestal and rested my palms on the sphere’s cool surface. It hummed under my skin. The Square held its breath.
The orb flared to life beneath my hands. I braced for red, expecting it—but the color never came.
Orange bloomed first, hot and flickering. Then yellow, sharp and blinding.
My hands shook with excitement. I can't believe it! Spark! Yes!
But then, the yellow seared into white, like moonlight caught in crystal. Blue followed, deep and electric, humming against my skin.
And then… violet.
Celestial. The highest of all castes.
Impossible.
My chest hollowed out, breath snagging in my throat as I stared, unable to tear my eyes away. The orb’s violet light pulsed against my skin—dazzling, alive—flooding me with awe and a fear so sharp it set my limbs trembling.
Celestials were a myth… weren’t they?
Every head in the Square turned. Gasps erupted around me.
“What the—”
“No way—”
“That’s impossible—”
From the back, Warden Voss leaned forward slightly, her honey eyes narrowing. Her red lips curved into a slow, calculating smile—pleased, as if she’d just spotted something valuable in the dirt.
The orb shimmered—deep, brilliant—the violet hue bright it cast a glow across the platform.
I was a Celestial...
Was this real?