9. Black and Gold (14)
9. Black and Gold (14)
Before the draft began, the exam results were announced.
A total of 456 people had taken the exam—434 applicants plus the 22 released troupe members.
Of those, the top 44 would be selected through the draft.
"Aaaagh!"
The strongman who had cut in front of Ella and Reina earlier and been humiliated for it let out a howl and collapsed to the floor. He hadn't made the top 44. Several other acrobats in identical pink uniforms were in the same boat, their despair spilling out in ragged groans.
If they'd simply been released, it wouldn't have stung this badly. They could at least hold onto the hope of selling themselves somewhere else and getting hired again.
But being cut through a public exam like this was no different from having the word "incompetent" stamped on your forehead for the whole world to see.
I tried so damn hard precisely because I was afraid this would happen...
Their odds of ever entering the Grand Prix again were effectively zero. In a system where every troupe had to choose its members with painstaking care, nobody was going to pick someone who'd just been officially certified as worthless.
The audience's attention abandoned the losers with practiced speed, swiveling instead toward the two figures who had set this exam ablaze.
Reina and Ella. They'd been tied on every single challenge through the twenty-fourth, and the gap had only appeared on the final task. Ella had been disqualified due to injury.
The draft rankings placed Reina first and Ella second.
Not a single person in that gymnasium actually thought of Ella as second place. Reina herself agreed more than anyone. Ella had saved her life—knowing it would cost her the competition. The true first place belonged to that girl, and Reina had no quarrel with everyone thinking so.
The problem lay elsewhere.
"Eugh, do you smell piss?"
"Pfft, look at that. Little bed-wetter acting all noble—it's hilarious."
"Must feel great grabbing first place like that, huh?"
"Pathetic! Absolutely pathetic!"
Whenever she walked past, a contingent of Rekachev students made a point of jeering or clicking their tongues. Clara led the charge, subtly stoking the mood so the others would pile on one jab after another.
Reina had to fight with everything she had just to keep the color from rising to her face.
At last she stood before the platform and forced herself to face the audience. Her father wasn't looking at her. He was rifling through a stack of contracts, pretending to prepare for the draft.
Reina recognized the act for what it was: her father making a show of ignoring the whispers of his rivals.
He had no actual reason to prepare. Golden Carnival had already agreed with their sponsor well before the entrance exam that they would not select additional members in the draft. They were here for one purpose only—to demonstrate overwhelming strength. Her father's desire to grind Rekachev under his heel had aligned neatly with a sponsor's wish to raise their profile.
The extra slot was already earmarked for a top-tier acrobat currently active on the circuit. Golden Carnival's selections would end the moment they reclaimed Reina.
A sigh of relief slipped out before she could stop it. Thank goodness. Having her father avoid her eyes and pretend to be busy was, for now, the better option. If he had thrown her a look of contempt here, she wouldn't have been able to endure it.
The draft worked like this: the forty-four slots were filled by combining the applicants and released members, arranged in order of score. Then each of the twenty-two circus troupes would select a new member in that same sequence.
The natural result was that released troupe members who had scored higher than every applicant simply returned to the circus they'd come from. The whole thing was, in effect, a handicap on any troupe that boasted an exceptionally strong member. For the sake of fair competition, troupes like that had to take back the person they'd sent out and move to the very back of the line.
The real selections began the moment the troupes faced the applicants. With each of the twenty-two troupes picking two people, the draft would close once all forty-four were chosen.
Assignment was mandatory. A troupe could exercise a veto, but only once per team.
Being mandatory didn't mean they were shackled to the result, however.
Selection in the draft didn't constitute permanent employment—it was a temporary contract. Forcing two years of labor onto students who had come seeking admission was out of the question. So the temporary contract remained valid only until the day before the September 1st entrance ceremony: two weeks. After that, the selected individual could choose whether to remain with the troupe or withdraw.
Withdrawing to enroll was perfectly free. Withdrawing to join a different circus, on the other hand, came with restrictions. The circus taking the person in had to send one of its own members to the original troupe as compensation. This was called a trade.
Wonderstein felt like he was watching professional baseball back in the real world. There were safeguards preventing the top troupes from hoarding talent, the forced sequential assignment, the mandatory trial period, and a whole set of trade regulations.
Because the system automatically matched troupes to ranked individuals, the draft was practically settled the moment the rankings were posted. The only real variable was each team's single use of its veto.
Outright forfeiture was technically an option, but Wonderstein had no intention of giving up this precious right. Passing the Rose Windmill Cabaret's trial had nudged their reputation upward a little, but they were still in no position to recruit talented acrobats on their own.
Their only shot at acquiring a high-ranking acrobat was to exploit the draft's mandatory assignment rule.
They'd have two weeks to cajole their new pick into choosing "remain." For that purpose, someone who'd already been a working troupe member was a far better target than a student—students had the escape hatch of "enrollment," but former troupe members didn't. Once they picked one, they were guaranteed at least one acrobat through the trade system.
Their turn was second. First they'd take Ella back, then pick the twenty-fourth-ranked candidate—twenty-two plus two.
The order could shift depending on who exercised a veto, so Wonderstein kept a close eye on the names clustered around rank twenty-four.
Once the results had been fully announced, a woman in her fifties wearing a crooked pointed hat and long robes stepped onto the platform. It was Vice Principal Elpara, the tightrope-walking instructor known as "the Witch."
She offered a brief explanation of the exam's intent.
The entrance exam was designed to assess aptitude in what were known as the Traditional Five Acts: Strength Show-off, Ground Acrobatics, tightrope walking, shooting, and taming.
"Together with clowning and literature, these seven subjects represent your SPECIAL abilities."
Strength Show-off for Strength. Shooting for Perception. Ground Acrobatics for Endurance. Taming for Charisma. Literature for Intelligence. Tightrope walking for Agility. Clowning for Luck.
The six professors representing these seven S.P.E.C.I.A.L. categories climbed onto the platform and introduced themselves once more. The headmaster, who taught clowning and had founded the school, was away on business.
The forty-four primary candidates, ranked one through forty-four, and the supplementary candidates from forty-five to sixty-six lined up before the platform. The twenty-two troupe leaders took their positions in front of them.
"First place. Reina Magier."
Scattered jeers broke out across the audience. Reina walked forward with her head held rigidly high, not a flicker of disquiet on her face.
She looked up at the stands. Her father was still pretending to organize contracts and checks.
No.
That was strange. Her father wasn't the sort of man who put on an act because people were talking. If anything, he was the type to lift his chin and fire right back at them. But he was pretending to be distracted because of snide remarks about his daughter? She hadn't had the presence of mind to question it earlier, but the behavior was completely unlike him.
She watched him pull a few documents and a contract from the stack of papers. A thought flickered through her mind before she could stop it.
It was a nauseating, monstrous idea. Her lower stomach turned to lead.
No. No. That can't be right. He wouldn't...
A tiny smile tugged at Lord Fantastic's mouth. It was aimed squarely at his daughter.
His lips parted, and out came words nobody in that hall had anticipated.
"I veto."
Silence washed across the room. People thought they'd misheard.
Veto? Veto his own daughter's return to the troupe?
Even Professor Elpara on the platform was caught off guard. Bewilderment surfaced on a face that always seemed to carry a perpetual chill wind.
"You're vetoing?"
"Yes."
The answer came with almost absurd calm. Elpara paused for a moment, then stepped forward again and resumed the proceedings. She was a woman who held herself to as strict a standard as she held everyone else—she would not indulge in open displays of emotion at an official function.
"...Second place, Ella!"
The girl with the plaster cast on her arm stepped forward, blinking rapidly, utterly lost as to what was unfolding.
What on earth is that man thinking...?
Lord Fantastic looked straight at her and smiled.
"I'll select her."
The auditorium erupted as if a bomb had gone off. The most agitated corner was, naturally, the Monster Circus contingent.
"Ha-ha, this is a full-blown crisis."
"What do we do? What do we do? Are they taking Ella?"
Yurakne's hands shook as she flailed in panic. Maya steadied her with a calm voice.
"They can't. The trade rule guarantees she can come back. Two weeks, and she's ours again."
Wonderstein was well aware of the rule.
The draft gave the selected individual the right to choose after the two-week temporary contract: remain, enroll, or transfer. If the person wanted to transfer and another troupe was willing to accept them, there was no real way to block it. The only mechanism for the accepting troupe was a trade.
He wasn't worried about Ella. They could simply send her off and treat it as a two-week observation tour.
The problem was Reina.
Speculation flew in those brief moments. One theory held that Lord Fantastic was doing this to enroll his daughter at Rekachev—with two years until the Grand Prix, he'd send her there for a year or two of training and call her back later.
Reina's expression said otherwise. Even if the theory were true, it was clearly not something they'd discussed in advance. The calm that always sat on her face had vanished; every trace of color had drained from her cheeks, leaving her looking as though she might shatter on the spot.
You bastard.
Wonderstein spat the curse inwardly as he watched her mind teetering toward collapse—aimed not at her, but at the man seated beside her.
The man would have to release Ella in two weeks anyway if she wished it. Choosing her over his own daughter served no purpose except to humiliate and torment the girl.
To Wonderstein, who knew the full history, the man's thinking was transparent.
The third selection pick—a new member from the Silver Screen Circus—stepped forward.
Wonderstein had already made his decision. He needed a card to throw at the other side when it came time to trade for Ella.
"I'll select number one. Reina Magier."
Lord Fantastic let out a derisive snort, as if he'd seen it coming. It grated to move exactly as the man intended, but Wonderstein had no other move. Taking Reina was the cleanest transaction available.
Reina didn't even seem to register that she'd been chosen. She stood rooted to the spot, staring at her father with a hollow face, as though the shock had knocked the spirit right out of her.
The look in Lord Fantastic's eyes as he gazed back held not a shred of sympathy.
She would never understand why she was being looked at like that. Why her father's eyes had grown so cold.
Wonderstein recalled the laments she'd voiced in the games. On days when her father treated her with particular cruelty, she would always take out an album. It held snapshots of her childhood—her younger self beaming between her father and mother. She'd gaze at that bright little face and spend the night sighing, weeping.
The mother and father in those photographs had doted on her. Even when she'd grabbed and yanked at her father's mustache, he'd only winced, eyes glistening, and managed a rueful smile.
Wonderstein knew her past from TTT. Knew the process by which she drew closer to the truth with each installment of the trilogy.
In TT2, she'd unearthed part of it: the girl in the photos she clung to wasn't her. Simon Magier's real daughter, Reina Magier, had died at the age of three.
The Golden Libra Reina standing here now was a purchased replacement.