The other Nadin frowned, her eyebrows scrunched up in confusion, but she tugged her earlobe, and the evaluation began. Questions about Iamos’ history, the procedures of the gerotus, basic political and scientific and mathematical knowledge—all blurred together in my ears and in my memory, the standard evaluation questions I’d been memorizing since birth. I’d answered flawlessly then, as the Nadin in the chair did now. A perfect exam score. No chance of failure. I would be a gerouin by the night of my enilikin.

Then Gitrin hesitated, looking solemnly at the girl who sat before her. “Nadin, what if there was a way to save Iamos?” she asked. “What would you do?”

The other me hesitated, her mouth half-open. “The geroi have initiated the evacuation plan. If all proceeds on schedule, all remaining Iamoi will be safely on Hamos within one year.”

“Not the evacuation. Something else,” Gitrin said. “Something that could return the atmosphere to Iamos. That could prevent the cataclysm.”

I opened my own mouth to respond, but no sound would come. My tongue felt weighted down.

“Surely if there were another way, the geroi would have already tried it,” not-me said.

“But what if the geroi were wrong? What if you knew of a way to save Iamos, but the geroi refused to use it? What would you do then?”

I knew the answer now. I ran over to Gitrin, crouched before her, waved my hands in front of her. The time postern. That was the answer—it had to be. Why hadn’t I realized it before, when it would have mattered? I tried desperately to speak, to get Gitrin’s attention, but she looked right through me.

“There could be no such scenario, Gitrin,” the other Nadin insisted, damning herself with each word. “The geroi’s first priority is the protection of Iamos. If there were a solution, they would not refuse it.”

I knew how this would end. I’d lived it and relived it almost constantly for the past week. Gitrin would look me square in the eyes and tell me, “You’re not ready.”

But the words didn’t come. Instead, Gitrin stopped and looked at me. Not the other Nadin, but me, though I wasn’t really there. When she spoke, something about her voice was not right—it echoed, reverberated, out of sync with the movements of her lips.

“The answer lies in freedom.”

The walls of the classroom began to melt around her, dripping into the dark stalactites of the cave. Hissing voices swirled around me, whispering, “Elytherios, elytherios,” in my ear.

I swallowed hard. My voice came back in a rush. “But what does that mean?” I cried.

“Seek, and you will find,” said Gitrin. “Begin where we began.”

“Elytherios, elytherios.”

The floor beneath my feet began to rumble and shake, cracking apart. “Wait, Gitrin! Please—”

“Find me in the place where freedom lies.”