Trystan makes no move to accept the Gardnerian blacks. “I won’t wear them,” comes his icy reply.

I stiffen, my eyes flicking toward Trystan in surprise.

“You’re creating havoc,” Ung Li snaps.

Trystan’s lips give a slight curl. “By refusing to put on clothing?”

“It’s a politically charged move.”

Trystan’s water power rears with defiant energy, his slight smirk vanishing. “So is putting on the clothing of a group of people we’re about to be at war with.”

Ung Li fixes him with a narrow glare. “You’re sworn to obey the Wyvernguard. If I order you to take these and you defy me, I will strip you of your apprenticeship and kick you out.”

“Then kick me out,” Trystan bites back in a stunning show of rebellion. “I’ll still fight the Gardnerians. I’ll still fight the Alfsigr. But I will not wear those clothes ever again.”

“I order you to take them.”

Trystan and Ung Li face off, and it feels like two dragons going toe-to-toe as the tidal energy inside Trystan gains ground. I struggle to keep my own turbulent power from rushing toward it. But then Trystan reins it all in, consolidating the raging storm so deep in his core I can no longer sense it.

“Hoiyon, Nor Ung Li,” he says as he takes the clothing, straightens and salutes our commander, fist to chest, his expression military blank. His eyes meet mine, a flash of defiance burning in them that’s so explosive it sets off an answering flash of invisible lightning.

Conflict surges in me, the urge to protest this monumentally unfair thing almost impossible to suppress. I turn to Ung Li as the protest rises in my throat, but it’s silenced by the look of ire she’s directing at Trystan’s back.

Our commander wants him gone.

There’s no winning here, I realize. Not for Trystan. Not for me. Not for anyone who aligns themselves with one Mage versus all of the East. It’s one thing to argue with your fellow apprentices, quite another to question your commander.

I struggle to justify my silence. You can’t keep getting emotionally involved in this and be his guard. You’re continually making that error.

Lightning crackles through me, straining toward Trystan, but I enfold it in a tight hold and force it back.

You’re his guard, not his ally, I doggedly remind myself as I follow Trystan out.

Still, even as I rail against it, I know my sympathies have shifted.

“You’re just making your life difficult,” I warn Trystan as I follow him to the Wyvernguard’s base and onto the waterside terrace. The starless sky is ink black, the river rushing by the terrace’s onyx stone in a rhythmic whoosh.