CAVERNS

Hey, Zal—Astaroth…?! Do you want to be our third?” someone blurts out loud enough to make me jump.

I maneuver into a more defensible position, only to realize it’s Keen and his cousin Pritchard. Who looks none too pleased that her cousin’s asking me to join them. 

My dormmate falters. “Unless…you already have a…”

I just stare at him in utter disbelief. Does it honestly look like I have anyone, Keen?

I swallow down any ounce of pride I still had left.  Beggars can’t be choosers after all. “I’ll join you.” 

Pritchard’s lips press into a hard line. “Fine. But I want to be Defender,” she states almost as if it’s a challenge. As if she’s daring me to object. 

Before I can even get a word out, Keen swings his attention to her. “But you know that’s my best craft.”

“And? You’ve got others. You can be the Seeker.”

He gives Pritchard the most dubious look. “Tegan, I couldn’t divine my way out of a wet paper bag, and you know it.”

I try, and mostly fail, to smother my snort at his snappy quip.

“And you think I can?! I’ve never even taken Divination, Haru!”

I decided I better jump in before their argument gets any worse. Being that I was angling for the position in the first place. “I can be Seeker.”

Keen and his cousin whirl around to look at me, almost as if they forgot I was even standing here. 

Fantastic. 

“Like I was saying, I can be Seeker since I’ve taken Divination all seven years.”

“And us?” Pritchard questions.

I shift my gaze between the two of them. “Honestly, I think Keen should be Defender. He has better athame skills. And his affinity is fire.”

Keen’s brow jumps up. “How did you…?”

“Pritchard should be Gatherer since you can use any of the crafts for it. Hell, you could even use your bare hands in a pinch to gather the crystals.” 

She stares at me a moment before looking over at her cousin. 

He shrugs. “I mean, he’s not wrong.”

She rolls her eyes in obvious annoyance. “Uck, whatever. Fine.”

Just as we come to that decision, Professor Finlay calls out, “Alright, mages, I hope you’ve made your selections. Because I’ll be assigning the teams of any stragglers.”

“Furthermore, you are to leave any belongings you will not be explicitly using for this exam behind with my assistant Yanev.”

* * *

As our class starts off toward the Portway chamber, Pritchard starts grilling me on my…qualifications. 

“Have you really taken Divination all seven years?”

“I have.” Much to the surprise of House Astaroth, I have more than a passing affinity for it.

“And Artificing?”

I shoot her a sideways glance. What does it matter to her if I was or not? She’s not even in our class.

“Of course. I would have been disowned by my House if I didn’t,” I snarl, shoving my hands in my pockets once more.

“And Athame Arts?”

“Yep, that one too.” I’m already regretting agreeing to team up with them.

“Ha! It’s only offered to 6th Years and above,” she announces triumphantly as if she’s caught me in a lie.

“No, it’s not,” I counter in irritation.

“Yes, it is.”

“Not at Astar, it isn’t. They make you take it every year.”

“Even the girls?” she sputters, looking taken aback.

“Of course. If they didn’t want a complete magikal education, they’d have gone to Laedin instead,” I scoff.

Pritchard opens her mouth, but whatever she was about to say gets cut off by her cousin.

“We’re going through a Portway? Aren’t the caverns beneath Bealnora?”

I snort at the sheer ridiculousness of such a thing. “Of course they aren’t.”

Pritchard narrows her brown eyes at me, and I amend my statement quickly. “If any singular academy or House were to lay claim to a resource like that, it would be tantamount to a declaration of war, Keen. Resources such as the Draygus Caverns are the shared property of all magikal citizens of Britannia.”

Keen looks genuinely surprised. “Huh… Are they really…?”

I let out a long sigh. “And…if it comes up on a written portion of an exam, the Portway we’re about to walk through…was created by my House.”

They both stop dead in their tracks.

“Are you serious?” Keen asks with genuine interest. “Do you mean the magik or this one in particular?”

“Uh…both…” At Astar, no one cared that I was an Astaroth. Not really. All my House’s greatest contributions to magik were old news or disregarded as a shame by the time I arrived. And I was just the third son after all. But the way he looks at me sometimes… You’d think I invented magik itself. 

I shift my gaze away from Haruki Keen’s amber eyes that seem to burn right through me. 

“You can tell because it has our… Because it has the Astaroth House crest at the pinnacle. There. See the Star of Astaroth?” I point to the eight-pointed star etched into the basalt above the Portway.

The same star that’s etched into my very flesh.

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Chapter 25 – Caverns: Part Two, ExSpelled © 2026 by Kat Vancil

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