Page 12 of Lucent Academy: Trinity Awakens
She laughed, but there wasn't much humor in it, and soon her breathing evened out into the rhythm of sleep. I lay awake for a while longer, listening to the unfamiliar sounds of the Academy at night, thinking about summoning circles and Pacted mates and the life I had left behind. Somewhere out there, across the veil between worlds, someone was waiting to answer my call. I just hoped they would be kind.
CHAPTER SIX: THE GRAND SUMMONING
Morning came too quickly, gray light filtering through the window and the sound of bells echoing through the corridors to announce what the schedule had simply called "Assembly." Amber and I dressed in silence, both of us too nervous for conversation, and joined the stream of first-year students flowing toward the courtyard where yesterday's ceremony had taken place. The mood was different today, charged with an electricity that made the air itself feel heavier, and I noticed that even the most confident-looking nobles among us had a tightness around their eyes that betrayed their nerves.
The courtyard had been transformed overnight. Where yesterday there had been benches arranged in neat rows, today there were ten massive circles carved into the stone floor, each one easily thirty feet across and filled with symbols that seemed to shift and writhe when I tried to look at them directly. They were arranged in two rows of five, with wide aisles between them, and around each circle stood a group of Academy staff in formal robes, their faces solemn and watchful. At the far end of the courtyard, on a raised platform that hadn't beenthere yesterday, stood the principal and his mate, and I felt a flutter of something that might have been embarrassment when Crystalline caught my eye and waved cheerfully.
"First years, please find your assigned positions," the principal's voice rang out, magically amplified to fill the space. "You have been divided into ten groups based on various factors including magical aptitude and regional origin. Your group number was included in your orientation materials. If you have forgotten your number, please speak to one of the staff members along the walls."
I pulled out the crumpled paper from my pocket and squinted at the number written there. Group One. I looked at Amber and found her checking her own paper, her eyebrows rising in surprise.
"Group One," she said. "You?"
"Same."
"Huh. I figured they'd put all the nobles together and stick us commoners in the back somewhere." She grinned, though it didn't quite reach her eyes. "Maybe the frost phoenix put in a good word for you after yesterday."
"Don't remind me."
We made our way through the crowd toward the first circle, where a small group was already gathering. There were perhaps a hundred of us in Group One, and as I looked around at my fellow students I felt a chill run down my spine that had nothing to do with the morning air. Seraphina was there, her golden hair immaculate and her expression radiating confidence, surrounded by a cluster of nobles who seemed to be competing for her attention. She caught my eye and her lip curled withdisdain before she pointedly looked away. But what really caught my attention was the figure standing apart from everyone else, alone in a bubble of space that the other students seemed instinctively reluctant to enter.
She was the most beautiful woman I had ever seen. Tall and majestic, with violet hair that fell past her waist and eyes the color of amethysts, she stood with the easy posture of someone who had never in her life had to prove her worth to anyone. Her features were perfect in a way that seemed almost artificial, like a painting or a statue rather than a living person, and the air around her shimmered faintly with power that I could feel even from twenty feet away. She was dressed simply compared to the nobles around her, a plain white gown without embroidery or jewels, but somehow that simplicity only made her more striking, as though she didn't need ornamentation because she herself was ornament enough.
"Who is that?" Amber whispered.
Before I could answer that I had no idea, the principal stepped forward, and the murmur of conversation died instantly. In the silence that followed, I could hear my own heartbeat, loud and rapid and seemingly determined to escape my chest entirely.
"Before we begin," he said, his voice carrying easily across the courtyard, "I will explain the nature of what you are about to do. Some of you may know this already. Some of you may think you know it. Listen regardless, because misunderstanding the summoning is the fastest way to ensure a poor outcome."
He paused, letting the words sink in, and I saw several students shift uncomfortably.
"The beings you will summon today are not servants," he continued. "They are not pets, or tools, or weapons to be wieldedat your convenience. They are partners. Equals. The bond you form will last until one of you dies, and in some cases beyond even that. You will share your power with them, and they will share theirs with you, and together you will be stronger than either could be alone. But this requires trust, and respect, and a genuine connection between two souls. The summoning is not a transaction. It is a marriage, in every sense that matters."
He began to pace along the edge of the circle, his boots making no sound on the stone.
"Manaborn are ranked according to two measures: mana capacity and mana control. These determine how much power you can hold and how precisely you can use it. The ranks, from lowest to highest, are bronze, iron, steel, silver, gold, platinum, and diamond. Most of you will fall somewhere between bronze and silver. A rare few will reach gold. Platinum is seen perhaps once a decade, and diamond..." He paused, and his eyes flickered briefly toward the violet-haired woman. "Diamond has appeared only a handful of times in the Academy's thousand-year history."
Someone coughed nervously. The principal ignored it.
"Pacted beings are ranked only by mana capacity, as their control is inherently matched to their power. The same scale applies. A bronze-rank being might be a common imp or a lesser sprite. Iron and steel encompass most beastkin, kobolds, and minor elementals. Silver includes more powerful creatures: skilled vampires, trained werewolves, mid-tier demons. Gold is where we begin to see truly formidable beings: higher vampires, fae nobles, chimeras, drakes, werewolf pack leaders." He stopped pacing and turned to face us directly. "Every year, only a handful of students manage to summon a gold-rank mate. It is considered a significant achievement, worthy of note in the Academy records."
I thought of Seraphina's confident declaration on the airship, her certainty that she would summon a phoenix, and wondered if she truly understood what she was claiming.
"Platinum rank is rarer still," the principal continued. "Dragons, vampire lords, phoenix, hydra, higher demons, werewolf alphas—these beings answer perhaps one call in a decade, if we are fortunate. My own mate is platinum rank, which is considered remarkable not only for her power but because I am male, and the vast majority of Manaborn are women." A small smile flickered across his face, there and gone so quickly I might have imagined it. "She has never let me forget this fact."
A ripple of nervous laughter moved through the crowd, quickly suppressed.
"And then there is diamond rank." The principal's voice grew quieter, forcing us to lean in to hear. "The Primordial Dragons, who existed before the world took its current form. The Vampire Monarchs, who have ruled their kind since the dawn of blood magic. The royals of the Fae Courts and the Phoenix Clans. The Ancient Devils, whose names are not spoken lightly. These beings are so powerful that a single one of them, properly bonded, can turn the tide of a war. They answer a summoning perhaps once a century, when they find a Manaborn whose soul resonates with their own in ways that cannot be predicted or manufactured."
He fell silent for a moment, and the weight of his words settled over us like a physical thing.
"This year is different," he said finally. "You were all born during the Equinox Supremis, a celestial alignment that occurs once every thousand years and floods the world with mana at levels not seen since the founding of the Empire itself. The effect thishas had on your generation is... significant. Three years ago, a student born during the Equinox summoned a diamond-rank mate—the first in nearly a century. I have reason to believe that more of you may have the potential to do the same. If even one more diamond emerges from this generation, it could be the turning point we need in the war against the Voidborn. If several emerge..." He shook his head slightly. "But I am getting ahead of myself. Let me explain the rules of the summoning itself."
He gestured toward the nearest circle, and the symbols within it flared briefly with light.
"You will enter the circle one at a time. You will take the ceremonial dagger from the altar at the center and cut your palm, allowing your blood to fall upon the stone. As your blood touches the circle, you will speak aloud your hope for your bond—not a demand, not a list of requirements, but a genuine expression of what you seek in a partner. The beings of the Pacted Realms will hear your words and feel your intent, and if one of them finds resonance with your soul, they will answer."
A hand went up somewhere in the crowd. The principal nodded.
