Calista’s thoughts wouldn’t settle. All morning, Felix’s scream echoed in her skull — looping, louder each time. No one spoke about it. No one dared. But it lingered in the silence like smoke after fire.

She rubbed at her eyes as she stood in line for lunch, the scent of burnt starch and metal trays hanging heavy in the air. Her stomach clenched — not in hunger, but dread.

At noon, the Kraluantian children ate first — their voices high and bright, plates warm and full. An hour later, the Northern students filtered into the hall, silent shadows. Calista stepped forward with the rest, collecting her cold steel tray. The food was barely lukewarm — grey gruel, a few limp crackers, fungal stew bubbling with a sickly green film, and slivers of Dire Crow meat, its sinew dark and oily.

She chose the Crow and the crackers. She always did.

The meat was tough, gamey — the kind of bird that survived by biting back. She sat alone, sliding into a seat beneath the faded sports team photographs, poking at her tray with her fork. Her appetite had gone somewhere far away — like Felix.

A shout pulled her halfway out of her daze.

“Calista!!”

She blinked.

A northern girl, maybe two years older, plopped down across from her with a tray that sloshed fungal stew and something pretending to be vegetables. Her grin was too wide for the room. Dim oil lights above flickered, catching in her twin messy pig-tails.

“Ready for the quiz after lunch?” she asked, sipping her fungal stew. She didn’t even bother blowing on it — it was cold already.

“Quiz?” Calista blinked, stiffening. Her stomach twisted. “Layla, don’t mess with me. That’s not funny…”

Layla grinned, her spoon clinking against the steel bowl. “I’m not messing with you. It’s real. Language quiz for us, science for the older kids.”

Calista groaned, dropping her head onto the sticky metal table. “Why does no one tell me these things…”

Across the hall, the last clatter of trays echoed, followed by a silence that settled like fog. A few minutes passed before a teacher stepped into the cafeteria. No announcement. Just a sharp, curt gesture — a finger pointing at the Northern children’s section.

The murmurs fell silent. One by one, Calista and Layla stood up, carrying their trays to the rusting rack. The pile of dishes was crusted with dried stew and cracked crackers from lunches past. No one cleaned it properly. No one cared.

They walked back in silence, their boots squeaking on the linoleum floors. The walls of the corridor — white, spotless, and lined with framed photos of Kraluantian academic stars — gave way to peeling plaster and flickering lights the moment they crossed the threshold into the Northern classroom.

Their classroom was small and cold. The air smelled of mildew and old ink. Desks were mismatched, scratched with years of names — some carved deeply, as if by someone trying to prove they’d existed. The chalkboard was cracked. The radiator didn’t hum anymore.

Calista sank into her chair, the metal legs creaking under even her light weight.

A Kraluantian woman entered the room, her long white skirt whispering against the scuffed floor tiles. She wore a pastel-pink wool turtleneck that clung tightly to her arms, the sleeves pulled precisely to her wrists. Her dark brown hair was tied into a tight bun, two thin strands framing her face with surgical neatness. She looked barely older than the oldest students — fresh from teacher training, no doubt. The cheapest teacher for the least valued children.

She let out a sharp cough as she stopped in front of the cracked chalkboard. Every head in the room snapped forward. All but Calista.

“Foraster.”

The name cracked through the silence like a whip.

Calista jolted upright, her head swinging up from her palm. “Ma’am…” she stammered, voice barely audible.

“What have I told you about slouching in class?”

Calista dropped her eyes. “S-sorry, ma’am…”

The teacher muttered something under her breath — just loud enough to hear: “These Northerners…”

She began handing out the test papers. With each desk she reached, she slammed her open palm down, letting the slap echo for emphasis. A thin sheet of paper landed in front of Calista.

She picked up her pencil — the same one she'd chewed through last week, its wood soft and splintered at the tip.

30 questions.

Her heart sank. Too many. Too complicated. A mishmash designed for an average student — but there was no average here. The 12-year-olds would breeze through it. Calista was 7.

The first sentence stared at her in tight Kraluantian script. She recognized three words. Maybe four. She scratched her head, chewing the pencil again until the taste of wood and graphite filled her mouth.

Her hand hovered.

Try. Just try.

One letter at a time, she began writing. Even if she failed, it would at least mean she hadn’t given up.