Walls of polished steel, a plain white ceramic mug filled with steaming instant coffee. A never-ending stream of questions, condescending looks, and doubt.

  My days were nothing if not monotone. I was never allowed to leave the room. Although calling it a cell might’ve been more adequate. I’d been playing along with the farce for a bit longer than a week now. The interrogations were already losing their novelty.

  I had no windows, and the walls were sound-proofed—but the rumbling of explosions and the smatter of gunfire still made its way inside. It was getting closer by the day.

  Awaiting the approaching violence would be a maddening ordeal if the steel wasn’t so thin. It might’ve been enough to hold a whispered blessed, but an unsung? I could break out when I wanted to. But that would do nothing to help me earn their trust. And I needed to be trusted if I wanted to be heard. So did the others. I could only hope they kept their emotions in check, especially the surviving captives. They’d just been rescued, only to be caged again within a few days. A pity. If it were me, there would be no quenching my rage at the indignation. But we were not the same. I believed in nothing, they believed in family, the order. Some even believed in me.

  A notion so out there that I still had trouble wrapping my head around it at times.

  “The harbinger,” I scoffed and took a sip of the coffee. It was bitter, yet at the same time artificially sweetened, not at all how I liked it. Still I couldn’t stop myself from taking another sip. Just as I couldn’t help but enjoy the other novelties in the cell. A bed that could rival the one I had in the amphitheatre, duvet covers that kept me cozy, ventilation shafts that circulated fresh air inside. While in the Layered empire you forgot the taste of fresh air, I’d never forget it again.

  But most of all I appreciated the radio. I never let it go silent, always playing some kind of music. For some reason I didn’t do well with the silence. It reminded me of the struggle I’d just escaped—it reminded me that I was still knee deep in it.

  A sharp knock on the door jolted me awake from my thoughts. I counted the seconds before the metallic click of the lock bounced against the walls of my cell. Three, like always.

  The woman jerked back, startled that I hadn’t gone to stand at the wall as they’d instructed us to on the day of our “rescue”. I didn’t know why she reacted like this every time. I’d never done as they instructed, nor did I ever move a muscle with intent to hurt any of them. But nonetheless they were afraid of me.

  She exhaled, and eyed me sharply before stepping inside. Behind her, a man with arms as thick as my waist followed. They both wore military attire with stars on their shoulder flaps and medals proudly hanging from their chest. The woman held her cap under her arm, a sign of some sort of respect, I’d gathered. The man didn’t show any such thing, nor did he hide the disgust in his scowl.

  “Good morning, Caleb,” the woman greeted and stepped closer, yet never within two meters of me, always just outside of reach. Though I never had any intent of harming her. I’d told her this, multiple times.

  “Morning,” I grumbled back and felt my mouth water at their arrival. I’d already finished the sorry excuse for breakfast they so graciously supplied me with through the hatch in the bottom of the door. She always brought me something extra.

  The man didn’t so much as flinch as he stepped inside my reach to move the table, placing it between myself and the woman. I almost didn’t have time to snatch the cup away before it fell. His shoulders wore fewer stars than the woman’s, making it clear that he was her subordinate. Yet I knew he was blessed, I could tell from how the veil warped as he walked. A physical blessing too, no doubt. But nothing more than a whisper.

  “How are you feeling today?” the female officer asked and glared at her muscle.

  “Bored. As always.”

  “I understand, and I do apologize for this… drab solution. It will only last a few days longer.”

  She’d said the same thing the very first day I met her too. That was a week ago now.

  I rolled my eyes, not hiding my displeasure, and took another sip.

  The veil rippled and I looked to the brute who spent all his effort in holding himself back. His eyelids twitched as he watched me disrespect his superior openly. If my judge of character was right, he didn’t care much about the officer’s image getting sullied. What he cared about was how it reflected on him if I held his superior in such regard.

  I hid my smug grin with the cup and pretended to take another sip as I watched an artery on the side of his temple almost explode.

  The officer clicked her tongue and turned to the grunt with a glare. “Mind your manners or you will wait outside.”

  He snapped upright with a salute. “I apologize, Ma’am.”

  Unlawfully taken from Royal Road, this story should be reported if seen on Amazon.

  And that was that. I sighed and leaned back in the chair.

  “So? What’ll it be today? More questions I suppose?”

  Her cold demeanor shifted and she smiled. “That’s right.”

  Behind her, the grunt retrieved a briefcase left outside the door and handed it to her. She pulled out a stack of papers so thick it could have been a book and dropped it onto the table with a thud.

  “Before we get started, I need you to do the usual introduction,” she said with the same bureaucratic smile on her face and placed a tape recorder on the table. I waited for her to press the button, and she did, while gesturing at me to go ahead.

  “Caleb Kane. Eighteen years of age. Blessed of the unsung rank. Survivor of the rupture in Turkey.”

  “Also known as?”

  “Many things.”

  “You know what I mean.”

  I groaned. “Cal.”

  She glared at me and placed a bar of candy on the table. My mouth watered at the sight of it. If this was before the Forgotten lands, then I would never have stooped so low as to let someone Pavlov me for a piece of candy, but it wasn’t.

  I swallowed my pride and admitted, “The harbinger.”

  She smiled and slid the bar of candy over, I wasted no time in unwrapping it and taking a bite. The nut-caramel sweetness coated my mouth, I closed my eyes and pretended to revel in the taste. To them, I was a child, barely old enough to drive. A child who somehow managed to stumble into the good favour of the veil, and reached the rank of unsung while his peers struggled to survive.

  They wanted to know how, and I wanted to know who the hell they were. I’d play along for as long as I needed for them to slip up. Maintaining the image of a naive youth was beneficial for that cause.

  But it would also break easily if someone from the Forgotten lands tattled. But they wouldn’t. I was sure of it. Not many actually knew of my exploits, they heard whispers and rumours, but few actually knew for sure. And those that did wouldn’t talk. It would undermine their own achievements while at the same time making me harder to obtain as more factions were made aware of my deeds.

  For me, staying anonymous was my preferred way of life. Sure, people would know, soon. I’d come to terms with the fact already, waited for it even. But who’s to say I couldn’t enjoy my last time of anonymity living in blissful freedom of responsibility—well, relative freedom.

  “Of what?” she asked and scratched a piece of paper with a ball-point pen. She had to click it repeatedly and wet the tip with her tongue for ink to start flowing.

  Somehow the little nickname had turned into one of the points of interest. They still hadn’t told me what country they served, or what their purpose was. All I could surmise was that their English was perfect, accented even. But they didn’t wear the fatigues of the English, theirs were much too dark, black almost. Like special forces of some kind.

  “You tell me. I didn’t choose the name, it was forced upon me.”

  “By who?”

  The same question as so many times before.

  “The survivors, the veil.”

  “Why?”

  “Why does the veil do anything?” I retorted with my mouth full. “Because my actions warranted the consequence, duh.”

  I’d heard, and read the line so many times now that it had become a sort of mantra. A way for me to understand the world of magic.

  She nodded attentively, eyes shining as she scribbled down notes of our conversation. She asked about my rank, what I did to achieve it. I downplayed the events as much as I could without it sounding odd.

  She seemed convinced that the rumours about me on the other side had been exaggerated to calm the masses. A false Messiah kind of deal. The man wholly supported her idea.

  “And your blessing?” she asked after hours of questions. “It’s not physical, is it?”

  “It’s not.”

  “I see,” she hummed and scribbled something before closing the thick stack of papers. She made a gesture of disbelief as her eyes flitted to the clock. “Well! Would you look at the time? We’ll have to end our talk for the day here. I have more survivors to interview.”

  Interrogate.

  She packed the stack of papers into the briefcase with trained ease, even though the stack of papers looked larger than something the briefcase should be able to hold. My mind flit to Elana’s crate of mimicry. I’d cursed myself for not stealing it from her room as the library burned to the ground. It would have been a fine addition to my collection, most of which rested in my core.

  It made the officer and her goons feel at ease.

  The two dusted off their clothes and moved to leave as I stopped them by clearing my throat. I felt blood rush to my cheeks.

  “How are the others?” I asked.

  There really was no reason for me to worry. If they were on the side of humanity—which them not trying to kill me clearly suggested—the others would be fine. Yet I couldn’t help but wonder.

  The officer smiled and handed her briefcase to the thick man. “Oh my sweet. They’re fine. As are you. This is all just procedure, and it will not last much longer now. The events surrounding this rupture, and its consequences are just so… so extraordinary. We have but to investigate thoroughly.”

  I scowled. “For weeks? Do you know what people went through?”

  She tapped the briefcase. “Oh, I have an inkling. Terrible things, really. Rest assured, Caleb, there aren’t many we still keep under watch. Most have been sent to the rear for readjustment and are already preparing to join society again.”

  So they’re affiliated to some sort of government, I concluded. Perhaps specifically with reintroducing blessed to the rules of Earth.

  “Most?” I prodded further.

  “Well leaving out the Harbinger himself and the leading actors of a certain council.”

  “And the Solburnes and the Order think nothing of this?”

  Her smile fell. “They have no say in the matter. Whether they like it or not doesn’t matter. They simply have to accept the situation for what it is.”

  I readjusted my view of them. They were not only some organization for rehabilitating blessed—they were larger than that. Large enough for powerful factions to take heed of them. I raised my eyebrows. “And what is the situation?”

  Her smiled returned to her lips but didn’t quite reach her eyes as she closed the door with one last word. “Abnormal.”