I was born and abandoned. My mother, the Commandant, left me with the Saif Tribe, slipping from the desert night like a shadow I could never catch. My grandfather, Quin Veturius, the leader of the Veturia bloodline, brought me to the Empire’s reach. They thought I would break, thought the desert would harden me into nothing. But I survived.

Mamie Rila found me first. She named me Ilyaas An Saif, a boy of the tribe, running with children whose laughter carried in the wind. I believed it then: that I was one of them. I played under the sun, ran barefoot across sand and stone, and slept beside fires that smelled of cedar and smoke. Life was simple. Life was mine.

Until I turned six.

The letter came, edged with ink so dark it seemed to swallow the light. Blackcliff Academy wanted me. I didn’t want it. No child wants to leave the warmth of home, to be taken from the only family he’s ever known, to face a future of blades and rules and relentless shadows. But I was taken, wrapped in chains of obedience disguised as education.

The moment I stepped into the Academy, I realized I had been a child in a world that demanded warriors. I was stripped of names, of laughter, of the Saif desert beneath my toes. They gave me lessons in survival, in cruelty, in power. They called us Masks. I despised the name. I despised what it meant. To be a Mask was to erase yourself, to surrender your humanity for skill. I never wanted that, but I learned quickly: resistance invites pain.

It was in the culling pen that I met her—Helene Aquilla. She had that strange calmness, gravitas of someone who had already decided to endure whatever the Empire could throw at her. “I’ll watch your back,” she said, rain dripping from her hair, mud in her palms, eyes as sharp as a blade’s edge. And I believed her, because I had no choice but to. We were Fivers together, two pieces of shadow surviving in the wilderness, hunted by the cruel and unrelenting world we had been forced into.

Even then, I learned: to survive meant to hide parts of yourself. I hid my fear, my sorrow, the echo of desert nights where Mamie’s lullabies still lingered. I hid my humanity behind steel and silence.

By thirteen, I could read a man’s intent before he spoke. I could anticipate every strike, every movement, every lie. But with skill came loneliness. Every friend a rival, every glance a threat, every moment of hesitation punished. Yet there were cracks in the armor. Sometimes, I would pause at the screams of the punished, at the cries of the weak, and feel a flicker of what I was meant to protect, not kill.

The raid had ended hours ago, the soldiers drunk on their own bravado, the clamor of celebration spilling through the camp. Dex and the others laughed and drank, tossing stories back and forth as if the world were only ever this simple, but I couldn’t. I pressed my back against the wall, feeling the heat of the torches, the weight of the kills still settling in my chest, and I realized I needed air. I slipped away, letting the shadows swallow me, moving away from the drunken celebration toward the town below.

The streets were alive with lanterns, their light drifting like fireflies in the night, and music thumped through the cobbled alleys. It was the Moon Festival, I could almost forget myself, almost forget the masks and the commands and the way the world demanded I suppress everything that made me human. Almost.

That’s when I saw her. I froze without meaning to, and I don’t think she noticed me at first

I moved without my mask, no one saw me without it. Careful through the crowd until I noticed, a man edging too close, hands lingering, a smile too sharp, too calculating. My chest tightened. I could feel the surge of instinct, the training, the Mask lurking beneath, but I couldn’t let him ruin the night, couldn’t let him hurt that girl while I stood by, after my guilt with the raid.

I stepped forward, letting the crowd shift around us, and as I reached her, I offered my hand, “Dance with me” I said, voice low, just enough to carry over the music