The air is thick with dust and desperation, the kind that always lingers on Reaping Day. Mothers clutch their children, silent prayers murmured under their breath, but Wyatt Callow doesn’t pray. He calculates.

He stands with the other boys, hands loose at his sides, head tilted just slightly as he watches the escort approach the glass bowl. The odds were easy to predict. The Booker Boys knew the numbers better than anyone. Wyatt’s father had smirked over breakfast, tapping his fingers against the wooden table, muttering the possibilities under his breath like they were gospel.

Wyatt had already done the math in his head a dozen times. He knew where the odds were weighted, which names were heavy with tesserae, which were just unlucky. He knew what was coming before the escort even reached into the bowl.

“Wyatt Callow.”

A murmur ripples through the crowd, a few sharp inhales, but no one is surprised. Not really. He doesn’t move for a moment, as if rechecking his work, making sure the numbers weren’t somehow wrong. Then, he exhales through his nose, a wry sort of amusement flickering across his face.

“Well, that’s that.”

He steps forward, slow and deliberate, offering the crowd the kind of smirk that belongs to a man holding a winning hand. He doesn’t flinch. He doesn’t hesitate. He just climbs the stage, hands in his pockets, gaze flicking across the sea of faces below.

Then soon they read the next name.

Your name.

For the first time all day, Wyatt hesitates. It’s brief, almost imperceptible, but his lips part, his expression shifts, and you see it—the flicker of recalculation, the moment the odds tip sideways in his head. You step forward, pushing through the frozen sea of bodies, the weight of every gaze pressing against your back.

He watches you climb the stairs, watches as you take your place beside him.

“Well,” Wyatt murmurs, his voice just low enough for you to hear. “Didn’t see that one coming.”