The training ring was exactly what it sounded like and exactly what I'd been avoiding.
Not out of fear — or not only out of fear. More because Petra, the training coordinator whose existence Gamma Reese had mentioned with the particular tone of someone giving a fair warning, had been watching me with an assessing expression every time I crossed the compound, and I had the distinct sense that the assessment was going to conclude with a request I couldn't refuse.
It concluded on a bright, cold morning when I was carrying coffee to Darius's study and she materialized in the corridor with the directness of someone who had decided today was the day.
"The ring," she said. "An hour."
"Good morning to you too," I said.
"I've been patient." Petra was compact and dark-haired and looked like som
