Noe felt small in front of the two well-dressed girls waiting for her, and the nerves made her clumsy.
"Welcome back," the white-haired girl said. "Congratulations on passing."
"First, we'll get you fitted for your uniform and measured for size," the black-haired girl added. "Then we'll mark your rank."
"There are ten ranks in the Corps," the white-haired girl went on, "from lowest to highest: Mizunoto, Mizunoe, Kanoto, Kanoe, Tsuchinoto, Tsuchinoe, Hinoto, Hinoe, Kinoto, and Kinoe."
"You're brand new," the black-haired girl said, "so you start at the very bottom. Mizunoto."
She clapped her hands, and a chorus of strange crow calls rang out overhead.
A crow dropped onto Noe's shoulder. She flinched away from it on instinct.
"This is a Kasugai Crow," the black-haired girl said. "The Corps uses them to send word. From today on, it stays with you."
"Next," the white-haired girl said, "you'll choose the ore for your blade. Forging takes ten to fifteen days."
The black-haired girl lifted a red cloth off a small wooden table, revealing a tray of gray, fist-sized lumps of steel.
"Choose carefully," she said. "This is what you'll use to protect yourself, and the world."
Noe stepped up to the table and stared at the near-identical lumps, unsure where to even start. She wished Cold Cry were here to help her decide. After a long moment, she picked the biggest one on the theory that, like food, bigger steel probably meant more of it.
"Your uniform and blade will be sent to your registered address," the two girls said together. "Assignments from the Corps will reach you through your crow. The Final Selection is now officially concluded. Please make your way down the mountain."
They bowed in unison and waved the group forward.
"Wait, sorry, one more thing." Noe hesitated. "The boy in white. Did he pass too?"
"Yes."
"Where is he now? Can I see him?"
"Butterfly Mansion."
---
Two weeks later, in the courtyard at Butterfly Mansion, Cold Cry stepped out of his room for the first time since waking up, left arm in a sling, favoring one leg.
He was still in the hospital robe. The room behind him, the smell, the constant chatter of the staff all of it had become familiar enough that he'd started to realize the nurses weren't as grating as he'd first thought. After what he'd survived, there was something almost comforting in having them fuss over him.
He sat down on the steps under the covered walkway. A light breeze stirred his white hair, and his gaze settled on the cherry blossom tree in the courtyard.
He'd come back from the dead.
Most of that last day of the assessment was gone from his memory. Only two words stuck: keep swinging.
He looked down at his hands, raw and calloused. He could still feel the ache in them, even now.
At the corner of the building, Kanzaki Aoi appeared, carrying a stack of white sheets. Spotting him staring blankly at his own palm, something flickered across her face something close to joy.
She caught herself and buried it fast, arranging her expression into something sterner before walking over.
"Who said you could be out here? Get back inside."
He turned his head slowly to look at her.
Seeing his pale face and the exhaustion still hanging on him, her resolve wavered instantly, and she regretted snapping at him. Her ponytails swayed as she stood there, looking almost like they were teasing her for it.
"It's stifling in there," he said. "I wanted some air."
It was the first time she'd ever heard him talk in a tone that soft, and it caught her off guard.
Whatever tough front she'd built collapsed. She opened her mouth, then thought better of whatever she'd been about to say. A strange, sudden panic rose in her instead. She shot him a glare, snatched up the sheets, and marched to the middle of the yard to hang them on the line.
The white sheets caught the light, almost too bright to look at.
He sat there quietly, the same way he had the day he'd first arrived, completely out of place. But something about it felt a little less foreign now.
"Gaga! Alive, alive, gaga!"
A crow's off-key caw broke the quiet, and the bird itself landed in his lap. Man and bird stared each other down.
Once the sheets were hung, Aoi came back to the walkway.
"What is this thing?" he asked.
"Excuse me! I'll have you know I've come to check on you every few days. I'm not just some random bird. I'm your Kasugai Crow! Kasugai Crow, understand?" The crow flapped and hopped in indignation.
"Too loud." He frowned, clearly unimpressed, and waved a hand to shoo it off.
"You ungrateful jerk! I've been worried sick about you every single day, and this is the thanks I get? Cold-hearted."
The crow hopped onto his head, pecking lightly at his arm and patting him with its wings.
Aoi couldn't take it anymore. She grabbed a broom from the walkway and pointed it at the bird. "You overgrown piece of charcoal, chattering all day isn't that exhausting even for you? Get out of here before I pluck you and make soup."
The crow scrambled up to the roof beam, glaring down at both of them with its bright little eyes, let out one last wail, and took off.
"Fine! See if I care. I'm not sticking around people who bully me. I'm going to go find the big-chested one instead."
"Go on, then. The second you show up, you won't stop talking. It's exhausting." Aoi huffed.
Once the crow had disappeared, she slammed the broom against the wall in frustration, turned around, and found Cold Cry watching her, steady and unreadable.
There was something almost unsettling about the way he looked at people, like it went straight through you, cold and blunt.
"Every full member of the Corps gets a Kasugai Crow," she said, businesslike again. "Assignments and messages all come through them."
He looked away and nodded.
"I heard about Fujikasane Mountain," she added. "Congratulations on making it in."
"Thanks."
That caught her off guard too; hearing him say thank you was rare enough to actually surprise her, and something in her lifted at it.
"A few people came to see you while you were out. Noe sat with you for a week straight before her sister finally pulled her away."
That shy girl actually stayed and looked after him?
He remembered, now, that Noe had mentioned an older sister already in the Corps that she'd come out here originally just to see her, and ended up in Final Selection almost by accident.
"Did she bring me down off the mountain?"
"Sort of. If you want to know who really saved you, though, it was the boy Akino. He's the one who treated your wounds and got first aid going in time. From what I heard, you had no pulse, no breath, and Noe was the one who... kept you breathing until Akino could get to you. That's how you made it."
Aoi was young enough that her grasp on anything between men and women was still mostly guesswork, and even saying that much brought color to her face.
Cold Cry went red too, mortified, and cut her off before she could add anything else. His expression twisted somewhere between shame and helpless irritation. Just picturing what she'd meant made him want to disappear into the floor.
He privately swore he'd never look that shameless girl in the eye again.
"I also heard," Aoi said quickly, changing the subject to cover her own embarrassment, "that the boy, Akino, gave up his own spot in the Corps at the last second to go get you help."
Something in Cold Cry still went on. He said nothing for a long moment, then, "I'm tired," and pushed himself up, limping back into his room without a glance behind him.
Watching him go, Aoi had the distinct feeling she'd said something she shouldn't have.