In time, his father said, he’ll get it. He developed last among the boys, meaning last among his entire class, no, his entire grade. He didn’t understand numbers, didn’t care for words, didn’t really have any interest in particular. He was just that, a boy. Only he wasn’t an angry little  boy, not at all.

Which was why when the papers came through, the sector gasped at the rigger’s decision: get the boy into the head of cavalry.

No one understood.

“What were the other boys missing?” they asked. They milled about the dry, yellowed streets like ancient wasps, unwilling to hide incredulity. “What did you see in this particular boy? How can he be fit for battle?” And they said this not because they cared about the boy, but because quite suddenly the meaning of being chosen by the rigger was on shaky ground.

He had come to the induction in purple robes, looking very much like the boy that he really was: out of place, out of rhythm, out of food. He looked around at the crowd and wondered how long they’ve been standing, and whether any of them would be willing to take his spot.

The rigger, that magnanimous clown with deadly magic, appeared on the platform with a cloud of smoke. The crowd gasped, unable to contain its surprise. They have been waiting for several minutes around the public square, getting quite close to the conclusion that this was all a hoax.

“In thirty days, the envoy, whom I have picked from a roster of ten thousand children, shall be sent aboard a wondrous vessel called the Bloody Sea Farer. The envoy will travel for three hundred days, until the vessel reaches the shores of an enemy land. The envoy is not just an envoy, but a soldier. There will be battles. And blood shed.”