“Friends of Ferenwood,” he boomed, caterpillar voice creeping out of his caterpillar lips. “I congratulate you all on the first day of spring.”

The crowd cheered and stomped and raised their glasses of cider.

“Today is a most auspicious occasion,” Lottingale went on.

And on, and on and on.

He spent the next ten minutes giving a speech about the great day that is the day of their Surrender, and I can’t be bothered to remember it all (it went on for nine minutes too long, if you ask me), but suffice it to say that it was a heart-warming speech that excited the crowd and sent jitters up Alice’s skirts; and anyway, I hope you don’t mind but I’d like to skip ahead to the part where things actually happen.

They would all perform. All eighty-six of them.

Only after all of the twelve-year-olds had surrendered their gifts would they be allowed to take seats with their families, where they’d attempt to eat a meal while the Elders took a break to deliberate. Once the decisions were final, an envelope would appear on their plates, their tasks carefully tucked inside.

Of the group, only one task would be announced to all of Ferenwood; only one child would be celebrated.

Only the best.

Alice held tight to this reminder as she watched Valentina Milly take the stage. She was the first of them, and Alice admired her for it. Valentina stood in the middle of the square with a great, quiet sort of dignity, never once letting it show that she’d been crying in the bushes just a moment before.

And then she sang.

She had the voice of a featherlily, effortlessly charming the lot of them. Valentina sang a song Alice had never heard before, and the words wrapped around their bodies, sending shivers up tree trunks and hushing the birds into a stillness Alice had never seen. The song was so lovely that Alice was blinking back tears by the end of it, certain that something strange and frightening was coming to life inside of her.

Alice knew then that Valentina Milly had no ordinary voice, and though Alice was terribly jealous, her hands found themselves clapping for her competitor all the same.

Next came Haider Zanotti, a boy with the bluest hair Alice had ever seen. Electric, violent blue, thick and rich and so gorgeous she was sorely tempted to run her hands through it. Haider stepped into the very center of the square, took a bow, and then jumped. Up. High. Straight into the sky. His hands caught something Alice could not see, and he was suspended in midair, fists clenched around what seemed to be an invisible ladder. He hoisted himself up and climbed until he was standing taller than the tallest trees, a speck in the distance held up by nothing at all.

The crowd gasped and some got to their feet, shielding their eyes against the sun as they tried to get a better look at where he’d gone.

Then, Haider jumped.

He fell fast toward the ground and a few people screamed, but Haider was prepared. He held both arms out as he came down and, with just a few feet to fall, latched on to the air, his fists curling around some impossible bit of sky. He hung there for just a moment longer before dropping to one knee.

When he finally stood up, Ferenwood had, too. They were so excited and so impressed that Mr. Lottingale had to beg them to stop cheering so the proceedings could move forward.

Haider rejoined the line looking very pleased with himself. Alice knew she should’ve been happy for him, but she felt the knot in her stomach tighten and so she bit her lip, hugging herself against the sudden chill creeping down her neck.

Olympia Choo was up next.

Olympia was a big girl, tall and rotund, her hair pulled back so severely she looked much older than twelve. She walked onto the stage with not an ounce of nonsense about her. And when she looked out over the crowd, they seemed almost afraid to look back.

Olympia clapped.

And everything broke.

Chairs, tables, glasses, pitchers, plates, and even one poor man’s trousers. Everything came crashing to the floor, and the citizens of Ferenwood with it. But just as they were about to start shouting out in disapproval, Olympia whistled, and all wrongs righted themselves. The tables repaired, chairs reupholstered, glasses pieced back together, and torn trousers were suddenly good as new.

Alice looked down at herself; a loose thread in her skirts had sewn itself back into place. A smudge on her knee, wiped away. Even her braid was suddenly smooth, not a single hair out of place.

Alice couldn’t help but be astounded.

Olympia was just about to clap again when the crowd shouted NO! and ducked down in fear. Mr. Lottingale ran up to shuffle Olympia offstage.

That meant Alice was next.

And oh, she was terrified.

Only three others had gone before her, and already Alice knew she had made a great mistake. No one had been around to prepare her for today, not Mother who didn’t seem to care at all, and not the teachers she no longer had. Alice thought Father had given her this gift before he left— instilling in her this need to dance. She thought it was her talent. The gift she would surrender.

Alice was only now realizing that this was a true talent show, and she—well, she was no talent at all. She could not sing awake the soul, could not climb air, could not right every wrong. She could only offer a dance—and she knew then that it would not be enough.

Alice wanted to cry. But no, that wouldn’t do.

Mr. Lottingale was calling her name and it was too late to give up now. Too late to tell Oliver she’d made a mistake, that she should’ve chosen Father over this moment of humiliation.

Suddenly Alice was sorry.

She was standing onstage, all alone, staring out at some ten thousand faces, and she could not make herself look at Mother.

So she closed her eyes.

The music found her the way it always did, and she let herself lean into it. She met the rhythm in her bones and moved the way she had a hundred times before.

Alice danced the way she breathed: instinctually.