I lie on my bed and pick at the end of my braid. The candle on my beside table flickers, causing the shadows on my ceiling to move around like cartoon ghosts.

"It's just doesn't make sense," I say for the second time to no one.

Appa must have known about this school, because as far as I can tell you're either in the know or you're absolutely not. He got in after the cutoff age. Plus, this is the place he chose above all others to send me to while helping Uncle Jin.

He said, I promise you that you know exactly as much as will keep you safe. Do I know something I don't think I know? It's possible this is a test, an extended version of one of our outdoor strategy games, but I can't shake the feeling that I should be worried - worried about Uncle Jin and appa, and very possibly about being here in general.

I roll onto my side. When Kang suggested it in her office, I didn't think it was likely Appa went here, but I'm not so sure anymore. And if  he went here, then does that mean all his stories about him growing up in Gyeryong and being your typical country boys were basically bunk? Has appa been lying to me my entire life? The thought makes my stomach do a small flip. But I'll take the Gyeryong lie any day as long as what he told me about fixing everything with Uncle Jin is true. There are a lot of things I can deal with, but my family being in serious danger when I have no way of getting to them quickly is not one of them.

I get out of bed and open my door. Sejeong's on the grey couch, reading a book with her legs tucked under her. I look at the clock, which says 11:55 p.m., and head for the door. If I'm going to sneak out tomorrow night, I might as well get a sense of what kind of obstacles I'm in for.

My hand touches the iron latch.

Sejeong looks up from her book with its worn fabric cover and faded lettering. "It's past curfew."

"I'm just going to step into the hallway."

Sejeong shakes her head and her hair easily flows. "Not unless you want a mark against you."

"A mark?"

"For being out after curfew, for trying to pick a lock to a restricted area, for opening a curtain at night and letting light out, etc. Get three and you get a punishment of their choosing."

"Like what/"

"Depends on the person. But they're always terrible."

I consider telling her that her brother suggested we meet in the vine courtyard after  curfew, an offense probably worth twenty marks.

"Sejeong?"

She marks her page with her finger. "Yes?"

I choose my words carefully. "If I'm asking something I shouldn't, don't tell me. You were right about Rose. I made a mistake. And I don't want to misstep again."

Her expression loses a little of its ice.

I take a breath and pace myself. "I've never met anyone from a . . . Jackal Family before, and, well . . .I'm not sure how to say this . . . Is there anything you can tell me?"

She purses her lips and levels her gaze at me like she's trying to decide something. "Only that the stories are mostly true. We're ninety percent sure that the Jackal Family was responsible for Lee Jin-pyo's driver taking  a wrong turn in 1920, that turn that got him and his wife assassinated and instigated a war. And we're certain they had a hand in "accidentally' leaving the gate open at the Blue House in 1395, leading to the city's demise and the death of Emperor Taejo. Not to mention the 'accidental' bakery fire in Bucheon in 1666, which led to the destruction of more than ten thousand houses and buildings, and dozens of other incidents. I'm not saying Jackals only cause chaos, because you know, none of our Families are perfect. We all have a long list of mistakes. But what I am saying is that Jackals are more likely to serve their own agenda than the Council of Families'. And because they are spread throughout numerous countries, it's much more difficult to identify them. They speak every language, and they blend in everywhere. They are more true to their characteristics than any other Family here. Deceptive. Innovative. Clever. They will cause you trouble if they can."

I freeze, and not because Sejweong just alleged that Rose is likely related to people who started wars and chaos, but because the description she just gave is ringing like a bell in my head. Deceptive. Innovative. Clever. And now I remember exactly where I heard about the Jackal Family. Eomma.

The latch moves under my hand and I jumped backward. The door swings open and on the other side is the guard with the X scar. His eyes narrow ever so slightly when he sees me. For a second we stare at each other, and just as I about to open my mouth to ask him what his deal is, he walks away without a word.

I look at Sejeong questioningly, but she's already off the couch and moving. "Get dressed. Fast!"

I run into my room and grab my clothes off the floor. It takes me all of a minute to put them on, but even so Sejeong is standing by our open door when I finish like she's been lounging there for hours.

She tosses me my cloak and I follow her full-speed into the hallway, which is lit by the open doors that students are pouring out of. I want to ask Sejeong what's going on, but I don't need to advertise my ignorance in front of everyone.

We follow the other girls from our hall down three flights of stairs and to the foyer that leads to the vine courtyard. It's a mirror image of the one with the shields and the knight statue on the south side of the building, only it has nothing more than two torches and some faded curtains hanging from its walls.

The girls are sitting cross-legged in a U-shape and Sejeong and I are among the last to join them. I do a quick count and come up with twenty-eight girls, including me. Maybe it's only the advanced students, then?

Rose sits on the opposite side of the U, smirking at me while her friend with the bangs fidgets with the hem of her cloak. I stare back at Rose, wondering what her Family has to do with a make-believe game I played with eomma when I was little. At least, I always thought it was make-believe.

"Welcome," Kang says, emerging from the staircase. She wears the same ruffled shirt with a blazer and black pants she did last night. It's eerie the way no one's clothes ever change in this place. Ever her hair remains the same high ponytail.

"I trust that when we search your rooms tonight, we'll find that everything is in order," Kang says, and scans the group in front of us. Everyone nods. I swallow, remembering the fork, and make a mental note to ask Sejeong if Jimin could have somehow known they were doing a search tonight.

"As you all know, we have a new student," Kang says, and looks at me. "So I thought we would play a strategy game." She shifts her weight and smiles a strained smile. "We often talk about this school's best students, about their accomplishments and their awe-inspiring feats. But seldom talk about their failures." She pauses. "Twenty-five years ago, there was a girl at this school who won every single midnight strategy challenge in her fourth year. Every. Single. One. What's interesting, however, is that lost so often in her first three years people would roll their eyes when they had to go up against her. How do you explain that?"

"She spent three years strategically identifying flaws in other people's strategies," Rose says, now speaking with an Italian accent. "And when she accumulated enough information, it provided a map to people's strengths and weaknesses, allowing her to navigate them as she pleased. She also had the element of surprise after everyone assumed she would lose."

"Very true," Kang says. "There is untold advantage to true observation. Take Lisa, for example - she catches details, most of you miss." She looks at Rose's quiet friend, who recoils every so slightly from the compliment.

There's a petite girl on the other side of Rose who shoots Lisa a look that I can only guess is a sort of angry jealousy. Rose looks at her and the girl turns away, but there is definitely something going on there.

"You all are trained in verbal and body language clues," Kang continues. "You analyze masterfully, but you also have egos. And if you allow your need to win to compromise your ability to truly observe, then you have missed a great deal. This girl did not make that mistake."

Kang braces her hands behind her back. "Consider this example, too: In the mid-eighteen hundreds, twelve-year-old Park Sooyoung witnesses a machine malfunction at a factory that resulted in the injury of a worker. As a result, she invented a protective cover for that same machine that wound up being immensely popular. Unfortunately, she never got credit because she was too young to apply for a patent. But the patent wasn't what concerned her in the moment of invention. It was the problem at hand. If you want to be truly great, you need to find solutions even when they don't directly serve you. What else can we surmise about about former student?"

Sejeong shifts subtly next to me. "To win every challenge for a year straight, she would have had to do more than accumulate information on the other students," she says. "She would have had to know they way each student thought, and then think differently. We always expect that people will react the way we do - that when we hit them they'll hit back, or that when we help them they'll be grateful - and when they son't behave the way we think they will, we're surprised."

Kang looks at Sejeong approvingly. "Leonardo da Vinci didn't limit his study to one thing. He was curious about art, anatomy, an engineering, to name just a few. He didn't see the world for what it was, but for what it could be. And he combined his interests to tackle ideas like human flight. He knew that there were many ways to solve the same problem if you were brave enough to dream them. So yes, Sejeong, this girl did just that. She did what no one expected over and over, and just when you thought you knew her next move, she changed again. She was the most breaktakingly brave strategist this school has ever seen."

Judging by their expressions, the other girls seem to take this lesson quite seriously. There is a mixture of what I think is admiration and an ambition to be better. I can't help but wonder if they know the identity of the girl Kang referred to.

"Now let's have go at this challenge," Kang says, and her eyes lands on me. "Stand up, Suzy."

My hear hammers so loudly, I'm positive the vein Sehun saw in my neck is going wild.

Kang motions for me to approach her at the open part of the U. "Turn around."

I face the other girls, who all stare at me with blank expressions, except for Rose, who looks amused. The girls appear to come from all over world, yet I've only heard people speaking Korean. And I'm suddenly feeling grateful. The only thing that could make this place more baffling would be if I couldn't understand anyone.

"The rules will be as follows," Kang says, untying my cloak. It swishes to the floor and the cold night air immediately seeps through my clothes. "No light, and no leaving this room."

I quickly look around me. There is a guard by the courtyard door, one directly across from her by the bottom of the staircase, and one in each of the hallway exits. Behind the hallway guards, the torches have already been snuffed out.

"Each participating girl will get one of these cloths." Kang holds up two pieces of grey fabric. "They will be tucked into the back of your pants and will stay there. The idea is to steal the other girl's cloth. The first person to do that wins."

Oh man. I look around again, this time making a fast mental map of the room. The staircase is directly behind me. There's a tapestry, a chip in the wall a little lower than my waist, a torch holder above the chip, tapestry, door. and it repeats in a mirror fashion on the other side of the room, minus the chip.

"we'll need one more girl," Kang says, and Rose's hand shoots up in the air. "Everyone else will stay seated exactly where they are. Suzy, you'll be paired with" - her eyes scan the group and land on the petite girl next to Rose who gave Lisa the jealous look - "Jennie."

Jennie, my brain translate, the goddess of the night and gracious, mother of wealth and, oh, yeah, death. And by the light gasps and someone's snicker, I guess her name is fitting. She stands up without her cloak and joins me on my left. She takes one look at me and I can tell she's already decided that I'm not a challenge. Well, we'll just see about that.

Jennie is short that she reaches my nose, and now that I'm close to her, I notice a thin black line along the top edge of her lashes, winging out at the corners, giving her eyes a cat-like appearance. And since Kang doesn't let us keep anything personal here, I can only assume that Jennie either makes her own eye makeup, or had the line permanently tattooed on. Makeup isn't usually something I would look to in order to tell me who my opponent is, but in this particular instance it tells me she's resourceful and stubborn and does not bow to other people's will.

Kang tucks the cloths into the back of our leggings. I look at the chip int he wall again, I'd guess it's just about as high as Jennie's grey cloth.

Kang takes our hands, pulling me to her right and Jennie to her left. She nods at the two guards behind us, and they move to the torches on either side of the foyer. The guard nearest me is the one with the X. Boy, that guy is everywhere I go.

Each guard lefts a metal-cone-stopped pole above a torch and snuffs it out. The room goes dark - blind-fold game dark. And I'm positive it's not going to get any lighter as my eyes adjust: there are no windows.

From the direction of the hallways come knocking sounds, which I can only assume mean that the guards have returned to their posts. The room is unsettlingly quiet. I can't even hear anyone breathe.

"Begin," Kang says, and let go of my hand.

My heart jumps into my throat. There's nothing like the feeling of absolute darkness and being hunted by a probable goddess ninja to inspire nightmaresque fear. And if I don't prove myself in this exercise, the entire school will get the memo that I'm a fly in a sea of spiders.

I take a handful of careful steps until I'm just beyond the U. I must pass awfully close to the end girl, because I can feel her body heat as I go. My boots don't make a sound on the stone. The problem is, Jennie's steps are silent, too. If I can just make it to that torch holder . . .

I loop around the U near the backs of the girls until I think I'm about lined up with where the torch should be. I carefully put my hands out in front of me, trying to detect body heat from Jennie, but all I get is chilled air. Here goes nothing. I take a step toward the wall and something hooks my ankle, sending me stumbling forward and making all kinds of noise. And there's a laugh, which I would bet money belongs to Rose. That girl is seriously getting on my nerves.

"Way to cheat, Rose," I say, normally I would just continue without a blip, but I can't have Kang and these girls thinking I'm so bad at getting around in the dark that I tripped over my own feet.

"Who's cheating? It's not my fault you're wicked clumsy," Rose replies with an American accent.

There is the sound of a match striking, and the room is illuminated.

Kang holds a candle in front of her face. "Enough. Rose, you have no place in this challenge. I specifically said to stay where you were. And Suzy, surprises happen. People don't follow the rules. Were you under the impression that this challenge was about being fair?"

We all look at her, including Jennie, who's standing next to me with my cloth in her hand and a smile that appears to say "I knew I would kick your " - not as a gloat, but as an obvious statement of fact.

Damn. I not only lost, I get the added benefit of looking foolish. "Let me try again," I say.

"You lost, Suzy," Kang says.

"I know. But you just told us a story about a girl who lost in order to win," I smile. "Let's see if Jennie can beat me when she doesn't have Rose's help."

"No one needs Rose's help to beat you," Jennie says, and I can tell she'd annoyed I even suggested it. She also seems to have a New Zealandian accent.

The room is completely silent as everyone looks from me to Kang. Kang moves like she's rolling the idea around, then gives a perfunctory nod. I immediately scoot back to my starting position before she can change her mind.

Kang resets our cloths and I look at Jennie, who gives me a withering look that makes me wonder if I just made a very bad choice. After all, she came right for me; she didn't even try to go around the circle the other way.

Kang blows out the candle and throws the room back into blackness. My heart beats three times and she releases my hand.

I run for the wall, not even attempting to silence my footsteps. My hands slap against stone and there are snickers from the girls. I pat the walls in fast circles, trying to find the chip. Gotcha. I reach above me, yank the unlit torch out of the holder, and throw it with all my might across the room and away from the U of girls.

There are surprised gasps as it skids along the floor, and I yank at the edge of the heavy curtain, pulling it toward me. Then I push it hard, sending it swishing in what I hope is the direction of the X guard in the hallway. There's the sound of squeaking leather that I believe is the guard attempting to readjust himself, and I'm grateful I hit my mark. In the midst of all the noise, I grab the now-empty torch holder above my head with both hands.

I can hear the girls whispering, and I pull my legs up to where my hands are on the torch holder. I get my boots firmly wedged between the wrought-iron rings for balance and to take some of the weight off my hands. The iron is surprisingly sturdy and easy to grip, but even so I won't be able to hold myself in this inverted position for very long. Kang shushes the room and I have to smile: Appa always said that if you can't do something without being noticed, create confusion.

I carefully place my braid between my teeth and let my right arm hang down along the wall, finding the chip in the stone. And I wait.

It takes only two seconds before the air near my hand warms. I hold breath. Jennie came directly after me again. Boy, this girl doesn't play games. If she's after you, she's after you, simple as that. Judging by the fact that I can't hear her breath and our heads should be fairly close together, I'm guessing her back is to me. I move my hands forward, miscalculating her height and grabbing her shirt just above the waist. Thankfully I catch the edge of the cloth, too, and secure it between my fingertips. I yank.

She lets out a surprised yelp.

Kang lights a candle and the entire room looks at us, blinking in the pale light. The shock on their faces is obvious. I unhook my feet from the torch holder and jump to the floor.

Jennie's eyes narrow. "Winning second is still losing," she says under the breath.

I smile at her. "But didn't we just learn that it's the most recent win that everyone remembers?"

"Nicely done." Kang nods at the cloth in my outstretched hand. From the tone of her voice I can tell that something in her relaxed, like she's just decided not to throw me out.

"You can't win second if you're already dead," Jennie says so quietly that I almost miss it. I stop smiling. She's determined, focuses, and straightforward and it's obvious she doesn't like me. I get the feeling that by winning tonight, I'm going to lose something in the near future.