By the time the aerial society lowered its signal flags, the declaration had reached every quarter of the recruitment grounds.
It traveled ahead of the people who carried it. Students left the northern slope with some portion of the truth and reached the central tables with another: House Vayne had entered the Circuit, Alaric Vayne had pledged himself to the Crown Prince, three more houses had put their names beside Lucien's. Each telling drew a cluster around it, and within minutes the event belonged as much to those who had missed it as to those who had watched.
