Page 7 of Rookie Rules

Clean. Predictable. Useful.

They reset.

On the second rotation Rowan waited near the boards with Finn, watching a camp center work between Luca on the right and another winger on the left. Eli and Mateo set as the defensive pair. Benji Shaw crouched in goal, tapping his posts.

The first pass came out clean. The center swung low, received it from the defenseman, and moved it right as the group crossed the red line.

Luca caught the puck in stride.

The left winger held width. The center drove the middle with his stick available. Mateo stepped toward Luca at the blue line, exactly as the drill invited him to do. That pressure opened the weak side. One inside touch and Eli would have to choose between the center and the far winger.

The picture was there.

Luca saw it. Rowan knew he saw it because Luca's head moved once, mapping all four skaters.

Then Luca kept the puck.

He pulled it tight to his skates as Mateo closed, shifted his weight outside, and cut inside off the defenseman's reach. Eli changed angle to seal the middle. Luca dragged the puck across his body before Eli's stick arrived, using the narrow seam between their lanes as if it had been drawn for him.

It had not.

Benji set at the top of his crease. Luca released through Eli's legs while the goalie was still adjusting to the second change in angle.

The puck struck the underside of the crossbar and dropped into the net.

For one beat, the rink answered honestly.

Sticks hit the ice. Someone shouted. Jace made a noise from the line that belonged in a building with twenty thousand people. Even Mateo looked over his shoulder at the net with offended appreciation.

Luca curved behind the goal, one knee low through the turn, grin quick and bright beneath his visor.

Then he looked at Rowan.

There it was.

Not celebration. A question disguised as victory.

Rowan could still see the weak-side winger open by six feet.

Vale's whistle cut through the reaction.

Players began to reset, but Rowan was already moving. He crossed from the boards to the top of the circle and stopped hard enough to send a low spray of ice away from Luca's skates.

Luca's grin remained.

"Mercer was open," Rowan said.

Finn, waiting outside the drill, lifted one glove. "Usually am."

A few players laughed. Rowan kept his eyes on Luca.

"The middle was open too," Luca said.

"For half a second."

"Long half second."

"You abandoned the read."