Orientation was a ceremony of subtle cruelty.
Dozens of students in their finest—tailored crests, embroidered names, magical accessories calibrated to whisper prestige—all herded into the silverglass auditorium.
Lyren sat near the middle. Not hidden. Not highlighted.
The perfect position for an observer.
At the front of the room stood the Provost, back straight, robe weighted with six layered sigils. Beside him, the Head of Magical Combat and the Chair of Story-Theory.
And between them, like a blade in a velvet sheath, stood **Princess Avelyne**.
"Your excellence," the Provost intoned, "has earned you entry into the highest circle of mortal cultivation. Valtessan is not simply a school—it is a crucible of sovereignty. Only one in every hundred will be chosen to enter the Imperial Selection after graduation. Most of you will become weapons. A few… names."
A pause.
Then, as if the words had been waiting for silence:
"Do not forget that."
—
Afterward came the reception.
Music.
Spirits in tall crystal flutes.
Laughter measured in tactical bursts.
Lyren floated through it like a dream. Never idle. Never still. Conversing with lesser nobles, correcting instructors without arrogance, brushing off barbed questions with artful shrugs.
His **mask was perfect.**
Until she found him.
The girl with no crest.
**Seri Meryn.**
Still unnoticed by most. Still out of place.
But she didn't look lost.
She looked… amused.
"You're very good at this," she said, appearing beside him like she belonged there.
"At what?"
"Pretending to be what they fear."
He sipped his drink. "I'm not pretending."
"You are. But not for them."
He turned, really looking at her.
"You're not normal."
She smiled. "Neither are you."
Then walked away.
Leaving behind a pulse in the air.
And a faint smell of ink and ashes.
—
Later, Lyren found Ishira on the outer garden wall.
She was watching the sky like it owed her answers.
He said nothing.
She broke the silence. "You feel it too, don't you?"
"Yes."
"Something's going to break."
"I know."
"Will you be the one to break it?"
Lyren smiled faintly.
"If I am, it was already broken."
They stood there, twin silhouettes beneath the high lights of the warded sky.
Two stories too old to still be unwritten.
—
Far below them, in a vault no one remembered, something blinked.
Not alive.
Not dead.
Just... **waiting.**