The announcement came two days after the mixed trial.
By then, Eleres's bruises had faded to the yellow of old parchment. The cut on his arm was healing well enough that the academy's healers had stopped checking it twice a day—though they still gave him the kind of sidelong glances reserved for troublemakers who managed to walk away from trouble without limping.
Word had traveled faster than the official report. Cadets he didn't know nodded to him in the hallways. Others stepped aside without meeting his gaze. Once, a trio of older students fell abruptly silent as he passed, then resumed their conversation in low, urgent tones. The story of the duel with Instructor Varran had swollen in the retelling: some claimed Eleres had disarmed the man outright, others swore he'd driven the examiner to his knees before being stopped. None of it was quite true—but none of it was completely false either.
It didn't matter. In the space of a week, Eleres had gone from unknown to unavoidable.
The great hall of the Academy was crowded for the assignment ceremony. Names were read aloud, one by one, each followed by the placement into one of the specialized classes: Command and Strategy, Knightly Combat, Skirmisher Units, Arcane Division… and others with stranger names whispered about in the dormitories.
Cedric's name was called early."Cedric Vale," the herald announced, "assigned to the Commanders' Cohort."
The boy straightened, flashed Eleres a grin, and strode forward to accept the insignia—an enamel badge shaped like a crossed banner and sword. He caught Eleres's eye as he stepped back into the crowd. We'll talk later, that look promised.
Taron's turn came minutes later."Taron Luth, assigned to the Knightly Order Training Battalion."
The farmer's son—broad-shouldered, already carrying the easy balance of a man used to heavy tools—breathed out hard and grinned. The golden sword-shaped emblem was pinned to his tunic. "Guess I'll be learning to ride and swing at the same time," he said under his breath as he passed Eleres.
Then came the moment Eleres had been waiting for.
"Eleres."
The herald's pause was long enough that the murmur in the hall dimmed. A few of the instructors leaned subtly forward.
"Eleres," the herald repeated, "assigned to… the Shadow Wing."
The words fell into the room like a stone into deep water—no splash, only a ripple that spread in silence.
The Shadow Wing wasn't on the official academy pamphlets. It wasn't whispered about the way the Arcane Division was. It was a class that, according to rumour, never filled more than a dozen seats, and never graduated more than half its intake.
No applause followed. No cheer. Only a few sidelong glances, a quick, almost wary assessment from instructors and cadets alike.
Eleres stepped forward, took the insignia from the herald—a black enameled badge shaped like a downward-pointing dagger—and pinned it over his heart without comment.
He could feel eyes on his back as he returned to his place.
The Shadow Wing's quarters were not in the main dormitory towers.
A single arched corridor led to a low stone wing on the far eastern side of the academy, its windows narrow, its doors heavy and unmarked. Inside, the air smelled faintly of oiled leather and something sharper—like crushed mint leaves and steel shavings.
There were only eight other cadets in the common room when he arrived. None looked up from what they were doing: one was polishing a set of throwing knives, another tightening the strings on a small crossbow, a third working quietly at a table covered in small glass vials and powders.
"New blood?"
The voice came from the far corner. An old man sat there, hunched slightly over a cane that looked like polished ebony. His hair was the color of snow under torchlight, his skin lined deep enough to map whole years. One eye was clouded; the other was sharp and pale green, watching Eleres with the measured weight of someone who had seen far too much and survived it.
"Yes, sir," Eleres said.
The old man's mouth curled—not a smile, but something that might one day remember how to be one. "Name?"
"Eleres."
"You're the one who made Varran bleed." It wasn't a question.
"I fought him," Eleres allowed.
"Mm." The old man tapped the cane once against the floor. "I'm Master Orven. You'll call me Master until you've earned the right to call me something else. This is the Shadow Wing. Our business is silence, precision, and inevitability. You'll learn to make your hands faster than your shadow, your steps quieter than your breath, and your strikes so certain that the target stops existing before the mind registers the cut."
The other cadets looked up now. Not in welcome—more like hunters sizing a new knife.
Master Orven's gaze stayed on Eleres. "You're here because someone decided you could be useful. That doesn't make you one of us. Yet."
"I'll earn it," Eleres said.
A grunt. "We'll see."
That night, after the other cadets had retreated to their quarters, Eleres sat alone at the narrow desk in his room. The walls were bare stone, the single window looking out over the eastern training grounds where moonlight traced silver edges along the training dummies and the tangled shapes of the obstacle courses.
Somewhere across the Academy, Cedric would be bent over maps and war tables, learning how to command a hundred blades at once. Taron would be on the sparring field, feeling the weight of a knight's armor and the grind of endless drills.
Different halls. Different weapons. But the same goal.
Eleres looked down at the black dagger badge pinned to his chest. The cold enamel seemed to drink in the moonlight, swallowing it whole. In its reflection, he saw not the boy who had stepped through the Academy gates, but someone sharper, quieter… someone dangerous.
The Shadow Wing wasn't about glory. It wasn't about applause. It was about ending fights before they began. And that suited him just fine.
He closed the window against the night air, fastening the latch with deliberate care. Tomorrow, the real training would start.