The summons came at dusk.
There was a rap on Lucian's door—firm, measured, the kind that did not leave room for refusal. When he opened it, two knights stood in the hallway, their silver sigils glinting in torchlight.
"Lucian Vale," said the taller of them, voice crisp. "The Council requests you."
Requests. The word was polite, but the voice was not.
Lucian didn't even condescend to reply. He shrugged into his black coat, clicked shut his door, and followed behind.
The walk through the upper halls of the academy was heavy but quiet. The more they walked, the more desolate it felt—no laughing students, no meandering teachers. Nothing but quiet, interrupted by the unchanging pound of boots on wet stone.
Double doors carved with runes at the end of the hall swung open.
Inside, the Council sat waiting.
The room was circular, bedecked in academy crest pennants. At its center, there was a lone chair—plain, austere, positioned in the sight of a half-moon shaped table where the teachers sat.
Lucian walked in. The doors slammed shut behind him with a last thud.
Professor Aldren leaned forward first, with piercing eyes as keen as knives. "Sit."
Lucian did not move at once. He read the faces before him—Aldren, Mistress Elara with the calculating look, some other high-ranking professors… and in between, the Headmaster, dressed in dark blue, face obscured.
Finally, Lucian sat down.
The chair was deliberately low, and he had to look up at them by tilting his head. He nearly smiled. How melodramatic.
Aldren's voice shattered the silence. "Lucian Vale. You went to the Festival of Awakening as an E-rank. But you were using power far beyond that level. Explain to me what I'm being blind not to notice."
Lucian's eyes did not flinch. "I fought. I won. That was the end of the duel."
"Don't lie," Aldren snapped, slamming his hand on the table. "What were those shadows?"
The torches in the room fluttered, as if the very mention of the word agitated the air.
Mistress Elara's lips quivered ever so slightly. "A gift, yes? Or. something entirely different." Her eyes sparkled with curiosity, the scientist's gaze upon a creature to be handled with care.
The Headmaster finally spoke, his voice calm but filled with seriousness. "Lucian Vale. The academy has no need for secrets that endanger its students. Such power as you have is. unorthodox. If you decide to remain here, you must tell us."
Lucian held his silence. He felt the weight of their eyes upon him, probing, intrusive.
At last, he answered, "It is a gift. Nothing more."
Aldren burst into laughter. "Gift? Shadows that seem to move on their own? That is no gift I have ever seen."
Lucian tilted his head to the side. "Perhaps you have not looked enough."
Gasps rippled through the professors. Aldren sat halfway out of his chair, fury burning in his eyes.
But the Headmaster raised a hand, and stillness descended.
His gaze settled upon Lucian, searching, as though he sought to peel away the inner husks of his soul. "Very well," he breathed. "If it is talent… then it must be tested."
The words landed with weight.
Lucian's eyebrow climbed a fraction. "Tested?"
The Headmaster's voice was level, almost benevolent. "A lad who has strength superior to his peers needs to show that it is mastered. Tomorrow, you will have a test of battle, supervised by the Council."
Aldren's lips curled into a resemblance of a sneer. "Yes. We shall see if you can master those shadows when real danger confronts you.".
Lucian felt the shadows stir at his back, ravenous, restless. He walked them down with an iron will, his expression unyielding.
"If that is what it takes," he said.
A soft shuffle out of the hallway beyond. The Council didn't know, but Lucian did. His senses had been honed years ago, sharpened on betrayal and blood.
Someone was listening.
Seraphine.
He did not look about, did not permit it. But he sensed her presence, the desperate rustle of her breathing as she clung to the wall, grasping for sound.
When finally the council let him go, Lucian stood, bowed briefly, and prepared to leave.
As the great doors swung shut behind him, a small hand clutched at his sleeve.
Seraphine. Her amber-colored eyes blazed with fear, with anger, and with concern—concern for him.
"Lucian," she breathed, her voice low with urgency. "What are they doing to you?"
He looked into her eyes, unyielding as rock. "Nothing I cannot handle."
"Don't deceive me." She clamped her hand around his arm, shivering. "They're scared of you. I could see that in their eyes. This 'trial'—it's not to guard the academy. It's to bind you down."
For a moment, his mask dropped. He saw her fear, felt the warmth of her hand on his arm, and for an instant, he yearned to share with her. In the dark. In the life before. In the deception in the darkness.
But not yet.
He retreated slowly. "Seraphine… trust me."
Her eyes sparkled with tears, mouth opening in protest. But the words would not leave her. She stayed there while he marched off, lost to the torch-lit corridor, darkness streaming behind him.
And deep within her, she knew—something terrible was coming.
High up, in the academy's tallest spire, hooded forms watched the night sky. One threw back his hood, a scarred face set in a smile.
"The Monarch awakens," he breathed. "And the world begins to pay attention."
His friend's voice was as silk. "Do we intervene?"
"Not yet," the scarred man said. His eyes glinted. "Let him develop. Let him believe he is free. When the time is right… his shadows will be ours."
The moonlight crept across the spire, silver on stone, as in the distance the academy bells tolled midnight.
And in the background, Lucian's shadows tensed uneasily, hungry for the trial to come.