The lecture hall smelled of chalk and feathers and old stone. Light fell in slanted swords through the high arches, catching motes that drifted like ash. Rows of young angels sat with backs straight and wings half-folded, their auras thrumming like quiet instruments tuned to a single note. The benches creaked with the shifting weight of primaries and secondaries, the rustle of quills on slate, the small, nervous glows of Lumina pressed close to the skin.
At the back, Sorin Asher slouched so low on his bench it was a wonder he didn't slide off. His slate lay crooked on his thigh; a chalk stub left white crescents on his fingers. He wasn't taking notes. He drew circles—spirals collapsing into themselves, as if his hand knew a path his mind didn't.
"Look at him," someone breathed from the next row up—sweet with venom, meant to be heard. "The Devil's Seed doodles while the rest of us learn."
Snickers rippled. Feathers whispered like a flock turning.
Sorin's mouth twitched. The grin came uninvited—the crooked slice that curled his lip whenever fear cinched his chest. He hated it. Hated how it arrived exactly when he wanted it least. But better the grin than letting them see him flinch.
If I glare, they win. If I sulk, they win faster. Smile and maybe they choke on it.
The whispers thickened. Flicker. That was the nickname most favored lately. The jab fit too neatly: he couldn't even hold his aura steady. Where others were counted in Lights—First, Second, Third—Sorin's own flickered like a candle in the wind, never once catching into true Ember.
He grinned wider. Pretend it doesn't burn. Pretend you're not ash trying to pass for flame.
At the front, Instructor Elyra set down her quill. She didn't raise her voice; cold precision carried it to the furthest corner. "Recite the seven divisions of the Heavenly Host."
Quills paused. Spines straightened. A few eager hands lifted.
Sorin's chalk hovered mid-spiral. Not me. Pick a golden feather, not the ash at the back.
Elyra's silver eyes moved across the rows like a measuring line. For a heartbeat they touched him. His stomach dropped. The grin sharpened. Then her gaze slid past.
"Veyra," Elyra said.
The girl in the fourth row sat up like a spark catching dry grass. Veyra Ophanim had white bangs slashed across electric-blue eyes and a little fizz of light at her temple that never quite went out. Her aura was bright for her stage—Third Light Ember Ascendant, already stable enough that sparks leaked when her mood spiked. "Weakest form of manifestation?" she said before Elyra finished the prompt. "A flicker. Barely there. Like—" her gaze edged backward "—a candle that never learns to catch."
Laughter hissed. Someone added, too loud to be an accident, "Like Asher's."
The sound swelled—benches creaking, wings rustling, a tide rolling up.
Then the air shifted.
It began like the moment before thunder—pressure drawing close, feathers trembling against bone. A faint gold radiance lifted around Instructor Elyra, not bright, not showy—absolute. It pressed through the room in a single controlled pulse.
Every whisper died. Even the sparks at Veyra's temple winked out.
"Silence." Elyra's voice did not rise. It didn't need to. Authority wasn't volume—it was presence.
The pressure vanished as quickly as it came, leaving the air clearer, the stone humming at the edges. Quills returned to slates with guilty little taps.
Sorin's grin twitched, not at them but at her. So that's what a Brilliant Light Ascendant feels like. A reminder: teachers lived on another height entirely.
Elyra's expression remained a carved mask. "Correct," she said to Veyra—nothing more, nothing less.
Sorin breathed through the burn under his ribs. Part of him had wanted her to scold the room. Another part was glad she didn't. Pity was just a different kind of bruise.
"Define the nature of Lumina," Elyra said next.
Her attention shifted to the left aisle. "Liora."
Liora Renewal blinked, startled. Auburn hair slid over her cheeks as she straightened. She had healer's hands—slender, with a soft glow that looked like lamplight caught under skin. Her aura pulsed faintly, Second Light Ember Ascendant, steady if small. "It is light," she said quietly, "and power. And will. Manifested through an angel's body."
Approval murmured through the hall. Even Sorin nodded. Solid. Safe.
Elyra tilted her head. "Half-right." No malice. No warmth. Only a blade honed to a single edge. "Lumina is the reflection of the Almighty's own breath. Misuse it, and you reflect yourself instead."
Silence thudded. Sorin felt the words settle cold in his bones. So what do I reflect? A stain? Static? A bad joke with teeth? He pressed harder. Chalk bit a groove into slate.
Across the aisle, Drael Forge wore a soot-smudge on his cheek and goggles parked permanently in his hair. He was sketching the inside of a training gauntlet instead of the lesson, mouth moving as he did math no one had asked for. He kept flicking little looks at Sorin between lines like Sorin was a mechanism missing a spring.
Two rows ahead, Caden Bastion sat like a wall—broad-shouldered, thick wings folded neat, granite-gray eyes steady. His aura glowed faintly, Third Light Ember Ascendant, anchored and immovable. When the whispers rose again, his jaw tightened. He didn't turn. He didn't have to. His silence said I'm here.
"Applications," Elyra said, shaving thin curls of noise from the room. "Seraphic flame differs from lightning how?"
Hands shot up. Veyra's, of course. A boy with bright crimson primaries glowed like a coal—Kael Ignis, silent until now, his aura humming like a forge. Elyra chose neither. "Calen."
A sturdier kid—face like Caden's but sharper in the eyes—cleared his throat. "Flame persists and consumes. Lightning strikes and passes. Flame shapes; lightning shocks."
"Acceptable," Elyra said. "We drill implications this afternoon."
Collective groans. Afternoon drills meant blisters and singed feathers and someone crying behind the water basins where no one had to see.
Elyra let the sighs spend themselves. Then, precise as a plumb line: "Why did the Most High grant angels free will," she asked, "and what danger does it bring?"
The room breathed once, shallow and together.
Sorin's hand froze over his slate. His mouth went dry. No. Not this. Ask a feather that isn't stained.
For half a heartbeat, no one spoke. Then the ripple began, not toward the front but back, turning heads the way grass leans into a wind.
"Ask him."
"He'd know."
"The Devil's Seed wrote the foreword."
Sorin's grin pulled wider, the only thing keeping his face from falling apart. His pulse thudded too fast. If I hide, I lose. If I speak, I bleed. Pick one.
Elyra didn't look at the whisperers. She looked at him. Not long. Not kind. Precise.
"Asher."
His name cracked across the hall like a lash.
Sorin swallowed. The grin held.