Elias didn't mean to follow him.
But when the silver-pin senior turned down the old east corridor the one that curved where it shouldn't Elias felt the hum pull, subtle but insistent. Not a command. An invitation.
"Mara," Elias said quietly.
"I know," she replied, already moving. "I felt it too."
The corridor stretched as they walked, walls lined with faded notices and trophy cases that hadn't been updated in decades. The silver-pin senior stopped beneath a flickering light and turned to face them.
"You're persistent," he said.
"So are you," Elias replied. "You keep showing up."
The senior studied him for a long moment, then sighed. "Fine. If you're going to keep breaking the school, you might as well know why."
They entered a small room Elias had never seen before bare except for a single bench and a cracked mirror.
"My name is Rowan," the senior said, unfastening the pin and placing it on the bench. "I was chosen when I was sixteen."
Elias felt the hum tighten.
"You were a Listener," Elias said.
Rowan nodded. "I listened. I gave. I stayed."
Mara asked quietly, "Why did you leave?"
Rowan looked at the mirror not at them. "Because it never stopped asking."
He spoke slowly, as if measuring each word.
"The school doesn't want power," Rowan continued. "It wants continuity. When something breaks memory, balance, magic it leans harder on the Listener. Little by little."
Elias felt cold settle in his chest.
"I thought if I gave enough," Rowan said, "it would stop. It didn't."
"What did it take?" Mara asked.
Rowan's jaw tightened. "Names. Faces. The sound of my mother's voice. I remember facts but not feelings."
Silence filled the room.
"That's why you walked away," Elias said.
"Yes," Rowan replied. "And the moment I did, the school erased me from its systems. Doors stopped opening. The hum went silent."
He met Elias's eyes. "I survived by becoming irrelevant."
Mara spoke carefully. "And now?"
Rowan picked up the pin. "Now it's unstable. Because you changed the rules."
Elias nodded slowly. "I won't give myself up."
Rowan studied him, searching for doubt. Finding none, he exhaled.
"Then you'll need an anchor," Rowan said. "Something the school can't take."
Mara felt it then the hum shifting, settling around her.
Her eyes widened. "Oh."
Rowan gave a grim smile. "That's why you're here."
Elias turned sharply. "No. She's not part of this bargain."
"She already is," Rowan replied gently. "Just not in the way you think."
As they left the room, the hum steadied less strained than before.
Elias's mind raced, but one truth anchored him.
"I won't let it take you," he said to Mara.
She met his gaze, calm and certain. "Then don't face it alone."
Behind them, the cracked mirror repaired itself slowly, imperfectly.
The school was learning.
But it was still hungry.
*End of the chapter*