The library was the only spot on campus where the sounds of academic life seemed truly distant.
Adam began visiting there in the evenings, not for the books but because the quiet allowed him to think. Thinking had become something he needed to do for long, uninterrupted periods.
He had a corner table that he quietly claimed by arriving early enough so that no one else took it.
It was tucked between a tall shelf and the window overlooking the western courtyard, offering good sightlines and minimal traffic.
This was exactly the kind of spot a person quietly analysing the future of an entire academy would find useful.
He was halfway through reviewing a set of theory notes he was supposed to have completed two days ago when he noticed her.
She sat at the table diagonally across from him, close enough that he was mildly surprised he hadn't noticed her right away.
She had light copper hair that fell loosely past her shoulders, wearing the standard uniform with pushed-up sleeves and ink stains on her right hand, indicating she had been writing for a while before he arrived.
She had three books open before her, moving between them in a pattern that appeared chaotic from afar but revealed a clear internal logic upon closer look: checking details in one, jotting down notes, confirming in the second, then moving on.
He did not recognise her from the novel. That meant she was either a background character the story never named or someone introduced in later chapters he hadn't read because he stopped reading before reaching her part.
Both options deserved consideration for different reasons.
He went back to his notes and left her to her books.
She was there again the following evening, at the same table with the same three books, her ink-stained hand steadily taking notes.
This time, she had a fourth book stacked next to her and a slight frown of concentration tugging at the corner of her mouth, indicating that her current work was not going smoothly.
Adam was three pages into his own reading when she let out a quiet, frustrated sound, barely audible, and gently pushed one of the open books away from her.
He glanced over without thinking.
She caught him looking, and for a moment, they simply exchanged glances across the quiet library, each recognising the other's silent choice of this corner as the best spot to be.
"Sorry," she said, low enough not to carry, "did I disturb you?"
"No," he said.
She nodded, pulled the book back toward herself, then returned to her notes. Adam did the same, and that marked the end of their first conversation.
She was there again on the third evening, and the fourth, and by the fifth, he had started arriving and finding her already seated at her table—like a piece of furniture expected to be there.
During those quiet evenings spent in the same corner of the library, they exchanged only a few words, and he learned her name was Elara.
She was a first-year advanced magic theory student working on independent research that her track supervisor called ambitious—an indication she needed to work harder.
She also had a habit of staring out the window for exactly thirty seconds when she was stuck, as if that pause reset something before she went back to her page.
He picked all of that up the same way you learn about people you sit near quietly, gradually and without asking just simply by being around long enough for the details to emerge on their own..
He had not decided yet whether she was someone the original story had simply overlooked or someone whose route arrived later in chapters he had never reached.
Either way, she was genuine and sharp, possessing a specific kind of focus that, in his experience, usually signified that when she finally concentrated fully on something, it would be felt entirely.
He filed that away and kept reading his notes and said nothing about any of it.
On the sixth evening, she took a seat opposite him instead of at her usual diagonal table, placed her books down with the calm confidence of someone who had made a decision, and without any introduction, stated, "You're Adam Reindeer, second year, theory and combat elective."
"That's me," he said.
"Elara," she said, "first year, advanced magic theory." She opened her book. "You don't talk much."
"Neither do you," he said.
Her mouth twitched as if she was about to smile, then she turned to her page.
They spent the rest of the evening reading in the same comfortable silence they already shared, but now it had a name on both sides.
He returned to the dormitory and reflected on the ink stains on her hand, her shifting focus among three books simultaneously, and her steady demeanour- an indication that she had early on chosen to see the world as a puzzle to solve rather than just a place to pass through.
He thought about the novel and the routes he remembered and the ones he did not and the gap between them that kept bothering him like a stone in his shoe.
Then he reflected on Seraphine, who hadn't been at the training grounds for the past two evenings, and Ren, whose increasing visibility on campus grew more natural each day, effortlessly drawing people to him in a way they couldn't quite explain.
The dungeon practical was ten days away.
He needed to stop drifting and start being deliberate.
But not right now. Not quite at this moment.
He pushed his door open, dropped his notes on the desk and lay back on his bed and stared at the ceiling and let himself have one more evening of simply learning the shape of things before the real work began.
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