The lecture hall smelled of paper and burnt ozone.
Kaelen sat near the back, trying to focus on the diagram Professor Arlin was etching mid-air—threads of blue light weaving glyphs that pulsed in slow rhythm. Each stroke left behind a shimmer like stars fading at dawn. It was beautiful magic. Complex. Meant to be appreciated.
But all Kaelen could think about was the mark still faintly glowing on his palm, the afterimage of a failed restraint glyph he'd cracked yesterday during training. Another slip. Another warning sign.
They were happening more often now.
"Repeat," Arlin said, voice echoing through the domed room, "what is the natural counterpoint to a Cascade-type resonance when dealing with layered mental wards?"
A girl three rows ahead raised her hand, her tone too eager. "Diffusion-lattice. But only if the primary sigil isn't of the Mirror school—then it would collapse."
Arlin nodded once. "Correct, Miss Syl."
Kaelen felt Seraphine shift slightly beside him. Her arm brushed his.
Neither of them moved away.
She hadn't said a word since entering the lecture earlier than usual—an unspoken message, perhaps, that something was weighing on her. Her face was unreadable. Perfect posture. Eyes forward. But her fingers kept toying with the pendant around her neck. The one she never took off.
He should've said something. About the way the Tower glyph had responded to him last night. About the old markings beneath the dormitory grounds that he hadn't told anyone about. Not even Selene.
But what would he say?
Hey, Seraphine. I think I accidentally awoke part of the ruins last night, and something spoke to me. Also, I'm starting to see glyph patterns before they form.
Yeah. That'd go over well.
The bell finally rang.
The classroom emptied slowly. Arlin floated his notes into a sealed scroll and left without fanfare. Seraphine stood, silent, and Kaelen followed her without thinking. It wasn't planned, but neither of them broke the quiet.
They walked together down the side corridor, away from the other students, toward the back courtyard lined with ivy and stone lions. The spring breeze was cool today. Bracing. Almost enough to shake off the restless heat building behind Kaelen's ribs.
Only when they were alone did Seraphine speak.
"You're slipping."
He blinked. "What?"
"You cracked a control glyph with your palm, Kaelen. Even first-years noticed." She turned, finally facing him. Her golden eyes weren't angry, but they were… sharp. "Do you want them to find you?"
A beat passed.
"No," he said quietly. "But it's getting harder to hide."
Her expression softened. "Then don't do it alone."
That surprised him.
"I thought you didn't trust me."
"I didn't," she admitted, tucking a loose strand of hair behind her ear. "I still don't… completely. But I've seen the way your glyphs move. That isn't taught magic. It's alive. It adapts."
Kaelen looked down at his hand. The faint outline of the Veritas sigil pulsed just beneath the skin, responding to his unease.
"I think something's waking up inside me," he said.
Seraphine hesitated. Then stepped closer. "That thing in the ruins. The song only you could hear." Her voice dropped. "I read the old records. Those ruins were sealed after the Tower's emergence. No one knows what's underneath."
He looked up at her. "You think it's connected to Veritas?"
"I think…" she frowned, voice uncertain for once, "I think you might be older than you realize. Not by years. By memory."
Kaelen felt his stomach twist. The glyphs, the visions, the way his body responded to patterns he hadn't studied… It wasn't learning. It was remembering.
She reached out—tentative, as if unsure she had permission—and placed a hand on his wrist.
"If you go into that ruin again," she said, "don't go alone."
A thousand unspoken things moved between them. He should've pulled away.
But he didn't.
Elsewhere, beyond the safety of the Academy's boundaries, the Tower Envoy stepped into the capital.
Rain hadn't touched the streets here in days, but the man's cloak was damp, marked with sigil-scars that shimmered faintly in shadow. No badge. No crest. Only the slow, deliberate weight of his gaze as he passed through the checkpoint.
He said a single word to the guards: "Inquiry."
That was enough.
The gate captain led him through without question, already sweating. The Envoy didn't bother with courtesies. He didn't need to. The glyph floating near his shoulder—silent, circular, rotating in fragments—marked him for what he was.
And for what followed him.
That night, Kaelen found himself unable to sleep.
The ceiling of the dorm felt low, too quiet. Selene had gone to the Observatory to run a starlight alignment. Seraphine had vanished after their conversation.
He lay back against his pillow, fingers laced behind his head, staring into the dark.
Then a knock.
He sat up.
Not a loud one—just two soft taps against the door.
He opened it expecting Selene or a patrol warning of curfew.
Instead, he found Seraphine standing there with a book in her arms.
"I can't sleep either," she said before he could speak. "Thought maybe we could… not sleep together."
Kaelen blinked.
She blushed, then frowned. "That came out wrong."
He stepped aside, amused. "You want to read?"
"Or talk."
They sat on the floor. She opened the book—it was an old one, from the sealed archives, written in pre-Tower script. She pointed out a passage. It was a lullaby, hidden in a ledger of military chants.
Kaelen read it aloud, slowly.
By the end of the stanza, the glyph on his hand warmed.
"It's a resonance key," Seraphine said, quietly. "A trigger for old glyph lines."
He looked at her. "How long have you known?"
"I suspected. You're not the only one hearing echoes, Kaelen." Her eyes shimmered, this time not with challenge—but something closer to fear.
He reached for her hand, instinctively.
And this time, she didn't pull away.