The rain had stopped sometime in the early hours, leaving the academy shrouded in damp mist and silence. Stone courtyards shimmered with the sheen of moisture, and faint wisps of fog curled along the base of the towers. Alex walked alone beneath the overcast sky, boots echoing softly as he crossed the inner grounds toward the dueling arena—not because he had a reason to be there, but because the silence offered him something normal. Something steady.
His body still ached. His ribs throbbed with a dull pain from the impact of Rivena's kinetic wave, and a sharp ache tugged at the muscles in his sword arm. The healers had offered to treat him fully, but he'd refused. Some wounds needed to be remembered.
But it wasn't the physical pain that gnawed at him.
It was the whispering.
It had started faint—like a distant breath stirring the leaves of his thoughts. A voice low and cold, familiar and foreign all at once. It didn't command him. It didn't threaten. It simply... lingered.
"You bled with grace," it had said.
Now, he heard it every time his heartbeat slowed.
Kaer Thalor.
The spirit—if it could even be called that—had not forced itself upon him during the duel. It hadn't burned through him in desperation or rage. Instead, it had waited... and he had let it in. Not fully, not consciously. But he had allowed the bond to stretch, to touch that place of power just long enough to ignite his blade and stand his ground.
He couldn't forget the look on Rivena's face.
Or the flame that had turned crimson the moment he stepped toward the arena's heart.
He paused beside the obsidian obelisk near the dining hall. The student rankings shimmered faintly across its polished surface, names shifting like firelight. He found his near the bottom of the third column: Alex of Bramblehold – Rank 31.
He didn't feel ranked. He felt hunted.
"Staring at your name won't make it climb faster," came Nikki's voice.
Alex turned to find her standing behind him, arms crossed, bow slung over her shoulder, the hood of her academy cloak pulled back to reveal her freckled face and sharp eyes.
"You should be proud," she added, stepping up beside him.
He didn't answer.
"You stood against one of the Thrones and didn't die," she said. "Hell, you nearly won."
"I didn't win."
"You made her bleed. That's enough."
Before he could reply, a ripple of silence swept through the courtyard. Students looked up, falling into hushed murmurs as a figure emerged from the mist.
Clad in white robes that shimmered faintly with magical runes, the Seer glided across the stone with no sound of footsteps. Its face was hidden behind an opaque porcelain mask. One hand lifted—and pointed.
Straight at Alex.
"Summons," Nikki whispered, face darkening. "The Obsidian Council."
Alex swallowed.
It was said that no student sought the Council. They were summoned. Called.
And if they were lucky, they returned.
The path the Seer led him down twisted in ways that made his skin crawl. Hallways he had never seen. Doors that opened with no key. At last, they stopped before a massive obsidian slab veined with red light, pulsing like a heartbeat. It opened without a sound.
The chamber beyond was circular, vast, and dimly lit. Five figures sat on thrones carved from ancient stone, each masked—each bearing a different sigil: Flame, Ash, Bone, Silence, and Blood. Their presence pressed down on the air like a storm waiting to break.
"Alex of Bramblehold," one of them intoned. The voice echoed oddly, distorted by the enchantments woven into the chamber. "You have drawn attention."
He stood straight, hands at his sides. "I didn't mean to."
"Intent is irrelevant," came another voice, female, sharp as a blade. "You manifested power unsanctioned. Spirit magic without invocation. You destabilized a Throned."
"She challenged me," he replied.
Silence.
Then the figure marked with Blood leaned forward. "We are not here to punish. We are here to... observe."
"To test," said the one of Bone.
"You will undertake a sanctioned trial. Outside the Academy."
Alex blinked. "A mission?"
The mask of Ash nodded slowly. "A field test. You will go beyond the Veil, into the wilderness north of the Outer Spires. Gravepoint Hollow. There, you will investigate a collapse—arcane interference, possibly spirit-related."
"That area is restricted," Alex said. "Only second-years and above—"
"You are beyond first-year classifications," said the Flame. "You carry a legacy. A curse. We must know what you are."
"And what you might become," added the one of Silence.
He swallowed. "And if I refuse?"
Kaer Thalor's voice curled softly in his thoughts.
"Then you remain prey," said the mask of Blood.
They dismissed him with a wave of magical force that turned the world black.
When he woke, he was back in the training hall, his cloak damp with sweat, his breath ragged.
Therion stood over him, arms crossed.
"You're lucky you weren't expelled."
Alex sat up slowly. "They want me to go to Gravepoint."
"I know."
Therion knelt beside him, fingers glowing with a soft green ward. He pressed a symbol onto Alex's chest, above his heart. The warmth sank into his skin.
"Protection," the mentor said. "Not from the Hollow. From yourself."
Later, as dusk fell, Alex sat alone beneath the pale-limbed wyrm tree behind the eastern spire. The wind had picked up. Leaves rustled like whispers.
He didn't hear Nikki approach until she dropped a folded piece of parchment in his lap.
"Map," she said. "Stolen from the archive."
He opened it. Lines of ink traced a path beyond the academy's boundaries, into the northern wastes. A ruined valley marked with ancient wards. Gravepoint Hollow.
"I leave in two days," he said.
"I know."
"I have to go alone."
"I know that too."
She didn't try to stop him. She just stood there a moment longer, then vanished into the mist.
The wind grew colder.
Alex folded the map and stared into the darkness. He could feel it—somewhere far beyond the mountain peaks, the Hollow was waking.
And deep within him, Kaer Thalor stirred.
"They seek to measure your worth," the spirit whispered. "Let them. I have walked those ruins before. And what sleeps there... remembers me."
Alex didn't sleep that night.
He watched the moon rise.
And prepared to walk into forgotten places.
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