Thorne's day started with his head hitting the desk.

Magical History & Arcane Law was never thrilling, but today it might as well have been a lullaby. The professor's voice droned in rhythm with the scratch of quills, and Thorne's eyelids refused to cooperate. He'd managed maybe two hours of rest after returning from the delta.

When he slipped under, it wasn't graceful. His quill slid from his fingers, clattered to the floor, and rolled away.

A moment later, a cool voice cut straight through the fog of sleep, Nyssha's, brushing across his thoughts like cold silk.

Wake up.

The words weren't spoken. They appeared inside his mind, clear and immediate.

Thorne jolted upright with a sharp inhale, wand half-drawn before he even registered where he was. A few students jumped. One screamed.

"By the stars!" Elias hissed beside him, grabbing Thorne's arm before he hexed the ceiling. "What are you doing?!"

Thorne blinked, the room snapping back into focus, the desks, the startled faces, the professor's glare. Nyssha's golden eyes met his from across the row, faintly glowing with amusement.

You were snoring, she said privately, her tone too calm to be innocent. And drooling.

He wiped his mouth on instinct, then scowled when she tilted her head in mock curiosity.

"Right," he muttered under his breath, lowering the wand. "Thanks for that."

Elias leaned closer. "You okay, man? You look like you fought a demon."

Not far off, Thorne thought. Out loud, he said, "Just didn't sleep."

The rest of the day wasn't much better. He slogged through lectures half-awake, eyes glazing over during runic theory, nearly spilling a vial of reagents during potion practice, and answering an entire question in combat tactics with the word "coffee."

By the time classes ended, his skull throbbed and the idea of a bed sounded divine.

He didn't take it.

When the bell rang and the students scattered toward dorms, Thorne slipped the other way, down a side stairwell, through the resonance chamber, and out to the central courtyard. Most students had finished with their classes and they were relaxing or making plans for later that night.

The afternoon air hit him like a wake-up spell. The city below shimmered under the afternoon light, canals glowing faintly as runes along their banks came alive. He adjusted his cloak, pulling the hood low, and joined the stream of students heading down to Evermist.

He told himself it wasn't about restlessness, but about progress.

He had coins now, hard-earned, risk-stained coin from his dealings with Humus and it was time to use them. He needed more than contacts; he needed footholds. People who could move goods, whisper secrets, forge papers.

Sleep can wait.

He had to check on Fen, do some searching for reliable contacts and be back before nightfall, so that he could go hunting in the forest. Just the thought of his long list of tasks made his head ache, but he gritted his teeth and descended the glowing staircase.

***

The smell of spiced smoke and river salt thickened as he crossed into the lower wards of the city. Floating lanterns drifted above narrow streets, reflecting off water that wound between the stone paths like veins of light. Somewhere ahead, laughter mixed with the clink of mugs, and the hum of a thousand small enchantments filled the air.

Thorne shoved his hands into his pockets and kept walking.

The smell of roasted spice and aether-charged sugar hung thick over Evermist's Grand Plaza. Lanterns floated in slow spirals above the open square, each one pulsing with faint runes that hummed in time with the heartbeat of the city. At the far end, the staircase of light shimmered, hundreds of steps of translucent crystalized light rising toward Aetherhold's distant spires. It was nearly midnight, and the air still carried the pulse of enchantment.

Thorne leaned against the edge of a vendor's stall, half-hidden by the glow. The old dwarf behind the counter was using a levitating skillet, the pan hovering over blue fire that burned without fuel. Each flick of her wrist sent ribbons of golden dough spinning through the air; they twisted mid-flight into spirals before landing on his plate with a faint pop. The smell was intoxicating, honey, citrus, and something sharp that prickled with residual aether.

"Careful," she warned as he handed over a coin. "They keep sizzling till they've stolen a bit of your heat."

Thorne bit into one anyway. The pastry snapped and melted instantly, warmth flooding down his throat. A moment later he saw his breath mist, his body temperature dropping as the magic equalized. He smiled despite himself. Evermist never does anything simply.

He moved toward the fountain at the plaza's center, eating slowly, watching the reflections of the glowing steps ripple across the water. Around him, late-night vendors called halfheartedly to dwindling crowds, and somewhere a street musician coaxed lazy notes from a silver flute.

Thorne let the calm settle just long enough to think.

He'd checked on Fen earlier that evening. The boy was safe at the Silver Lantern, fed and snoring through a meal he hadn't finished. Mara, the inn's serving woman, had given Thorne her sharp-eyed assessment between polishing mugs, Fen was a "good kid, terrible liar," and someone had been asking about him two nights ago but hadn't come back since. Nothing else. For now, that was enough.

After that he'd spent the night investing.

The first lead had come from a man who owned a cramped apothecary wedged between a cobbler and a half-shuttered rune shop. The place smelled like mold and desperation, but Thorne had seen potential. The shelves were full of dust-coated vials, some cracked, some mislabeled, all perfectly legitimate camouflage.

Thorne had dropped a small pile of silver on the counter and asked, "What's worth hearing in this part of town?"

Coins spoke clearer than words. The apothecary's eyes had gone wide; his tongue loosened before the first clink stopped echoing. He told Thorne about smugglers who drank too much in the tavern next door, about a merchant whose shipments never made it to the official docks, about rumors of the Council's tax collectors turning a blind eye for the right price.

By the time Thorne left, with two satchels of potions, half of them probably mislabeled but still useful, the man was promising introductions. "I could ask around for one of my regulars," he'd said eagerly. "Discreet folk, that sort."

Thorne had smiled, flipped him another coin, and told him to do that.

His second contact had required a different mask entirely.

The Ivory Arcade, Evermist's affluent quarter, glittered like it thought itself separate from the rest of the world. Marble bridges, perfume in the air, laughter that sounded rehearsed. Thorne had strolled in wearing confidence instead of sleep, his academy insignia gleaming, the eye-catching golden band of the Empire around his arm. Eyes were following him everywhere he went. He'd stopped by a glass-fronted atelier specializing in enchanted fabrics, run by a beautiful, sharp-eyed tailor named Daria Sael. Daria's clientele were nobles, guild heirs, and bored socialites, which meant she heard everything worth knowing.

Thorne had turned on the charm, smiles measured, voice smooth, the practiced arrogance of a young aristocrat. He'd complimented Daria's work, let slip that the Empire had offered him a place among their apprentices, and in return, the tailor had all but poured out gossip with the wine. Trade disputes, council bribes, the names of families dabbling in forbidden aethercraft, Daria seemed delighted to have an audience who could keep up.

When Thorne left, the woman had promised to "reserve her finest silks" for the next visit. Thorne suspected what she'd really meant was, come back with more secrets to trade.

Two reliable informants in one night. A start.

He'd also tested a few others, one of them a woman barely older than him, a courier for one of the merchant houses. Pretty, bold, and smitten the moment he'd smiled her way. She'd told him half a dozen stories in the span of an hour, some useful, some nonsense. He couldn't tell if she believed any of them or if she was just saying what she thought he wanted to hear.

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Another was a dock foreman who claimed to know every ship entering Evermist's harbor but had asked too many questions in return. He'd smile his way through that one too, but he wouldn't be going back soon.

Thorne finished the last of the pastry, brushing glowing crumbs from his gloves. The heat had returned to his fingers; the magic was fading. He stared up at the staircase of light, its steps now brightening for the dawn shift, and felt that strange double pull again, one world above, one below.

He'd made progress. Small steps, but steps all the same. A network forming piece by piece, just like Uncle had taught him. Only this time, the game was bigger, the stakes higher.

He exhaled, the breath turning to faint mist in the cool air.

"Two lives," he muttered, echoing the thought from the night before. "Let's see how long I can keep them balanced."

With that, Thorne adjusted his cloak, turned toward the shimmering steps, and began the long ascent back to Aetherhold. The city behind him buzzed faintly with waking life, but his mind was already moving ahead, toward the edge of the forest, the beasts beyond the wards, and the power he hadn't yet learned to control.

The staircase of light rose before him like a bridge to another world. Each step shimmered with faint radiance, humming softly under his boots as he climbed. The glow of Evermist stretched behind him, canals reflecting moonlight, towers still half asleep, the faint glitter of a city pretending nothing dangerous ever lurked beyond its borders.

Thorne's mind wasn't sharp tonight. It drifted in fragments, facts, names, impressions, all half-blurred by exhaustion. He rubbed the bridge of his nose, trying to force focus. He had enough pieces now to start seeing the outline of Brennak's situation, even if his body was begging him to stop thinking altogether.

All signs pointed to desperation.

Ever since Thorne had collapsed half of Brennak's underground market, the dwarf's empire had been bleeding coin. Revenue gone. Connections fraying. The traders who once kissed his boots now spoke his name in past tense. The collapse had scared them, reminded them that their safety depended on a man who could no longer protect his own den.

First came the vendors—leaving quietly, packing up before dawn and slipping away to other markets, other cities. Then the customers, turning to new suppliers, unwilling to risk another explosion under their feet. And when the revenue streams dried up, even Brennak's loyalists started questioning the monthly "protection fee" that kept them in his good graces.

They called it a fee; everyone knew it was a tax for breathing his air.

Now, even that was crumbling. The smarter ones were refusing to pay, claiming there weren't enough customers left to make the coin back. Thorne almost felt sorry for him. Almost.

Brennak's smuggling routes were the only lifeline left. Risky, but profitable. He'd built a private web of tunnels and canals to move rare reagents, exotic scales, aetherstones, aetheric dust, straight to the pockets of the rich and reckless. That business was smaller, quieter, and more selective. Those customers didn't sneak through alleys; they had servants for that.

Still, even that branch was cracking. The "crystal dust" operation Thorne had uncovered through Fen's report was proof enough that Brennak was gambling on more dangerous goods to stay afloat. The kind of gamble men made right before they lost everything.

And his newest obsession—the thing he thought would save him—was his most reckless yet.

Thorne reached the midpoint of the staircase, the city sprawling beneath him like a dream fading in the dark. He took a slow breath and pieced together what he knew.

Brennak wanted monopoly. Not coin, not power, not reputation. Control. Control over the trade of high-tier magical ingredients, the kind that could only be found in the Primordial Zones, places soaked in pure, unfiltered aether. There weren't many left on the continent, and Evermist happened to sit right beside one.

The Primordial Forest was an untamed scar of creation, a place where the aether ran so thick it warped the creatures inside it. A natural vault of priceless materials. Brennak must have seen it as salvation. A resource the guilds feared to touch and the council refused to claim. The last frontier.

And he'd tried. Repeatedly.

Thorne had confirmed it through multiple sources. Brennak had spent a mountain of gold recruiting teams of adventurers from the city's guild. Not amateurs either — seasoned hunters, mages, mercenaries, all paid obscene amounts to venture into the forest and bring back what they could.

None returned.

Every report told the same story: vanished groups, lost signals, no survivors. The only constants were the empty ledgers and the rising cost of replacements. Each failure made the guild more cautious, the coin demanded higher, the silence deeper.

Even the city council had taken notice. Officially, the guild was permitted to enter the forest under strict supervision—to cull the beast population, harvest manageable resources, and retreat before the deeper zones. But Brennak's teams were disappearing before they ever reached those limits.

Why? Thorne frowned. He'd faced those beasts himself, seen their strength. The forest wasn't forgiving, but it wasn't unknowable. The guild had maps, procedures, aether-tethering techniques. For them to vanish completely meant something else was at play.

He glanced upward, to the faint shimmer of Aetherhold's floating spires above the steps.

Whatever the reason, Brennak was running out of moves. His vendors were gone, his smugglers terrified, his operations collapsing from within. All he had left were dwindling coffers and half-baked dreams of reclaiming power through raw aether.

Thorne's hand brushed against the railing of light, its warmth humming through his glove.

Good, he thought. Let him reach for it.

The desperate were always the easiest to destroy.

Thorne's lips curved into a tired smile.

"Hopefully," he muttered, voice low, "by the time I'm done, he'll be ripe for picking."

The last step of the staircase of light dissolved under his heel as Thorne stepped onto Aetherhold's upper terrace. The vast courtyard spread out before him, silver fountains and marble towers gleaming under the moonlight. Normally the sight carried a kind of quiet awe, but right now, he felt nothing but the weight behind his eyes.

He paused under the archway, taking a slow breath. He'd been planning to head out again, to hunt while the school still slept, but the thought alone made his knees ache. The Primordial Forest didn't forgive fatigue. Out there, a moment of distraction could turn into a corpse.

Tomorrow, he decided, rubbing at his temple. Tonight, I rest.

He started across the courtyard, boots whispering against the polished stone. The fountain's mist cooled his face, and for a heartbeat the stillness was almost enough to make him forget how much he hated this place for feeling so safe.

"Thorne!"

A voice came from somewhere behind the statue of the goddess Auriel, bright, human, and entirely too awake.

Thorne cursed under his breath. "Stars above!"

Elias stepped out from behind the statue, all wide grin and tousled hair, still dressed in half of his dueling uniform. "You should've seen your face! You looked like you were about to hex me into next week."

Thorne exhaled sharply. "I would've, if I wasn't too tired to aim."

Elias's grin faltered. He studied Thorne for a moment, taking in the damp cloak, the shadows under his eyes, the sluggish glow in his irises. "You look terrible."

"Appreciated." Thorne walked past him toward the main hall, but Elias fell into step beside him.

"I mean it," Elias said. "You've been off for days. Always vanishing. Half the time you look like you haven't slept, and the other half you're not even here. What's going on?"

"Nothing."

"That's not nothing." Elias frowned. "You don't even try anymore. At first lies kept rolling off your tongue like they were nothing, half the time having me look up to check if it was actually day, when you said good morning. And now..."

Thorne rubbed his eyes. "Maybe I'm evolving."

Elias tried to laugh, but it came out thin. "You're scaring people, you know that? Even Lucien asked if you'd been cursed. Nyssha says your aura's dimmer than usual."

"Dimmer," Thorne repeated flatly.

"Yeah. She says your eyes don't glow the same anymore. Usually, they've got that… whatever, that thing. Now it's like you're running out of aether."

Thorne's mouth twitched. "Maybe I'm just running out of patience."

"Funny." Elias stopped walking. "You know, I knew you were weird when I met you, brooding, secretive, all that 'mysterious rogue' crap. But lately?" He shook his head. "It's getting out of hand. You're not just weird anymore. You're… gone."

Thorne sighed. "Elias..."

"No, listen to me." The elf stepped in front of him, blocking his way. "You disappear for hours, come back half-dead, won't tell anyone what you're doing, where you're going, or why. You're my friend, or at least I thought you were. So if something's wrong, maybe stop pretending you're made of stone."

Thorne's expression didn't change. "You really don't want to know what I'm doing."

Elias blinked, thrown by the quiet finality in his tone. "That's supposed to make me feel better?"

"It's supposed to make you smarter." Thorne's eyes met his, tired, hollow, and far older than they had any right to be. "Curiosity gets people killed."

Elias stared at him for a long moment. "You don't trust me."

Thorne frowned, genuinely confused. "What kind of question is that?"

"It's a simple one."

He rubbed the back of his neck, exasperated. "I've known you for a few months. Of course I don't trust you."

The words landed harder than he expected. Elias's face went still, not angry, just… hurt. Then something softened behind his eyes, a flicker of understanding that made Thorne look away.

"I get it now," Elias said quietly. "Someone's hurt you, haven't they?"

Thorne's jaw tightened. "Many people," he said, voice even. "But that's not the point."

"Then what is the point?"

"The less you know, the better for you."

Elias let out a small, humorless laugh. "You always talk like you're about to disappear. You ever think that maybe you don't have to do everything alone?"

Thorne rolled his eyes and started walking again. "If this is the part where you try to give me a heartfelt speech, save it. I'm going to bed."

Elias followed him for a few steps, then stopped. "You can keep pretending all you want, Thorne. But one of these days, that mask you wear is going to crack."

Thorne didn't turn around. "Goodnight, Elias."

He pushed open the doors to the main hall and let them close behind him, the echo swallowing everything Elias might have said next.

The corridor was empty, lit only by the faint glow of suspended orbs. He dragged himself up the stairs toward his dormitory, too drained to think, too numb to care.

By the time his head hit the pillow, the last thought that crossed his mind was simple and sharp...

Tomorrow. The forest.

Then the world went dark.

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