He caught up to her as she reached the edge of the old quad path, his footsteps ragged, breath sawing in and out like torn bellows. Fabrisse nearly tripped on the last turn and had to grab a post for balance—partly from the terrain, mostly from the fact that his lungs felt like they were boiling.

Liene slowed when she heard him, but didn't stop. Not until he stumbled again and actually wheezed, a sharp, involuntary sound like a dying teakettle. She turned halfway, arms crossed, watching him catch up the last few steps.

[Intense Fitness Training]

[STR +1 | Current STR: 9]

"Liene . . . Can we . . . find somewhere to . . . sit down?" He put his hands on his thighs, panting.

She stared at him, not saying anything for a few seconds, then said, "There's a bench—"

"No, Liene. This needs . . . to be private."

Her stare got even more intense.

The semi-forgotten maintenance balcony halfway up the east tower looked the same as it always did: quiet, dusty, and stubbornly empty. The two old chairs were still there, sagging in opposite directions like they'd been in a conversation for years. Below, the glowvine threads shimmered in the atrium like they always did, but tonight the light felt farther away—too soft to be warm, too pretty to touch.

Liene extended one hand and reached for the railing, fingers brushing over the rusted edge as if grounding herself. With the other, she slowly spread her palm, angling it toward the atrium's gentle light like she was trying to catch the glow of the vines in her skin. The glow pooled in her hand, casting shifting patterns across her wrist and the edge of her sleeve. She hadn't said anything.

He'd been sipping from the bottle of water Liene had bought for him, not saying a thing. The scullery only sold either Logan Prime or water at this hour since any kind of tea would keep the students awake at night, and a student awake at night was a student up to mischief. Tea was what he direly needed, as it could've calmed his nerves for what he was about to say.

And he hadn't been able to say anything yet.

Then Liene broke the silence that had gone on for ten minutes.

"I was a weird kid, Fabri," she said as she leaned her hip against the railing and drew her hand back into the folds of her blouse. Her voice was soft and tired in a way that meant she'd stopped expecting anything and started talking anyway.

She kept her eyes on the atrium below. "When I was eleven, I asked my teacher why we didn't learn spells for sadness. Like, not cheering charms or distraction tricks. Real spells; ones that could pull a feeling out of you and bottle it somewhere safe. She told me it wasn't stable."

She glanced over at him then, a brief flick of her eyes before returning to the view. "But you and I both know that's a lie. Magic can do a lot of things. It just doesn't do the ones grown-ups find inconvenient. If you feel a stable source of sadness for a long time, you could produce stable magic."

She lifted one hand again, this time not toward the vines, but toward the air in front of her. Her fingers curled as she flicked them as if striking a match in reverse. A light bloomed in her palm. Unlike the atrium's golden glowvine threads, this one was a deep, steady blue—brilliant and rich, like ink spilled in a well of stars. It cast no shadows.

Fabrisse thought about how wrong it felt that sky-blue meant joy, when clearly joy was something that jumped and fizzed and tried to escape. This blue—that deep blue—was the opposite. That was sadness.

Liene let her hand fall to her side again, and for a moment, she looked like she might say nothing else. But then she let out a small breath and sat back on the sagging chair behind her. The cushion gave a squeaky protest.

"I came to enjoy writing poetry on leaves," she said. "I'd go around campus collecting the ones with nice veins or funny shapes, and I'd write little lines on them with gold ink. Sometimes with spells to keep them from drying out. Sometimes not." She paused. "I think there's still a box of them under my bed somewhere. I used to leave them in random places—under benches, in other people's books, once in Headmaster Draeth's laundry chute. He never figured out it was me."

He wanted to say something comforting. Instead, he thought about how long it would take a leaf to dry without enchantment.

She smiled, but it didn't reach her eyes. "My mom hated it," she added. "Said I was wasting ink, and potential. I was supposed to be like Lorvan. He's good at everything. He was already on his second thesis when I first enrolled. They said he's getting fast-tracked into the Order's Academic Arm. He deserves it. But . . . I don't know how to be like him. So I told mom poetry was my passion. Whenever she'd lecture me about how my grades were decidedly average, I'd take out a leaf, write on it, and pretend to not listen to her. That . . . weirded her out, so she finally stopped berating."

Fabrisse stared at the bottle in his hand like it might offer a script. The water inside had long since lost its chill.

He wasn't sure why she was telling him all this now.

It wasn't that he didn't appreciate it—he did, or thought he did—but some part of him kept running diagnostics on the moment, trying to find the pattern, the catalyst. Was it the time? The place? The fact that neither of them had run away yet? He had no reference point for this kind of openness, no prompt in the imaginary social guidebook that said: when someone shows you the color of their sadness, say X in response.

"People don't like weird, Fabri. Weird gets you sorted into the back row of group projects and forgotten in departmental nominations." She turned one hand up, fingers splayed in a shrug that looked almost theatrical. "Say. Do you remember the first time we met?"

He nodded. It was their second term of Fire Foundations, when he turned fourteen. He'd been trying to split a flame stream using two mirrored shaping runes etched into a crucible—an idea he'd read about in an upper-year textbook. Technically sound, if wildly premature for a beginner class.

"It was when I nearly set Professor Marrow's robes on fire," he said quietly.

She nodded in return. "Everyone else panicked, and you just stood there blinking through the smoke with soot on your face like a confused chimney ghost. I thought, 'that's the weirdest boy I've ever seen.'" She paused. "And maybe that weird boy needed a friend."

Fabrisse swallowed. He didn't have a response ready.

"I . . . you seem to have been busy lately, Fabri, doing your own thing. You're hanging out with more people. I saw you with the new visiting professor the day earlier; I've never even seen him around before. I—I just . . . I don't know. Maybe you're growing out of your shell, and . . ." She didn't finish her sentence.

Fabrisse looked down again. A tiny fray had come loose at the seam of the water bottle label, and he ran his thumb over it with a sort of mechanical focus, the kind he defaulted to when his brain began to overheat.

He didn't want to lie. Not to Liene. But telling the truth wasn't simple. There were so many variables to weigh. What if she got scared and fussy about what happened? What if he got her expelled? What if she didn't believe him? What if she did, and it meant she'd be dragged into something dangerous?

But if he didn't tell her, who else? Dubbie wasn't around; she had gone to town and started her life anew. They wouldn't talk for another month.

Fabrisse drew in a slow breath. "I've decided I'm not going to be one of those people who hurt my friends and make a drama out of my life by letting a misunderstanding stands."

He glanced up. Liene was watching him with that same patience she wore during her poetry sessions, during the petal ritual, during things she thought were worth the time and energy. "Okay. I'm listening."

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Then he told her about the Eidralith; about the attribute screens, the hallucination-like prompts only he could see, the ancient voice of a system calling itself PRAXIS NODE: Calibration Beta. About how it had labeled him Apprentice – Field Calibrator, Aetheric Epoch 9, and how it operated in Compatibility Mode because the world had moved on without it.

"So the Eidralith is this system, and it aids my progression by giving me, among other things, . . . quests," he continued. "I was given one right before I chased after you, but I swatted it away."

"Do you get rewards for it?" She asked.

"Usually. I haven't had time to check this one out."

"Maybe you should," she tilted her head. "Maybe it's telling you to tell me the truth, and you'll lose out on the reward because you haven't accepted it."

He sighed and blinked the interface back into view.

[NEW QUEST RECEIVED: "Threads Left Unspooled"]

Objective: Disclose your high-level secret to a Trusted Individual

Status: Not Yet Accepted

Reward: +3 EMO

[SYSTEM NOTE: A shared load is lighter.]

Would you like to accept the quest?

[Yes] [No] [Remind Me Later]

Fabrisse stared at it for a beat. "You're not going to believe this," he muttered as he chose the option 'Yes'.

Liene smiled. But then her smile faded. "But you still haven't told me the reason why you and Celine and Tom and his girlfriend spent the entire day together, and not tell me about it."

"I am not allowed to tell you about it. Mentor Lugano is also not allowed to tell you about it."

"Ah." She seemed to have caught on to what he was trying to say, about how serious all of this really was. "Then . . . I won't pry."

Fabrisse stayed silent, folding his hands loosely in front of him.

Liene's shoulders sagged as she let out a quiet breath. "I don't want to put you in a difficult position," she said.

After a moment, Fabrisse tilted his head slightly. "How good are you at sound-dampening spells?"

She gave a small, almost rueful smile. "I'm good enough. As long as you speak in a low voice, I can keep it from carrying."

"You'll need to cast your spell then," Fabrisse said.

Liene nodded and lifted her hands slightly, murmuring the soft, precise syllables of the sound-dampening charm. Bubbles of confident green aether swirled around her fingertips, but underneath, faint streaks of anxious pine-colored light wavered and bled into the edges.

He leaned slightly closer, careful not to break the dampening effect, and spoke in the lowest voice he could manage. "Test. Quiet enough?"

Liene's lips curved into a small smile as the faint echo of his words barely grazed the edges of the courtyard. "Yes."

He closed his eyes. When he opened them, he told her everything.

Not just about the Eidralith, but about the events that had unfolded in its wake. About the sudden attack by the voidspawn after their Stupenstone Fling practice. About how Ganvar'd given him a tracking quartz during their tutoring session. About the interview with Celine. About the collapse of the pond. The way Rubidi had dragged him under. How he'd fired a flare for help, and Severa Montreal had shown up to save him. How Lorvan and Kaldrin had chased the voidcaster away for good.

While he spoke, Liene was quiet. Very quiet.

At first, her expression was simply attentive—eyes open and earnest, like she was trying not to miss a single thread of meaning. But when he reached the part about the voidspawn, her brows pinched slightly. The corners of her mouth turned down. When he described the moment the fold buckled and nearly tore open, she covered her mouth with one hand and whispered something under her breath.

When he explained that the perpetrators had been caught, that the worst was over, her shoulders dropped. The tension in her jaw loosened. She didn't smile, but she let out a long, quiet breath and leaned back against the bench like her body was remembering how to be held up by gravity again.

"I was going to tell you," he said. "But . . . nobody else was supposed to know."

"Is that everything?" Her voice was tiny when she finally spoke.

"Yes," he said, omitting the final part about Lorvan's arms possibly being erased as he spoke. He figured it wasn't his place to talk about it.

[QUEST COMPLETED: "Threads Left Unspooled"]

Reward: +3 EMO

Fabrisse sat there for a beat too long after the notification faded. He was feeling something now. Not the sharp anxiety from earlier, not the hollow gnaw of dread, but something warm. Like warmth left in stone after sundown; a kind of softness behind his ribs he wasn't used to. It didn't feel earned, but it didn't feel wrong either.

Liene didn't speak right away. She just watched him for a moment longer than was comfortable before turning fully toward him, legs crossed on the bench, one hand braced against the slat between them. "So you were in danger," she said. "You could've just told me so, without telling me the details."

Fabrisse couldn't see the logic behind that, but he decided to not question it.

Liene pressed her lips together. "I shouldn't have asked. I'm sorry. Now you're saying all this, and you might get in trouble for it."

"It's fine, Liene. I trust you with my secrets."

Her cheeks flushed faintly, and she looked down, twisting a finger around the edge of her sleeve. For a moment, her words seemed caught in her throat, and her usual composure wavered just enough for him to notice. "It's not—I . . . I'm sorry."

"No. I'm sorry."

Then Liene did something very her. She reached out and, with great care, touched the side of his forearm, the way one might calm a skittish bird. "You didn't have to tell me all that," she said in a murmur. "But you did. Thank you. And before you're going to say anything else . . . No. I won't say a thing. I won't mention it ever again."

"Okay."

"Did you get the rewards for your quest?"

"Yeah. 3 EMO."

She tilted her head to the other side now. "As in, emotions? Can you feel three more emotions now?"

He gave a hoarse little laugh. "I don't think it works that way."

"Well, whatever it is," she said, "I think it's working. You can cast 'joy' now, and I think that suits you more."

Fabrisse leaned back against the warped slats of the bench, the warmth still lingering behind his ribs, gentle and unobtrusive. He had three points yet to assign from levelling up, and a bunch of unused Mastery points. He'd yet to try out his spells now that his attributes had seen upgrades. And then there were the Stone skills. Would Draeth be willing to teach him Faultweave if he asked, or would he think that was too high-level for him?

He was halfway through planning a full internal syllabus—what order to learn skills in, whether to prioritize aethereal compatibility or physical efficiency—when Liene's voice cut through his focus like a soft stone dropped into still water.

"Will you flake on me again," she said, "if I ask you to come leaf-poem hunting with me this week?"

The stats and skills evaporated from the edges of his vision as he turned toward her.

She wasn't teasing. Her eyes were steady, thoughtful. She wasn't just asking for his company; she was asking for follow-through.

"No," he said, after a beat. "No, I won't flake."

"Good," she said, and leaned her head against the backrest, the way someone does when they've finally been given permission to stop bracing for disappointment. "Because I found a leaf that looks like your freckles, and I need you to see it. But only if I'm not intruding on your practice sessions and it's not after eight."

Fabrisse smiled. Maybe he'd even bring gold ink this time.

Then from afar, the sixth bell rang, and Liene frowned slightly. "Don't you have dinner with Anabeth's family on the seventh bell?"

Fabrisse blinked. "How do you know?"

"She told me! You forgot to tell me about that as well."

He braced himself, expecting a flash of irritation, something like a deep furrow of her brow or a pout to indicate her annoyance. None came. She frowned slightly, yes, but it wasn't the frown of someone scolding or upset and her eyes held only mild concern. Fabrisse's mind ran through the possibilities: was she disappointed? Deep in thought? Or simply reserved in expressing emotion (unlikely)? Either way, the usual warning signs weren't there.

"You're not mad?" He asked.

"I would've been angry if it wasn't for . . . well, everything that happened today. But Anabeth is my friend. Also, she's not into boys that way."

She's into boys in what way then . . .

Liene continued, "But you really need to work on your scheduling."

"Yeah. I still have time to show up," he said, already calculating in his mind the path from the courtyard to her residence and how long it would take to clean off the dust and residual aether sparks from his robes.

She gave him a slow, appraising look, looking up and down as she took him in from head to toe. "Are you going to show up like that?"

Fabrisse followed her gaze down at his academy robe and cloak, both rumpled and streaked from the day's fighting. He hesitated, counting pros and cons internally. Functionally, he was clean enough; for a high-class dinner, probably not.

"We don't have time! Do you even have semi-formal attire?" Liene asked, her tone a mix of exasperation and disbelief.

"Yes," he said.

"Not the—" she began, eyes narrowing slightly, "the one from last Winter Solstice that you spilled ink on?"

"No," he corrected.

Liene huffed. "Come with me. You'll wear my thing then."

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