Elias learned, over the next few days, that routine was not repetition.
Routine was erosion.
It wore away edges. It softened outlines. It convinced the world that something had always been the way it currently was — and therefore did not need to be questioned.
He carried crates.
He followed Rellin through the bazaar.
He nodded when spoken to and stopped speaking when ignored.
And little by little, people stopped noticing when he stopped.
The fishmonger handed Rellin the receipt without looking at Elias — even though Elias had paid.
A guard checked Rellin's papers twice and waved them both through without glancing at the second silhouette beside him.
A clerk thanked no one in particular for returning a ledger Elias had personally delivered.
No shadows moved.
No magic stirred.
Nothing happened.
That was the problem.
Elias tried to ponder what went wrong. Perhaps it was due to his old soul influence? Perhaps it took his thoughts too literally and somehow influenced reality through him?
"Aster's not gonna like this when she figures it out" Elias thought almost amused, and managed a small smile that didn't look rehearsed at the thought. Too bad nobody noticed.
—————————————————————
Rellin noticed on the fourth day.
They were loading resin jars into the wagon when a young courier approached, glanced between them, and handed a sealed slip directly to Rellin.
"For the merchant," the courier said.
Rellin blinked. "He's the one who ordered it."
The courier frowned, confused, then shrugged. "Right. Sure."
And left.
Rellin stared at the slip, then at Elias.
"…That's the third time today," he muttered.
Elias adjusted a crate strap. "Third time for what?" Elias tried to pretend like he'd not realized it few days earlier himself.
"For someone talking around you."
Rellin leaned against the wagon wheel, expression tightening.
"You didn't do anything, did you?"
"No."
"Didn't say anything clever?"
"No."
"Didn't… I don't know. Loom?"
Elias paused, considering.
"I stood normally."
Rellin exhaled sharply through his nose.
"That's not reassuring."
He watched Elias move — unhurried, precise, entirely unremarkable — and felt a chill that had nothing to do with shadow.
"You know," Rellin said slowly, "people forget faces all the time. Names too. But they don't forget presence unless something's wrong."
Elias met his gaze.
"What kind of wrong?"
Rellin hesitated.
"…The kind you don't notice until you try to remember."
Elias felt nervous now, since Rellin noticed it would be only a matter of time when Aster would find out and then all reality would stop agreeing with itself, and probably start disagreeing with Elias personally.
He suppressed a shiver but said " yeah, your right"
——————————————————————
Aster did not notice it in the market.
She noticed it in reports.
Names that should recur… didn't.
Interactions logged without secondary attribution.
Patrol notes that referenced "merchant and associate" without descriptors.
She sat alone that night in the shed — mask off, cloak folded, quill idle — staring at a list of observations she hadn't written.
No alarms.
No violations.
No anomalies.
Just… absence where a variable should be.
She closed her eyes.
"He's not hiding," she murmured to the empty space.
"He's being… discounted."
The system was no longer categorizing Elias as a subject.
Which meant it wouldn't track him.
Wouldn't escalate.
Wouldn't respond.
That was worse than rebellion.
That was irrelevance by design.
Aster leaned back against the crate, staring at the rafters.
"If he ever decides to leave," she said quietly, "there won't be a moment we can point to and say 'that's when it happened.'"
There would only be after.
The PocketElias waited until the shed was empty.
Then until the corridor was quiet.
Then until even the shadows in the corners had settled into their most forgettable angles.
He moved without hurry.
A bundle slipped from beneath his cloak — cloth, thread, a thin needle, a roll of treated lining — things he had gathered slowly, one at a time, always small enough to be overlooked.
No one had noticed him carrying them.
That, too, was information.
He closed his door, warded it normally, and sat on the floor with his cloak spread across his knees.
The fabric accepted his touch easily now.
He worked by lantern-light, hands steady.
No shadow weaving.
No concepts stitched in.
Just craft.
He opened a seam along the inner lining and let the shadows rest there — not shaping, not deepening, simply holding the idea of space the way they had learned to.
The pocket formed quietly.
Too quietly.
Inside, it was vast.
Not infinite.
Not unstable.
Just… more.
Enough for tools.
Enough for masks not yet finished.
Enough for the beginnings of something he wasn't ready to name.
Elias studied it for a long moment.
Then he closed the seam.
Carefully.
Patiently.
When he was done, there was nothing to see.
Not a ripple.
Not a tell.
Just a single thread — slightly darker than the rest — that would only catch the eye if someone already knew it was there.
No one did.
He stood, donned the cloak, and looked at his reflection.
Unremarkable.
Good.
Choosing Not to VanishThe next day, Elias walked through Mirage carrying everything he needed to begin making his first mask.
No one stopped him.
No one followed him.
No one remembered seeing him enter the Academy wing at all.
He felt the temptation then.
Just for a moment.
To lean into it.
To let himself slip fully between attention and absence.
But he didn't.
Not yet.
Instead, he observed.
How long people forgot.
What kinds of interactions erased him faster.
Where presence lingered — and where it dissolved instantly.
He was mapping forgetting the way he once mapped fire.
That night, as he laid the mask materials out on his desk, Elias paused.
"…Not yet," he murmured.
The shadows did not respond. They hadn't been doing it since he figured out the truth of them , even though he still thought of them as "them" or more like him. His Equinox,
They didn't need to.
He wasn't disappearing.
He was learning how the world lets go.
And somewhere between markets, ledgers, and a wagon that creaked contentedly in the dark, Elias Marlow became something far more dangerous than hidden.
He became unremarkable.
—————————————————————
The Council chamber was quiet in the way only places built for authority ever were.
Not peaceful.
Not calm.
Quiet like a held breath.
The silver-masked Councillor tapped a finger against a stack of ledgers.
Once.
Twice.
Again.
"These do not align."
Across the crescent table, the bronze mask leaned forward.
"Clarify."
"Movement logs," the silver mask said. "Personnel interactions. Supply requisitions. Observation tallies."
A pause.
"They resolve outcomes without consistent attribution."
The gold mask frowned.
"You are saying the records are incomplete?"
"No," the silver mask replied slowly. "I am saying they are complete — but incoherent."
A murmur followed.
The obsidian mask spoke next.
"There are no gaps."
"That," the silver mask said, "is precisely the problem."
They spread the documents across the table — patrol notes, merchant permits, Academy transit logs.
Events were there.
Consequences were there.
The cause was… diffuse.
"This shipment was ordered, paid for, delivered, and installed," the bronze mask said.
"…By whom?"
Silence.
A junior scribe had written 'associate'.
Another wrote 'second party present'.
One simply wrote 'resolved'.
No name repeated.
No pattern.
The gold mask stiffened.
"Is this sabotage?"
"No signs of falsification," obsidian replied. "Ink is correct. Seals are valid. Witnesses recall events occurring."
"Do they recall people?" the bronze mask demanded.
The silver mask hesitated.
"…Vaguely."
That word landed badly.
A long pause stretched.
Then, quietly:
"Prime-Three."
Aster stepped forward from the shadows at the chamber's edge.
"Yes."
The silver mask turned toward her.
"You have been overseeing Elias Marlow."
"I have."
"Explain this."
Aster glanced at the documents.
She did not pick them up.
"This is not corruption," she said calmly. "Nor evasion."
"Then what is it?"
Aster folded her hands behind her back.
"It is the expected outcome of encouraging him to be uninteresting."
The bronze mask snapped:
"This is not what we meant."
"No," Aster agreed. "But it is what you asked for."
She lifted her head.
"You wanted him normalized. You wanted him indistinct. You wanted him embedded in civilian routines."
Her voice sharpened — just slightly.
"You are now experiencing what that looks like when applied perfectly."
The obsidian mask leaned forward.
"…You are telling us the system is functioning as intended."
"Yes," Aster said.
"And that is why," the silver mask said slowly, "we are frightened."
Aster met their gaze.
"As you should be."
A pause.
Then the gold mask asked the question none of them liked:
"If we summoned him now… would he come?"
Aster considered.
"Yes."
"And if we lost track of him tomorrow?"
She did not answer immediately.
When she did, her voice was level.
"You would not notice the moment it happened."
Silence swallowed the chamber whole.
Finally, the silver mask said:
"Ensure this… does not progress further."
Aster inclined her head.
"I will do my best."
She did not say how.
Rellin decided to keep track of Elias.
This was, in hindsight, a mistake.
It started simply enough.
Morning.
Rellin watched Elias leave the dormitory wing — plain clothes, neutral posture, no shadows misbehaving.
"Right," Rellin muttered. "I can do this."
He followed at a respectable distance.
Elias walked through the bazaar, stopped at three stalls, exchanged coin, nodded twice, left.
Easy.
Then Rellin stopped to argue with a spice vendor.
Not long.
Barely a minute.
When he turned back—
"…Elias?"
Gone.
Rellin spun in place.
No panic.
No assumptions.
"He's fast," he told himself. "That's all."
He scanned.
There — half a block away.
Elias stood near a fabric stall, examining bolts with mild interest.
Rellin exhaled.
"See? Fine."
He followed again.
This time Elias entered a narrow side street.
Rellin waited three seconds — three — before following.
The street was empty.
No doors opening.
No footfalls.
No shadows moving strangely.
Just… gone.
Rellin broke into a jog.
He checked adjacent alleys.
Circled twice.
Asked a fruit seller.
"Boy with dark hair?" she said. "Just left."
"Which way?"
She pointed vaguely. "That way."
Which way was that way?
An hour passed.
Then two.
Rellin found Elias again by accident — standing patiently outside a clerk's office Rellin hadn't known existed.
"Where did you go?" Rellin demanded.
Elias blinked.
"…Here?"
"That's not an answer!"
Elias frowned. "I walked."
Rellin stared at him.
Hard.
"You didn't do anything," Rellin said slowly. "Did you."
"No."
"You didn't hide."
"No."
"You didn't use… the thing."
Elias shook his head.
Rellin rubbed his temples.
"Then how did you—"
A bell rang nearby.
Someone called Rellin's name.
He looked away.
Just for a second.
When he looked back—
Elias was no longer waiting.
Not running.
Not fleeing.
Simply… no longer occupying the space Rellin had been watching.
Rellin stood there until the bell stopped ringing.
Until people passed him with puzzled looks.
Until the day moved on without consulting him.
By evening, Elias reappeared at the shed as if nothing had happened.
"Did you finish your errands?" Rellin asked weakly.
"Yes."
"…All of them?"
"Yes."
Rellin sat down hard on a crate.
"…I lost you four times."
Elias hesitated.
"…I didn't mean to."
"I know," Rellin said hoarsely. "That's what scares me."
He looked at Elias — really looked.
"You're not sneaking," he said. "You're not hiding."
Elias waited.
"You're just… not sticking."
Elias lowered his gaze.
"I can try to be louder."
Rellin laughed once — sharp and humorless.
"No," he said. "Please don't."
He stood, exhausted.
"If I can't keep track of you when I'm trying…"
He didn't finish the thought.
Elias didn't ask him to.
The wagon creaked softly nearby, a witness to nothing in particular.
And Rellin learned something deeply unsettling:
If Elias ever decided to leave…
No one would chase him.
Because no one would notice he was gone.
——————————————————————
Aster closed the door to her quarters and activated every privacy ward she was legally allowed to use.
Then two more she technically wasn't.
The room settled into stillness — not silence, but insulation. A controlled environment.
Good.
She unrolled the slate map across her desk and placed a single marker at the center.
Elias Marlow.
She exhaled once and began.
First method: Mana resonance tracing.
She already knew the result. Still, she tested it.
Nothing.
No residual signature.
No harmonic echo.
No distortion field.
Like trying to track a shadow cast by a concept.
Aster noted the failure without irritation and moved on.
Second method: Shadow displacement analysis.
She overlaid known shadow-path heuristics, cross-referenced with Academy movement models.
Result: inconclusive.
Shadows existed.
They behaved.
They did not indicate.
As if the shadows themselves did not consider Elias an event worth remarking upon.
Aster frowned.
Third method: Witness triangulation.
She reviewed reports.
"Passed through."
"Was present."
"Left."
No one recalled when.
No one recalled how.
One witness wrote: 'I believe he was there before I noticed him.'
Another: 'He did not draw attention.'
Aster pinched the bridge of her nose.
Fourth method: Ward response testing.
She triggered low-level detection fields near his usual routes.
Nothing activated.
No resistance.
No evasion.
No correction.
The wards behaved as if Elias had never intersected them at all.
Which meant—
She stopped.
Slowly lowered her quill.
"…You are not evading detection," she murmured to the empty room.
"You are failing to qualify as a disturbance."
That was worse.
Much worse.
Aster leaned back, staring at the ceiling.
"Fine," she muttered. "Then let's be stupid."
She stood, cloak half-on, already recalibrating her thinking.
"If magic won't see you," she said under her breath, "then perhaps something older will."
She exited her quarters, still muttering to herself.
She found Rellin in the shed.
Of course she did.
He was filing down a wooden edge with the resigned patience of a man who expected disappointment but refused to rush toward it.
Aster stepped inside without announcing herself.
"I cannot track him," she said.
Rellin didn't look up.
"Morning to you too."
"I have tested arcane detection, institutional surveillance, behavioral modeling, and shadow-path heuristics," Aster continued, pacing slightly. "None of them function."
"Uh-huh."
"He does not register as absence," she said sharply. "Nor presence. He simply… resolves."
Rellin glanced up now.
"…That sounds bad."
"It is unacceptable," Aster snapped. "There are systems for this."
Rellin went back to sanding.
"Have you tried looking?"
She froze.
"…I beg your pardon?"
Rellin shrugged.
"I mean literally. With eyes. Following him."
"I have," Aster said stiffly.
"And?"
"I lost him."
Rellin nodded.
"Right."
Aster turned to face him.
"Do you have something useful to contribute, or are you attempting to die today?"
Rellin considered that.
Then said, casually:
"Well… if magic doesn't work, why not use hunters?"
Aster blinked.
"…Hunters."
"Yes," Rellin said. "You know. People who track animals."
Silence.
Aster stared at him.
"…Explain."
Rellin gestured vaguely.
"Footprints. Disturbed dust. Bent grass. Scent. All that boring, practical nonsense."
Aster opened her mouth.
Closed it.
Opened it again.
"…You are suggesting," she said carefully, "that after centuries of arcane development, intelligence networks, and metaphysical surveillance—"
"Yes," Rellin said pleasantly.
"—the correct method is mud."
"And dogs," Rellin added helpfully. "Dogs are excellent."
Aster stared.
Then—
She laughed.
Once.
Short.
Sharp.
Genuine.
It surprised both of them.
"…I have been attempting to locate him as a phenomenon," she said slowly.
"And he's just… a person," Rellin said. "Walking places."
Aster's laughter faded into something thoughtful.
"…No," she said. "He is not just a person."
She turned toward the wagon, eyes distant.
"But you may be correct that I am looking in the wrong layer of reality."
Rellin nodded, satisfied.
"Magic forgets the obvious. Happens all the time."
Aster paused at the door.
"…If I deploy mundane trackers," she said, "and they fail…"
Rellin smiled faintly.
"Then you've got a bigger problem."
Aster nodded once.
"Yes," she said quietly. "Then I truly have an anomaly."
She left the shed without another word.
Rellin watched her go.
"…Huh," he muttered. "I helped."
The wagon creaked.
It did not disagree.
——————————————————————
The hunter was good.
Not Academy-trained. Not arcane-touched. Just good.
His name was Harrek, and he had tracked people through rain, snow, ash-fall, and once through a wine cellar after a brawl that involved three barrels and a goat. He trusted his eyes, his nose, and the way the ground spoke if you bothered to listen.
Aster's instructions had been simple.
"Follow him," she had said.
"No magic."
"No interference."
"Report when you lose him."
Harrek had smiled at that.
People always thought they were special until they weren't.
He picked up Elias Marlow's trail near the lower bazaar.
Clean footfalls.
Even stride.
No hurry.
No hesitation.
Good balance, Harrek noted. Light on the heel. Doesn't drag.
He followed.
Past a bread stall.
Across a stone bridge.
Down a narrow lane where refuse gathered and rats watched like judges.
The trail was perfect.
Too perfect, maybe—but Harrek had learned not to distrust clean work. Some people just moved like that.
He paused once, crouched, brushed fingers across the dust.
"…Huh."
The prints weren't light.
They weren't heavy.
They were decisive.
Someone who knew exactly how much of the world needed to notice him.
Harrek stood and kept going.
After an hour, he frowned.
Not because the trail was gone.
Because it wasn't.
It never weakened.
No scuffing.
No overlap.
No false step.
Just… continuity.
"Alright," Harrek muttered. "Clever, then."
He turned a corner.
So did the trail.
He crossed a small square.
So did the trail.
He stopped suddenly.
The trail stopped with him.
Harrek slowly turned in place.
"…You're good," he said to no one.
He crouched again.
Touched the stone.
The prints were fresh.
Not fading.
Not disturbed.
Like they had been placed there and then politely abandoned.
He looked up.
Nothing.
No alleys branching off.
No doors recently opened.
No carts.
No crowds.
Just a quiet stretch of road and the uncomfortable sensation of being slightly late to a joke.
Harrek scratched his beard.
"…Alright," he said. "We'll do this properly."
He stood and resumed walking.
Five minutes later, he heard footsteps behind him.
Measured.
Even.
Unhurried.
Good pace.
Harrek didn't turn.
"Bit rude," he called over his shoulder. "Walking up on someone like that."
The footsteps slowed.
Then matched his pace exactly.
Harrek smiled faintly.
Amateur mistake.
"You should've broken stride," he said. "Matching like that, tells me your thinking."
Silence.
He stopped.
The footsteps stopped.
Harrek turned.
And found himself looking at Elias Marlow.
Standing there.
Hands folded loosely behind his back.
Head slightly tilted.
Curious.
"Oh," Elias said. "Hello."
Harrek stared.
Then looked down.
Then back up.
Then slowly turned in a full circle.
"…You're supposed to be ahead of me."
Elias blinked. "Really? Then I definitely am, you look like you know your business."
"That's not how that works."
"I think," Elias said carefully, "that it is."
Harrek squinted.
"…Have you been following me?"
"Yes," Elias said honestly. "For a while now."
Harrek felt something cold settle between his shoulders.
"…Why."
"You were very good at it," Elias replied. "I wanted to see whatever it was that you were doing."
Harrek laughed once.
Short.
Sharp.
"No," he said. "No, no. That's not—"
He stopped.
The realization crept in slowly.
He looked at Elias.
Then back down at the ground.
The prints.
The entire time.
"…I wasn't tracking you," Harrek said quietly.
Elias smiled, faintly apologetic.
"No," he agreed. "You weren't."
Harrek straightened.
"…I was tracking myself."
"Yes."
Silence.
The kind that presses on the ears.
Harrek exhaled slowly.
Rubbed his face.
Laughed again—this time shaky.
"Well," he said. "That's new."
Elias shifted his weight.
"I'm sorry if I interfered. I didn't realize you were… hunting."
Harrek looked at him very carefully now.
"You disappear a lot," he said.
"I try not to," Elias replied. "It just happens."
Harrek nodded.
"Right."
He took a step back.
Then another.
"Listen," he said, voice steady but eyes alert, "I think… I think I'm done for the day."
"That seems reasonable," Elias said.
Harrek hesitated.
"…You're not going to—"
"No," Elias said quickly. "I don't want anything from you."
"…Good."
Harrek turned.
Walked away.
Did not run.
He did not look back.
Later that evening, Harrek returned to Aster with a single, carefully written report.
Result: Trail acquired successfully.
Duration: 1 hour, 17 minutes.
Failure point: Total.
Notes:
Subject did not evade tracking.
Subject allowed tracking to complete.
At conclusion, subject was behind me.
Recommendation:
Do not pursue further.
If you must observe, do so indirectly.
Preferably from a different profession.
At the bottom, in smaller handwriting, one final line:
If this boy ever decides to hunt, pray he does not become curious.
Aster read it twice.
Then a third time.
She folded the report very carefully.
"…Of course," she murmured.
Far away, Elias Marlow was returning to his room, mildly puzzled but satisfied.
Hunters, he thought.
Interesting people.
He made a note to avoid them in the future.
Not out of fear.
Out of politeness, they seem easily frazzled.