The transport glided to a stop on soft, humming wheels. The moment Avenya stepped down, her breath caught.
The school didn't look real.
It looked like a memory someone tried to paint — with towers so tall they pierced the clouds, their windows aglow with soft spells, and walkways that bent through open sky like music frozen in stone.
But it wasn't just the grandeur of the buildings.
It was the people.
Students were arriving in clusters. Some wore polished cloaks lined with fur, coats threaded with runes that glittered. Gold brooches, leather-bound cases with family seals. They didn't carry bags — attendants followed them, whispering in low tones.
Avenya stepped aside to let a group pass. One of them, a tall boy with icy gray eyes and a cloak clasped with a lion crest, glanced at her briefly.
Not cruelly. Just… curiously.
She looked away quickly.
"Wealth-born," someone muttered beside her. "Descendants of the Council Houses."
Avenya didn't reply. She didn't know what that meant — only that whatever power they were born into, she'd never had a drop of it.
Not yet.
When they were gathered in the courtyard for their formal welcome, Avenya stood at the edge of the group, arms folded tightly under the scratchy sleeves of her only coat. Around her, voices hummed.
Some students whispered about the instructors, others about bloodlines and ancient spells.
And some — the wealthy ones — were already falling into place. As though they knew each other from birth. Names like Rael, Elinor, and Cassien passed between them. They didn't seem unkind — just distant, practiced, as if life had always prepared them to stand above others.
Cassien, the boy with the lion crest, stood among them.
He was quiet, his presence not loud but undeniable. Something about him was... still. Heavy with the kind of silence people listened to.
She caught him watching her again.
Just a glance.
But there was something behind it — not recognition, but interest. A puzzle. A thread he couldn't place.
Avenya looked away again, pulse ticking in her neck.
Her room was simple — two beds, a single lamp that floated midair and dimmed at her voice. The wardrobe opened only when she whispered her name. A window stretched above her bed like a skylight, catching the stars as they emerged.
Lysa was already sprawled on her bed, shoes kicked off.
"Did you see the nobles?" Lysa asked, biting into an apple. "So shiny I almost went blind."
"I noticed," Avenya said, sitting on her own bed carefully.
"Don't worry," Lysa grinned. "They mostly stick to themselves unless they want something. Like a duel. Or a dance."
"Dance?"
"Ballroom. Big thing in second term. It's how they pick favorites. Alliances. All that noble fluff."
Avenya stayed quiet.
She'd never danced.
The school was a maze of magic and memory. Scroll-laden halls. Ceilings that changed with the weather. Candles that floated. Stone archways that whispered history if you paused long enough to listen.
Her first class — Energy & Elemental Flow — began with quiet breathwork. Avenya closed her eyes, steadying her thoughts. She was used to stillness. It had kept her safe when she had nothing else.
The instructor passed a crystal orb around. Students tried to coax light from it, most barely managing a flicker.
When it reached Avenya, it warmed before she touched it.
Her fingers brushed the surface.
The orb flared — a soft, golden glow filling the room like sunlight.
It dimmed just as fast.
The room went still.
"Interesting," the instructor said.
"Lucky," someone whispered behind her.
She turned.
Cassien — the boy with the lion crest — was watching her again.
Not with jealousy.
With calculation.
And something almost like... wonder.
Each student was called to be registered formally.
Avenya stood in line, watching as names like "Elinor of House Vale" and "Cassien Therai of Solspire" were announced with pride, each followed by subtle bows and murmurs of approval from the attendants.
When it was her turn, the clerk hesitated.
"Name?"
"Avenya."
"Family line?"
"None."
A pause.
"Origin?"
"Westmoor district. No record."
The clerk nodded, expression unreadable. He handed her a silver-threaded token marked only with a blank seal.
Cassien stood two places away. She could feel his gaze.
Later, she passed him in the hall. He didn't speak.
But as they crossed paths, he paused and murmured softly without looking at her:
"Names are only beginnings."
Then he was gone.
Avenya kept to herself. She studied. She trained. She explored the edges of the school when no one else was awake. But slowly, she began to notice the rhythm of the place.
Whispers moved in the halls.
Rumors of a war on the horizon.
Of a power lost long ago that might one day return.
One night, she found herself standing before an old tree in the underground gardens. Its bark shimmered in the dark — black shot with faint gold.
She touched it.
It pulsed.
You are more than they see.
She jerked her hand away.
The tree said nothing more.
But when she turned, she found someone watching from the shadows.
Cassien.
He didn't move.
Didn't speak.
Then he simply nodded once — as if he knew something she didn't — and walked away.