There are rooms in the Imperial Academy that feel like places.
Then there are rooms that feel like decisions.
The Chancellor's office was the latter.
It wasn't that it was large — though it certainly was, with a ceiling high enough to echo and windows that stared down on half the Empire. It was the way the walls murmured. Not literally, but in the way old furniture does when it remembers more than it should.
The wood was etched with invisible runes. The scent of stormlight ink and pressed vellum lingered in the air. And behind the desk, seated as if he'd been carved from consequence, was the Chancellor himself.
He smiled.
"Princess Arwen. And… guest."
I hissed.
Arwen didn't flinch. "You summoned us. I assumed that meant you'd use names."
He steepled his fingers. "The academy registry doesn't list one. Nor does the royal archive. Nor, to my knowledge, any catalog maintained by the Binder's Assembly. That makes him… anomalous."
"He's mine," Arwen said flatly.
"I don't dispute that. But anomalies unsettle balance. And balance is very dear to us here."
He gestured to a porcelain teapot on a side table. The cups were carved from stardust porcelain. Delicate. Beautiful. Probably enchanted to measure your soul while you sipped.
"Tea?"
"No," Arwen said immediately.
I waddled toward it, sniffed a cup, and spat into it. The tea turned green. Something fizzled.
"Charming," the Chancellor said mildly. "Truthroot infusion. Harmless to most familiars."
"He's not 'most,'" Arwen snapped. "And we didn't come to sip lies disguised as politeness."
He tilted his head. "Then let's speak plainly."
He rose — slow, precise, tall in a way that shadows clung to.
"The orchard surge was not minor," he said. "Three spirit alarms triggered. The soul chart flared. And half the Tea Society is demanding his registration."
"They can demand a new set of manners while they're at it," Arwen muttered.
"I admire your restraint," the Chancellor said. "Were it me, I would've hexed Miora halfway to a plant pot."
Arwen didn't answer.
He folded his hands behind his back. "You know what this means. You saw the surge. You've felt the bond. The spirit you carry is not just unusual. It's untethered."
"He's loyal," Arwen said.
"Loyalty is not the issue. Recognition is. That surge was not a familiar's echo — it was a soul declaration. That puts him under Clause Seven."
Arwen's knuckles tightened. "You want to classify him."
"I want to understand him. The Empire does not tolerate spiritual wildfires. And this one is burning quite… colorfully."
"I won't register him," she said.
"I'm not asking you to. Yet."
He turned to me, eyes suddenly gentler. "And you, small one. Do you understand the danger you're in?"
I blinked.
I sneezed.
Then I climbed onto Arwen's head like a crown made of fluff and defiance.
The Chancellor chuckled. "Excellent answer."
He sat again, slow and thoughtful. "You remind me of someone, Arwen. Your mother, perhaps. But she never had your restraint."
"Nor your scheming," she said.
He didn't deny it.
"But consider this a warning, not a threat. Others won't be as courteous as I am. They will come. With papers. With laws. With blades that carry mandates."
Arwen stood. "Then they'd better learn to miss."
She didn't bow.
We left.
And the silence behind us lingered like a sealed verdict.
---
Back in our dorm, Arwen paced the floor until her boots wore worry into the carpet. I curled up in a nest of stolen tea towels and chewed a dried plum pit for comfort.
"He was calm," she muttered. "Too calm."
I chirped.
"They're going to escalate. Registrar visits. Thread probes. Spirit inquiries. And if anyone from the Binder's Assembly shows up…"
She paused.
I flapped onto her shoulder, fluff pressed to her neck.
"I wasn't supposed to care," she said, quiet now. "This place was just a waystation. I was meant to endure, excel, escape."
I nuzzled her cheek.
"But then you bit the Chancellor's pigeon."
That had, in fact, happened during orientation.
She sat down, finally, and buried her face in her hands.
"You don't even know what you are," she whispered. "But they'll try to define it. Claim it. Twist it."
I chirped again, softer.
"I won't let them."
---
The next morning, the Academy hummed with gossip. Soulbeasts weren't supposed to surge outside of combat. They especially weren't supposed to glow.
I accidentally set a pencil on fire just by sneezing.
Arwen didn't let me out of sight. She carried me in her satchel, on her shoulder, even once stuffed in the sleeve of her coat like a weird noble ferret. When someone tried to approach, she smiled with all the warmth of winter.
Still, whispers trailed behind us.
"Did you see the surge?"
"He bit Professor Hale's robe last week."
"I heard he was part phoenix. Or maybe part god?"
A first-year tried to offer me a cookie. I accepted it. Then bit his sleeve. Balance.
---
Elsewhere in the Academy, the real danger brewed.
The Binder's Assembly was not a club. It was a council — unofficial but iron-clad. Their job was to catalogue and classify all spirit-familiars within imperial jurisdiction.
They had been watching Arwen since day one.
And now, they made their move.
A dossier landed on the center of a long table. Arwen's face stared out in profile. Next to it, a blurred image of me mid-pounce.
"Unregistered. Ascendant-class potential. Abnormal bond flares."
"Dangerous," one binder said.
"Corruptible," said another.
"Powerful," said the third, lips curling in thought.
A decision was made.
---
That evening, Arwen received a gilded envelope. Another summons. Not from the Chancellor.
From the Assembly itself.
She read it.
She didn't speak.
She burned it.
"They want an inspection," she finally said.
I hissed.
"It's not optional."
I chirped something rude in three languages.
But she only stared out the window, into the clouds where lightning traced the edge of the world.
"If they try to touch you," she whispered, "I'll remind them what the Nightveil bloodline really means."
I didn't know what that meant yet.
But I believed her.
---
That night, we didn't dream.
We planned.
And for the first time, I wasn't just a passenger in Arwen's arms. I was her anchor.
The Empire would come.
Let them.
We had teeth too.