As the carriage jolted along the uneven forest road, the thick canopy of the Wailing Woods finally began to thin. Inside the cramped, velvet-lined interior, the air was heavy with the scent of pine and the lingering metallic tang of spent Aether.
Commander Varkas rode ahead with the main vanguard, leaving a specialized detachment of Academy Knights to flank the carriage. Among them was **Siris**, the detachment's lead scout.
Siris possessed the **sharp, angular features** of her elven ancestors, with **high cheekbones** and **slit-like emerald eyes** that seemed to see through solid objects. Her hair was a **braided vine of deep moss-green**, and her tall, **willowy frame** was encased in flexible leaf-patterned leather armor. The armor clung to her **supple, athletic waist** and **long, powerful legs**, but it was her **heightened senses** that made her dangerous—she could feel the "pulse" of any living thing within a mile.
Inside the carriage, Caelum wasn't resting. He moved between the girls with a quiet, focused intensity that was entirely devoid of his usual predatory heat.
He took **Isolde's** hands—her fingers were still deathly cold. Instead of the aggressive fire he had used in the cave, he channeled a **steady, rhythmic thrum** of Gold Aether. It was a "low-boil" technique, meant to jumpstart her natural circulation without shocking her system.
"Don't pull away," he said softly, his voice a calm anchor. "Your veins are constricted. Let my energy widen the channels."
Isolde looked up at him, her **diamond-blue eyes** wide and glassy. She had expected him to mock her or demand a price for her life. Instead, she felt the genuine, stabilizing care of a master craftsman tending to his finest material. She felt a strange, fluttering warmth in her chest that had nothing to do with magic—a purely human "softening" that made her want to lean her head against his shoulder.
He moved to **Elena**, the fire-mage. Her emerald eyes watched him warily as he examined the gold-film bandages Mina had created. He adjusted the pressure of the slime with a gentle tap. "The redness is fading," he noted, offering her a small, supportive nod. "You fought well, Elena. Most would have folded when the oxygen ran out."
Elena's face flushed a deep crimson, her **full, pouting lips** trembling slightly. No one in the elite circles of the fire-mages had ever praised her for her grit—only her output. To hear it from *him* made her heart race.
Outside, Siris rode parallel to the carriage, her hand resting on the pommel of her sword. Her Wood Aether was flared, her "vines" of perception reaching into the carriage to monitor the health of the VIPs.
She froze as her senses brushed against Caelum.
Usually, when a man was surrounded by four beautiful, vulnerable women, a scout would sense a "spike" in pulse—the jagged, hot rhythm of lust or opportunistic ego. But Caelum's pulse was like a **deep, subterranean river**. It was calm, nurturing, and incredibly vast.
She "saw" through the wooden walls how the girls' Aether signatures were reacting. They weren't just being healed; they were being **attuned**. Their jagged, broken energies were smoothing out, flowing toward Caelum like iron filings to a magnet.
*He isn't taking from them,* Siris thought, her emerald eyes narrowing as she adjusted her seat on her horse. *He is knitting them back together. But he's doing it so perfectly that they won't even realize they've been 'rewired' until they try to leave his side.*
She felt a shiver run down her **lithe spine**. As a Wood-elemental, she was sensitive to "growth." And what she was sensing from Caelum wasn't just magic—it was the growth of a forest that would eventually overshadow the entire Academy.
The spires of the Silver Lily Academy finally appeared on the horizon. As the carriage passed through the gates, the student body had already gathered, tipped off by the early return of the wounded.
Standing at the very front was **Professor Vespera**.
Her indigo eyes immediately locked onto the carriage window. She saw Caelum sitting calmly, with the Academy's "Ice Queen" practically draped over his arm for support, and the fierce Elena looking at him with starry-eyed adoration.
Vespera's hand gripped her staff so hard the wood groaned. She could smell the change in the air—the scent of a "successful reaction" that she hadn't authorized.