Attention has weight.
I felt it before anyone spoke to me, before footsteps slowed or voices dipped. It pressed against my awareness as I crossed the main wing after combat class, subtle but insistent, like a hand resting between my shoulders. The academy had shifted, not loudly, just enough.
Elowen walked beside me quieter than usual. She kept glancing around , then back at me, like she expected something to leap out of the stone walls. "You realize," she said finally, "that Kael doesn't single people out for entertainment."
"I didn't ask to be paired with Rowan." "I know," she said. "That's the problem."
We turned down a narrower corridor, one that smelled faintly of old paper and ash. This wing felt less traveled, less polished. The academy s attention thinned here, but it didn't disappear. It followed.
"People will talk," Elowen continued. "They already are." "About what?"
She gave me a look, "about the human who didn't flinch, about the human who touched an upper-year first."
"That's generous wording." "It's accurate wording."
I stopped walking, Elowen took two steps before realizing I wasn't beside her anymore. She turned, brows knitting. "Liora?"
"I didn't do anything wrong."
"I didn't say you did."
"But they'll act like I did," I said calmly. "And you know that."
She hesitated, then nodded once. "Yes."
That was the thing about this place, innocence wasn't protection. It was an inconvenience. We resumed walking, but the space between us and changed. Elowen was still my closest ally here, but she was also a wolf. She understood the academy's rules in ways I never would. Or maybe ways I refused to.
By the time we reached the lecture wing, the day had sharpened. Students gathered in clusters, their conversations quieter now, threaded with speculation. Some looks slid off me, others lingered too long.
Rowan stood near the archway ahead, speaking with two older students I didn't recognize. They were listening to him, not interrupting. That alone told me enough.
I adjusted the strap of my bag and kept walking. He noticed, I felt it. The same awareness as before, like a line drawn briefly taut between us. His gaze lifted, met mine, held. No surprise , no smile just acknowledgement. I looked away first.
Not because I was intimidated, but because I was disciplined.
The lecture passed without incident, but I absorbed very little of it. Not because my mind wandered, but because something older had surfaced, something coiled tight beneath my ribs.
I had been careful, do careful, controlled movement, limited response. Enough skill to survive, not enough to provoke.
And still, the academy leaned closer.
After class, a message awaited me. No summons, no notes just a request delivered by a first-year runner who wouldn't meet my eyes.
"Professor Kael wants to see you," he said quickly. "Now."
Elowen stiffened beside me. "For what?" The boy shook his head. "Didn't say."
Of course he didn't.
The training wing felt different without the noise of class, emptier, heavier, each step echoed too clearly against the stone floor. The air smelled of iron and something faintly burnt, like magic used too often in the same place.
Kael stood near the weapon racks, arms crossed, expression unreadable. Rowan leaned against one of the pillars nearby, posture relaxed, eyes sharp. That was new.
"I didn't realize this was a group meeting," I said.
Kael's mouth twitched. "It isn't."
Rowan straightened, pushing off the pillar, "I was asked to stay."
Asked, not ordered.
Kael turned his attention fully to me. "You fought with restraint today."
"Yes, sir."
"You could have ended the match faster."
"Yes, sir."
"You chose not to."
I met his gaze evenly. "The rules discouraged it."
A pause, then, a short humourless laugh. "You hide behind rules like someone who knows what happens when they are removed."
The air tightened.
Rowan's attention sharpened, not toward Kael, towards me.
"Why?" Kael asked.
It was a simple question, it carried weight.
"Because attention invites pressure," I replied. "And pressure breaks things."
"Or reveals them," Rowan said quietly.
I didn't look at him.
Kael studied me for a long moment. Then he said, "you've been assessed as human."
"Yes, sir."
"That assessment remains."
I didn't react, inside, something settled... confirmation.
"But," Kael continued, "this academy doesn't run on labels alone, it runs on outcomes."
He stepped closer, stopping just short of my personal space, "Whatever you're hiding," he said, voice low, "make sure it doesn't interfere with my classes."
"Is that a warning?" I asked.
"It's advice."
I nodded once. "Then I'll take it."
Keal stepped back, "you're dismissed."
I turned to leave.
"Liora." I paused.
Rowan's voice held no command. Just curiosity sharpened by intent. "You didn't answer the question."
I faced him now. Met his gaze fully.
"Which one?"
"Why you hide."
The corridor felt very far away. The academy's awareness pressed closer, curious now, hungry.
I let none of it show.
"Because," I said, "people who show everything rarely survive long."
Something flickered across his expression. Recognition, maybe. Or something darker.
I walked away before he could respond.
That night, the forest pressed closer than it had before. The wind carried voices I didn't listen to. I sat at my desk long after Elowen had fallen asleep, staring at my reflection in the darkened window.
Ordinary. Human. Transfer.
All lies. Useful ones.
I reached beneath the floorboard I had memorized earlier that day, fingers brushing the worn edge of an object wrapped in cloth. I didn't unwrap it. I didn't need to.
Memory stirred anyway.
Firelight. Screams cut short. A promise pressed into my palm by hands that shook.
Survive first.
Then return.
I slid the bundle back into place and smoothed the floorboard down. No trace. No evidence.
The academy thought it was watching me now.
It had no idea how long I'd been watching it.
And when the time came not yet, but soon...it would learn what happened when something it tried to categorize finally stopped hiding.