Two days later, a folded slip of parchment waited in his rune-etched locker.
"Could you meet me in the Old Archive Annex for a moment before your Runecrafting Practical today?"
Kaelen smoothed the brittle paper. Curiosity pricked, then faded. A summons was common. Perhaps a missed assignment. This academy, Lumina Arcanum, buzzed with clandestine requests. He dismissed any other thought. Such sentiments were for the noble scions, not for a scholar like him. Not here.
He forgot the note entirely until the chime signaling fourth period, the Runecrafting Practical, echoed through the halls. Changing into his specialized smock, Kaelen remembered. A faint pull of annoyance stirred within him.
Arriving at the Old Archive Annex, its heavy oak door slightly ajar, Kaelen pushed it open. Dust motes danced in the slivers of light filtering through grimy, leaded windows. A hushed silence hung in the air, thick with the scent of aged parchment and forgotten knowledge.
Lysander stood near a towering shelf, spine pressed against the worn bindings of ancient grimoires. His dark hair, usually so meticulously combed, now seemed to cling to his brow with a nervous sweat. Small fingers picked at the cuff of his academy uniform.
"Lysander?"
Kaelen’s voice, though quiet, seemed to startle the other student. Lysander’s head snapped up. His eyes, wide and unnervingly bright, fixed on Kaelen. A faint, almost imperceptible tremor ran through his slight frame. He offered a hesitant, lopsided smile, one Kaelen remembered from their very first interaction. That smile, once merely odd, now felt like a cold tendril of obligation winding around Kaelen’s heart.
Kaelen’s brow furrowed. "What is it? Why here?"
Lysander wrung his hands, his gaze darting around the dim annex. "Ah, Kaelen... I... I have something I want to say..."
"Speak quickly."
Kaelen felt a prickle of unease. Remaining alone with Lysander carried its own risk. Whispers traveled fast in Lumina Arcanum. He needed to maintain a pristine image, one untainted by the shadows that clung to Lysander. His interactions with Lysander were strictly professional, helpful just enough, never more. A careful distance was vital.
Lysander, oblivious to Kaelen's growing impatience, continued to twist his fingers. He chewed on his lower lip. His face, pale and drawn, betrayed a struggle between indecision and a desperate resolve. Each time he seemed on the verge of speech, his mouth clamped shut, a silent battle raging behind his eyes.
Irritation coiled in Kaelen's gut. Lysander’s quiet intensity always grated. His silence, his nervous fidgeting – it all felt like an imposition. Kaelen knew he was perhaps overly sensitive, but the sheer burden of Lysander’s presence was a constant weight.
"Look, I apologize, but my class begins momentarily. Can you simply state your purpose?" Kaelen’s voice was sharper than he intended.
His mind felt like a frayed runic circle, each glyph sparking with conflicting energy. Perhaps his frustration was not solely directed at Lysander. He carried a heavy internal burden lately, a persistent ache in his stomach, a sign of his growing stress. A yearning to lash out, to find release, simmered beneath his composed exterior.
As Kaelen wrestled with these thoughts, Lysander finally steeled himself. His voice, when it came, was a barely audible stammer.
"Kaelen... I... you see, I..."
"Yes?"
Kaelen scraped a fingernail against his jaw. Time was ticking. He wanted to pry the words from Lysander’s throat, force them out with a practiced runic bind.
---
Just then, the heavy oak door of the annex swung inward. Both Kaelen and Lysander turned, eyes widening.
Lord Darius Valerius stood framed in the doorway, chest heaving. Sunlight from the corridor behind him haloed his dark hair, but his face was shadowed, drawn taut with exertion. His labored breaths filled the silence. Darius had been running. A suffocating pressure seized Kaelen’s chest. He pictured Darius, a noble of immense standing, racing through the hallowed halls, searching for Lysander.
Darius let out a slow, deliberate exhale. He moved into the annex, his strides long and purposeful. Kaelen’s hand, which had subconsciously risen to massage his neck, dropped to his side. Darius’s fierce gaze flickered between Lysander and Kaelen. His fists clenched, then slowly relaxed.
"Why are you here with him?"
His question hung in the air, sharp and accusatory. Kaelen couldn't tell who Darius was addressing, but the intensity of his stare felt like a physical blow.
Beneath Kaelen’s practiced composure, a violent tremor began. His insides felt like they were being pulverized. After a stretched moment, Darius’s eyes settled fully on Kaelen. Kaelen couldn’t bear the weight of that gaze. It was a look of raw, consuming resentment.
"Darius, what is this?"
*Please,* Kaelen pleaded internally, *don't look at me that way. He called me here. Blame Lysander, not me. I am your... your colleague. Why direct such fury at me, caught in this foolishness?*
Darius’s burning eyes remained fixed. Kaelen knew that look. Not passion, not fervor. This was the gaze of a man consumed by anger, by jealousy, by a possessive madness. It was the face of obsession, a deranged love Kaelen found both pitiable and utterly repulsive.
"Why are you here with him!"
You look wretched, Darius. So pathetic. Kaelen stared back, a cold contempt forming within him. Yet, a chilling thought pierced him: *Perhaps the pathetic one is not you, but me.*
Before Kaelen could react, Darius’s long strides closed the distance. As Kaelen looked into his furious face, the world tilted.
"...!"
A sudden impact. Kaelen’s body reeled, then crashed to the flagstone floor. His mind struggled to catch up.
*No... it couldn't be.*
He hit me.
Lord Darius Valerius had struck him.
Kaelen lay stunned, a throbbing pain blooming on his cheek. His trembling fingers touched the spot. Disbelief warred with humiliation. *How could you... how could you do this to me?*
"K-Kaelen!" Lysander cried out.
"You fool! I told you to call me Valerius! No, don’t call me anything at all, you imbecile!" Darius’s voice cracked, a raw, furious scream.
Lysander, horrified, stumbled towards Kaelen, but Darius’s mad rage stopped him short. Lysander’s face, already pale, now drained of all color.
"I-I'm sorry, I'm sorry."
"You promised! You swore to me! Damn it all!"
Lysander recoiled, tears welling in his eyes. But no, Kaelen thought. He was not the one who should be weeping. That right belonged to Kaelen.
A burning sensation pricked at Kaelen’s own eyes. Before the dam could truly break, Darius cursed again, a guttural sound, and seized Lysander by the arm. He dragged the smaller student away, out of the annex, leaving the door ajar. The silence that descended felt heavier than before.
Kaelen remained on the cold floor, staring at the sliver of sunlight streaming through the open door. Something within him shattered. The carefully constructed walls around his emotions crumbled, and hot tears streamed down his face.
He hated everything. Lysander, for his desperate summons, for drawing Kaelen into this. Darius, for his brutal, humiliating assault. Kaelen wished they would both vanish, cease to exist. He felt utterly miserable, reduced to a mere pawn in their twisted drama.
He pushed himself up, his cheek throbbing. Skipping Runecrafting Practical, he made his way to the Archmaster’s office. His swollen, reddened face provided ample evidence for his hastily concocted excuse of a sudden ailment. The Archmaster, a stern but perceptive woman, offered a sympathetic nod, excusing him without further inquiry.
---
Returning to his small, modest townhouse – a stark contrast to the grand residences of Lumina Arcanum’s noble students – Kaelen collapsed onto his bed. He surrendered to an exhausted, dreamless sleep.
Waking hours later, his face felt stiff, puffy, and bruised. Habitually, he retrieved his scrying mirror, checking for any academy communiques. A message from Hadrian Vance glowed faintly on the obsidian surface. Hadrian, Kaelen knew, moved within Darius’s inner circle, a noble in his own right, second only to Darius in terms of influence among their peers. Kaelen had no direct reason to communicate with Hadrian, save for his association with Darius. A sour taste filled Kaelen's mouth.
Were it anyone else, Kaelen would have ignored it. But Hadrian Vance wielded subtle power. He could not be casually dismissed.
*What?* the message read, sent hours ago. *Disappear like a wraith, Kaelen?*
Kaelen clicked his tongue. He chose his words carefully, crafting a response that was light, dismissive.
*Haha, feeling rather under the weather, I’m afraid.*
He needed to conceal the truth. The thought of anyone discovering Darius had struck him, especially because of Lysander, ignited a wave of unbearable humiliation.
*Are you well?* Hadrian’s reply followed swiftly.
Concern from Hadrian Vance? Kaelen frowned. The strangeness of it made him dim his scrying mirror.
Hours drifted by. A profound sadness settled over Kaelen. Even Hadrian's unexpected solicitude felt suffocating. Other academy mates, primarily those he studied with, sent polite inquiries. None of it offered solace.
No one, not a single soul, searched for him as Kaelen yearned. No one was Darius. Kaelen felt a fresh surge of self-disgust. *You are utterly mad,* he told himself. Still, a faint, illogical hope flickered. This was the curse, he reasoned, of being caught in the orbit of maddening, possessive love.
Even understanding this bitter truth, Kaelen lay prone, closing his eyes, doing what he did best: turning away from an inconvenient reality.
"...I am not alone."
Perhaps Lysander and Kaelen shared a similar plight. That twisted, grotesque thought, selfish and childish, clung to him. Lying there, staring at the intricately carved ceiling, his scrying mirror pulsed again. An unknown number.
*Kaelen, are you gravely ill?*
Kaelen’s brow furrowed in irritation. Who among his peers would address him so intimately? Hadrian? But the number was unfamiliar. Before Kaelen could ponder further, a relentless series of messages arrived.
*I am so sorry. Truly, I am.*
*It is all my fault.*
*I am sorry.*
*Please forgive me.*
Each word, whether three or four, fueled Kaelen’s simmering rage. He flung the scrying mirror onto the flagstone floor with a violent clatter. *How did this imbecile acquire my personal frequency? And how is someone who supposedly possesses no personal scrying mirror sending these?*
Then it struck him. Ah. He had called Lysander that night, hadn’t he? At the sanatorium. The memory felt like a fresh wound.
He cursed his own foolishness, letting out a frustrated sigh. To vent the building pressure, he pounded his fists against the mattress until exhaustion claimed him once more. Just before sleep dragged him under, a final message flickered in his mind’s eye, the words echoing on the obsidian.
*Please, do not hate me.*
*Funny,* Kaelen thought, drifting into darkness. *I have despised you for months.*
Next morning, Kaelen woke to a face swollen grotesquely, like a puffed-up bread roll.
---
He skipped the academy. Regardless of his impeccable academic record, Kaelen possessed insufficient passion to attend classes presenting such a disfigured countenance.
Mistress Elara, the family’s long-serving retainer, prepared his midday meal. As he ate, she tutted, chiding him gently to be more careful, her eyes filled with a concern Kaelen rarely afforded himself. Lunch was bland, soft porridge and simply steamed root vegetables – easily swallowed, barely chewed.
Setting his spoon down, reaching for a goblet of spiced water, Elara returned to clear the dishes. Plate in hand, she paused.
"Kaelen, you have a visitor."
"What?"
"Shall I admit them?"
A visitor. The word caused a peculiar flutter in Kaelen’s chest. Before he could identify the emotion, his mind conjured an image.
*Could it be... Darius?*
It seemed a fantastical notion, yet not entirely impossible. Few from Lumina Arcanum knew the location of his humble townhouse. Of his acquaintances, only a handful had ever crossed his threshold. If it were Darius, he must have arrived, finally, to offer some semblance of apology, wracked with guilt over his unprecedented violence. Darius had never, not once, laid a hand on Kaelen before. Yes, he must be consumed by worry and regret.
"Yes, please, admit them."
The fantasy solidified into a quiet certainty. Kaelen chastised himself for such foolish hope, yet a small, undeniable warmth bloomed within him. Despite everything, he was still significant to Darius, still held some importance. This thought, illicit as it was, settled deep in his heart. He turned toward the entry door, his pace quickening with a surge of anticipation.
But the figure waiting there was not the one he had envisioned.
"Yo, Thorne. What’s the word?"
Hadrian Vance, all sharp angles and casual arrogance, stood in his doorway. A playful smirk touched his lips, a small satchel, likely filled with sweetmeats, clutched in his hand. Hadrian’s smirk, however, faltered as his gaze fell upon Kaelen’s face. He stopped mid-step, his tone losing its usual flippancy.
"By the gods, what happened to your face?"
Kaelen’s knees almost buckled from the sudden, crushing disappointment. The internal warmth dissipated, leaving a hollow chill. *How does Hadrian even know where I reside?*
"I... stumbled," Kaelen replied, his voice flat.
Hadrian frowned, twisting his lips in that familiar, sardonic manner before he unleashed a cutting remark.
"You really are a clumsy fool, aren’t you?"
Kaelen offered no argument. He merely rubbed his swollen cheek, a dull ache throbbing beneath his fingertips. Shame washed over him, hot and bitter. His earlier anticipation felt like a monstrous idiocy. Darius did not consider him important. And here Kaelen had been, wagging his tail like a hopeful, idiotic hound.
"Here. Take this."
Hadrian offered him a small, chilled container. Kaelen accepted it, prying off the lid.
"...It’s Matcha sorbet."
"Is it? Never noticed."
"Figures. Why would you care?" Kaelen muttered, the bitterness seeping into his tone.
"Damn, that’s harsh." Hadrian stepped past him, surveying the modest foyer. "What are you even doing cooped up here?"
"What do you think? Came to check on you. Mind if I enter?"
"Hey, wait!"
Hadrian’s long legs carried him further into the house without hesitation.
"Where’s your study?"
"Hey, where are you going?"
"Where else? Not much else of interest in your... home, is there?"
Kaelen had no retort. Hadrian was not wrong. Houses, after all, all served the same basic purpose. He followed Hadrian, feeling awkward, a sense of fresh humiliation washing over him as Hadrian, a scion of privilege, so casually intruded upon Kaelen’s private, unassuming world.