The brass key felt unnervingly cold in Miklós’s palm, a sliver of deceit nestled amongst his fingers. Treaty summit preparations churned around the Sovereign Lyceum like a restless tide. Delegates in their finest ceremonial robes flowed through the grand halls, their laughter and pronouncements echoing against the frescoed ceilings. He moved with purpose, a phantom in the gilded throng, guided by Réka’s sparse directions and his own intimate knowledge of the Lyceum’s bones. He found the ventilation conduit Réka described tucked away behind a maintenance panel in a rarely used service corridor. The air within was thick with the scent of aged dust and ozone from the magical wards. Miklós inserted the key. With a series of precise, soft clicks, the ancient mechanism yielded. He slipped inside, replacing the panel, and plunged into a claustrophobic world of metal ducts and faint, distant light. His Glasswright’s eye, trained to see the play of light and shadow, was his greatest asset. He knew how light bent, how it reflected, how it could betray. He moved through the labyrinthine passages, avoiding the shimmering threads of detection spells by predicting their refractive patterns, pressing himself against the cool metal when a delegate’s voice drifted too close through a vent. A bead of sweat traced a path down his temple. He could feel the pulse of the building around him, a low thrum that vibrated through the floor plates. After what felt like an age, the ducts opened into a cavernous space beneath the central hall. This was no dusty archive; it was a secure data vault, a chamber of cold, polished obsidian and humming, enchanted workstations. Rows of sealed, crystalline data spires glowed with a faint internal light, stretching into the gloom like a silent, waiting army. This was the Ætherium Repository, the Chancellery’s final resting place for secrets. The key Réka provided was not for a physical lock here. It was a cipher. He approached a lectern terminal recessed into the wall, its interface a blank sheet of polished stone. He pressed the key’s unique symbol against it. The stone surface rippled, then resolved into a glowing menu of archived files. He entered ‘Varkonyi, Ilona’. The mechanism whirred, a soft, almost imperceptible sound in the vast chamber. A file materialized: a stark, monochrome portrait of a younger Ilona, her eyes holding a faint, artistic spark he recognized from the redacted student file. Beneath her name, in chilling crimson text, the words screamed at him: **STATUS: RETIRED – ERASURE PROTOCOL: PERMANENT. EXECUTION PENDING: POST-TREATY SUMMIT.** Air scraped in Miklós’s throat, dry and thin. Retired. Erasure Protocol. Not a quiet life, not anonymity. Annihilation. The chilling truth, stark and merciless, punched through him. He scrolled frantically, seeing dozens of similar entries: agents ‘retired’, lives ‘erased’. A methodical culling emerged, page after page of agents who had served only to become liabilities. Ilona was not unique in her fate; she was just one more cog in Chancellor Ottó’s brutal machinery. He typed ‘Szilágyi, Réka’. Another file. And beneath it, a linked sub-file: ‘Szilágyi, Family – Investigation into Anomalous Power Consolidation Scheme’. Miklós opened it. The digital pages blurred past, detailing Réka’s parents, both high-ranking Weavers, who had stumbled upon Ottó’s true ambition: not the protection of the ungifted, as he so publicly proclaimed, but the systematic seizure of their land and assets, funnelling wealth into his own burgeoning power base, funding his private legion, his ‘Iron Wardens’. The family was marked for ‘asset redistribution and memory scrubbing’ – a euphemism for their complete removal. Réka’s 'erased' past wasn't an accident, but a deliberate act of suppression. The chill in his ribs burned down to flint. Ilona, a gentle soul, was being sacrificed not for the state’s good, but for Ottó’s avarice. Réka's family was destroyed for the same reason. He had to expose this. He had to save Ilona. He began to siphon the files into a portable reservoir crystal. A piercing klaxon split the vault. The skin across his forearms prickled. Red warning lights strobed across the obsidian walls, painting the room in a pulsating crimson. A deep, resonant voice, amplified by the vault’s acoustics, boomed from the entrance he had used. “Well, well. It seems my little mouse has found its way into the lion’s den.” Miklós spun, heels sliding on the slick obsidian. Chancellor Ottó stood silhouetted against the flashing red light, his imposing figure framed by two hulking guards in the distinctive black and silver armor of the Iron Wardens. Ottó’s smile was not benevolent; it was a predatory baring of teeth. The usual mask of paternal benevolence had stripped away, leaving only flat calculation. “The Glasswright,” Ottó said, his voice laced with chilling amusement, “meddling where he doesn’t belong. Did you truly believe you could outwit me, boy? My wards are not so easily bypassed. I confess, I am surprised. You have spirit.” He took a slow, deliberate step into the vault, his gaze sweeping over the pedestal, then settling on Miklós. “But spirit will not save you from the inevitable.” Miklós clutched the data spire, the incriminating files still transferring. He was trapped. The alarms shrieked, a deafening cacophony. Ottó advanced, his thin mouth curling. He had walked right into a snare. And the man who held Ilona’s life in his hands was now standing directly before him, an icy, confident predator. The Iron Wardens sealed the sole archway, leaving him cornered before the architect of Ilona's quiet execution.

The Lyceum's Ghost