Morning came like it was afraid to.
Light crept in soft and grey through the high, narrow window slits. No harsh brightness, no triumphant sunrise—just a cautious seep of dawn, as if the sky had heard the wards scream and wasn't sure it wanted to be
associated with this place anymore.
John woke to the ache of muscles that hadn't moved in far too long.
His last clear memory was of Brian finally going limp in Doris's arms, the wards settling, Maevra leaving with a storm in her shoulders.
After that, exhaustion had dropped on him like a net. He'd slept where he sat, hunched awkwardly against the side of the bed, one arm still half-wrapped around Doris's waist.
Now his neck protested as he straightened.
Beside him, Doris still slept, her body curled protectively around Brian. The baby's cheek was pressed against her collarbone, his little
fist at his mouth. His breathing was slow, steady, and—most importantly—quiet.
No screams.
No ward surge.
Just the small, stubborn sound of a four-day-old deciding to keep living.
Flint snored softly from his pallet, sprawled on his stomach like he'd lost a fight with gravity and given up arguing. Dorothy sat in the
same chair by the shutters, chin on her chest, staff across her lap. Her eyes were closed, but one hand still rested lightly on the wood, fingers twitching now and then as if feeling invisible threads.
The walls hummed. Not frantically. Not silently. Just a low, steady thrum, like the residual tremor after a lightning strike.
John rubbed his face and stood carefully.
His knees cracked.
He winced.
He checked the door—still closed, sigil faint—not screaming, not bright. A good sign.
Behind him, Doris stirred.
"John?" she whispered.
"I'm here," he said. "We're all here."
Her eyes opened slowly, red-rimmed, lashes clumped from dried tears.
"What time is it?" she murmured.
John listened.
No bells yet. The air had that pre-bell stillness.
"Early," he said. "Before first bell. Everyone's probably pretending they slept through last night."
Flint mumbled into his pillow, "Didn't happen, we're fine, nothing screamed, go back to your essays…"
Dorothy made a soft sound that might have been a laugh or a sigh. "If you listen, you can almost hear the denial."
John crossed to the wash alcove, splashed his face with cold water from the basin, and felt his brain begrudgingly return to full function. He caught sight of himself in the small polished metal plate above the basin.
He looked… older.
Not in the way Maevra or Halvar did. Not with wrinkles earned over decades. More like a piece of metal that had gone through too many quick tempers of heat and cold.
He dried his face and turned back.
Brian shifted.
His dark eyes blinked open.
For a heartbeat, there was that moment John dreaded now—the question: Will he cry? Will he pull on something he shouldn't?
Brian yawned instead.
The tension in the room dropped by half.
Doris kissed the top of his head. "Morning, my love," she whispered. "You caused entirely too much trouble yesterday."
Brian grunted in the vague, unimpressed way of someone who did not accept responsibility for anything that had occurred while he was busy being overwhelmed.
Dorothy stood, stretching slowly, joints popping. "We should get Kaeth," she said. "She'll want to look him over after that… event."
John nodded. "I'll go."
Doris's hand shot out and grabbed his wrist.
"Don't leave long," she said, fingers tight. "Please."
He covered her hand with his. "I won't. I'll shout if any robed lunatic tries to follow me back."
Flint rolled onto his back. "I heard that," he muttered. "I am sitting right here."
"I said what I said," John replied.
The corridor outside their suite was quieter than John expected.
No cluster of curious students. No line of robed faculty eager to "just ask a few harmless questions." Two wardens stood stationed at either end of the hall, spears upright, expressions carefully neutral.
They nodded as John emerged.
"Morning," the nearer one said gruffly. A faint bruise darkened his jaw—maybe from being thrown into a wall by resonant screaming.
"Morning," John replied.
The warden shifted, then added, "Head Rectrix posted extra guard till further notice. No one through without clearance. You call, we answer. Fast."
John studied him.
"Thank you," he said.
The warden looked faintly uncomfortable, as if unaccustomed to being thanked. "Just doing the job," he muttered.
John moved down the hall, following the now-familiar path toward the healer's chambers. The ward hum underfoot felt different today—not frightened, not aggressive. More like… wary.
Like a dog watching someone who had startled it the night before.
The thought was not comforting, but it was better than imagining the wards as hungry.
He reached Kaeth's door and knocked.
"Enter," her voice called.
He stepped inside.
The healer's chamber looked much as it had before—shelves of vials, neat stacks of cloth, a central padded bench. Kaeth herself was bent over a slate, writing in shorthand that looked more like a spell matrix than words. She looked up, eyes sharper than her otherwise tired face.
"John," she said. "I was on my way to you."
"That saves a trip," he said. "He… screamed."
"Yes," she said dryly. "I felt it. Half the city felt it. I imagine the Paragons in their holes felt it, too, and are writing new songs as we speak."
John's stomach clenched. "Can they… track that?"
Kaeth waved a hand. "They can feel it. They can guess at direction. It doesn't give them a map. But we should assume every cult cell
within a hundred leagues now knows something big cried in Aetherion last night."
"Wonderful," John muttered.
Kaeth grabbed her satchel and gestured. "Walk with me. The sooner I see him, the sooner I know if I need to shout at Halvar."
"You shout at Halvar?" John said, following her.
"I shout at everyone," Kaeth said. "That's how healing works in this place: equal opportunity scolding."
Back in the suite, Doris had managed to coax Brian into feeding. He suckled with the quiet, fierce focus of someone who had burned
through too much energy and was now single-mindedly refilling the tank.
Kaeth's gaze sharpened at the sight.
"Good," she said. "If he eats, he mends."
She moved closer, hands already lifting.
Doris stiffened. "Don't—"
Kaeth stopped immediately.
"I won't take him," she said. "I remember our agreement. I only need to touch his back. Two heartbeats. That's all."
Doris hesitated.
John touched her shoulder. "We need to know."
She nodded grudgingly. "Two heartbeats."
Kaeth's fingertips brushed Brian's back—barely any pressure at all.
She closed her eyes. The lines at the corners deepened slightly as she concentrated.
"One," she murmured.
"Two."
Her hand lifted.
"Well?" Doris demanded.
Kaeth exhaled. "His channels look like someone rattled them with a bell," she said. "But they're not cracked. More… stretched. Think of a rope that's been yanked hard. It might itch. It might ache later. But it didn't
snap."
"Can they… stay stretched?" John asked.
"Not at this age," Kaeth said. "He's still growing so fast his body rewrites itself every few hours. By this evening, whatever strain last night left will be knitted over. The problem isn't his physical resilience. It's what he touched."
"The Spire," Doris whispered.
Kaeth nodded grimly. "Yes. Do not repeat this outside these walls, but I might as well be honest with you: every time the Spire pays
attention to someone, it leaves a mark."
"That's supposed to make us feel better?" Flint said.
"It should make you cautious," Kaeth replied. "There are faculty who have dedicated their lives to coaxing a reaction from it. They've
chanted, burned, bled, written treatises thick as my arm trying to get that tower to twitch." She glanced at Brian. "He got it to reach without trying. They will not like that."
Doris's arms tightened around him. "Then they can stay away."
"They won't," Dorothy said quietly. "Curiosity is a disease here."
"Yes," Kaeth said. "But now Maevra has an excellent argument to keep them out: 'Remember when you almost got us all folded into Aether soup because you couldn't leave well enough alone?' It's amazing what near-disasters do for discipline."
Flint snorted. "So we almost died to improve workplace safety. Great."
Kaeth turned to him. "Drink more water today. All of you. The ward scream dehydrated anyone with even a hint of talent. Which includes you, annoyingly."
"Annoyingly?" Flint protested.
"Your nervous system is annoyingly sensitive for a non-mage," Kaeth said. "I'd like it to stay intact."
Flint opened his mouth, paused, and shut it again.
He nodded instead.
Kaeth repacked her satchel.
"Keep him close today," she said. "No new places. No visits to the Spire or the Deep Weave, obviously."
"We weren't planning field trips," John said.
"Good," Kaeth replied. She hesitated at the door. "One more thing. He may be… clingier. More easily spooked. He just brushed up against something old and enormous that he didn't understand. That leaves shadows."
"Shadows?" Doris echoed.
"Memories his body doesn't have words for yet," Kaeth said. "Let him cling. Let him ride your heartbeat back to normal. You're his anchor."
Then she left, footsteps brisk in the hall.
Silence settled.
Flint blew out a breath. "So. Good news: his insides are fine. Bad news: he's haunted by the magical equivalent of a mountain glaring at him."
Dorothy rubbed her temples. "That wasn't a glare. More like… a curious side-eye."
"That makes me feel so much better," Flint said.
John sat beside Doris again.
Brian had finished feeding and was drifting, eyelids drooping, but every few breaths his body jerked, like someone experiencing a
sensory echo—half-remembered fear.
Doris stroked his hair. "We won't let it take you," she whispered. "Not the tower. Not the cult. Not anyone."
Brian didn't answer, of course.
But his breathing slowly evened.
First bell chimed—clear notes this time, no undertone of panic.
The Academy woke.
Footsteps sounded in the corridor. Voices rose. Somewhere distant, a class full of novices groaned in unison at the mention of exams.
Dorothy stood and stretched. "They'll be gossiping already."
Flint raised a hand. "Speaking of gossip—do we expect our informant today?"
"The boy from the garden?" John asked.
"Kael," Doris said. "He wasn't lying about the ward sensitivity."
Dorothy glanced at the small, silver-leafed branch they'd agreed to mark with red cloth for emergencies. It hung bare.
"No urgent news yet," she said. "Which means this morning's nonsense is still making its way down from faculty to students."
Flint made a face. "Trickle-down terror. Classic."
A knock came at the door.
Three short taps.
Halvar's knock.
John opened.
The Master Rector looked like he'd slept even less than they had. Dark circles under his pale eyes, jaw shadowed with stubble. His robe was impeccable, of course. He had the air of a man held together by duty and strong tea.
"How is he?" Halvar asked without preamble.
"Kaeth says his channels are intact," John said. "Just rattled."
"Good," Halvar said. Some tension left his shoulders. "That makes one thing today that isn't worse than it could be."
Flint raised a hand. "How many things are worse than they could be?"
"Several," Halvar said. "But we're containing them."
Doris's expression sharpened. "Contain. Always that word."
Halvar stepped inside, closing the door behind him.
"Honesty again," he said. "Last night scared the entire Academy. You heard the wards. Everyone did. Students panicked, some cried, a few fainted. Several faculty almost caused secondary incidents trying to lock
down their pet projects."
"Pet projects like Rennic's?" Dorothy said flatly.
Halvar's mouth thinned. "Rennic is currently suspended from experimental privileges. Indefinitely."
Flint blinked. "You can do that?"
"I just did," Halvar replied. "Maevra backed me. The Emperor's representative has been sent a strongly worded notice that any
interference with our internal discipline will be treated as willful sabotage of Imperial security."
"So you yelled at Ren," Flint said. "What else?"
"We're re-mapping the arrays near the Spire," Halvar said. "Some of the old lines shouldn't have connected as easily as they did. And
we're adding a new layer to the ward logic around this wing."
John's eyes tightened. "New… layer."
"Not a cage," Halvar said quickly. "Think of it as… padding. We're teaching the wards to interpret his resonance as internal first,
not as a system-wide alert."
"That's possible?" Dorothy asked.
"Difficult," Halvar said. "But yes. It's similar to how we adjusted decades ago for a generation of lightning aspected mages who kept setting off storm barriers every time they sneezed."
Flint blinked. "You had a whole generation of
sneeze-lightning?"
"Yes," Halvar said wearily. "It was a tedious time."
Doris's grip on Brian shifted. "What about…" She swallowed. "What about the Spire?"
Halvar hesitated.
"We don't fully understand why it reacted," he said. "Yet. But we know this: it didn't pull him. It… responded. The difference matters."
"How?" John demanded.
"If it had pulled, the pattern would have shown coercive flow," Halvar said. "Like a riptide. This was… sympathetic. Connected resonance. Two similar notes vibrating together. Unstable, yes. Dangerous, potentially. But not an attack."
"That's your version of comfort?" Flint muttered.
"It's my version of precision," Halvar said. "The Spire noticed him. It didn't try to take him. That's a distinction I'm very interested in preserving."
"And if it tries later?" Doris asked.
"Then Maevra will fight a tower," Halvar said simply. "And I will help. And so will half the staff. We are arrogant enough to believe we can keep our own heart from eating us."
Flint winced. "You say these sentences like they're normal."
"In this building, they are," Halvar said.
He glanced at Brian.
The baby's eyes were half-open now, in that unfocused way that suggested he was awake but not entirely present.
Halvar lowered his voice.
"Outside this room," he said, "the story is already forming. Students are calling him the Echo more loudly. Some think last night proves he's a blessing. Others think he's a walking disaster. Faculty… are divided."
"We've heard worse names," John said.
"Worse names are coming," Halvar replied. "I can't stop people from whispering in corners. I can stop them from acting on those
whispers without oversight."
Doris's jaw clenched. "Will anyone try to separate him from us?"
"Some will argue for it," Halvar said. "On paper. In meetings. Using all the right academic language: 'risk mitigation,' 'study
conditions,' 'security protocol.' Maevra will shut most of them down. Ren from Imperial Security has already sent a recommendation to the Court saying parental presence is stabilising."
Flint blinked. "He backed us?"
Halvar nodded. "Ren is not sentimental, but he's not an idiot. He knows tearing a child away from his anchors after a ward event like
that is more likely to make him volatile than compliant."
Doris sagged with relief. "So he stays."
"For now," Halvar said.
John's hand tightened.
"That 'for now' keeps slipping into all your promises," he said.
Halvar met his gaze.
"I don't make forever promises," he said. "No one can. Circumstances change. Emperors die. Wars start. Towers crack. Anyone who tells you 'nothing will ever change' is either lying or a fool." His voice softened a fraction. "What I can promise is that as long as I hold this chain"—he touched the badge on his chest—"I will fight to keep him with you and out of anyone's control but his own."
Flint studied him. "Why? Really. Not the Academy speech. The you speech."
Halvar considered.
"When I was thirteen," he said slowly, "I manifested a talent that terrified my village. Things… bent around me. Lights went wrong. My father wanted to hide it. My mother wanted to cut it out of me with knives and prayers. The village priest wanted to proclaim me blessed and build a shrine." His mouth twisted. "The nearest imperial official wanted to send soldiers."
Doris frowned. "What happened?"
"A traveling scholar saw the mess," Halvar said. "She dragged me to the Academy. She told them I was theirs now. She stood in council chambers and risked her career to insist that I was a person, not a tool or a
curse." His jaw tightened. "They still almost broke me. But they didn't. Because one person in the right place refused to bend."
John watched him carefully. "And now you're that person."
Halvar gave a small, humorless smile. "I try. I fail. I try again. It's an irritating habit."
Dorothy snorted. "Some habits are worth keeping."
Halvar nodded once, as if the conversation had tipped some invisible balance.
"Rest today," he said. "The Council will meet at midday. Maevra and I will argue for stricter controls around your wing, not around you.
I expect shouting."
Flint perked. "You shout?"
"Oh, excellently," Halvar said. "You should hope you never hear it."
"I kind of want to now," Flint said.
"Don't," Dorothy advised.
Halvar moved to the door, then paused.
Without turning, he said, "If anyone approaches you with offers of special training for Brian, or 'private research projects,' or
'family support packages,' report it. Immediately."
"Family support packages," Flint repeated. "That sounds like they'd like to gift-wrap us and ship us somewhere."
"That's exactly what it sounds like," Halvar said. "And exactly what they'd like to do if they think they can get away with it."
He opened the door.
"And John," he added.
"Yes?" John said.
Halvar hesitated just a fraction.
"You did well last night," he said. "Anchoring him. Most people panic when walls move. You… held."
John shifted, uncomfortable. "Didn't feel like I had much choice."
"That," Halvar said, "is sometimes what courage looks like."
Then he left, and the door shut with a soft click.
They drifted through the morning like people moving in the eye of a storm.
Doris kept Brian close, skin-to-skin as much as possible, letting his tired system recalibrate to her heartbeat. She dozed in snatches,
waking at every small twitch.
John moved restlessly between chair and window and bed, checking the door more than was strictly reasonable. Old habits. Patrol habits. He wanted a wall to walk, a perimeter to scan. Instead he had stone that hummed
and responsibilities that were small and soft and infinitely more terrifying than any battlefield.
Flint alternated between pacing and scribbling notes on a borrowed scrap of parchment—diagramming their situation with arrows and labels like "spymaster," "high priest," "tower's temper tantrum." He circled "Rennic" three times and added a skull beside it.
Dorothy sat quietly most of the time, eyes half-lidded, occasionally sending small pulses of harmless magic into the room to see how
the wards responded.
"They flinch less each time," she murmured at one point. "They're learning him. Or he's learning them."
"Is that good?" Doris asked.
"It's inevitable," Dorothy said. "We might as well shape it."
Second bell chimed.
Not long after, a soft knock sounded.
Two taps.
Pause.
One tap.
John opened, ready to snarl at anyone in a robe.
It was Kael.
The novice looked tired but alert, his hair slightly more orderly than yesterday, robe straightened as if he'd tried to look respectable and then remembered no one here truly managed that.
"May I come in?" he asked.
John glanced at Doris.
She nodded once.
"Short visit," John said. "Door stays open."
Kael inclined his head. "Fair."
He stepped inside, staying near the threshold, gaze flicking to Brian almost immediately.
"Is he… all right?" he asked.
"That's a very large question," Flint said. "Define 'all right.'"
Kael's mouth twitched. "Alive. Breathing. Not currently vibrating the entire tower."
"He's fine," Doris said. "Kaeth checked him."
Kael relaxed a fraction. "Good."
"How bad was it?" John asked. "Outside this room."
Kael exhaled. "Like someone shook a hive. I was in my dorm when it started. The glass in the windows shivered. Half the second-years
bolted upright. Some panicked. Some tried to 'help' by throwing up shields no one asked for; that made things worse. A few of the sensitive ones vomited from the resonance."
Flint grimaced. "Glad I was here and not listening to that."
Kael continued. "Faculty were shouting in the main hall. Someone rang a mortal alarm bell at the same time as the wards, which didn't
help. They locked down the training fields for an hour after, in case it was an attack."
"And rumor?" Dorothy asked.
Kael made a face. "Wild. Some say a Paragon bomb went off in the Spire. Some say the Emperor died. Some say the First Flame twitched in its sleep and the world remembered."
"And what do you say?" John asked.
Kael looked at Brian.
"I say the wards met something they didn't know how to categorise," he said. "And screamed about it."
Flint pointed. "You see? This is why I like him."
Doris frowned. "The students. Are they… afraid of him?"
"Some," Kael said honestly. "Some are jealous of the attention. Some are excited. A few are angry—say it's irresponsible to house 'a live spell' in a residential wing."
Doris's mouth thinned. "He's a child, not a spell."
Kael nodded. "I know. But they don't see him. They see the tremor. They hear the echo." He hesitated. "Most of them are just… curious.
Curious is dangerous here, but it's better than hatred."
"Any professors sniffing closer?" Dorothy asked.
"Two tried to get near your hall," Kael said. "Maevra herself turned them away. I heard one call this wing a 'volatile node' and suggest relocating you to the lower labs."
John's jaw clenched. "Labs."
Kael met his gaze. "She said no."
"Loudly?" Flint asked.
"Loud enough that the walls carried it," Kael said. "She reminded them that their last 'volatile node' was a boy who jumped from a tower after being 'relocated.' The hallway went very quiet."
Doris's face flickered with something between relief and pain. "Your brother," she said softly.
Kael's hands tightened around the book he carried. "Yes."
"Any word from the Court?" Dorothy asked.
Kael shook his head. "Nothing I've heard yet. But messages move quick along the inner routes. If they're going to send someone new, we'll see it in how many fancy coats show up in the refectory."
Flint groaned. "More spymasters."
Kael hesitated. "There is one thing."
John's instincts sharpened. "What?"
Kael looked at Brian again.
"In theory," he said slowly, "first-year novices aren't allowed anywhere near Spire-adjacent diagrams. But some of the older students…
like to show off. Draw things they shouldn't. Yesterday, one of them sketched an old seal pattern in the practice yard. Just a fragment. For fun, they said. It tingled." His jaw clenched. "We scrubbed it out. We thought that was it."
"And now?" Dorothy prompted.
"Now," Kael said, "someone's saying the pattern reacted after they erased it. Like a faint glow in the dirt. And when the wards screamed last night, the same spot cracked."
Doris's eyes widened. "Cracked how?"
"Hairline," Kael said. "Just the ground. No one fell in. But it glowed inside. Briefly." He hesitated. "Same color as the wall here, I think."
John felt cold. "Does anyone know that's connected?"
"No," Kael said. "They think it's coincidence. I don't believe in that. Not here. Fragment of an old seal, a Voidborn child, a tower that's too awake… the patterns rhyme."
Dorothy swore softly. "The old wardstations," she said. "The ones that stabilized fractures. The ones we walked past on the road. The
Academy built its own versions, but they didn't understand all of it. If students are idly scratching those patterns into practice dirt…"
"And if he screams at the same time," John finished, throat tight.
Kael nodded once.
"Then the cracks listen," he said.
Silence settled, heavy and taut.
Flint broke it with a sigh. "So. Action items. One: we don't take him near that yard. Two: you keep listening. Three: we keep pretending
everything is perfectly fine while the ground hums like a plucked string."
Kael's mouth twitched. "Yes. That sounds like standard Academy procedure."
He stepped back toward the door.
"I'll keep you updated," he said. "Bench, second hour after noon. No red cloth unless it's life-and-death."
John nodded. "And you?"
Kael shrugged. "I go to lecture. I pretend to care about elemental theory. I listen to which professors are angling for access to your wing in their lunch conversations."
"Be careful," Doris said quietly. "They break more than students here."
Kael's gaze flicked to Brian.
"I know," he said. "That's why I'm helping."
He slipped out, closing the door gently.
Afternoon slid in.
No more screams. No more cracks.
Just a tower full of people pretending their hearts hadn't jumped into their throats the night before.
Brian slept more than he woke.
When he did wake, his eyes seemed… older. Not truly aware. But there was a wariness to his tiny flinches at sudden sounds, a way he clung to Doris with a ferocity beyond instinct.
Once, as John held him to give Doris a moment to wash, Brian's fingers tangled in the fabric of his shirt.
John felt a strange, subtle sensation.
Like the air around them thickened for half a second and then relaxed.
He looked down.
Brian wasn't crying.
He was simply… concentrating, insofar as a newborn could.
John's skin tingled.
"Easy," he murmured. "Not everything has to hum."
Brian blinked up at him.
After a moment, the tension in the air faded.
John exhaled.
"I don't know if you heard any of the speeches," he said softly, "but they all have plans for you, you know that? The tower wants your echo. The cult wants your power. The Church wants your soul safe on paper. Security wants you in a neat box with a label."
Brian's fist tightened in his shirt.
John smiled, small and grim.
"Let them write," he said. "We'll teach you how to choose which lines to cross."
Doris came out of the wash alcove, drying her hands.
"He's calmer?" she asked.
"For now," John said. "Kaeth said to let him cling. So I'm letting him cling."
"And you?" she asked quietly.
He considered.
"I'm clinging too," he admitted.
She stepped close and pressed her forehead to his.
"We all are," she whispered. "That's how we survive this place."
Outside the warded walls, Aetherion buzzed.
In lecture halls, professors rehearsed new lectures about "resonant incidents" and "systemic anomalies," carefully not naming the child everyone was thinking about.
In the refectory, students traded exaggerated versions of last night's events.
In a quiet council chamber, Maevra and Halvar raised their voices, arguing for restrictions that would bruise egos but save lives.
In a shrine, Arch-Deacon Serais lit a single candle—not for a prophecy, but for a boy who screamed against a tower and survived.
In an office full of maps, Ren Kaltan reread his report and added one more line:
Subject remains within acceptable stability bounds. Further provocation not advised.
And somewhere deep beneath the Academy, in the old foundations where stone remembered being molten, a hairline crack glowed once, faint as a memory.
Then went dark.
For now.
In the small suite tucked between humming walls, Brian slept against his mother's chest, his father's hand warm on his back.
They hadn't chosen any of this.
But they would choose what came next.
One day at a time.
One scream at a time.
One held line at a time.