The Grand Assembly Hall of the Azure Spire was a piece of architecture designed to make you feel insignificant. It was a cavernous amphitheatre of polished limestone and floating acoustic baffles, usually filled with the chaotic noise of two thousand teenagers plotting, flirting, or sleeping through announcements.
Today, the silence was heavy enough to crack a rib.
I sat in the middle row of the stone benches, flanked by my squad. To my left, Finn was vibrating so hard he was practically blurring.
"The air pressure," Finn whispered, his voice barely audible even to me. "It's too heavy. It feels like the bottom of a lake. My ears won't pop."
To my right, Grace was dismantling her quill pen, her fingers moving with manic, nervous energy. Kael sat like a stone gargoyle, his massive arms crossed, staring at the empty stage with a gaze that promised violence if the curtains moved too fast.
'This isn't an assembly,' I thought, pulling my grey cloak tighter. 'This is a lineup.'
'It is a display of dominance,' Ronan corrected, his mental voice cold and sharp. 'Look at the faculty.'
I looked down at the front row. Usually, the professors sat with an air of bored superiority, but Thaddeus Vex, the rune teacher who hated my existence, was currently wringing his hands in his lap, sweating through his expensive robes.
But it was the man next to him who drew the real attention.
Master Elrend wasn't the slumped, wine-stained wreck I had seen in the arena weeks ago. The transformation was absolute. His silver hair was pulled back in a severe, disciplined knot, and his posture was rigid, his spine unbent by the weight of the past. He didn't look like a drunk anymore; he looked like a High Elf Lord in his prime.
A girl from House Vermillion whispered loudly to her neighbour, "Is that Elrend? By the Gods, he looks... younger. He looks dangerous."
I frowned. He wasn't leaning on his black cane. In fact, the cane was nowhere to be seen. He was sitting with a strange, coiled tension, his hand resting on his hip.
The heavy iron bells tolled the hour. BOOM. BOOM. BOOM.
The sound faded, leaving a silence so absolute it felt physical.
The Headmistress walked onto the stage. She was a reclusive figure, rarely seen outside the High Spire, and her presence alone usually commanded a hush. But today, she looked small. She walked to the podium, her usual confident stride replaced by a nervous shuffle.
"Students of the Spire," she said, her voice amplified by the lectern but lacking its usual bite. "Today, we are... honoured. We receive a visitation from the Cathedral of the Sacred Flame."
She paused, swallowing hard.
"He comes to us not as a judge, but as a guide. A Shepherd of the Faith."
She stepped back, bowing deeply to the empty air. She retreated into the shadows of the stage, looking like a woman fleeing a burning building.
The lights in the hall dimmed.
'Here comes the monster,' I thought, bracing myself.
I expected fire. I expected a squad of Silencers kicking down the doors. I expected a man in black iron armour with a flaming sword and a book of laws.
I got none of that.
From the stage left wings, a single figure walked out.
He wore simple, unadorned robes of white linen that dragged slightly on the floor. He wore no jewellery. No golden symbols. No armour.
He was barefoot.
Pontiff Mortimer Valentine walked to the centre of the stage, his pale feet moving silently across the cold stone. He looked frail, almost translucent under the magelights. He was beautiful in a terrifying, fragile way, like a porcelain doll that had been left out in the rain.
He stopped at the edge of the stage. He didn't look like an executioner. He looked like a man who had just buried his only child.
His eyes were red-rimmed, swollen, and wet. Fresh tears tracked through the pale dust on his cheeks.
He looked out at the sea of terrified students. He didn't sneer. He didn't judge. He just looked... devastated.
The tension in the room snapped.
I felt it happen. The collective breath of two thousand students released. The fear that had been a solid wall crumbled into confusion, and then, dangerously, into pity.
"He's... crying?" a girl behind me whispered.
"That's the Inquisitor?" another boy muttered. "He looks like he needs a hug."
'Don't fall for it,' Ronan's voice cut through my mind like a whip. 'Look at him, Murphy. Really look.'
I narrowed my eyes, engaging my new Dark Blue senses.
To the naked eye, Vane was a weeping saint. But to the Aetheric sight, he was a black hole. The mana in the room wasn't flowing around him; it was bending toward him, being swallowed by a gravity well of pure, crushing will.
'He isn't weak,' Ronan warned. 'He is a spider painted white. He is disarming the prey before he feeds.'
Vane raised a hand. He didn't use the magical amplifier. He didn't shout. He simply whispered, and the acoustics of the room carried the sound to the very back row as if he were standing right next to our ears.
"I look at you," Vane whispered, his voice trembling with emotion. "The brightest sparks of the Empire. The future of our world."
He took a shuddering breath.
"And I do not see power."
He swept his gaze across the room, locking eyes with random students. A First Year shrank back. A Noble puffed out his chest.
"I see terror," Vane diagnosed softly.
He walked along the edge of the stage, his movements fluid and unnatural.
"You fear failure," he murmured. "You fear your fathers and their expectations. You fear the dark. You fear death."
He stopped in front of the section where House Aurelius sat. He looked directly at Lysander Thorne. Lysander looked bored, bordering on disgusted, but his hand gripped the armrest of his bench tight enough to turn his knuckles white.
"Why?" Vane asked.
It wasn't rhetorical. He waited. The silence stretched out, uncomfortable and heavy.
"I will tell you why," Vane continued, wiping a tear from his jaw. "It is because of the Lie. The Lie that says you are separate. The Lie that says 'I' am here, and 'You' are there."
He tapped his own chest.
"The Ego."
My Danger Sense woke up. It wasn't the sharp, electric zap of a sword swing or the cold prickly feeling of a trap. It was a slow, suffocating pressure, like the air in the room was being replaced by water.
Vane wasn't attacking us. He was scanning us. Not with magic, which the Academy wards would block, but with something far more invasive—his own supernatural empathy.
"Why does a man kill?" Vane asked, his voice gaining a hypnotic rhythm. "Because he wants what is not 'his'. Why does a mother weep? Because 'her' child is gone. The words 'Mine' and 'Yours' are the knives we use to cut ourselves."
He spread his arms wide, the white robes hanging like wings.
"We build walls around our hearts and call it 'Self'. And inside those walls, we are lonely. We are cold. We are afraid."
I glanced at Finn. The nervous wind-mage had stopped vibrating. He was staring at Vane with wide, watery eyes. His mouth was slightly open.
Finn, the boy who was terrified of heights, terrified of his family, terrified of being a failure. Vane was speaking directly to the hole in his chest.
"Imagine..." Vane's voice dropped to a seductive hum. "Imagine a world where you are never alone. Where you feel the joy of a million souls as your own. Where there is no envy, because we are all one. Where death is not an end, but a return to the Ocean."
Vane smiled. It was the most heartbreakingly beautiful smile I had ever seen.
"I offer you the Silence of the Self," he promised. "I offer you... Peace."
A single tear rolled down Finn's cheek.
'He's listening,' I realised with a jolt of horror. 'He wants it.'
I looked around. It wasn't just Finn. Half the room was leaning forward. The scholarship kids, the ones struggling to keep up, the ones crushed by debt and expectation—they were drinking the poison.
But for me?
For a split second, the words hit a crack in my own armour.
A thousand lifetimes. A thousand deaths. Running. Hiding. Being cold. Being hungry. Being alone.
The idea of stopping. The idea of just... letting go. Of sinking into a warm ocean where the Danger Sense finally turned off.
It hit me like a physical blow. A longing so deep it hurt.
'NO!'
Ronan's shout in my head was a thunderclap. It shattered the trance.
'It is a trap, Murphy!' Ronan roared, his spirit flaring with indignation. 'A cage is still a cage, even if it is made of velvet! To feel everything is to be nothing! Do not listen to the siren!'
I shook my head, blinking rapidly. The longing vanished, replaced by the cold sweat of a near-miss.
'Right,' I thought, my knuckles white as I gripped the bench. 'Peace is for the dead. I plan on living.'
Vane stopped pacing. He stood perfectly still at the centre of the stage. He tilted his head, like a dog listening to a high-pitched whistle.
He inhaled deeply.
My stomach dropped.
'He smells it,' Ronan whispered.
Vane wasn't looking at the crowd anymore. He was tasting the air. He was smelling the faint, metaphysical residue of the Soul Echo—the signature he had touched in the sewer. It was weak, diluted by the presence of two thousand other souls, but it was there.
Vane stepped off the stage.
He didn't take the stairs. He simply stepped off the five-foot drop, landing on the stone floor without a sound, his knees bending gracefully.
He began to walk up the centre aisle.
The pressure in the room spiked. This wasn't a sermon anymore. It was a hunt.
He walked past the terrified first-years. He ignored the Nobles. He was walking a straight line, his eyes unfocused, following a scent trail only he could perceive.
He was heading straight for House Argent.
'He's coming for us,' I thought, panic rising in my throat. 'He knows.'
'Hold the line,' Ronan ordered. 'Do not flinch. Do not run.'
Vane stopped.
He was standing directly in front of our bench. He was close enough that I could smell him—he didn't smell like incense or oil; he smelled like rain and ozone.
The entire hall held its breath.
Vane looked down. His eyes were red-rimmed and brimming with infinite sadness. He looked past Finn. He looked past Grace.
He looked right into my eyes.
I tried to summon my "Bored Student" mask, but my face felt frozen. The weight of his empathy was crushing. I felt like he was peeling back my skin to look at the scars underneath.
Out of the corner of my eye, I saw movement in the front row.
Master Elrend stood up. The other professors stayed seated, cowering, but Elrend moved with a sudden, fluid purpose. He didn't have his cane. My eyes caught a glint of metal at his hip.
'He brought steel,' Ronan realised, his voice tight. 'He is wearing a sword. He is going to engage.'
'What?' I panicked. 'Why?'
'He thinks we are cornered. He is ready to die to buy us time.'
I watched Elrend's hand hover over the pommel of his sword. He was coiled, ready to strike a High Inquisitor in front of two thousand witnesses. It was suicide.
Vane reached out a hand toward me.
'I have to move,' I thought, but my limbs were lead. The fear paralysed me.
'Forgive me, Murphy,' Ronan said.
My perspective shifted violently. I was suddenly a passenger in my own skull, screaming from the backseat.
'Ronan?! What are you doing?!'
Ronan ignored me. He sat up straighter, my spine snapping into a military posture I had never used. He raised my hand—our hand—and made a subtle, sharp gesture with two fingers against his chest.
It was barely a twitch. To the students, it looked like I was brushing lint off my tunic.
But Elrend froze. His hand dropped from his sword hilt. He stood down.
'What is happening?' I yelled in the shared dark of our mind. 'Who are you signalling? Why is Elrend stopping? And how the hell are you moving my arm?!'
'Elrend was getting ready to strike,' Ronan projected back, his focus entirely on the Inquisitor. 'I gave him the signal to stand down.'
'Elrend?!' My trust fractured. 'What does a drunk teacher have to do with this? What signal? '
'Later,' Ronan snapped.
Vane's hand landed on my shoulder.
The touch burned cold. It wasn't physically cold; it was the chill of the grave.
"You are interesting," Vane whispered, his voice soft with confusion.
He looked at me. If I had to guess, he was remembering the Ronan-Clone from the sewers—the defiance, the skill. But he couldn't quite place it. The face was wrong. The soul felt... different.
He looked past me, his eyes flicking to Elrend, who stood frozen like a statue in the front row.
"A military signal..." Vane murmured, his brow furrowing. "And who might you be signalling, child? Surely you have nothing to fear from me."
Inside our head, I was reeling. The realisation hit me harder than the fear of Vane. Ronan hadn't just taken over; he had secrets. He had allies I didn't know about. How much was happening while I was asleep?
'You lied to me,' I thought, the betrayal tasting like ash.
Ronan didn't answer. He looked up at the Inquisitor. He didn't look terrified. He looked serene. He met Vane's gaze with the absolute, unshakeable confidence of a Paladin who had stared down gods before.
"I am, but a humble servant of the Church, My Lord," Ronan said aloud, using my mouth. "I merely scratch an itch."
Vane stared at him. He probed deeper. He sent his empathy crashing against our mind.
But he didn't find Murphy's jagged, terrified Ego. He found Ronan.
He found a soul that was calm. Ordered. Noble. A soul that wasn't screaming for survival, but standing a vigil.
Vane blinked. The confusion in his eyes deepened, then cleared, replaced by a look of profound wonder.
"My child," Vane breathed, a fresh tear spilling over. "You are so very strange. I don't think I have ever seen anyone in control of such a powerful Ego."
He squeezed my shoulder gently.
"Do not worry," he whispered, his voice thick with love. "The Unbinding is coming for us all. Even the strongest walls eventually turn to sand. It will set you free, and you can finally rest."
He released me.
The cold vanished. Vane stepped back, offering me one last, beatific smile, and then turned away.
He walked back up the aisle, his white robes trailing behind him.
He left the hall. The heavy doors slammed shut behind him.
The spell broke.
The silence shattered into a thousand whispers. Students began to weep openly. Others looked dazed, like they had just woken up from a dream.
In the seat next to me, Finn was sobbing into his hands.
Inside my head, Ronan relinquished control. Gasping for air, my whole body was trembling. My shoulder, where Vane had touched me, felt numb.
'He knows something,' Ronan said, his mental voice grim. 'He didn't find you, Murphy. He didn't find what he was looking for. He knows I am connected to you somehow.'
I didn't respond. I just stared at my hands. The hands that had moved without my permission.
'Murphy?'
'Don't,' I thought, my mental voice cold. 'Just... don't speak to me right now.'
We filed out of the hall. The mood of the Academy had shifted. It wasn't the usual post-assembly chatter. It was hushed. Reverent. Vane's speech had cracked something open in the weaker students. I could see it in their eyes—a glazed, hopeful look. They weren't students anymore; they were converts.
As I walked back toward the dorms, keeping my head down, a flash of colour on the path caught my eye.
I stopped.
Crawling across the grey cobblestone was a beetle. It wasn't a normal bug. It was iridescent, its shell shifting colours like oil on water.
It stopped. It turned.
It looked at me.
I felt a sudden, cold recognition. The goddess's warning echoed in my mind. You will know it by the insects it controls.
Was this it? Was this the hunger she spoke of?
I lifted my boot and brought it down hard.
Crunch.
I twisted my heel, grinding the iridescent shell into dust.
'Was the Inquisitor and 'The Hunger' connected somehow?' I thought, looking at the smear on the stone.