Elliot learned that power had a texture.
It wasn't something he could see—not yet—but he could feel it. In the way Michael's presence steadied a room. In the way certain people on the street caused others to move aside without realizing they were doing it.
Power pressed.
And it expected obedience.
Michael's lessons expanded beyond the yard.
He began taking Elliot into town, not to train, but to observe.
"Watch how people walk," Michael said one afternoon as they passed through the market. "Who gives way. Who doesn't."
Elliot watched.
Warriors were easy to spot. Straight backs. Scarred hands. Swords worn openly. Even the lowest-ranked among them carried an aura of disciplined violence.
Administrators looked different. Cleaner. Sharper. Their clothes bore insignias—marks of office and authority. People bowed to them, not out of fear, but habit.
Then there were the Holy.
Robed figures moved through the crowd like calm currents, hands glowing faintly as they healed minor wounds or offered blessings. Their eyes held a distant kindness Elliot found unsettling.
And finally—
Inventors.
Elliot felt them before he saw them.
A man stood near a stall selling mechanical lamps, his fingers tracing glowing runes in the air. Metal shifted beneath his touch, folding and unfolding like liquid.
The crowd watched in awe.
"That's mastery," Michael said quietly. "A gift you're born with. You can't learn it."
Elliot's stomach tightened.
Born with.
He'd been born twice now.
What did I bring with me? he wondered.
That night, Elliot dreamed of the envelope again—but this time, when he reached for it, it turned into a blade.
He woke drenched in sweat.
As months passed, Michael introduced structure.
He explained the ranks—not as aspiration, but warning.
"Warrior child," he said. "Warrior novice. Warrior disciple. These are the foundations. Most die before reaching higher."
"And the others?" Elliot asked.
Michael's jaw tightened. "Saint. Monarch. Divine."
Silence fell.
"No one reaches the top without losing something," Michael said. "Remember that."
Elliot did.
At home, Paige watched her brother with growing unease.
"You're scary sometimes," she said one evening.
Elliot blinked. "I am?"
"You don't play like other kids," she said. "You look at people like you're counting."
He looked away.
She wasn't wrong.
What Elliot didn't tell anyone—not Michael, not Victoria—was that when he trained, when he pushed himself until his body shook, the guilt quieted.
For a moment, he wasn't a thief.
He was someone becoming.
Far away, beyond continents Elliot had no name for yet, something else learned his name.
And it did not forget.
End of Chapter 10