The summons arrived without ceremony.
No seal. No signature. Just a single strip of arcane vellum slipped beneath Vahn Romanoff's door, humming faintly with restrained authority.
Attendance Required. Dawn. North Spire. Observation Hall.
Vahn stared at it for a long moment, then smiled without humor.
"So," he murmured, fingers crackling softly with residual lightning, "they've decided to stop pretending."
The North Spire rose higher than any other structure in Mystara Academy, its upper levels piercing the cloud layer like a blade aimed at the heavens. Few students were ever invited there. Fewer still returned unchanged.
At dawn, Vahn ascended alone.
Each stair hummed beneath his boots, reacting to his presence. Ancient wards brushed against his aura, testing, tasting, recoiling. He felt it clearly now—his resonance no longer fit neatly into the Academy's architecture. The stone itself hesitated, unsure how to categorize him.
Good.
The Observation Hall was a vast circular chamber with no walls—only towering arched windows that revealed the world beyond Mystara. Mountains drowned in mist. Rivers like veins of silver. The sky churned overhead, restless.
Ten figures stood spaced evenly around the room.
And one more waited at the center.
Principal Ardyn Valemar did not turn as Vahn entered.
"You're early," Ardyn said quietly.
"I don't sleep much anymore," Vahn replied.
"That," Ardyn said, turning at last, "is part of the problem."
The Divisional Heads watched in silence—Fire, Wind, Stone, Light, Shadow, Water, Spirit, Metal, Mind, and Aether. Power radiated from them in disciplined, orderly patterns.
Behind them, half-hidden by veils of sigil-light, stood the Circle.
Not ten.
Nine.
The absence was deliberate.
Ardyn gestured, and the floor beneath Vahn shifted—runes spiraling outward, forming a containment lattice. Not a prison. A lens.
"You're not here to be judged," Ardyn said. "You're here to be measured."
Vahn raised an eyebrow. "And if I refuse?"
A Circle member spoke, voice layered, distorted. "Then you confirm our worst fears."
Vahn stepped forward.
"Proceed."
The lattice activated.
Immediately, pressure slammed into him—not physical, but existential. His Source channels flared as the array peeled back layers of resonance, examining how his lightning intertwined with fire, shadow, wind. The Weaveborn mark beneath his skin glowed faintly, reacting in defiance.
Murmurs rippled through the chamber.
"This output—"
"Impossible without collapse—"
"He's stabilizing it instinctively—"
Vahn clenched his jaw as the strain mounted. The lattice pushed deeper, probing for limits.
And then—
Something pushed back.
The windows rattled.
The sky outside darkened unnaturally fast, clouds spiraling inward as if drawn by an unseen hand. A low thunder rolled—not from above, but from everywhere.
One of the Circle members stiffened. "That's not the array."
Lightning flashed.
Not summoned.
Answered.
A bolt lanced down from the heavens, striking the spire's apex—and instead of dispersing, it flowed through the structure, racing along the runes, slamming into the lattice around Vahn.
The containment sigils shattered.
Vahn dropped to one knee, breath tearing from his lungs as raw stormlight flooded his system. Pain flared—but so did clarity.
He wasn't calling the storm.
The storm recognized him.
For one suspended moment, every person in the hall felt it: a presence vast and attentive, brushing against Mystara like a fingertip testing glass.
The Eleventh Seat.
A Circle member cried out. "Sever the array! Now!"
Ardyn acted instantly, slamming his staff into the floor and collapsing the remaining runes. The pressure vanished. The storm above broke apart, dispersing as quickly as it had gathered.
Silence followed.
Vahn remained kneeling, steam rising from his shoulders.
When he stood, his eyes crackled faintly with violet light.
No one spoke.
Finally, Ardyn exhaled slowly. "That," he said, "was not in any projection."
Vahn looked around the chamber, meeting every gaze—Divisional Head, Circle watcher, Principal alike.
"You wanted to measure me," he said evenly. "Now you have your answer."
One of the Circle stepped forward, voice sharp with something dangerously close to fear.
"The Eleventh Seat is responding to you."
"Yes," Vahn agreed. "And you should be asking why."
Another Circle voice cut in. "You are a liability."
Vahn smiled—small, tired, resolute.
"Then stop treating me like a secret," he said. "Because secrets rot. And rot spreads."
Ardyn studied him for a long moment.
Then, unexpectedly, he bowed his head.
"Effective immediately," the Principal announced, "Vahn Romanoff is granted autonomous research authority. No oversight from the Divisions. No Circle veto."
Outrage erupted.
"You can't—"
"He's unstable—"
"The risk—"
Ardyn raised his staff. Silence snapped back into place.
"The risk," he said quietly, "is pretending this can be contained."
He turned to Vahn. "Whatever the Eleventh Seat is becoming—it has chosen you as its point of contact. That makes you dangerous."
Vahn inclined his head. "I've been dangerous for a while."
As he turned to leave, one final voice followed him—soft, almost curious.
"Tell us, Weaveborn," a Circle member asked. "When the Seat finally awakens… will you sit upon it?"
Vahn paused at the threshold.
"No," he said without turning."I'm going to break it."
Thunder rumbled distantly as he descended the spire.
And deep beneath Mystara—far below stone, below wards, below history—something ancient shifted.
Not in anger.
In anticipation.