The infirmary in the Royal Academy was too clean to trust.
Rem sat on the edge of the bed, shirt off, leg wrapped, ribs taped, dagger leaned against the wall within reach. The air smelled like sharp herbs and boiled linen instead of blood and iron like Livesey's clinic. The healers here wore pale robes, spoke in soft voices, and kept their hands gentle.
Gentle felt wrong.
"Nothing torn," the healer murmured, hands glowing a pale green at his knee. "You overloaded the joint. You keep forcing like that and you'll grind cartilage you actually need."
"I'll walk it off," Rem said.
"You'll walk with a cane if you keep talking like that."
Rem smirked. "Don't think it fits me."
"It might if you live long enough," the healer muttered. He scribbled something on a slate and stepped back. "Your ribs are bruised, not cracked. Breathe shallow. Don't try to be heroic when it hurts. You are cleared for movement, not cleared for sparring or impact. Repeat that back to me so I can say I did my job."
"Movement, not impact," Rem said.
The healer narrowed his eyes like he didn't trust that at all. Then he bowed his head and slipped out.
The door clicked behind him.
Silence.
Rem rolled his shoulder and hissed when his ribs protested. Fine. Whatever. He'd had worse. He'd had holes. He'd had broken bone scraping against itself. This was pain, not damage.
He reached for his dagger.
"Don't."
The voice was quiet, but it wasn't soft.
Professor Kael Ardent closed the door the rest of the way behind him and turned the lock. He didn't look like a medic. He didn't look like the kind of noble sponsor who comes down to pat the promising talent on the head either. He looked like an old war that refused to die and had gotten a salary out of it.
He walked to the foot of Rem's bed and leaned his cane against the frame. Then he just stood there, studying him.
It wasn't the kind of stare Rem got in alleys, the kind where someone is measuring how much coin is in your pockets and how fast you can run. It wasn't the predatory stare from dungeon beasts. It was colder. Assessment. Calculation. A scribe deciding which column you got written in.
"So," Ardent said.
Rem tilted his chin. "So."
"That center of gravity you used today," Ardent said. "You didn't have that in the exam against Instructor Solm from the Association. You fought like a battering ram that day. Today you fought like a boulder that knows how to roll. Who taught you to correct that overnight."
Rem shrugged one shoulder. "I figured it out."
"Did you."
"Yeah."
Ardent's expression did not move. "On your own."
"On my own," Rem said.
Ardent let silence sit. He was good at silence. He could turn quiet into a weapon. He just watched Rem and waited to see if he'd crack under it.
Rem stared straight back.
He was tired and sore and his knee still pulsed with hot ache, but he held the look. He'd been stared down by angry mercenaries twice his age. He'd sat still while Livesey stitched him without numbing. He could sit still for this.
After a long moment, Ardent nodded once. "Fine. You will lie to me. You will lie consistently. That at least shows discipline."
"Thanks," Rem said dry.
"It was not praise."
"Didn't sound like praise."
"Good. You are not stupid."
Rem grinned, slow. "People keep being surprised by that."
"They will continue to be," Ardent said. "You should not correct them. Stupid men are allowed to be strong. Clever men are not allowed to be unpredictable."
Rem blinked once.
He filed that.
Ardent tapped his cane lightly against the bedframe. "Listen closely. I am going to explain how today actually worked. Not how it looked from the stands. How it functioned."
Rem nodded.
"Lucien d'Arclight did not challenge you because he thinks you're interesting," Ardent said. "Lucien d'Arclight challenged you because he wanted to bleed you in front of the Imperial Heir and frame you as undisciplined garbage attached to House Verran. Then the d'Arclight faction gets to turn to the court and say, look how the Verran girl is dragging unregistered muscle into Imperial space. Look how feral the duke's people have become. Look how unstable. They were setting up a narrative. Understand that word. Narrative. That is worth more than aura in this place."
Rem's jaw tensed.
Ardent watched it. "You did not let him take that from you. You did something almost no one in your position would think to do. You did not win by humiliating Lucien. You won by keeping Lucien dignified."
Rem frowned. "I had a dagger to his throat. That didn't look very dignified."
"You told the arena it was a good fight," Ardent said. "You said he hit hard. You gave him a way to stand back up without looking like a joke. You made sure he could tell his House he wasn't shamed. That means he can't scream sabotage without looking like a liar. That means his people can't run to the Emperor whining that House Verran unleashed a rabid street animal on an innocent noble child."
Rem stared at him.
He hadn't thought it out. He'd just said it because it felt like the right thing, the decent thing. Because Evelyn had lied for him and it felt wrong to not give some of that back.
Ardent kept going. "By denying them humiliation, you denied them leverage. You think you threw a punch in the arena. You didn't. You blocked a blade at the imperial table."
Rem let out a breath he hadn't noticed he'd been holding.
"That," Ardent said softly, "is why you are now officially a problem."
Rem's head lifted. "I've been one for a while."
"You do not understand the level you just moved to," Ardent said. His eyes were steady, hard. "Up to this morning, you were a curiosity. Dangerous, yes. Unrefined, yes. Rumor. A piece on House Verran's side of the board. After today, you are not Verran's piece. You are a destabilizing variable in front of the Imperial Heir. That means if you are allowed to exist as you are, you make some people less safe, and if you disappear suddenly, you make other people less safe. Do you understand what I am saying."
Rem frowned. "Kind of."
"Good. I'll say it simple," Ardent said. "From this point on, if you become inconvenient, the people who come to remove you will not be students. They will not be bullies in a hallway. They will not be House scions who want to posture. They will be Empire."
Rem's body went very still.
Empire.
Not guards. Not random hunters. Empire.
"You are telling me they'll kill me," Rem said.
"I am telling you that if you lose control," Ardent said quietly, "if you turn into something unpredictable and public, you will not be arrested. You will be erased. Quickly. Without witnesses. With paperwork that says 'mana failure, unfortunate.' And most people will believe it."
Rem swallowed. His throat had gone dry.
Ardent watched him, unreadable. "If you are smart, you will think about how you want to be seen. You will think about it harder than you think about your next swing. You will pick a role and you will wear it. If you don't, somebody will hand you one you won't like."
Rem met his eyes. "What role do you think fits me."
Ardent actually huffed, just a breath. "I don't know yet, Avern. You are not like anything I've catalogued. You move like a blunt instrument. You think like a street rat. You hit like siege equipment. You terrify trained aura users without even flaring. I have seen monsters. You are not one. I have seen weapons. You are not only that. I have seen boys who think they are invincible. You are not that either. You are something I do not have a word for, and I do not enjoy not having a word for things."
"Sorry to disappoint," Rem said.
"Good. You still make jokes when you're scared," Ardent said. "That tells me you haven't started lying to yourself yet. That's when people get truly dangerous."
Rem exhaled slowly.
For a moment, both of them were quiet. He could hear the hum of the ward lines in the walls, low and steady. He could hear his own pulse in his taped ribs.
"One more thing," Ardent said, almost offhand, which meant it wasn't offhand at all. "Do not think d'Arclight is finished with you. You humiliated his House. I don't care how politely you wrapped it. You took his oxygen away in front of his own peers. You will get a smile, and a hand on your shoulder, and a promise of 'no hard feelings,' and then he will try to hurt you where no one can see. This school has empty corners, Avern. If you are still breathing by the end of this term, it will not be because they let you."
Rem's jaw tightened. "Good. I needed something to do anyway."
Ardent's eyes flicked to the massive black dagger leaning against the wall. "And put that thing under a cloak when you walk the halls. It looks like a war crime."
"It is a gift," Rem said.
Ardent's mouth twitched. "I am sure it is."
He reached for his cane.
"Professor," Rem said.
Ardent paused.
Rem looked him dead in the face. "Why do you care."
Something small and sharp moved behind Ardent's expression. Not softness. Something like respect that had never been allowed to grow into softness.
"Because I watched you in that arena," Ardent said. "And I watched the Imperial Heir watching you. And I watched Lady Verran not blink. And I said to myself, Kael, you are either looking at a catastrophe, or you are looking at a correction. And I would prefer to live long enough to see which."
He tapped his cane once on the stone.
"Get dressed. Walk on that knee like it belongs to you. If anyone asks, you are fine."
He unlocked the door and stepped out.
Rem sat there alone on the bed a long moment, breathing around the ache in his ribs and the heat in his knee.
If you lose control, they erase you.
Not punish. Not discipline. Erase.
He thought of the Effigy screaming. He thought of the way the dungeon had cracked and vanished under him when whatever that was woke up inside him. He thought about the way Evelyn had looked at him afterward. Not scared for herself. Scared for him.
He put his shirt back on. It stuck against the tape across his ribs and smelled like dust and arena sand.
He lifted the dagger. The weight dragged on his arm, comforting.
"I'm not losing control," he muttered.
He wasn't sure if he was lying.
He stood, rolled his shoulders, and walked out with the limp held down to almost nothing.
Evelyn sat without sitting.
On paper, it was just a debrief.
In reality, she was being presented.
The "private lounge" they brought her to after the duel was a high-ceilinged room draped in academy blue, not royal red. No sigils of individual Houses on the walls. Neutral ground. Supposedly.
Every inch of it smelled like old polish and quiet knives.
Three people waited for her.
Lord Cassian Vale, House Vale, silver hair, soft voice, smile like a veiled blade. He wasn't technically faculty. He didn't have to be. Vale money funded half the building.
Lady Mira d'Alen, old enough to be Evelyn's grandmother, thin as a whip, rings lined up across both hands like a crown melted and poured onto her fingers. She sat with perfect posture and never blinked unless she chose to.
And Leonhart Thorne, student, final-year, blond and composed, the kind of kid who already lived like a future council member. He had a signet at his collar and a notebook open in front of him. Which meant he was here to "witness." Which meant whatever was said in this room could travel.
They were not stupid.
They had her surrounded and they made it look like courtesy.
"Evelyn," Lord Vale said with a warm smile. "Thank you for coming so quickly. We know you're under a great deal of pressure. Sit, please."
She sat. Perfectly. Chin leveled. Back straight. Hands folded on her knees. She let her breathing slow to a controlled rhythm. She did not show that her body was still buzzing from the duel, or that she'd almost jumped out of the viewing box when Rem planted his blade and nearly toppled with it.
Leonhart made a neat note. "Lady Verran has taken her seat at our request, recorded at this hour under the neutral review custom. You may proceed, Lord Vale."
Vale nodded like this was all very civilized. "We only have a few clarifications to request. House to House. Collegial. You understand."
"Of course," Evelyn said.
Her voice came out smooth. Her insides did not match her voice.
Mira d'Alen smiled in a way that showed no teeth. "You did not seem surprised," she said lightly, "by the performance of that young man in the arena."
Silence waited for Evelyn's heartbeat.
Evelyn tilted her head a fraction. "You invited me here to discuss Rem Avern."
"We invited you here to discuss stability within the Academy's final year," Vale said kindly.
"Which includes Rem Avern," Leonhart added helpfully without looking up from his notes.
Mira folded her hands. Her rings caught the light. "Were you aware in advance that he could do that to Lucien d'Arclight."
If Evelyn said yes, she gave them their weapon.
If she said yes, she admitted House Verran had prepared a spectacle to humiliate House d'Arclight publicly in front of the Imperial Heir. That was treason-adjacent. That could be spun as an attempt at influence on the imperial line. That was exactly the kind of thing the other Houses wanted to pin to her family while her father was too sick to throw back.
If she said no, she risked something else. She risked letting them claim Rem belonged to her House anyway, that House Verran was fielding an unregistered weapon it couldn't even control. That narrative would poison Rem instantly. He'd go from student to asset in a heartbeat. Asset can be seized.
She breathed once, slow.
Then she smiled, cold and perfect.
"I was not aware of anything in advance," she said. "Because there's nothing to be aware of. Rem Avern is not a trained duelist. He is not a House combatant. He is a physically gifted commoner swinging a slab of illegally dense metal. He is interesting the way a half-wild hound is interesting. He is not strategic."
Leonhart's pen paused.
Mira's brows lifted a delicate millimeter. "So you deny that he is acting as a personal retainer of House Verran."
"Correct," Evelyn said.
Vale leaned back. "That is an unusual statement. There are witnesses who saw you training with him."
"My House sponsors remedial physical conditioning for under-ranked candidates as part of our public contribution to the Academy," Evelyn said without blinking. "I volunteer my time. Rem Avern is not unique in that regard. He is simply the only one strong enough to lift that thing he calls a blade."
"That," Vale said gently, "is not how it looked."
"Then you misread it," Evelyn said.
Leonhart looked up from his notes, expression still and polite. "From an image perspective, is this the kind of associate the Verran name intends to elevate."
Her heart spiked at the word associate.
She ignored the spike.
"House Verran intends to elevate excellence," Evelyn said. "We do not intend to elevate disorder. Rem Avern is unrefined. He lacks aura control. He does not possess proper House discipline. He does not understand etiquette. He is not politically usable. He is a spectacle incident, not an asset."
It tasted like acid to say it.
Mira watched her. "Interesting," Mira said. The word sounded like a blade sliding out of cloth. "You did not leave His Highness's side during the match. And yet your eyes were fixed on the boy the entire time. That is an unusual allocation of attention for a ducal heir in a room with an Imperial one."
There it was.
They were not just trying to pin Rem to House Verran.
They were trying to smell out whether she had already tied herself personally to an uncontrolled variable. If she said yes, they could call her reckless. If she said no, she had to cut Rem out loud.
Mira d'Alen was smiling because she thought she had Evelyn already in a box.
Evelyn leaned forward the smallest amount. Enough to change the air in the room.
"Listen carefully," she said quietly.
The room went still.
"Rem Avern has no House," she said. "He is not a Verran retainer. He is not a Verran weapon. He is not under my chain of command. He is not under my protection. He is not my guard dog."
Vale's eyes narrowed.
"And you," Mira said, soft, "still choose to stand near him."
Evelyn didn't blink. "I stand near danger," she said. "Because I am danger. Do not confuse proximity with loyalty."
Silence.
Real silence this time.
Leonhart Thorne stared at her. He had no expression at all. You could practically hear the gears turning in his head while he tried to reframe her answer into something useful to put in his little report.
Mira d'Alen's smile slipped, just a fraction. She hadn't expected Evelyn to claim the position of the blade in the room.
Vale cleared his throat softly. "So, in your view, Lady Verran, this was not a calculated hostile public move against House d'Arclight. This was a... flare-up. Of a talented outsider."
"It was an accident," Evelyn said.
"And House Verran claims no responsibility for it."
"House Verran claims nothing," Evelyn said calmly. "Because there is nothing to claim."
She held their eyes.
If she branded Rem as hers right now, they would tear him apart to get leverage on her House. Rip him out of the academy machinery, drag him through court logic, dissect him in the name of stability. They would call him illegal. They would call him her weapon. They would use him to choke her.
So she cut him away in public.
She did it while it felt like snapping off her own thumb.
Vale sat back slowly. "Very well," he said. "We appreciate your time, Lady Verran. You understand we are only thinking of the Academy's health. The final year sets the tone for the Empire's future leadership. We cannot be seen to tolerate wild elements in the presence of the Imperial line."
Evelyn smiled with her eyes and not her mouth. "Then perhaps House d'Arclight should stop picking duels it can't carry," she said politely.
Vale's smile flickered.
Mira's eyes flashed, sharp for one heartbeat.
Leonhart's pen stopped.
The air in the room shifted again. Just slightly. Enough.
Evelyn stood with the same perfect grace they expected from her. "If you will excuse me," she said. "There are duties waiting for me. His Highness's security is my current priority."
Which was its own knife, and they all knew it. She had just told them she could walk in and out of the Prince's shadow whenever she chose.
Mira's smile came back. Smaller now. "Of course," Mira said.
Evelyn turned and walked out.
Her shoulders stayed square until the door had closed behind her and the noise of the lounge died under the quiet hum of the corridor ward lines.
Then, alone in that hall, she exhaled like she had been holding her lungs shut since the duel began.
Her hands were shaking.
Not from fear of Vale and Mira.
From what she had just done.
She'd just told the most powerful old vultures in this school that Rem Avern was nothing. That he had no House. That he had no chain. That he was not under her protection.
Which meant now, officially, he had no shield but himself.
She pressed the heel of her hand to her sternum, just over the spot where her spiritual core sat.
Breathe.
You did what you had to do.
You had to cut him loose to keep them from branding him a Verran weapon. You had to. If they had gotten his name on record as "Verran," he would already be dead.
It still burned.
Because Rem Avern had looked up at her in that tunnel after the fight with his ribs taped and blood on his mouth and eyes that trusted her without saying it.
Because he had done exactly what she begged him to do. He hadn't lost control. He hadn't gone wide. He hadn't fed the animal they all wanted to see.
Because he had done good.
And she had just sold him to the room like he was nothing, to save him from being called hers.
Her throat tightened. She forced it down. She forced everything down.
There was no time to feel anything.
Not tonight.
Not with that guard in the Prince's box saying "phase tonight" in a voice he thought no one could read.
The study they used for the Imperial Heir wasn't big.
Rem expected banners. Gold. Marble.
Instead it was a quiet corner room in the eastern wing, lowest level of the guest apartments. No windows. Heavy drapes across the walls, not because of light but because of sound. Chalked ward sigils drawn clean along the door frame. A map of the Academy complex spread across a table with neat colored markers stuck like teeth along specific halls and stairwells.
The Prince sat with one knee up on the chair like any other student, not like a symbol. His jacket collar was open now. His hair wasn't as perfect as it had been in public. His guard stood just inside the door, eyes forward, hand near the hilt of a short spear. The plain-clothed man from the arena leaned against the shelf in the back, half in shadow, watching everything.
Rem stood near the table with his dagger strap across his back and his knee wrapped tight. He didn't lean on anything. He didn't want to look weak in front of the Prince's people.
"You limped all the way here to act like you're not limping," the Prince said without looking up from the map.
Rem blinked. "No I didn't."
"You're doing it right now," the Prince said. "It's fine. Just don't pretend you aren't. It looks stupid. Sit if it hurts."
Rem stayed standing out of spite.
The Prince glanced up at him then. Different eyes than in class. Same person, but stripped. Less performance, more core.
"First," the Prince said. "You did well today."
Rem opened his mouth. Closed it. "Thanks."
"I don't mean in the arena," the Prince said. "In the arena you were loud. I'm talking about after. When you didn't strut. When you didn't gloat. When you didn't turn and point at Lucien and scream that you were better. You let him crawl out with a scrap of pride on his face. That was wiser than you know."
"So I've heard," Rem muttered.
The Prince's mouth twitched, quick. "Ardent already gave you the speech then. Good. Saves me time."
Rem eyed him. "So what is this, then."
The Prince leaned back in his chair and folded his arms loosely. "Security."
Rem lifted a brow. "You have guards. I saw them."
"I have men who can form a wall," the Prince said. "I can get as many walls as I want wherever I go. That isn't the problem."
Rem frowned. "Then what's the problem."
"They fold when it gets ugly," the Prince said simply.
Rem blinked.
The Prince tilted his head. "People think they respect me," he said. "They don't. What they respect is what might happen to them if I die in the wrong way, at the wrong time, in the wrong room. They respect being punished for failing the Empire. They do not respect me."
Rem watched him. "You say that like you've practiced it."
"I have," the Prince said. His tone didn't change. "Three attempts this year. All written off publicly as mana surges or ritual misfires. All quiet. All handled. You may think you're the first problem this Academy has seen. You are not, Avern."
Rem felt heat rise behind his ribs at that. "Then why call me."
The Prince held his gaze. "Because they don't know how to predict you yet."
Rem stared.
The Prince leaned forward, forearms on his knees. "I don't need a bodyguard who bows," he said. "I have those. I need someone who will not freeze when it gets ugly. I watched you in that arena. You didn't freeze. Can you not freeze twice in a row."
Rem didn't bother trying to sound noble. "If something comes for you," he said, "I'll break it."
The Prince's mouth curved up slow. "Good answer."
The guard at the door shifted his stance, but didn't interrupt. The plain-clothed man in the back didn't move at all.
Rem glanced at him. "Who's that."
The Prince didn't turn. "Kade," he said. "He has no last name that you are allowed to use. He handles things that are not supposed to exist. If you live through tonight, you will pretend you never met him."
Kade's eyes flicked once toward Rem. Nothing else. Like looking at an animal in a cage, figuring out where the cage is thin.
Rem didn't like that.
The Prince noticed where Rem was looking, and there was something like satisfaction in his face. Like, yes, good, you're paying attention to the right danger.
"Next point," the Prince said. "Lady Verran."
Rem blinked. "What about her."
"She didn't take her eyes off you the entire fight," the Prince said, voice casual, like he was talking about weather. "Not when you bled. Not when you got hit. Not when you cracked Lucien's aura. She did not react to pain. She did not react to risk. She reacted when you almost slipped at the end and your knee buckled. Do you understand what that means."
Rem frowned. "No."
"It means she doesn't value you as muscle," the Prince said. "If she did, she would have flinched when your ribs got hit. She didn't. She values you as a promise."
Rem blinked. "What is that even supposed to mean."
The Prince's gaze sharpened. "People like that get killed faster," he said softly. "When someone becomes proof that the system can be broken, the system moves to erase the proof."
Rem felt something cold settle in his stomach.
He thought of Evelyn in the tunnel. Her hands shaking. Her voice small when she whispered, You did good.
His jaw clenched. "They won't touch her."
The Prince's eyes warmed for half a second, like he'd just been given a new piece of information he liked. "Spoken just like someone who does not understand how noble knives work," he said. "I approve anyway."
Rem made a low noise in his throat.
The Prince leaned back again. "Alright. Last part. Tonight."
Rem straightened without meaning to.
"We have confirmation," the Prince said. His voice didn't get louder. It got flatter. "Phase tonight. That is not practice language. That is active language."
"Who's 'we'," Rem said.
"People who listen to people who think no one is listening," the Prince said without missing a beat. "You don't need the names. You just need the map."
He turned the table a fraction so Rem could see. The map of the Academy complex lay in tight lines of charcoal and ink. Little red markers sat on stairwells and corridors. Little blue markers lined the outer dorm rings. A single gold pin sat in the east wing. The room they were in.
Rem pointed at one of the red pins. "What are those."
"Blind spots," Kade said from the wall. It was the first time he'd spoken. His voice was low and dry like stone. "Wards we can't see through. Wards we didn't put there."
"Someone's already in the building," Rem said.
"Someone's already in the building," Kade agreed.
Rem swallowed. "What's the plan."
"We do not scatter," the Prince said. "That's when people go missing. We hold position here. We keep circle tight. We let them come in controlled."
"That's bait," Rem said.
"Yes," the Prince said.
Rem blinked. "You sound very relaxed about being the bait."
The Prince smiled that small smile again. "Relaxed is not the word. This is simply familiar."
Rem's hands curled at his sides. His ribs still ached. His knee itched under the wrap. He felt his heart thumping steady and hard. The same feeling he got in dungeons, right before something crawled out of a wall.
He liked that feeling. He hated that he liked that feeling.
"You will stay near me," the Prince said. "If they try to hit from range, you close. If they try to pull me out, you anchor. If they try to take me alive, you do not let them."
Rem frowned. "Define 'do not let them.'"
The Prince looked him dead in the eyes. "Don't be gentle."
The ward lights in the corners of the ceiling flickered.
Rem's head snapped up.
The air in the room changed. You could feel it, the way pressure changes right before a thunder strike.
Kade lifted his head the tiniest amount. "Your Highness," he said quietly. "We just lost contact with post three in the east stair. No response after three calls. Lockspell return came back empty."
The Prince didn't panic.
He just stood.
It was almost lazy. He rose, rolled his shoulders once, adjusted his cuffs like he was about to go to dinner instead of a possible assassination attempt.
"So," he said calmly. "It's tonight."
Rem's pulse kicked up. "Good timing," he muttered.
"Stay close," the Prince said.
Rem planted his feet.
For one heartbeat, he thought of Livesey. Of the clinic that smelled like bitter tea and metal. Of being told, "you're strong, idiot, but you still bleed, eat first." For one heartbeat he wished the old man was here to yell at him and tape his ribs again.
Then the moment passed.
He reached back, gripped the dagger's handle, and felt the familiar impossible weight pull at his spine.
Someone was already moving toward this wing.
He could feel it, like pressure under stone.
He bared his teeth.
"Alright," he said.
"Come on, then."