The spell broke apart before completion.
Not violently. Not catastrophically.
It simply refused to finish existing.
The sigil suspended in the air—three interlocked planes of pale light—stuttered once, lost coherence, and unraveled into motes that dissolved before they could touch the ground.
The mage exhaled slowly.
"Again"
He adjusted his stance, boots sinking slightly into the frost-hardened earth. The training grounds lay beyond the academy walls, where stone gave way to exposed rock and wind-scoured snowfields.
The day was clear.
Painfully so.
Sunlight reflected off the white expanse until the world felt overexposed, stripped of shadow. Above, the sky was a hard, merciless blue—too clean for Caladan. Weather like this never lasted.
He raised his hand.
Symbols assembled— Each one precise, deliberate, occupying a distinct position in his mind. The first stabilized easily. The second followed. The third resisted, pulling at the edges of his concentration like a knot tied too tightly.
He forced it anyway.
A mistake.
His thoughts lagged. As though his mind were moving through cold resin instead of air. The symbols blurred, not visually but conceptually, their boundaries losing sharpness.
"Ars"
He released the structure immediately.
The backlash was mild: a brief wave of vertigo, a metallic taste at the back of his tongue. Acceptable. He had stopped before damage set in.
The mage lowered his hand and waited.
"Breath in"
"Breath out."
The world returned to normal speed.
Around him, the terrain bore the evidence of repetition. Shallow scorches in the snow where heat had briefly existed. Hairline fractures in exposed stone, spiderwebbing outward from precise points. Residual light clinging to the air like afterimages.
None of it dramatic. None of it accidental.
He had been here since dawn.
The academy rose behind him, half-carved into the mountain itself. Dark stone, austere lines, no ornamentation beyond function. Caladan did not build to impress.
That philosophy extended to magic.
He flexed his fingers, then deliberately simplified.
"This time, only two symbols."
The structure formed cleanly.
Light condensed— It hovered just above his palm, obedient, stable. He rotated his wrist, and the construct followed the motion exactly without distortion.
"Good"
He stepped forward and released the command.
The light struck the stone ahead and dispersed in a controlled wave. Snow vaporized instantly, leaving bare rock beneath—untouched beyond the intended radius.
Efficient.
That was the standard.
In Caladan, excess was considered a flaw.
He let the construct dissipate and allowed himself a moment to observe the surroundings— to look for residual instability. The air was clean.
Satisfied, he began again.
This time, he altered the internal ordering.
Not the symbols themselves. Their relationship.
The difference was subtle, but the effect was not.
When he released the spell, the light did not strike outward. Instead, it anchored—binding itself briefly to the stone before collapsing inward. The snow around the impact site shifted, drawn toward the center, then fell still.
He frowned.
That hadn't been intended.
He replayed the sequence in his mind, step by step. The error wasn't in execution. It was in assumption. He had treated the second symbol as subordinate when it wasn't.
A logic fault, not a failure of power.
He corrected it.
The next attempt behaved exactly as predicted.
A faint smile touched his expression—brief, restrained, gone as quickly as it appeared. Satisfaction was allowed. Indulgence was not.
From the academy walls above, a bell rang.
Not loud. Not ceremonial. Just precise.
First summons.
He glanced back once, toward the open training ground, then toward the distant horizon beyond the valley. From this height, the land spread outward in layered whites and grays, mountains receding into haze.
Peaceful.
Deceptively so.
Caladan's history was written in winters that arrived without warning and wars that did the same.
He dispersed the last traces of lingering constructs and turned toward the academy. As he walked, the sunlight caught on something far above.
A shadow passed across the snow.
Brief. Vast.
He stopped.
Looked up.
Nothing.
The sky was empty again, pristine as ever.
After a moment, he resumed walking.
Whatever had crossed the heavens had done so silently, without disturbance. If it had meaning, it was not one meant for him—at least, not yet.
The academy gates loomed ahead.
Stone swallowed sound. Walls swallowed warmth.
Inside, knowledge waited.
Outside, the world pretended to be calm.
And somewhere, far beyond the mountains, something had already begun to move.