Rhea did not wait for Leon to say yes.
She turned and started walking, expecting him to follow.
Leon did.
The hall behind them was still messy with students, staff, and the aftertaste of public embarrassment, but Rhea moved through it fast enough that nobody tried to stop her. The bandage around her right wrist looked fresh. White cloth. Too neat. Bell or Anselm had done it in a hurry and tried to make the hurry look professional.
At the end of the corridor, Rhea pushed open a side door and stepped into the outer stairwell that ran along the academy's east wing.
It was quieter there. Concrete steps. Thin railings painted black. A vending machine on the landing below with one dead light and a dent in the lower panel like somebody had kicked it years ago and never apologized. Through the wired glass, late afternoon sun lay hot across the courtyard.
Rhea climbed two flights without looking back.
Leon followed her to the rooftop access landing.
No cameras. No students. Just a broad maintenance level with a few storage crates, a rusted drain in one corner, and enough wind to keep the place from smelling like dust for long.
Rhea stopped at the railing and turned.
Now, she said, explain.
Leon leaned against the wall instead of the railing. The concrete still held some warmth from the sun.
I told you already. My class sees flaws.
That's not an explanation.
It's the one I've got.
Rhea studied him for a long second.
Up close, she looked younger than Leon remembered. Not softer. Just younger. There was still some roundness in her face the papers had polished out later. A tiny scar sat under her chin, the kind you got as a kid and forgot about until someone looked too closely. Her hair was coming loose near the left ear, one short strand moving every time the wind cut across the landing.
You knew about the vial, she said. Not just that something was wrong. The vial. That is not a guess.
No, Leon said. It wasn't.
Then how.
He looked away from her for a moment and out over the practice fields.
From up here the academy almost looked ordinary. Students crossing the lower walkways in uniform. Groundskeeper carts crawling along the paths. A line of half-dead shrubs by the fence that someone kept trimming as if that would solve the real problem. Beyond the walls, the city carried on in the slow afternoon haze, all glass and concrete and traffic lights, pretending it wasn't sitting one bad month away from gates swallowing whole districts.
Because I know what happens when people use the wrong fix on the wrong problem, he said.
That was not a lie. It just was not the whole truth.
Rhea folded her arms.
You talk like you've seen it before.
Leon looked at her again.
Maybe I have.
Her expression did not change much, but she did not let the answer pass either.
That is not normal.
No, he said. It isn't.
They stood there for a second with the wind moving between them.
Below, someone on the lower field shouted after missing a catch. The sound carried up clean and stupid and normal. Leon almost envied it.
Rhea shifted her weight.
My arm still hurts, she said.
The plainness of that landed harder than the accusation had.
Let me see it.
She hesitated.
Not out of fear. More like pride arguing with practicality for half a breath.
Then she unwound the bandage.
The skin along the inside of her wrist was faintly flushed. Nothing dramatic. That was how bad damage started most of the time. Quiet. Easy to explain away. Easy to ignore because people wanted the bigger, prettier result more than they wanted the truth.
Leon focused.
The line above her arm flickered again.
Class core fracture detected
Local route instability present
Current state: worsening under suppression
He swore under his breath.
Rhea caught it.
What.
They already dampened it, he said. That was fast.
Anselm wanted to be safe, she said. Bell agreed.
Leon let out a breath through his nose.
Of course they did.
Rhea watched him.
Can you fix it.
There were a lot of answers to that question.
Not permanently. Not today. Not with certainty. Not in a way he would bet his own life on after only five minutes with the class.
But enough.
I can stop it from settling wrong, he said. I think.
You think.
That's the honest version.
She looked at him for another second, then nodded once.
Fine. Honest works better than confident bullshit.
That almost got a laugh out of him.
Almost.
He pushed off the wall.
Do you have your blade.
Rhea glanced at the sword case beside her boot.
Yes.
Good. Open it.
She crouched and unclasped the case. Inside lay a straight, single-edged academy saber with a training sheath and a grip wrapped in dark blue cord. Clean weapon. Well kept. One nick near the guard that told Leon she actually used it instead of just polishing it for show.
He liked that.
Rhea lifted it out and straightened.
Now what.
Leon pointed to the empty space beside the railing.
Stand there. Not too close to the edge unless you feel like flying off the roof and giving Bell something new to blame me for.
A tiny shift at the corner of her mouth.
Not a smile. Close enough.
She moved where he pointed.
Leon stepped in front of her and kept his attention on the sword, the wrist, and the line only he could see.
The academy tried to quiet the route, he said. That bought you about an hour of less pain and a worse problem tomorrow. We need to force the excess out before it nests deeper.
Nest is an ugly word.
It fits.
He motioned toward the blade.
Draw half an inch.
She did.
Mana stirred at once, pale and sharp under the steel, with a brightness that made the fine hairs on Leon's arms lift. Good class. Very good class. Too much pressure packed into it too early.
You feel that, he said.
Rhea nodded.
Like it's snagging.
Exactly.
The word came out faster than he meant it to. Plain. Real.
He adjusted.
When I say now, pull the blade clear and vent through the edge. Not upward. Not inward. Out and away. If you try to muscle it down the arm again, you'll make it worse.
What if it blows back.
Then don't aim it at your face.
She stared at him.
That was your reassuring line.
It's the honest one.
A beat passed.
Then, annoyingly, her mouth did curve a little.
Leon had forgotten that. In the reports and the later footage, Rhea Solis was all command voice and bloodless headlines. He had not known there had once been a dry sense of humor under all that.
Good, he thought. Stay a person this time.
He stepped a little to the side.
Ready.
She settled her grip.
Ready.
Now.
Rhea drew.
Light broke off the blade in a hard white flare.
Not a full skill manifestation. Not that big. But too much for a rooftop landing with cracked concrete and a rusted drain. The burst hit the air and twisted back toward her wrist exactly the way Leon had feared.
Out, he snapped. Away from your body.
Rhea changed the angle fast.
The second flare tore sideways instead of back. It struck the railing and blew sparks off the black paint, leaving a bright gouge in the metal. A smell like hot pennies and burned dust filled the landing.
Rhea sucked in a sharp breath.
Pain.
Leon saw it in her face before he saw the line change.
Local discharge successful
Fracture pressure reduced
Current state: unstable but no longer compressing
Good.
Again, he said. Smaller this time.
Rhea reset her stance.
Sweat had gathered at the base of her throat and one strand of hair had come fully loose now, stuck against her cheek. She looked annoyed about both things.
She vented a second time.
Less violent.
The blade hummed. Another spray of sparks. The scorched mark on the railing widened.
Then the pressure behind Leon's eyes eased.
He exhaled.
Stop.
Rhea lowered the blade but did not sheath it yet.
For a second neither of them spoke.
The wind moved across the landing and carried the smell of burned metal away. Somewhere below, a whistle blew on one of the fields. A gull landed on the far roof and immediately looked offended by everything.
Rhea flexed her right hand once.
The tightness around her eyes loosened.
It's gone, she said.
For now.
She looked up at him.
For now.
Leon nodded.
You're not fixed. Just not digging deeper. Yet.
She slid the blade back into its sheath and stood there holding the case at her side.
Then why did they miss it.
Because the crystal only sees what it's built to see. And people trust clean readings more than they trust ugly exceptions.
That answer sat between them a moment.
Rhea wrapped the bandage back around her wrist, slower this time.
You still haven't told me how you knew about the vial.
Leon rubbed a hand over the back of his neck.
The right answer did not exist. Not one she would accept today.
So he gave her something closer to the shape of the truth.
Because I'm tired of watching useful people die for stupid reasons.
Rhea looked at him without blinking.
Useful, she said.
That's what you've got.
It's what I've got.
She considered that.
Down on the lower walkway, a group of first years came spilling out into the courtyard. Loud. Full of relief and false swagger. One of them nearly tripped over the curb, recovered, then looked around to see who had noticed. Leon almost smiled before he remembered himself.
Rhea rested the sword case lightly against her leg.
Bell thinks you're reckless, she said.
Bell thinks coffee counts as a personality.
That got a real reaction from her this time. Small, quick, gone fast, but real.
And Darius Crowe, she said, asked about you after you left the consultation room.
Leon's attention sharpened.
What exactly did he ask.
If you'd always been like this.
Leon let that sit there.
That bad, or that useful, Rhea said. I wasn't close enough to tell which one he meant.
Both, Leon said.
Probably.
Rhea nodded as if that matched something she had already decided.
I don't trust him, she said.
That surprised Leon enough that he looked at her properly.
Why.
She glanced back toward the door leading down from the rooftop landing.
Because when Bell and Anselm were arguing about my assessment, he never once asked if I was all right. He only asked what you saw.
Leon said nothing.
Rhea's grip tightened lightly on the case.
People show themselves in small moments, she said.
Yes, Leon thought. They do.
He looked toward the city beyond the academy walls and saw, for a second, the other version of it layered underneath. Smoke where there should have been afternoon light. Sirens. Broken roads. Names on casualty walls.
Then it was gone again.
Rhea pulled him back to the present.
You said your class sees flaws.
It does.
Then if you see something like this again, tell me before the academy does something stupid.
Leon studied her.
There it was. Not gratitude exactly. Not trust either. Something better for now.
A working arrangement.
You're making that sound like an order, he said.
Maybe I am.
He almost told her no just to see what she'd do.
Instead he nodded once.
Fine.
Good.
She picked up the sword case properly, then paused.
One more thing.
What.
Rhea looked him over in that same measuring way she had on the stage.
Next time you decide to humiliate someone in the middle of a corridor, do it a little farther from me. Brent Harlow threw blood on my shoes.
Leon blinked.
Then, against his own better judgment, laughed.
It came out rougher than he intended. Real. The first honest laugh he had managed since waking up in the hall.
Rhea watched him for a second, like she had not expected that sound from him either.
Then she turned and headed for the door.
Leon stayed where he was until she reached it.
Rhea.
She looked back.
You need to vent that channel again tonight, he said. Small release. Not enough to flare. If the pain comes back sharp, stop and wait until morning.
She nodded once.
Then she left.
Leon stood alone on the landing with the burned smell still hanging faint in the air and two fresh grooves cut into the black railing.
The line above the city looked empty.
The line above Darius's future did not.
Below the noise of students and teachers and a normal school day winding down, Leon could feel it now, clear as a wire pulling taut.
Things were moving.
Good, he thought.
Let them.
Add it to your library now. Things are about to get ugly.