CHAPTER NINE

I didn’t tell anyone about the dream. Not about the girl with my face standing in the field, and not about the frost spreading across my window like a hand pressed against the glass from the outside. By morning, the whole thing felt unreal in the way nightmares sometimes do after daylight touches them. Still, the memory stayed with me as I walked across campus toward Elemental Theory. It sat in my chest like a small, dense stone I couldn’t swallow or spit out. I kept telling myself it was just a dream.

The classroom overlooked the valley below the academy, wide windows letting the morning light stretch across the curved rows of desks. Students filtered in around me, talking quietly, the hum of conversation filling the room before class began. I took a seat near the back and pulled out my notebook, pretending to focus on the blank page instead of the occasional glance someone sent my way. Being the academy’s newly discovered Prime had turned me into a walking headline overnight. Some people stared openly, others tried to pretend they weren’t looking. Either way, it was impossible not to notice.

Professor Vasile entered with the calm precision of someone who measured her steps. She was small, almost delicate in build, with silver hair braided neatly down her back and sharp eyes behind thin glasses. Without wasting time, she placed a stack of notes on the podium and turned to face the room. The wall behind her flickered to life with a projection of an old map. “Today’s topic,” she said in a level voice, “is Prime energy and its environmental consequences.” Her tone carried the same casual weight someone might use to discuss seasonal weather.

The first map zoomed closer, showing a coastline that looked slightly wrong. The land bent inward where it should have remained straight. “In the year 1842,” Professor Vasile continued, “a documented Prime experienced a prolonged period of uncontrolled rage.” She tapped the image with a slender pointer. “Within forty-eight hours, the ocean moved three hundred meters inland.” A few students shifted in their chairs at that.

She changed the slide. A wide river appeared, arrows marking its current—but they pointed upstream instead of down. “Three weeks,” she said calmly. “A complete reversal of water flow.” The next image showed an enormous storm pattern spiraling across an entire region. “Atmospheric disturbance linked to prolonged emotional instability.” Her voice never rose, never dramatized the events she described. If anything, the quiet way she presented them made the information sink in deeper.

By the fourth example, my pen had stopped moving.

Each slide showed something catastrophic, something impossible under normal circumstances. Each one happened during a period when a Prime had been alive. More specifically, when that Prime had been emotionally unstable. The connection crept up on me slowly until it settled heavy in my stomach.

“The last documented Prime,” Professor Vasile said, switching to the final diagram, “destabilized a seventeen-mile coastal region through six weeks of unmanaged grief.” She paused long enough for the number to settle into the room. Then her gaze lifted and locked directly onto me. “Which,” she added evenly, “is why control is not optional.” The silence stretched for a moment before she finished the thought. “It is infrastructural.”

I spent the rest of the lecture acutely aware of everything happening inside my own head.

A flicker of irritation when someone whispered behind me. A brief sting of embarrassment when the word ‘Prime’ came up again during a question. Even the small rush of relief when someone opened a window and cool air drifted through the room. Each feeling felt sharper than usual, as if the world itself might react if I let any of them grow too strong.

By the time the class ended, I left the room slower than everyone else.

Combat training waited in the lower arena carved into the mountain. The space was circular, the stone floor polished smooth from years of practice. Tall walls rose around the arena with metal railings lining the upper level where instructors usually stood observing. Professor Eiden waited near the center, scanning the roster in his hand while students gathered along the edges. The scar running down his cheek gave him a permanent expression of mild irritation.

“Winter,” he called.

I stepped forward.

“Blackwood.”

Raven moved beside me without hesitation. His posture was straight, calm, like he had expected the pairing from the beginning.

Professor Eiden glanced between us once before nodding. “Blackwood’s resonance ability allows him to sense emotional fluctuations,” he explained to the class. “For someone whose elemental output is emotionally triggered, this makes him the most efficient sparring partner.” His eyes shifted briefly toward me. “Winter’s task is to stabilize her element before the emotional surge completes.”

Raven and I stepped into the practice circle.

Up close, he looked exactly as composed as always. No nervous tension, no curiosity about the Prime standing across from him. Just quiet attentiveness.

“Ready?” he asked.

“Let’s try,” I said.

I lifted my hand and let a small flame form above my palm. It flickered uncertainly for a moment before stabilizing. Raven watched it carefully, his gaze moving between the fire and my face. “Anger building,” he said calmly.

My eyes snapped toward him.

“What?”

“Left side,” he added. “Three seconds.”

The emotion hit exactly when he said it would. Heat flared through my chest and the flame doubled in size before I could stop it. I clenched my fingers slightly, forcing the fire smaller again.

“That’s… unsettling,” I muttered.

“It’s efficient,” he replied.

We tried again.

This time the flame held steady longer. For a moment, I thought I might actually manage it.

“Anxiety,” Raven said.

The word landed like a stone dropped in water. My shoulders tensed automatically, and the flame jumped higher. I groaned under my breath and lowered my hand.

“You’re narrating my feelings,” I said.

“You’re reacting to them,” he corrected calmly.

“That’s the same thing.”

“Not quite.”

We kept going. Each time the flame wavered, Raven named the emotion before it fully formed. Frustration. Embarrassment. Irritation. The strange part was that hearing the words slowed the reaction down, like someone turning on a light in a dark room.

By the end of the session, I was breathing harder than I had during Control Dynamics.

We paused near the edge of the arena, sweat cooling against my skin. Raven handed me a metal canteen and I took a long drink before speaking again.

“You’re not afraid of it,” I said.

“Of what?”

“My power.” I wiped my mouth with the back of my hand. “Everyone else either wants to manage it or they’re nervous around it.”

Raven leaned one shoulder against the railing.

“You just watch it.”

He took the canteen back, our fingers brushing briefly against the metal. “Being afraid of something I can already sense coming,” he said, “is a waste of energy.”

Across the arena, Blaze ran drills with another group. Flames sparked between his hands as he demonstrated a movement sequence for the students around him. He didn’t look over often, but once our eyes met across the distance. His expression was unreadable, something quiet and private behind it. Like he was observing a situation he had strong opinions about but had chosen not to comment on.

I looked away first.

As the session ended, students began leaving the arena in small clusters. Raven stayed behind to return the practice equipment while I headed toward the stairs leading out. Halfway up, I noticed someone leaning against the railing above the arena.

Lucian.

He stood perfectly still, one hand resting lightly on the metal bar while he watched the floor below. His gaze followed Raven as he handed the canteen back to Professor Eiden.

For a brief second something crossed Lucian’s face.

It was gone too quickly to read.

Then he pushed away from the railing and walked down the corridor without a word.

Night came quietly.

I had just finished brushing my teeth when I heard footsteps in the hallway outside my room. Slow, steady steps moving down the corridor.

I opened the door before the person passed.

Raven stopped mid-stride a few feet away.

“You’re developing a habit of appearing outside my door,” I said.

“I patrol this corridor,” he replied.

“Convenient.”

He didn’t comment.

I leaned lightly against the doorframe. “Your emotional resonance thing,” I said. “Can you feel it right now?”

“What you’re feeling?”

“Yes.”

Raven went very still.

After a long moment, he nodded once. “Yes.”

I waited.

He met my eyes.

“You’re not afraid anymore,” he said quietly.

The words landed heavier than I expected.

“That started sometime this afternoon.”

He said it like a simple observation. Like it didn’t matter at all.

But the way he said it made it feel like it mattered a great deal.

Before I could respond, he continued down the corridor.

I stood in the doorway watching him go, the quiet pressure in the air around the academy feeling closer than before.

Much closer.