Zephyr was a breathtakingly beautiful city. Most of its buildings and streets were formed of irregularly shaped stone joined by mortar with its overall design not giving an impression of careful planning, but rather the feeling of a winding maze, networking outwards from the two wide roads that crossed at its centre. One of those roads connected the countries East and West stretching from the great East coastal road to the capital city of Pyros; the other connected North and South, bypassing Etheret to take one as far North as the mountains near Alex’s birthplace, or as far South as Rust, the Southernmost port-city in the kingdom of Aisnet, from where one could board a ship to the continent of Glass.

While Zephyrs outer areas were quiet and pleasant, the inner-city was busy. Here, larger two and three-storey buildings with ground-floor arches, square windows, and fancy metal signs could be seen. Shopfronts and seating areas lined the footpath below, and people filled the balconies above, conducting business or simply relaxing with meals or drinks.

Alex hadn’t seen the inner-city the day that he’d arrived at Etheret, so it surprised him. Zephyr was the second largest city in Windria, and incomparable to any of the villages that he’d passed through on his journey South. What stood out most for him however were not the crowds or the buildings, but the strong presence of magic. Faint whispers of expert magisters could be heard occasionally from some of the buildings around them, and on their way towards the central crossroads they had even witnessed two tall dolls, both with similar people-friendly designs: one acting as a porter for a merchant, and the other pulling a two-wheeled touring carriage with a couple sitting in the back. The dolls appeared to be well received by the surrounding people who gave them friendly smiles and even waved. If that was all that they had seen, Alex would have simply accepted it as evidence of the peoples’ love of dolls. The warbeast completely changed this impression.

Pulling a particularly fancy-looking carriage, the furry, three-horned beast was decorated with excessively ornate steel armour and chains. Larger than a horse, with the senses and wiles of a wolf, these creatures were one of the fifteen types of spirits: a type that made excellent, though extremely dangerous, mounts.

“I get that it’s a creature well-suited to the job and that it’s under control,” Alex said, breaking the silence as they stared at the carriage passing “but that fur is as tough as iron, and that thing could probably lay waste to a full unit of the local guards without any trouble.”

Serah nodded seriously in agreement. “We had dolls that would help with the farms where I lived, but nothing like that.”

After they’d walked a little further along the street, she pointed out a second-floor coffee shop with vines along the balcony surrounding it, and looked at Alex questioningly: “care for a stop? I’m paying.”

He winced. “I couldn’t do that…”

“You can, and you will. I invited you out, so I get to pay if I want to. Next time you should invite me out, that way you can pay.”

Her logic seemed a little off. “It’s fine, I have enough money for something like this.”

She grinned at him, “Then you won’t have a problem with treating me next time.”

“…” he looked away awkwardly but followed her to the stairs.

The barista in the shop smiled upon seeing the Etheret uniforms, took their orders and guided them to a table before bringing their cups over. The shop was a cross between a garden and a café. It took-up the entire second floor of the building, and potted-plants stretched all along its inner walls, vines emerging from them to climb up iron grates and form curtains of green that encircled the customers within. Above, a set of tinted glass windows lined the high gable roof, letting in so much light that the café felt a little like a greenhouse.

Alex and Serah were seated at the balcony that had caught her attention, and together they sipped their coffee and watched the people passing-by below. They hadn’t talked yet, and Alex couldn’t help but feel a little nervous, both about what kind-of conversations she might want to have, and why she invited him. At the same time, he simply wanted to get the day over with, so that he could distance himself from her like he’d planned.

Seeing his face, Serah breathed out lightly and put her cup down, then raised one finger. “I have one rule, and I want you to follow it today, till the end of the day.”

It sounded to him like she was complicating things again “…What’s the rule?”

“For the rest of the day, you don’t stress about all the secrets, the problems, and the worries that you have, and we talk as if we were just two regular students.”

It was a difficult request.

She saw his hesitation and put her finger down, turning back to the people passing on the street. “Then how about I make it a deal instead of a rule?”

“What do you mean?”

“You want to be alone without us bothering you. I get it. It’s easy to see. So, if you forget about everything and just spend the day with me as another Etheret student, I’ll help you. Not only will I stop bothering you, I’ll make sure that the others in our group don’t bother you either.”

“I see… and why would you do that and go to all that trouble?”

“Because, if you want to be alone, it’s wrong of me to keep bothering you. I wish that you didn’t feel that way, but I clearly can’t change it; so instead of stopping you or trying to change your mind, I’m going to show you how much better it feels to have friends who stick with you. I want you to know, so that when you feel alone or feel like you need to talk to someone, you remember that you already have someone like that…people like that.” She stumbled over her words at the end.

He didn’t need the reminder. Alex knew that life at Etheret would be more fun with them, and he certainly felt that Serah was someone that he could talk to without fear of her divulging his secrets. Serah, he felt, was someone who would never betray a person’s confidence or intentionally cause a person harm, and Alex believed this because for her and the others at the school like her, who aspired to join the orders of the South, people were not the enemy. For Serah, he was a fellow student, a friend, and a potential ally against the monsters that hunted mankind in the dark, and he knew that she fully intended to join those orders of the South and pit herself against those monsters.

Alex admired her. Even her ability to see through him and his behaviour would be something that he would admire, if it hadn’t been aimed at him, and it was because of this admiration that he couldn’t refuse her. There was no way that he could bring himself to treat such a person badly, so her offer had actually come as a perfect way for him to remove himself.

He nodded. If this way of parting was something that she could accept and be happy with, he would go along with her request. “Okay, it’s a deal. For the rest of the day, I’ll do it.”

She smiled. “Excellent. So…first, how can you hear whispers that are so soft like that?”

Alex looked around nervously, but nobody was seated near them. ‘It’s not like she’s going to tell anyone anything’ he thought, ‘The only things that I need to keep from her are things that could get us both killed.’ So he confessed: “Me and my little sister were oversensitive from birth, so we could both hear whispers just like spirits do. I hear most spirit-infused whispers almost as though they were a shout, though whispers to bound and named spirits can be more difficult to hear.”

Serah nodded. “That explains the headaches.” Then she hesitantly posed the next question. “You said “were”, so I’m guessing that your sister isn’t alive anymore, is she?”

Alex shook his head.

“Ah, I’m sorry to hear that. I have a little sister, and I can’t even imagine it.”

That surprised him, and he impulsively asked, “What’s she like?”

Grinning at his question, Serah explained: “She’s very serious, probably smarter than me, and she prefers a two-handed sword. She’ll be coming here next year too. She wanted to come this year, but dad wouldn’t let her.”

She’d used the word “dad” for her father, so it seemed like they were close, yet she’d taken her mother’s name “Ashborn”. Alex still didn’t understand the situation, but since he felt that they were closer now than they were on the first day, this time he asked the reason why.

Serah made a bitter face and sipped her coffee, then looked away.

“Never mind.” Taking the hint, he quickly changed the subject. “What do your parents do?”

Serah squinted her eyes at the crowd. A few long moments passed, and just when Alex was going to change the subject again, she answered, “Mum sells jewellery, and dad grows produce.”

“Ah, I see.” Fruit, wheat and lumber were Windria’s largest exports, and were responsible for the countries great wealth. Aisnet and Lammria both had lands that were poor for farming, so Windria’s fertile earth was essential for the survival of all three countries. “My parents were involved in farming too. They were magisters for the harvest farms.”

Serah struggled to swallow her coffee for a moment.

“Are you alright?”

“Ah, yeah, I was just thinking that the harvest farms are owned by the same house that my dad works for, so it’s kind-of a coincidence.”

“House Thorn, huh. Well, they do own most of the farms in the country.”

She nodded and looked into her coffee for a few seconds before awkwardly asking, “They’re dead too, aren’t they? Your parents.”

Alex took a breath. “Yes. It happened a long time ago however, so it’s nothing that you need to worry over.”

Serah didn’t reply, she was only looking into her coffee and moving her fingers around the outside of the cup. She just sat like that for almost a minute before she spoke again, “Then those tavern owners took you in, right?” her voice was quieter than before.

“Yeah... they were friends of my parents, and a lot of the soldiers from the tavern were friends with them too.”

“To still live in the same town where your family lived without them…that sounds pretty lonely.”

He didn’t look up, “I also had my spirits with me, so it wasn’t so bad.”

Her face brightened a little bit “Oh, I’d love to meet them.” And then she stopped herself “Sorry, that’s probably not going to happen, I guess.” Then, finishing the coffee and putting down her empty coffee cup she asked, “did you feel like going for a walk?”

Alex finished his own coffee and nodded before standing. “I don’t mind letting you meet them when we go on our trip to contract greater spirits, though Star is the only one that speaks our language.”

“So you’re still going with us?” She looked at him surprised, “Wouldn’t that be a bother for you?”

Alex shook his head. “No, I’d rather be there to make sure that nothing goes wrong.” If they were away from the school on a trip, he didn’t see any problem with being around them, as it was only being seen with them around people that was dangerous. Then suddenly, as though this thought had been a signal, Alex sensed eyes on them the moment that they left the coffee shop.

He looked around, giving the impression that he was getting his bearings, and casually let his eyes touch on the watchers. There were two of them on the other side of the wide main road, standing and talking to one another. Only one was facing towards their direction, but as Alex and the stranger’s eyes met, Alex knew that the pairs’ conversation was a farce. The awareness of one-another was mutual however, and the stranger said something quickly to his friend, then a moment later they disappeared into an alley that cut through the row of shops.

Alex was confused. ‘How have I been found out?’ he wondered for a moment, before dismissing the thought. It didn’t matter how he’d been discovered, the problem was that they had seen him with Serah. They might either return and use her to lure him into a trap or leave her till he was dealt with and kill her later.

In the instant these thoughts surfaced, he made up his mind: it was necessary that he kill them, though he’d certainly want to confirm their intentions first.

“I’ll be back in just a moment,” Alex said to Serah, “Just wait here.” He then made his way quickly across the road, avoiding the steady flow of people as much as possible and whispered to himself: “Star, prepare for combat.”

Behind him he heard Serah cry out, “huh? Why? Where are you going?”

Reaching the other side, he rushed into the alleyway. It was lined with the brick walls of the two shops on either side, but besides a couple of wooden boxes, it was now empty. Alex moved past the boxes, now accelerating into a jog. “Take over if we’re ambushed.”

“No problem.”

Moving out of the other end of the alley, he found himself in a smaller side-street with the backs of buildings facing him and a single, very cosy looking, out-of-the-way restaurant. Tables and chairs were laid-about, attended by customers that preferred to eat away from the main road. Alex’s eyes darted over them, and then to the adjoining alleyways and either end of the street. The observers were nowhere to be seen. He turned to one of the tables “Excuse me, did you see which way those two men who just came through here went?”

The lady customer threw him an intrigued look and pointed to one of the alleyways that he couldn’t see down from his current position.

He rushed on. “Thank you.”

Running through the alley at full speed now, without any caution, he followed it as it turned and twisted, meandering behind the buildings that surrounded it. The alleyway seemed to be moving lower than the street level, so there were no other adjoining alleys (a fact for which Alex was thankful).

Then in an instant as he turned a corner, he saw an axe swinging full-speed at his throat, and as though he had pre-planned it, his right arm struck-out and caught the haft, instantly bringing the axe to a halt, then his body turned anti-clockwise around his handhold, as his left hand caught the opponents hand on the weapon. His body moved beneath the man, and with a quick twist threw him over one shoulder and into the ground. The thud as he hit the flagstones with his back was barely a second after he had initially swung the axe, and his partner who stood a little further back opened his mouth wide at the sudden and unexpected result, before turning to run with his sword still drawn. The axe flew and sunk deep into the back of that man’s skull, pushing him into a dive, so that he too hit the flagstone floor of the alleyway.

The sight of the man spasming with the axe still stuck in the back of his head caused Alex to avert his eyes. He still wasn’t sure if it had been the right decision.

“Who sent you?” he asked the man that Star had thrown down, as she twisted his arm and held him still. Star did not pin it to his back, cutting off his breathing, but instead opted to manipulate the elbow and lock his arm straight.

The man groaned for a moment, and then said a name. That word was not just any word however, it was infused with magic.

The air before Alex’s eyes moved and his body instantly twisted sideways, avoiding the five black blades that emerged from the shadows of the alley by a hairs breadth. As he twisted and fell, a figure slightly larger than a human was leaning out of the shadow, the lower half of it’s form lost in the dark. He knew that it was not a human, for instead of a face there was a featureless space, and instead of fingers there were two-feet long blackened blades. It didn’t slow for a moment, it’s other hand whipping around, bringing five deadly weapons swinging through the air with incredible speed. They sheared through the brick wall of the alley spraying sparks before they struck the ground where Alex had been only a moment before. If not for that moment of restraint, those claws would have cut him to ribbons.

It was a reaper. This particular species of spirit specialised in assassination and reconnaissance. The creature did not stop its assault. Before Alex could roll to his feet it shifted forwards, its body becoming an indistinct form before claws once-more emerged from it, this time from an angle where the presence of walls would not stop them. With perfect timing, Star struck the ground in the direction that they were rolling, immediately rolling back the other way, towards the figure and then, reaching out with her legs, she snagged the creatures lower half, and twisted her body, bringing it down.

Footfalls could be heard as the person who had first attacked Alex with the axe fled, clearly taking advantage of the scuffle.

Alex instructed, not daring to pull his eyes away from the battle for fear of distracting Star.

The creature that fell seemed to lose its form momentarily, and in that instant, Star got his legs to the floor and they jumped backwards, then claws once-more stabbed towards them. Attacking the thing in close-range was impossible, as it could shift and reform instantly, launching its blades out from unseen angles.

“Star, get to the axe.”

Turning, Star ran without a moments hesitation, straight for the man who had fallen, and pulled the axe from his head, before spinning back around. As they looked back, the shadowy figure was nowhere to be seen in that alleyway, but both Star and Alex knew that this only meant that it was moving slowly. Alex didn’t even pause at its apparent disappearance: “Star. Light.”

The light that burst from Alex illuminated the alley completely, and there, moving towards them along one of the walls was a skeletal figure with a blank and featureless mask of a face. The shadowy tendrils that would coil around it and hide it from sight were flickering along the edges of its form, struggling to conceal it. Then the axe struck that face, splitting it in half.

With a whoosh, the sound of an explosion was heard through the ether as its energy was released from the physical body and the spirit was destroyed. Where it stood, a mixture of grease, charcoal, rags and a handful of other unidentifiable substances now fell to the floor. That ooze was the sum of materials required to summon the spirit from its own plane and give it physical form, and without the spirit, that was the form its body reverted to.

Alex breathed hard from the sudden and frantic battle that had quickly exhausted him and looked down the alleyway towards the man who had fled. That man wouldn’t be preparing any ambushes after this experience and very likely only sought to save his own life at this point. Alex knew without a doubt that the man would be running at full speed, and he also knew that in his current state, it would be impossible to catch-up. He felt a knot tighten in his stomach. He didn’t know how the enemy had known he was at Etheret, but they knew, and furthermore the next time a foe targeted him, they could also involve Serah. He would have to follow the man later and ensure that everyone involved was eliminated. Now he had no choice but to act.

“Thank you, Star.” He whispered.

“No. I didn’t see the reaper. This was clearly my failure.”

“We’re alive. We can continue to fight. That’s your victory…and as for that reaper, is it…?” he left the question hanging

“Yes. It’s an illegal.”

With that last word, any of the doubts that Alex had were assuaged and he was relieved. He had briefly considered the chance that these men may have only been aiming to rob from him and Serah, or abduct them, thinking that their families might be wealthy nobles, but the presence of an illegal changed that. These men were undoubtedly allied with the Ashai.

Looking back at the corpse that had initially bothered him, Alex felt satisfaction wash over him, then a deep sense of peace. Despite his careful planning to hunt them from the shadows without revealing himself, his enemies had made the first move, pre-empting him. This meant that his cover was likely blown, and it meant that everyone on his list of names was likely aware of him. “It’s nearly over” he said out loud.

Star didn’t respond, but he felt her silence more strongly than he would any words that she may have spoken.

Before he could begin however, he felt that he should get Serah back to the academy and out of harms-way, and then of-course, he needed to get his sword.

She was smiling at him sinisterly when he arrived back at the café entrance with the air of a snake about to strike. “You promised me a full afternoon, Alex, and a full afternoon means that you don’t leave me in the street for half an hour. I really hope you’re prepared to pay the price for ditching me. It’s not going to be cheap, you know.”

He winced. She had no intention of heading back now.

She saw the sweat on his forehead as he came closer however, and the fact that he was still breathing heavily, and her sinister smile faded. “Are you okay?”

Alex was drained. The battle had been intense, but the cost that he had to pay towards Star was what had really hit him hard. Star was a lightbringer, and lightbringers didn’t drink blood: instead they would absorb the lifeforce directly from the source. Every time she moved his body, or called-on her power, his lifeforce would be sapped, and what topped it all was the price paid for disposing of the assailant’s body with scorchlight. If the authorities had evidence of a murderous Etheret student on the loose, every guard in the city would be out looking for him, which would alert the enemy to his approach, and pit him against a small army. “I’m fine. I just need to get my breath back is all.”

“I see. Could I ask what it was that you were doing, suddenly running-off like that?”

“…I’d prefer not to answer that.”

She pursed her lips, but her expression didn’t otherwise change. “Okay.” She didn’t push any further.

Twilight was fast approaching, and she wouldn’t have very much longer in Zephyr before she would have to head back to the dormitories, but when Serah turned and walked in the opposite direction, Alex immediately followed. After giving the earlier ambush some thought, Alex had decided that it was very unlikely that the two who had attacked earlier had done-so alone, and that they may have only been serving as reconnaissance for a larger unit dispatched to take-care of him. In-fact, he was fairly sure that using only two people and a reaper for such a task was far less likely. Alex knew that forces could be gathering on his enemies’ end while he was escorting her, but at the same time, he knew that he wasn’t in any condition for an all-out battle right at that moment. He was painfully weighing-up the risks in his head, and didn’t really know what to do, and so for the moment, he simply followed and stayed alert.

They walked down the main road for a while before turning-in to a side-street. Serah had slowed till Alex and her now walked side-by-side, but from her gesture when she indicated the direction for them to go, he felt as-though they weren’t simply going for a walk: she seemed to have a particular location in-mind. Somewhere up-ahead he heard music being played, which he felt was probably a clue.

“Have you ever been to Ritri, Alexander?” She suddenly asked with a strange curiosity in her voice.

“Ah, no.” Ritri was the capital of Aisnet, the Southernmost country, known mostly for its desert. It was the poorest of the three countries and survived mostly by exporting wytchglass. “I’ve never left Windria.”

“Truly?” Serah mused, with a smile slowly growing on her face.

They rounded the corner to another side-street, and all along the walls of the street were tents and stall-fronts, lighted by many burning lamps. Most of the people here were dressed in patchwork clothing of different colours, and the music of flutes and drums could be heard somewhere further ahead. It wasn’t a busy place, but there were enough people that it could be said that this particular street was quite popular. Curious looks were aimed their way, because their student uniforms were the only ones among this crowd but those looks were not unfriendly ones.

“Welcome to the secret market, Alexander.” Serah called-out, now openly grinning. “You can find markets just like this one in most of the major cities of the three kingdoms; little markets for those who once lived in Aisnet, or for those who trade goods from Aisnet.”

“I see,” Alex looked around confusedly, “so why did we come here exactly?”

Replying while walking, she explained, “I would travel to Ritri all the time with my mother on business. In-total, I’d say that I’ve spent around three years there, and that makes it something like a second home to me. I guess I came here because of that…and because I want to buy something of-course.”

From her answer, he knew that there was no rushing her here, so the fastest way to get her back to the academy, he decided, would likely be to go along with her. He certainly didn’t mind that his going-along with her wishes would meet his agreement to act as though he were just another student for the day also: just another paranoid student watching everyone who walked past them. “So you came here because you know the people and the customs well enough to fit-in here?” Alex managed.

Shaking her head, she responded, “It’s not just that. Ritri is a country so poor that most of its people live their lives sharing homes with several families. They struggle every day making-do with the small amount that they are given to survive by the wytches, but the people of Ritri are not angry, and they don’t hate the rest of the world for having so much more than them. The people of Ritri band together and help each-other, surviving only because everyone leans on each-other. Because of that closeness between all its people, it’s a place that’s close to my heart…so it was important to come here.”

Alex nodded and began looking at one of the stalls with Serah. “That sounds like a tough place to live, but not bad exactly. Are those wytches that you mentioned like nobles?”

Serah laughed at the last part. “No. They are more like advisors to the people and the kingdom. They’re all storytellers, who learn all the stories of their people and pass them down through the generations, and they also make wytchglass of-course, which lets the people of the desert survive. I suppose they’re treated more like priests than anything, though their gods would be stories and knowledge.”

Alex had heard of wytchglass but didn’t know any more than a few basic facts: it was the rarest, and for that reason alone, the most expensive product in the world; a fist-sized block of wytchglass was worth as much as a small castle, and only the super-rich nobles of Windria could afford it; and among the dozen or-so people that possessed it, it was seen as a symbol of status. “I see. So, they sell wytchglass to feed the people. They sound much better than our nobles.”

Serah nodded with a wry smile. “Exactly.” She then began to look at a few small necklaces on a stand, before picking one up and holding it against Alex’s chest. He blinked, and she quickly took it away, turning back to the vendor before speaking a few words in another language.

This surprised Alex considerably. The three kingdoms, and even the people living on the Southern continent all spoke the one language, the language of humans. The only other language that he knew-of was the spirit language. He decided to ask her about it later, as she seemed busy.

The stall owner, an older lady in a hooded dress of faded red, grinned widely and started talking with Serah in the same language, and then she picked up another necklace and showed it to her, talking more.

Feeling eyes on him, Alex turned, but this time he relaxed the moment he saw the other party. Two children were sitting on the floor a short way from them, whispering to each-other and looking at him and Serah. The two boys saw him looking their way with a smile on his face and both stood up, running over to him. The one on the left then bombarded Alex with questions. “Excuse me m’lord, are you and the pretty lady in love? Is she your girlfriend?” then the one on the right asked with a more serious expression “Have you k-kissed her yet?”

Alex felt his face flush a little. “No, no, nothing like that. We just go to school together. We’re friends, that’s all.”

Serah turned to him and took-in the situation in a glance, then threw Alex a sweet smile.

Alex blushed further, and she turned back to the shopkeeper to give her some coins.

For a moment he was a little dazed. It was only when she stepped towards him and lifted her hands to pin the necklace around his neck that he snapped-back to reality, almost taking a step back. “You need to wear this, Alexander. This small thing will be your payment to me, and until it breaks, you will keep it with you under your shirt at all times, right over your heart.”

“W-What is it?”

Her fingers deftly clipped the necklace behind his neck in moments, but she still held onto the clasp, checking something, her hands lingering around his neck. “This is a fateweavers necklace. It’s to keep your fate strong until you finish the task that you must complete. It’ll protect you.” She looked up at him seriously, with a little worry on her face. Her blue eyes were hidden by the reflections of the flickering lanterns that seemed to waver in-time with the soft flutes and drums, and then she whispered, too soft for anyone to hear, but he could hear it nonetheless. “You need to stay safe for me, okay?”

He could do nothing but watch her. His heart was already beating fast, and he wasn’t breathing at all. He couldn’t agree with her, because he knew that what he was doing would very likely end with his death, but he wanted to.

Her hands weren’t moving. She remained there, like that, for a few more moments just looking up at him, and it seemed like she wanted to say something, but then she took her hands from his shoulders, and her eyes from his, carefully tucking the front of the necklace into his uniform before laying a palm on his covered chest, as though to assure herself that it was there.

‘Does she know what I’m planning? Has she read that much in my expression?’ Alex wondered, staring at her. “Serah…” he said, but he didn’t know what else to say, so he just looked to the side awkwardly.

She took her hand away and bowed slightly to the old woman, before walking past him towards the street entrance. “I hope you didn’t bring all your money with you today Alexander,” she said slowly as she passed him, “because those kids are long gone.”

He was confused for a moment, then checked his pockets. His money had been taken. “Wha…Why? Why didn’t you tell me?”

“It’s fine, isn’t it?” she looked at him over her shoulder, her expression still serious.

He gawked at her, and she smiled a little at that.

“I’m sure they need it more. Besides, they showed me something interesting, so it seems like it’s worth it to me.”

“What do you mean?”

She turned away. “Secret.” She replied simply, then still facing away from him she said, “Please don’t forget that I’m waiting for you.” There was a moments silence as though she wanted to say something more, but then she started running towards Etheret instead.

Her voice called out to him as he watched her go, “If you don’t hurry, you’re going to miss curfew.”

Both of them did make it back in-time for curfew, but despite Alex’s best efforts, he was drained of energy and never did catch up with Serah. He expected to see her stop ahead of him and wait at the front gate, or in-between the two dorm buildings, but she didn’t stop. She ran right up to the front door of the girls’ dorm, and without looking back, went inside.

He watched her from the intersection that led to both dorms without moving, and because he felt that this might be the last time that he saw her, he wished her a silent farewell. As the door closed, his chest tightened a little beneath the necklace, but ignoring that feeling, he turned away.