“Okay, let’s open the chest.” Theo was breathing heavily. The flower of dust on the floor now had a snow angel in the centre, not a circle. Their clothes were both dirty once again.

“Are you sure I couldn’t convince you to sing another song like that?” Jenny trailed a finger down the side of his face, before playfully swiping at his nose.

Theo rubbed the dust from her finger off his face. “As much as I’d like to, we do have a chest to open, and I know if I do that again we’re going to end up in the same place we started, so…”

What came out of his mouth was akin to a screech, and just about the most unpleasant thing he ever used to cast magic, but it got the job done. All the dust around them exploded off and away from them, leaving a wide clean berth around them, and a noticeably thicker rim around the edges of the room.

Jenny was clean, but unimpressed, her arms crossed and lips pressed together. Wait, was she pouting? Theo thought it was a cute look (then again, right now she could do anything short of murder and his opinion would stay the same).

He reassured her. “Don’t worry, we can get this done fast. I still need to take you out on a proper date, after all.”

Jenny co-operated much more after that (although frankly Theo wasn’t sure whether or not he preferred it that way).

---

Opening the chest was much easier than digging it out of the ground. Inside was the usual stack of documents that Theo had gotten used to.

This time, as they looked over them together (progress slightly hampered by their unspoken need to hold hands at all times), there were notes about internal magic progression.

Or at least, theorised progression. Some of which was very interesting to both of them.

“Self Awareness and Meditation make sense together, but that’s a very dangerous combination to try blind. Who would try that?” Jenny paged through them, pausing on one Theo found very interesting.

She looked at him, in disbelief as he remembered that time he caused that internal damage. He scratched his head. “Yeah, I was trying to crack the third step of both, and tried them together. It helped, but I had to get patched up. It wasn’t pretty.” He admitted.

Jenny was about to say something, then stopped. She looked at her hand (the one that wasn’t intertwined with his). “Seeing as I learned to use explosions to move faster, I guess I’m not one to talk. We make quite a pair, don’t we?” She giggled, and Theo found himself nodding along.

“But hey, at least now I have some instructions on how to go about it properly.” Theo resolved to try that properly some other time. As they kept reading, they found another piece of internal magic that used that in tandem with Tome of Memories, which was also detailed in the notes.

Speaking of which, Theo used Tome of Memories to inscribe the contents of the pages into his memory for future reference. “Okay, let’s hand this over to someone trustworthy.”

Jenny didn’t take her eyes off the pages as she responded. “You’re done already?”

Theo almost pointed out where Tome of Memories was, but remembered that it was a second tier internal magic. That warred with his instinct to trust Jenny in this moment, and while it was definitely a rather biased instinct (especially right now), he still found there to be merit in it. If she was going to be involved in finding these, the least he could do was tell her he knew one of their discoveries already.

He pointed it out. “I uh, I know this one already. Helps your memory.”

Jenny nodded, before a mischievous grin came over her face. “Well then, let me make sure that it’s extra unforgettable.”

She leaned in close.

“Wait!” Theo held a hand up, before carefully placing all the pages back in the chest and moving it out of their way. The last thing he needed was a repeat of those herbs, but with something that would have no inherent value if atomized (of course, he had it all in his memory, but writing it all out would not be a pleasant task).

Jenny rolled her eyes, and waited patiently for him to get that done, and as soon as it was safe and secure, she tackled him to the floor.

---

Grant looked at them, with the kind of stare where there was no way to know what he was thinking. It was truly neutral, with a hint of disinterest and disdain (but that could have just been Grant being Grant). “I’m glad you’re feeling better, Jenny.”

Theo had ended up doing another burst of that scream, but it couldn’t do anything for the wild state of their hair, nor the swollen lips or blushing or hickeys or –

Point is, anyone that was capable of distinguishing one shape from another could tell very clearly what had happened between them. Especially since they were standing a lot closer together than they had before, even if they were deliberately trying to not hold hands in front of others (which would have been difficult anyway, what with the chest in their possession).

In retrospect, Theo was rather self-conscious about how they looked, but he couldn’t bring himself to care.

And neither did Grant, apparently. He made no further comment, turning to address Theo. “Did you find what you were looking for?”

Theo brought out the chest he had been holding behind his back, and presented it to Grant, grinning.

Grant nodded. “Great, now get out of here.” He turned back to his paperwork.

“Wait, this is for the College of War.” Grant looked up with a raised eyebrow and sceptical look as Theo opened the chest and placed the contents in front of him.

After a moment, the raised eyebrow turned into two, turning into a look of surprise and then fascination as he devoured the documents.

After a minute, Grant raised his head, narrowing his eyes. “Why are you giving these to me? And how can I trust them to be real?”

Theo shrugged. “Well, technically these are the writings of Ona the Strong so I’m just returning them to their rightful place. And anyway,” Theo look at Jenny, “Maybe I didn’t give you a chance like I should have.”

And for the first time, Theo saw Grant smile, as Jenny smiled at him and he smiled back.

He looked back over to Theo, and the smile dropped back off very fast, as he cleared his throat. “Well, that is appreciated. Now off you get.”

Theo smiled at Grant, and nodded, before offering his hand to Jenny. She grasped it gently, and they started to leave the College, looking mostly at each other instead of where they were going.

“Take her somewhere really nice!” Grant’s voice echoed through the entrance as they were on its cusp.

Theo stumbled for a moment. “I uh, don’t really know anywhere nice.” He admitted.

Jenny smiled, unconcerned. “Everywhere is nice with you.”

And so they left the College of War, hand in hand under a sky full of stars. To Theo, they felt a little hazier than normal.

Dusty, even.