The next day Ranvir was reading in the library, searching through some space generator abilities for something interesting. And there were plenty of techniques that were just that. Most of them were, however, directly related to the phenomenons involved with generating excess space. Like how increasing the amount of space within an area made objects fly off course.

Kirs was busy somewhere else. She couldn’t spend all her time helping him. She still had a job to maintain, after all. This meant that he was spending his time alone, something he was grateful for. His friends were great and there were no people—except for his parents—he liked more, but he’d been used to being mostly alone for most of his day.

Even after almost three months at the academy, that was a hard habit to kick. Though, he registered a light blue flicker of surprise that he was even thinking of his friends. Normally, it wouldn’t even register that far, so that was some sort of progress.

Ranvir caught movement out of the corner of his eye. Looking up, he saw Pashar’s dark-skinned form striding through the lowly lit hall of the library towards him. She had a serious look on her face, intent on him.

Noting the page on his current book, he slid it aside as he let the slightly too small finger-length of obsidian return to normal size in his other hand. Through the indistinct murmurs of students talking with each other and pages being turned, Pashar’s shoes could almost not be missed when she walked by.

Not by Ranvir, though. That kind of intense focus on someone was hard to miss, even if he hadn’t been looking.

“Mr. Ranvir.” She greeted. “May I?” With a casual wave of a hand, she gestured to the chair opposite him, on the small table.

Ranvir nodded, fiddling with obsidian in his fingers.

“Thank you.” She nodded to him and sat down. “I have some important news for you, regarding your ‘bet’ with Master Grimar.”

Ranvir perked up, a racing yellow blur of mild alarm burning through him. “Yes?”

“I’ve talked with the principal, Master Grimar and I both, actually.” She cleared her throat and took a quick look around. “The Master tried to get it thrown out. He had a lot of arguments, but it basically boiled down to him calling you a sensitive child and that he was raising warriors and soldiers.”

Both his parents had always talked of positions of power as responsibilities. When he first began to learn from his mother, she took on a responsibility to teach him properly and guide him to his future. If a Master resorting to physical violence was a break of the trust and respect the student had given them. His dad, too, had emphasized that physical violence was rarely a solution. While he wasn’t an enormously tall man, his father had the heft and strength of a hardworking one. When you were that much stronger than most people you met, physical dominance seemed like an easy option.

“Raising?” Ranvir asked in disbelief. “He really used the term raising? Not training?”

“Yes, he did.” She dead-panned. “My argument was simply that if you’re just a ‘child’, going against his ‘soldier’, then it shouldn’t it be an easy win? Why wouldn’t he just mildly accept it and move on.”

Ranvir couldn’t stop his lip from twitching.

“He never outright mentioned it, but Grimar has an uncle on the Lord’s Council. It’s probably cost the uncle a pretty favor to get Grimar on the academy as a teacher. Luckily for us, the Master’s Council has recently suffered quite a few oversteps from the Lords as of recently and they’re none too happy about it. I doubt he’ll be able to gather any help from that side of the political spectrum. They already don’t like him.”

Ranvir nodded. He lowered his brows as he thought over her words. “I’m sensing a but…”

“There are some nasty rumors going around about the principal. Neither I, nor my connections to the Master’s Council can find any evidence, but I’d suggest you keep an eye out.”

Ranvir worried at his lower lip with his teeth. A blue so dark it was nearly black was swirling throughout him, leaking out an unsettling feeling of nausea. “What does that mean?”

“Likely, nothing, though, until the duel’s over I would be wary.”

“Why don’t the Master’s just fire him?”

“We’re only working with rumors and the principal is reserved as a reward for exemplary service and a highly valued position. It has a lot of protections. The Master’s Council can’t simply wish away the principal, no matter how inconvenient it is.”

Ranvir rubbed a hand over his forehead. “What does this mean for me?”

“The principal has ‘sided’ with you in this bet. Either he’s got something up his sleeve for you, or he’s playing it safe.”

“That’s good to know.” Ranvir bowed his head, both to thank her and to hide the nauseous look on his face. “A slight jump of topics, if I may.” He said, forcing down his worries.

Pashar considered him for a long moment, before slowly nodding once. “You may.”

“You’re from Ankiria, right? How do they achieve Discipline of Body? The conventional wisdom here is to take the first stage in one of the other Disciplines and then move onto Body.”

“This is in the large parts the same as in Ankiria. Though, we always try to attain two first stage Disciplines before moving onto our second stage, no matter what Discipline we seek to master.” She laid a hand over her chest. “I, myself, am a Sword and a Veil.”

Ranvir burned to ask her what her element was, but assumed that since she didn’t mention it, she didn’t want to talk about it. Still, he had to forcibly shove his tongue into the roof of his mouth to stop it.

“Thank you.” He managed to get out, even as the question he wanted to ask tried to wrestle down his tongue. “May I ask why?”

“Unfortunately, I may not answer. I take it you’re going for Body, then?” She cocked her head to the side. A single strand of black hair fell free from her bun and landed on her shoulder.

Ranvir bit his lower lip, “Yeah, do you determine preferences in Ankiria? How do you do it? The one I lean towards the most is tether type.”

“How… scholarly of you. As I said before, I’m not allowed to tell you of the training methods we use in Ankiria.” She bit her lip, her eyes narrowing as she considered something. “That is one of the reason I’m allowed here, as an exile.”

Ranvir stilled. There was something important in what she’d just told him. He didn’t simply know it; he felt it from the soles of his feet to the top of his head.

Exile? He thought. No, Grev already knew much of how she came here… She’s not allowed to tell us how they train in Ankiria? Maybe she’s more than just a Sword? If she’s not allowed to tell us, that must mean she knows something worth telling us…

Ranvir looked up from the knot in the wooden table he’d been staring at. Pashar had left. Focusing on senses he’d learned to mostly tune out during the day-to-day duties of his life, he narrowed them in on the finger-length black stone in his palm. In the back of his mind, it was like a bright-torch suddenly lit up his tether as it came back into activity after a long period of idly turning.

Clenching his teeth together in effort, he shrunk the obsidian with all the force he could muster. The tether spun up faster, and he felt a sort of stirring in the surrounding air that wasn’t quite physical. Purple space around the stone roiled as it narrowed to a thin line.

Pop.

Purple swirled in his palm, like he’d stirred a mug of tea, sending it into a spiral. Ranvir blinked, stunned white drifting through him. “What.” Looking into his hand where the stone wasn’t. He blinked again.

Waving his hand, he searched—as much with his senses as his fingers—for where the stone had gone. There was something attached to the area where his palm had been. He narrowed his focus on it, poking it with his power.

The stone appeared in the mid-air, shoving his hand aside with an audible pop. The obsidian clattered onto the wooden table. Ranvir stared at it wide-eyed. “Oh.” He muttered.