Chapter 28 Magma Dragon
After a forbidden kiss and discovering my magical trace, I felt swollen with secrets, too full to breathe, too heavy to speak. I didn’t want to see anyone or talk to anyone.
I especially didn’t want to see Lorik. I had a lapse of judgment, and the farther away I stayed from him, the better, so we could both forget it had ever happened. The fact that Dragontail Trials practice would officially start the next day would further limit my interaction with second-years.
I couldn’t talk to Shakari either. If I did, I knew I might confess everything and that would put her in danger. Knowledge itself was treason. A Sunheart and Moonveil interaction left unreported was not just forbidden; it was a criminal offense, one punished by justice without mercy.
So I disappeared.
And for one quiet Sunday, I succeeded.
I slipped to the meadows by the King’s Forest, bringing my books and hiding in plain sight.
I studied for hours, mapping the sky, preparing for the trials, memorizing constellations as if they could save me.
During the day, I felt certain, I was a Sunheart, and the sun would guide me. But the night could still trick me.
I also studied an ancient book about dormant traces, hoping to find something, about mental immunity, or how I could be tested during the trials. I found nothing worth my time.
When I got tired of reading, I walked through the King’s Forest, stopping at the limits allowed by the academy.
That was when I found an old trail cutting through the meadow that led to the river.
I swam like I used to in the pools of the Glass Castle, diving, letting the water carry me instead of fighting it. This was my way to relax. No fists. No flames. No echoes of the Hall of Mirrors. Just cold water, open sky, and the fragile illusion that I could still be at peace.
When I returned to my room that night, I was hoping Soehl would be in one of her usual library meetings with the Auroric Legion. But she wasn’t. I was ambushed.
Shakari was stretched out on my bed while Soehl sat nearby reading. I knew a lecture was coming. Before I could say anything, Shakari jumped up, grabbed my hands, and smiled.
“There you are!”
Soehl hugged me and said: “I almost called the Emberkeep guard this morning. You left before dawn, and we couldn’t find you.”
“I just needed to be alone,” I said. “I didn’t mean to scare you.”
“You’ve had your space already,” Shakari said, pushing me to sit beside her. Soehl joined us. “We know you confirmed your immunity.”
I raised a brow.
“You disappeared all day,” Shakari continued. “Soehl figured you went to Lorik, the best mind-bender in Elarion, to prove it.”
“You went to Lorik Draventh?” I asked Soehl sharper than I meant to. She shrugged.
“Yes. And don’t blame her,” Shakari said. “Last time you disappeared, you got stabbed.”
“I knew you had gone to him,” Soehl said quietly. “He said you needed time. That you needed space.”
“He said that?” My heart started beating faster. “What else did he say?” Soehl hesitated. Shakari answered instead.
“That you were in the meadows. Reading. Swimming by the river.”
Relief hit me first, then tension. Lorik hadn’t told them about the kiss.
But he had known exactly where I was. This was the exact spot where he had caught me spying on him and his friends a few months ago.
Maybe he remembered. Or perhaps this was just his usual Sunday walk through the King’s Forest. Either way, he knew.
“He’ll keep your secret,” Soehl said gently. My mother had said the same thing last night. “How do you know?” I asked.
“He said he would,” Soehl replied. “And I... I trusted him.”
“Soehl trusts everyone,” Shakari said. “But it doesn’t matter. Your truthfinding ceremony is in a few months. If anything leaks before then, we’ll know it was him and he knows that.”
“Not necessarily,” Soehl said softly. “She’s immune to truthfinders, too. She could lie if she wanted to.”
“One step at a time,” I said. “Let me survive the Dragontail Trials first.”
“Speaking of that,” Shakari said, standing. “I’m going to sleep. Rowan’s waiting.” “Are you really going to sleep?” I teased.
“I take my training seriously,” she said with a grin before leaving.
“Thea…” Soehl said once we were alone, but words didn’t come out of her mouth. “It’s okay,” I said. “I understand why you went to him.”
Her golden eyes softened and she said: “I value your friendship.”
“I know. Me too.” I pulled the blankets around me. “I’m just surprised Lorik told you anything at all. But I’m glad he did, so you wouldn’t worry.”
She nodded and went to her bed.
I extinguished the candles with a flick of fire and slept.
I woke at dusk the next day, the castle unusually quiet. There was no Hall of Mirrors practice scheduled, today marked the beginning of trial preparation.
The Dragontail Trials were three weeks away, and all regular classes for first-year Dragontail candidates had been suspended.
We were given full autonomy to train, research, and prepare as we saw fit.
Attendance in other courses was optional, left to our own judgment and strategy.
The professors called it independence, an opportunity to hone our skills without interference.
For once, that freedom extended to me as well. My Emberkeep classes were excused, at least for now.
I entered the dining hall with Soehl at my side. The space was already crowded with students, voices rising and overlapping, but my attention drifted on its own, drawn toward the Dragontail table.
Lorik Draventh sat there, his caramel hair shining with the morning light, flanked by Ugo and Rory Rey, his gaze steady and unblinking, already fixed on me.
My muscles tightened as if his eyes alone could strike me with lightning. Heat spread through me, embarrassment first, then something worse. Shame, tangled with want. With need. His silver eyes sparked memories I didn’t want, memories my body remembered far too well.
Then, after a heartbeat too long, he looked back down at his plate. His expression didn’t change. Not a single muscle betrayed him.
And that was what I had asked for.
Distance. Silence. For him to stay away.
So why did it feel like I’d lost something the moment he did?
I buried the thought and turned back to Shakari and the twins as Soehl peeled away to join the auroric tables. I sat down for breakfast, pretending convincingly that I hadn’t noticed him at all.
From the Emberkeep tables, I caught Thalen watching me from the corner of my eye, waiting to see if I would return the look. I didn’t. He knew better than to expect my attention now. After his treason, I hadn’t given him any attention, and he knew I needed space,
especially when my focus was on the trials.
Around me, my friends were already deep in discussion, trading plans for the next three weeks of training.
Shakari wanted to practice navigating at night, learning to orient herself with the stars and the moon. In a fight, she was formidable, her water-freezing magic precise and terrifyingly controlled, but the trials would also demand strategy.
Rowan planned to refine his wind control, pushing for greater precision and endurance. Tran, meanwhile, insisted he needed to train in hand-to-hand combat without magic.
Despite his strength, he was convinced that Rory Rey would knock him out flat. Whether he truly believed it or was hiding nerves behind humor, I couldn’t tell. With Tran, it was always hard to understand.
For once, I didn’t feel lost about where to begin.
Now that I understood my magical trace, the second trial no longer frightened me the way it once had. I didn’t know the extent of it yet, but blocking mental magic came naturally to me. If I were going to be tested for this magical trace, I knew I could handle it. Orientation
and navigation in the forest wouldn’t be a problem either, it was practical, instinctive, the kind of thing I’d been trained for my whole life.
What worried me were the other two trials.
The first trial would demand fighting without magic, and I wasn’t finished sharpening myself in combat.
And the last trial would require fire, control, and combat.
The ability to face a dragon and take the ruby from it without letting my emotions control my magic, and even though I had won in the Hall of Mirrors, I still had to practice magical combat.
So I knew where I had to focus my attention.
I would spend every morning in the arena, where the professors had recreated last year’s dragon illusion for first-years to practice the third trial and learn how to claim the ruby.
My own trial would be different, a dragon illusion shaped by Headmaster Marvek himself, forged with his unique illusion magical trace.
It was always kept a surprise, changing every year, so the upper-class could never explain how they had defeated their dragon illusion.
Every afternoon, once the worst of the heat had faded and the sky began to soften toward sunset, I would train on the Sky Terrace with Tran and the other first-years, sparring until my muscles burned and my reflexes sharpened.
We were preparing not just for the trials, but for the possibility of facing second-year students in combat.
As Shakari reminded me, I didn’t have to win.
I only had to show enough strength, enough control, enough valor for the gem to reveal itself to me.
And between sessions, I would spend time in the library reading and learning. I was going to enjoy myself now that I didn’t need to attend Emberkeep classes.
That morning, right after breakfast, I went to the arena to practice my third trial. Shakari, Rowan, and Tran had come to watch in support. Jan and Soehl were there as well, standing among the spectators, close enough that I could find them without searching.
Many students had gathered to observe the session, and the constant movement in the stands, the shifting bodies, the low murmur of voices, made it harder to settle into my focus. Still, I kept my eyes forward, grounding myself in the space.