Fog crawled across the academy courtyard like pale fingers, coiling around the stone statues and choking the early morning air. Ashthorne felt heavier today—not louder, not darker… heavier. As if the weight of the world had dropped another layer atop it.
Students made a wide path around Caelum as he walked.
No shoves.
No mocking.
No casual insults.
Just fear pretending to be caution.
Mistress Halien walked at his side, pace brisk and nervous, robes tightening around her every time a lantern flickered. Her eyes shifted constantly, scanning the corners of the hallways, the ceilings, even the shadows clinging to the stone floors.
Caelum walked silently, hands in his pockets, eyes calm.
He saw everything.
Threads curled off the students around him like steam rising from warm bodies into cool air. Fear-thread, many. Curiosity-thread, fewer but bright. Hatred-thread, flickering weakly like dying embers.
He could sense the shape of Dorm Nine behind them still trembling with the memory of last night.
And beneath that—
Another presence.
Watching through the cracks.
Waiting.
"…bearer…"
Quiet.
Faint.
Almost affectionate.
Halien shivered like she felt the whisper too, even if she couldn't hear it. "They shouldn't have called you so quickly," she muttered under her breath. "The Dominion Council never summons a student this early. Not unless they already decided the outcome."
"Then they decided too soon," Caelum replied.
She tensed. "Caelum—this isn't a duel. This isn't a test. They deal with forbidden anomalies. Monsters. They punish things Ashthorne doesn't understand."
He tilted his head slightly. "Then they will find today… educational."
Her breath caught. She didn't ask what he meant.
They reached the south courtyard, where a pair of armored guardians stood waiting beside a set of iron-bound double doors carved with sigils too old to read.
Artheon the Bound stood between them.
Chains wrapped his forearms, glowing softly like molten silver beneath his sleeves. His eyes—those bottomless black-scar eyes—studied Caelum with an expression too calm, too knowing, and too hungry.
"Veylor," Artheon murmured. "Follow."
Halien stepped forward, voice tight. "Instructor Artheon, at least let me—"
A chain snapped forward with a metallic crack, stopping inches from her chest.
Her breath hitched.
Artheon didn't even turn to her.
"The Council did not summon you, Stabilizer Halien," he said softly. "This path is not yours."
She looked like she wanted to argue.
Caelum gently touched her arm.
"It's fine."
Her eyes glistened with fear. "Caelum… don't lie to them. Don't provoke them. And do not—under any circumstances—listen to anything that calls to you from below."
He almost smiled.
"That last one will be difficult."
Her expression broke.
But Artheon was already moving, his chains dragging behind him like shivering metal serpents.
Caelum followed.
The doors opened with a groaning hiss, releasing a wave of cold air that tasted like dust, stone, and old secrets.
The descent began.
The Descent
The staircase spiraled downward past torch-lit arches, deeper into the belly of the academy. The air grew colder. The stone walls bled condensation. Chains rattled faintly from the ceiling.
Artheon didn't speak.
Caelum didn't ask.
He watched the threads on the walls—thin filaments of power leaking from ancient sigils etched into the stone. Each one pulsed faintly, as if breathing on its own.
Far below, the academy rumbled softly.
Something stirred.
"…bearer…"
"…closer…"
"…unfold…"
Caelum brushed his fingertips against the wall as he walked.
Artheon noticed.
"You feel it," he murmured.
"Yes."
"Most break at this depth. Most lose stability. Most begin screaming by now."
Caelum looked at the stone beneath his hand.
"Fortunately," he said, "I am not most."
Artheon's smile curved faintly. "No. No, you are not."
The stairs opened into an underground chamber shaped like a circular arena carved from obsidian stone.
Lanterns floated without flame, giving off pale blue light.
Six masked figures stood in a half-circle.
The Dominion Council.
Each mask bore a different shape and sigil—
A serpent.
An eye.
A crown.
A broken thread.
A shard of bone.
A plain circle.
Their robes were black with silver embroidery, the fabric heavy with condensation or blood—it was hard to tell.
Artheon stepped aside.
"Council. The boy."
One of the masked figures stepped forward, voice cold enough to frost stone.
"Caelum Veylor."
His name echoed through the chamber unnaturally, bouncing in a rhythm that felt wrong to the ear.
Caelum bowed faintly—not deferentially, but politely, like greeting equals rather than superiors.
The Crown-Mask tilted their head.
"You stand accused of interacting with a forbidden anomaly beneath Dorm Nine."
Accused.
Interesting choice of word.
Caelum said nothing.
The Serpent-Mask stepped forward next.
"The creature that breached the dormitory was unmade. Its threads were destroyed without residue. Explain how."
Caelum lifted his eyes.
"I touched it."
Whispers ricocheted across the chamber.
Chain-Mask stepped forward sharply.
"Impossible—no Sigil allows—"
Caelum tilted his head.
"Your knowledge is incomplete."
The room went perfectly still.
For a moment, only the lanterns flickered.
Then the Eye-Mask spoke.
"Our instruments detected an irregular pulse of conceptual energy from your location last night. Energy matching the signature of ancient Thread-Path anomalies."
Artheon's eyes flicked toward Caelum, curious.
Caelum remained still.
"And where," Eye-Mask continued, "did you learn such techniques?"
Caelum answered simply.
"I didn't."
"How, then, do you know Thread manipulation?"
"I woke up."
Shock silenced everyone.
Not the words.
The tone.
Calm.
Matter-of-fact.
Like stating the weather.
The Circle-Mask stepped forward, voice colder than the others.
"You are not being questioned as a student, but as a potential anomaly. The entity beneath Ashthorne called to you."
Caelum lifted his eyes slightly.
"And I answered."
A tremor rolled through the chamber.
Several council members stepped back.
Artheon smiled softly behind him.
The Crown-Mask regained composure.
"What did it say to you?"
Caelum considered.
Then answered truthfully.
"It welcomed me."
As if on cue, a deep rumble echoed beneath the obsidian floor.
Dust drifted from the ceiling.
The lanterns flickered violently.
And then—
A black thread erupted from the stone floor at Caelum's feet, spiraling upward like a serpent of pure shadow.
Council members screamed.
Artheon stepped back, chains whipping to life.
The sigils etched in the walls glowed red, responding to an alarm older than the academy itself.
The black thread coiled around Caelum.
Gently.
Almost lovingly.
"…bearer…
…unfold…
…further…"
Caelum reached up and touched it.
His eyes darkened.
"This is not the time," he murmured softly. "Not here."
The thread trembled.
Artheon watched in awe.
Council members panicked.
The Circle-Mask shouted: "Contain him—seal the chamber!"
Chains fell from the ceiling.
Sigils burst with light.
A barrier flared to life around Caelum—
And cracked.
Instantly.
As if it had run into something it was not designed to understand.
Caelum exhaled a thin cloud of frost as his Sigil stirred beneath his skin.
"You're all wasting effort," he said quietly. "I told you. I can speak to it."
The Crown-Mask pointed. "You—step away from that thing!"
Caelum brushed the thread gently with two fingers.
"Enough."
The black thread recoiled like a startled animal—
then vanished through the obsidian floor.
Silence.
Real silence.
The lanterns steadied again.
The sigil-barriers flickered and deactivated.
Council members stared at Caelum with a blend of horror and unwilling fascination.
He straightened his uniform.
"The anomaly beneath Ashthorne is awakening," he said calmly.
Crown-Mask whispered, trembling, "You… you shouldn't be able to command it…"
Caelum's expression softened into something dangerous.
"You asked for answers," he said.
"And I answered."
Artheon stepped forward, chains rattling softly.
"Council," he said with a thin smile. "If I may… this boy is not an anomaly."
The masks turned to him sharply.
Artheon's eyes gleamed.
"He is something worse."
Caelum didn't blink.
The Council fell silent.
"A Proto-Sigil," Artheon murmured. "Perfectly aligned with the entity below. He is not its enemy."
He leaned forward.
"He is its heir."
The chamber fell into horrified quiet.
Caelum adjusted his collar.
"I believe," he said gently, "we are finished here."
None of them stopped him as he walked up the stairs and out of the chamber.
Not one.
Because for the first time since their founding…
the Dominion Council was afraid.