DEADALUS author of AETHERBORN
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CHAPTER 229
🕑 Added 2025-07-08 17:00:09 +0000 UTCThorne’s eyes locked on Percy Vayne across the Astral Hall.
He sat at the end of the Caledris table, surrounded by a loose knot of older students, all of them polished, immaculate, and loud in the way only nobles could be. Except Percy. The young man looked like a shadow of the man Thorne had met in Valewind almost a year ago. He’d been a smug, sharp-featured heir then. Arrogant, with a grin always tugging at the corner of his mouth, confident in the way of someone who had never known real fear.
Now?
Now he looked as if the years had skipped him ahead a decade. Hollowed cheeks, sunken eyes, pale skin that looked nearly translucent under the aether lights. He was thinner too, like something had been draining him steadily from the inside out. Illness? Magic? Something worse?
But it wasn’t just the physical transformation. It was the way Percy was looking at him, unblinking, calculating, as if already running a dozen possibilities through his mind.
He recognized him.
Of course he did.
Thorne felt his fingers tighten around the edge of the table, the threads of his Veil Sense stirring like a tide pulling back before the wave. He was a threat. A person who knew the truth. A single sentence from Percy could unravel the identity he wanted kept secret. It wouldn’t matter that he was in Aetherhold now. It wouldn’t matter that he’d buried his past.
Thorne could kill him. Quietly. Precisely. He’d done more with less. And it would solve the problem cleanly.
His eyes flicked to the students surrounding Percy. They were laughing, drinking, jostling shoulders, but not with him. Percy didn’t speak to them. Didn’t laugh. He just stared. Like a ghost haunting the edge of a memory.
And maybe that was what stayed Thorne’s hand.
What had happened to him? What turned the privileged, pampered noble into something closer to a ruin?
A flicker of movement. Percy looked away first, face blank. He reached for a glass but didn’t drink. His hands trembled slightly before stilling, fingers curling around the stem as if for control.
Thorne released his hold on the table. Slowly.
He wasn’t going to act. Not yet.
But his instincts didn’t let the danger go. Percy Vayne was still a threat. And if he made a move, if he breathed a word, then the past wouldn’t just catch up with Thorne.
It would consume him.
Thorne forced himself to look away from Percy.
Not out of fear. Out of control.
He couldn’t afford to dwell in old habits. But the training was always there, embedded in his bones like a second pulse. Assess. Predict. Eliminate. He’d already catalogued every escape route, every angle of approach. Knew the pressure points to exploit and how long it would take for the blood to stop pumping from a precise wound. He wasn’t proud of the calculations. They were just... automatic.
He drew in a slow breath, smoothing his features into something neutral as he turned his eyes toward the raised dais at the far end of the Astral Hall.
The teachers’ table stretched the width of the platform, a collection of mages, scholars, and arcane experts arranged like the world’s most intimidating council. Some wore sleek uniforms similar to the students’, others wore elaborate robes or armor that shimmered faintly with enchantments. House sigils burned faintly above each of them, and even seated, there was power in the air. A weight.
But it was the center of the table that held his attention.
There floated a tome, massive, bound in what looked like dragonhide and etched with luminous glyphs. It hovered open, its pages shifting slowly, as if turning on their own, absorbing the energy of the room. Above it floated a single quill, suspended mid-air, gleaming with a trail of stardust ink that dripped upward into nothingness.
As Thorne watched, the quill twitched and began to write.
Letters formed in glowing aetheric script, suspended above the tome in curling arcs that only lasted a second before vanishing. It wasn’t writing on paper; it was writing in memory.
He realized what it was, a recordkeeper. Every word spoken in the hall tonight would be transcribed and archived through the tome and quill, stored within the school’s great memory. No lies. No omissions. Only truth, written in light.
Around him, the other students chattered. Laughed. Bragged. At the other end of the Caledris table, Isadora had practically taken command of the conversation, tossing back her wine like water and whisper-shouting across to a girl three seats down about how "utterly scandalous" someone's attire was.
Lucien was smirking into his goblet. Ronan was deep in conversation with Garridan, animatedly debating the merits of field tactics over traditional spell formations. Garridan, to his credit, offered a brief nod of acknowledgment but stayed mostly quiet, as always.
Thorne barely registered it.
Because above them, without warning, the Astral Hall darkened.
The floating chandeliers flickered and dimmed, not extinguished, but subdued. A hush spread, rippling outward like a pulse. Students glanced up. Conversations died down.
Then the ceiling above, that great shimmering dome of glass and enchantment, flared to life.
Constellations ignited in a sudden blaze of color, not static stars, but dynamic, living aether. The sky rippled with illusions of distant galaxies, vast aether rivers, and glowing celestial beasts stitched from light.
Each constellation burst into being above a different quadrant of the room, four in all, one for each House. Umbra’s sigil, a violet candle, blazed in the western corner, hovering in a cloud of shifting shadow and soft, swirling starlight.
Zephyrus had a whirling silver serpent wrapped in a gust of wind. Aegis, a towering shield flanked by twin spears of light. Ignis, a burning lion roaring skyward, its mane composed of living flame.
The air buzzed with arcane tension as the constellations hovered. Then, one by one, they pulsed, and the House sigils hanging over each student’s heart flared to life.
Thorne felt it.
His candle, the mark of House Umbra, warmed faintly over his chest, and a soft light glowed beneath the fabric of his uniform.
The hall glowed with quiet, reverent awe. Even Isadora paused mid-laugh, her wineglass forgotten in mid-air as her own insignia shimmered violet.
For a moment, it was quiet.
Then the headmaster, the ethereal man who looked barely older than a student himself, stood again, wand raised.
But he didn’t speak.
The quill beside the great tome did.
It flicked to life, and the voice that emerged came not from the headmaster’s mouth, but from everywhere, as if the quill itself had been imbued with his tone, his rhythm, his presence.
“Let it be known,” the voice echoed, soft but undeniable, “that tonight marks the convergence of old magic and new minds. Aetherhold’s legacy continues with you, seekers of power, truth, and understanding.”
The headmaster lowered his wand and smiled faintly, letting the voice carry the rest.
“Tonight, the stars witness your promise. The realms beyond stir at your potential. You are not here by accident. You are chosen.”
The quill wrote each word as it spoke, glowing ink arcing across invisible pages.
“So rise, first years. Rise with curiosity. Rise with strength. Rise with humility, and with fire. For Aetherhold awaits, and magic, true magic, begins now.”
The voice faded.
The constellations shimmered, and with a quiet pulse, the celestial beasts dissolved into threads of light, drawn slowly back into the enchanted ceiling above.
The room exhaled.
Thorne didn’t.
The wonder was lost on him. Percy Vayne’s presence had hollowed out his mood, left his nerves taut like a pulled string. It was as if, at any moment, he expected to feel a hand on his shoulder, a whisper in his ear, Uncle’s voice telling him it was time to do something he’d regret.
He shifted in his seat, letting his gaze drift toward the floating tome and quill as they made their slow, elegant tour through the rows of tables. Every so often, the book would pause before a student. A name glowed into existence, golden and curling before vanishing again with a whisper of ink and magic. He wasn’t sure what it was recording, attendance? reactions? fate?
Probably all three.
Rowenna leaned slightly toward him. “Well. That was dramatic.”
Thorne didn’t answer.
She waited a beat longer, then added, “The headmaster seems... a bit too perfect. Is it just me?”
Still nothing.
She exhaled, the corners of her mouth twitching. “Right. We’re doing brooding silence tonight.”
But Thorne wasn’t ignoring her out of rudeness. Not entirely. His thoughts kept circling the same point. Percy Vayne. What had happened to him? Why was he here? What did he know, and worse, what would he say?
His instincts whispered the same answer they always did when danger presented itself in a polite, well-dressed package: remove the threat.
He didn’t like that instinct. But he didn’t ignore it, either.
Rowenna gave up the conversation and returned to poking at the contents of her plate. Thorne continued watching the quill as it passed by another student, writing something with a flourish of ink that only deepened his unease.
Aetherhold was supposed to be a new beginning.
So why did it suddenly feel like the past had followed him here?
Thorne ate in silence, occasionally tossing in a dry comment when someone threw a question his way. His eyes, however, rarely left Percy. Every forkful of food, every chuckle from Isadora, every spark of floating magic drifting through the air was a distant hum behind the weight of his focus.
The Astral Hall slowly dimmed with the shifting of the enchanted constellations overhead, soft twilight settling over the students. The headmaster was the first to rise. No parting words. Just a graceful sweep of his robes and a nod toward the faculty table.
One by one, the professors began to depart, some in pairs, whispering quietly to each other, others trailing scrolls of parchment or books in their wake. They vanished through a side door, the faint shimmer of a locking spell left behind as the final teacher exited.
Soon, the student chatter thinned as well. House by house, table by table, they peeled away into the corridors like threads unraveling from a tapestry.
Rowenna stretched with a small groan and rose from her seat, brushing imaginary crumbs from her sleeve. She turned to Thorne, her expression unreadable.
“I’m heading out,” she said, not quite yawning, not quite asking. “Coming?”
He shook his head. “In a bit.”
She studied him for a breath longer, as if gauging something. Then she gave a quiet shrug. “Suit yourself.”
And with that, she left.
The bench creaked slightly as Thorne shifted, the now half-empty table growing quieter with every departing student. He didn’t move. Not yet.
He waited.
It wasn’t long before Percy rose.
The noble didn’t look in Thorne’s direction, but something in the angle of his shoulders told Thorne he knew. Still, Percy made no move, just gathered his things, murmured a few brief goodnights, and strode toward the exit with slow, even steps.
Thorne stood a heartbeat later.
“Night,” he said absently to the few remaining Calesdrin students, his tone even, controlled.
And then he followed.
Silent steps, eyes fixed on the figure ahead.
If Percy Vayne was going to be a problem, he needed to know now, before this year truly began.
Thorne followed at a measured pace, his footsteps deliberate. He didn’t bother hiding them. Let Percy hear. Let him know he was being followed. Let him decide what came next.
They didn’t make it to the sigilwheel chamber. Just before the ancient wooden platform came into view, Percy veered sharply into a narrow, lamp-lit corridor to the left. Thorne didn’t hesitate, fingers brushing the hilts of his newly sheathed daggers, hidden just beneath his cloak.
Percy opened a door without looking back.
He stepped inside, leaving it wide open behind him, a clear invitation.
Thorne entered.
It was a small lounge, sparsely furnished but elegant in a subdued, old-money kind of way. Glass doors stood ajar, letting in the whispering night air. Percy stood at the edge, silhouetted against the vast expanse of stars and the glow of Evermist below, spread like a luminous tapestry across the landscape.
“Long time no see,” Thorne said quietly, his voice echoing just slightly in the stillness.
He reached out with his Veil Sense. Level 29. Weak. A student. Not a threat.
“You’ve changed,” Percy replied, still staring out at the city. “Those eyes of yours are unsettling.”
Thorne gave a soft chuckle. “You’ve changed too. Not in a good way.”
Percy turned suddenly and threw a punch, fast, fueled by something rawer than anger.
But Thorne’s Deadzone Reflex flared to life.
Time stretched, slowed, thickened around him.
In a blink, he shifted to the side, pivoted, and struck, open-palmed, controlled, precise. A second hit followed, then a third. One to the ribs, one to the shoulder, one to the thigh. Nothing lethal. Just enough pain to remind Percy where they stood.
Percy crumpled, clutching at his side with a grunt of agony.
Thorne crouched beside him, voice low, almost kind.
“I’m really trying here,” he murmured. “Trying not to kill you. So please, Percy… don’t give me a reason.”
The noble spat out a breath and reached for his wand, but Thorne was already moving.
A twist of the wrist. The wand was in his hand. Percy’s fingers met empty air.
Thorne twirled the wand lazily between his fingers, then tapped the tip against his knee. He tilted his head and gave Percy a faint smile.
“How about we talk, yeah?” he said, tone dry. “A civil conversation. One where you don’t end up a corpse on the floor. What do you say?”
Percy glared up at him, breath ragged, fury flickering behind his eyes, but beneath it, something else. Fear. And the bitter taste of recognition.
He knew now. Whatever he thought Thorne had been back in Valewind, he understood this wasn’t the same boy anymore.
Not even close.
Comments
Prokopis Manolis
That would be the easy solution. One that Thorne would have certainly chosen a few weeks ago. He is trying to change... Also who knows? Maybe they will become friends eventually... Or Thorne could use him for something down the line...
Silver Beard
I won't like it... it's a good chapter, but still- should have just ended him on the spot and moved on. There's plenty other drama going ob, '
Prokopis Manolis
He really doesn’t 🤣
Chris
Percy never disappoints lol
