Kael moved through the library with a stack of books in his arms, stopping at shelf after shelf as he returned each volume to its place.
'From here on, none of these will carry much meaning.'
More than a week had passed since he arrived at the Claymore estate, and he had spent most of it sealed inside the library, reading for days at a stretch. Now, at last, he had finished the books he considered truly valuable, the ones that offered more than repetition or shallow theory.
The door creaked open.
A tall, white-haired man stepped inside.
Kael turned and inclined his head slightly.
"Elric."
Elric waved a hand dismissively. "No need to be formal, Solian. You're our guest."
Kael nodded and went back to shelving the books. Elric walked alongside him, his gaze drifting over the shelves with the pride of someone surveying a lifetime's work.
"To think," he said, brushing dust from a spine, "besides Darian and Mael, this is what I'm most proud of."
He smiled faintly. "It does my heart good to see you reading. Too many young Luminaires forget to sharpen their minds once they gain power."
Kael slid the last book into place, listening.
"The soul becomes dyed by the color of one's thoughts, after all," Kael said, giving Elric his full attention.
Elric's hand paused mid-motion, then a deep, wholehearted laugh echoed through the library.
"You're absolutely right," he said, still smiling. "Solian, join me in my office. There's something I'd like to discuss."
Kael turned his head slightly.
'We've barely spoken beyond dinner.'
He followed Elric through the estate until they reached an office tucked away at the far end of the building.
"Please, sit," Elric said, gesturing toward the chair opposite his desk.
Kael did, watching as Elric settled in across from him.
"Normally, I don't concern myself too much with guests," Elric began, folding his hands, "but given the current situation, I hope you can understand my position."
"I do," Kael replied, tightening the blindfold just a fraction.
Elric nodded and drew out a few papers.
"Claymore has always been a target for those seeking its assets. Because of that, I have people look into anyone we keep close."
The air in the room felt heavier.
Kael's gaze hardened.
"So," Elric went on, scribbling lightly as he spoke, "I was a little surprised to find that there's only a single record of you ever existing." He glanced up briefly. "The purchase of a blindfold. I assume that's the one you're wearing now."
Elric's tone stayed relaxed, almost conversational, yet Kael felt pressure closing in around him.
'Well… I had no doubt Claymore's influence ran deep, but even this is impressive, Elric.'
He leaned back in the chair.
'Still, that they found only the one official transaction meant I'd done my job properly.'
Elric continued.
"We reviewed Mael's class records from the capital," he said. "No matter how we searched, we couldn't find a Serane listed anywhere. Did you perhaps study at a different academy?"
Kael snickered inwardly.
'Seems like I'll need to return to the books after this…'
Such a simple question, yet Kael had no knowledge of any other schools in the capital besides the one he was certain Mael had attended.
Elric waited.
An entire minute passed.
No answer came.
"I see…" Elric sighed.
He set the pen down carefully and lifted his gaze, fixing it on Kael.
"Then I must ask… what is your real name?"
Kael rested his arms on the chair's armrests and met his stare. For a long moment, neither spoke, the silence stretching until it carried weight. Elric was the one to break it, his voice firmer this time.
"Solian," he said, slowly. "Please answer."
Kael exhaled.
'So chance gets its turn.'
Another crossroads where the outcome hinged not on preparation or calculation, but on luck. He despised moments like these. They left a bitter taste, a reminder that no matter how carefully one planned, there were always gaps where chance slipped through.
Luck was a poor foundation for survival.
His ignorance pressed at him like a thorn lodged too deep to pull free. If he knew more, if he were stronger, if his reach extended just a little further, this conversation would not be happening at all. It never was the situation itself that angered him, but the fact that it existed in the first place.
'Every problem traces back to the same root,' he thought.
'Insufficient power.'
Power erased uncertainty. Power turned questions into decisions and negotiations into conclusions. Without it, one was forced to gamble their life on another person's judgment, their patience, or their goodwill.
"Not once have I wanted to hurt anyone from Claymore," Kael said at last.
The air in the room seemed to thicken.
"Does Mael know?" Elric asked, his tone cold and stripped of warmth.
"I have not once lied to her." Kael rested his chin in his palm. "That, she can vouch for."
He didn't embellish it. He didn't need to.
The moment the words settled, Elric's posture shifted, tension bleeding from his shoulders as he exhaled and rubbed at his temples.
"Why does that girl always bring trouble…" he muttered.
After a moment, he straightened.
"I will allow you to stay," Elric said evenly, "but you understand this. Claymore has always remained politically neutral."
'I get to see another day…'
Very little was said after that, yet more had been agreed upon than words could carry. Neutrality meant silence. It meant denial. It meant that if questioned, Kael would lie without hesitation, and that nothing he did would ever trace back to Claymore, no matter the truth.
Elric didn't need to spell it out. Kael understood.
A slow breath left his chest.
He had never intended to entangle himself with the Claymores. He had never sought their protection, their goodwill, or their resources. And yet, coincidence after coincidence had placed him beneath their roof.
In truth, they had already helped him more than anyone else ever had.
And that, more than anything, made him uneasy.
It wasn't guilt. He never felt indebted, never felt the urge to repay kindness simply because it had been given. But the more he traced the path behind him, the more moments surfaced where he wasn't sure how he would have escaped on his own.
"I'll take my leave then," Kael said, rising to his feet.
He was halfway to the door when Elric's voice stopped him.
"Wait."
Kael turned.
"You should read Stories of the Past," Elric said. "I wrote it in my younger days."
Kael inclined his head in silent acknowledgment and closed the door behind him.
By all measures, things had ended in the best possible way. He was safe, unchallenged, allowed to remain.
And yet.
Knowing that someone like Elric Claymore now understood that the name Solian was a mask sat poorly with him.
—
Kael sat by the window, staring out at the snow-veiled estate, when a knock sounded at the door.
"Come in."
Mael stepped inside, a faint sheen of sweat on her forehead and a grin stretched wide across her face.
"I finally did it!"
Kael looked at her for a moment, confused, before understanding settled in.
"You did?"
"Yes!" She lifted her hand and summoned a mote in its bound form.
A white feather quill materialized in her palm.
"It just looks like a normal quill," she said, pride softening her tone, "but its effect is exactly what you wanted."
Kael rose from his chair.
'She's better than I thought…'
When he had first asked her to refine a mote, he had never truly expected success. It had been a last resort more than anything, and he had not even known whether the result would be useful. Yet she had persisted, relentlessly. Partly to help him, he suspected, but mostly because she enjoyed the challenge.
And now she stood there, holding the result like a trophy.
It was only a rank-one mote, and on paper its effect was insignificant. What mattered was not the mote itself, but the fact that she had refined it from nothing but an idea. Kael doubted more than a handful of Luminaires in Velthoria could claim to do the same.
"May I?" he asked.
Mael extended her hand at once. "Of course. I made it for you, after all."
Kael took the mote, examining it closely before lifting his gaze to her. She gave a small, expectant nod.
He raised a finger and let his Will envelop it.
The mote accepted him without resistance, his Will sinking into it cleanly as it became his.
"Well? Stop waiting, try it!" Mael said, practically bouncing in place.
Kael returned to the desk and placed the empty notebook he had prepared in front of him, then slipped into his inner realm.
With a thought, the Feather Quill mote appeared before him.
He let it hover in the air while drawing a thin stream from his river of Will, guiding it into his palm and shaping it into a flat square suspended in front of him.
'Around twenty thousand Thoughts in this portion of Will… It should suffice.'
He stepped closer, examining it. Thoughts swirled within, interwoven with countless faint white tendrils.
Kael exhaled slowly and began.
Time blurred as he worked, manually separating every trace of the weeping eye's influence from his Will. Again and again he refined it, until he was certain not a single tendril remained. Only then did he take the Feather Quill mote, withdraw his previous Will, and replace it with the purified fragment.
He leaned back, rolling his neck once.
"That should do it."
—
He returned to his room.
The moment Mael sensed him resurface from his inner realm, she sprang to her feet and rushed to his side.
"You're ready?" she asked, barely containing herself.
Kael nodded.
With a thought, the Feather Quill mote materialized beside him, floating lazily in the air. He opened the notebook, slid it beneath the hovering quill, and deliberately turned his head away.
The quill paused for a heartbeat, then dipped to the page and began to write.
"It works!" Mael burst out.
"It does," Kael said calmly, letting it continue undisturbed. "Thank you, Mael."
She grinned, clearly pleased. "Then maybe you owe me now."
Silence stretched when he did not respond.
"I'm joking," she added with a playful sigh.
Noticing Mael's fascination with the words appearing on the page, Kael lifted an arm and placed it in front of her face.
Mael raised an eyebrow, grabbed his wrist, and gently pulled his hand down so she could peek at the paper, only for him to raise it again.
"Don't read my thoughts, Mael," he said quietly, his tone soft but firm.
She tugged his hand down once more, trying to steal another glance. "Come on, I refined the mote. Consider it repayment."
"No," Kael replied flatly.
Mael sighed dramatically and leaned back. "Fine… fine."
Kael lowered his hand.
This was the mote's activation ability. Simple. Utterly useless to almost anyone.
When activated, it could write purely from Thought and Will. Perfect for an author, perhaps, but meaningless for a normal Luminaire. Except Kael was not normal.
He had owned the mote for less than a day, yet he already valued it more than countless others.
When the Weeping Eye had entered him, it had attacked the thing he treasured most: his clarity, his sense of self. Since then, he could no longer fully trust his own thoughts. A desire to visit the library, to study, to rest. Were those impulses truly his, or subtle nudges planted by the eye?
He had no way of knowing. And how could he? The eye influenced him at a fundamental level, twisting even trivial decisions into uncertain territory. Something as simple as choosing what to eat could feel like a manipulated choice rather than a genuine one.
At the time, he had felt cornered. Unable to trust himself. Unable to trust his memories. Terrified of losing more control.
So in desperation, he had asked the first person available to refine a mote for him. Whether it had been luck, fate, or something closer to heaven, he did not know, but it had worked. Mael had accepted without conditions.
Kael despised relying on others so blindly, but beggars could not afford principles.
And when she finally appeared in his room with the refined mote, an undeniable sense of relief had washed over him. Something he had not felt in months.
The idea had been simple.
If he could not trust his thoughts, then he would extract them. If the Weeping Eye tainted his mind, then he would isolate a portion of Will and Thought, purge it of every last tendril, and use it to write what remained.
A record of thoughts untouched and untampered with.
That was why he had turned his head away.
Not out of secrecy. Out of fear.
If he looked, if the eye stirred, if even a single tendril shifted… he could no longer be sure whether the words on the page were truly his.
The Feather Quill continued writing for forty more minutes before it finally dropped onto the table with a dull cling, drained of all Will and reduced to nothing more than an empty husk.
Kael picked it up, poured fresh Will into it, refined it once more, and dismissed it.
He closed the notebook and slid it into his desk.
Then he turned toward Mael, who lay sprawled across his bed, staring blankly at the ceiling as though lost in her own thoughts.
"Want me to grab you something warm from the kitchen while I'm at it?" Kael asked.
"Yeah," she replied, her gaze never leaving the space above.