The three days before the Academy did not pass. They sat on Rem's shoulders and breathed in his ear.
Rest, Livesey had said.
Sure, Rem had answered.
He had not rested.
Day one, he went alone to the Hunter Association. The licensing office smelled like ink and dust and too much order. He wrote his full name for the first time on an official line that mattered, pressed his thumb to a rune plate that stung his skin, and watched the ledger burn him into the book.
Rem Avern. Hunter, Rank D.
No ribbon. No applause. No priest to pin a blessing on his forehead. Just a woman at a desk sliding him a stamped chit and saying, without looking up, "Next."
He left with the badge in his pocket and sat for a long time on the Association's stone steps, elbows on his knees, watching the street.
So that was it. He existed now. The world could no longer pretend he was just weight to carry and drop off.
He should have felt proud.
Instead there was a gap in his chest he could not name. Like something should have been there and wasn't. Not sadness. Not happiness. Just space.
Night came and sleep did not.
The dreams had changed since the dungeon. They were not clean images, nothing story-shaped. More like pressure. A slow roll of heat from his ribs outward, like a forge was lit inside him and someone forgot to open the vents. Sometimes the heat felt like power. Sometimes it felt like drowning. Every time he woke with his jaw clenched and the blanket twisted in both fists like he had almost tried to tear the world in half while he was unconscious.
Day two, Livesey decided the cure for restless thinking was pain.
They went behind the clinic, to the back lot where the dirt was scarred with chalk rings and old boot marks. Rem had trained there before, but never like this. Today the dagger was part of it.
The dagger sat low across his back in the brace-lock sheath the Academy had delivered. They had insisted on rune-binding it "for safety". Livesey had stared at the courier like a wolf stares at a drunk hunter, signed the receipt, and said in a quiet voice, "If that lock fuses you will lose both hands and I will still consider that merciful." The courier had laughed, the way people laugh when they think you are joking. Then the courier had seen Livesey's eyes and stopped.
Now, under a pale morning sky, Rem moved.
He drove forward, spun, cut air, shifted weight. The dagger pulled at him like a live animal. It dragged his center of gravity down and back on every fast turn. It did not want to be whipped around like a toy sword. It demanded he respect its mass or trip over his own feet like an idiot.
"Your hips," Livesey said calmly. He rapped two knuckles against Rem's lower side. "You keep throwing from your spine. Stop letting your back do the work. You're not a cart mule. Knees under you. Frame from the ground. Again."
Rem exhaled, took position again, adjusted his weight. "It's easier when I just force it."
"No," Livesey said, like he was correcting a factual error, not an opinion. "It's lazier when you just force it. Easier is when you make the weight yours."
Rem grunted, tried again.
The dagger was stupid heavy. The dagger was always stupid heavy. His muscles could handle the raw load, that was not the point. The point was that the dagger was honest. It punished sloppiness instantly. Every time he got arrogant with it, it almost pitched him face first into the dirt like a joke.
He hated that. He also loved that.
"Still heavy," he muttered.
"It is supposed to be heavy," Livesey said. "You think carrying it makes you scary. It does not. Carrying it makes you honest. There is a difference."
Rem turned his head, breathing hard. Sweat rolled down his arm, caught at his wrist wrap, fell. "Honest how."
Livesey's eyes flicked, like he was about to walk to a place in his head that Rem was not invited to yet. "Keep your knees under you," he said instead. "You're drifting again."
Typical Livesey move. He would walk you right up to a door that smelled like truth and then slap your hand away when you reached.
Later, when Rem leaned back against the warm brick behind the clinic, shirt stuck to his back and shoulders buzzing, Livesey passed him a cup with both hands. The water was cold enough to bite.
"When you go in there," Livesey said, not looking at him, "you won't be alone."
Rem wiped his mouth with the back of his wrist. "There'll be nobles everywhere. That's not company. That's decorations."
"I'm not talking about crowds," Livesey said. "I'm talking about someone who will actually look at you instead of at your name."
Rem lifted one eyebrow.
"Evelyn Verran," Livesey said.
Rem's jaw tightened before he could stop it.
He hadn't said her name out loud since the dungeon. He hadn't even let the thought sit too long in his head. He'd pushed it away every time it crept close, like touching a bruise.
"Why her," he said.
Livesey rolled the cup between his palms. "Because the Duke still has pull, even sick. Because the Academy can't publicly say no to House Verran without starting a faction fight. Because a commoner walking straight into final-year combat track makes the kind of people who go to dinners with chandeliers very nervous. They're going to want a leash on you right away. If that leash is hers, they can't call it a leash. They have to call it mentorship."
Rem snorted. "I'm not a dog, old man."
"In that dungeon," Livesey said quietly, "you were not a dog. You were not even human for a moment. Do not play stupid with me."
The words hit like being slapped.
Rem looked down at his hands.
"I don't remember what happened at the end," he said. He almost never admitted that out loud. "It's just... black. Then pain. Then hospital."
"I know," Livesey said. "That's part of why I'm saying this. She knows. She knows something nobody else in that building knows. You need someone on the inside who knows. I would go myself if I could. I can't. So she will."
Rem didn't like that. He also didn't have an argument.
Day three came anyway.
Sunlight slid in through the shutters, pale and clean. Rem woke on his back, breath sharp, heart in his throat, the ghost of heat still coiled behind his ribs like something half-awake and annoyed he had dared to sleep.
He sat up and rubbed his face with both hands. His palms felt hot.
The river outside was doing its patient river noise. The clinic smelled like boiled herbs and clean cloth and faint iron. It smelled like home.
He pulled on the uniform the Academy had issued him.
White shirt. Too stiff at the collar. He left the top buttons undone even though he knew they would talk. There was a narrow cravat folded with military precision in the bundle. He looked at it, then left it on the table. The jacket was fitted and dark, cut to make him look cleaner than he usually allowed himself to look. He put it on but didn't close it. The trousers sat right. The boots gripped.
He turned in front of the old hallway mirror, the one that had a crack in the lower corner that warped his shin and made him look like his leg bent wrong.
He didn't look like a porter anymore.
He didn't look like a noble, either.
He looked like something the rules had not been written for yet.
Good.
He slid the dagger into its brace at the small of his back. The rune lock hummed against his palm with controlled annoyance. He didn't like anyone else having put their magic on his weapon. But he liked less the idea of some Academy clerk touching it "for inspection."
He clomped down the stairs.
Livesey was already in the kitchen, sleeves rolled, frying something in a pan that hissed like it wanted to protest. His hair was pulled back. His eyes were awake. Of course he was awake. Livesey slept like a hunting cat, two hours at a time and never fully relaxed.
The doctor looked up, and for a second something like surprise flickered across his face before he masked it with mockery.
"You look like trouble," Livesey said.
Rem grinned slow, lazy. "Good."
"Be trouble on purpose, not by accident," Livesey said. "If you embarrass me in front of nobles I will pretend I have never seen you in my life."
"You love me," Rem said.
"I tolerate you," Livesey said. "Barely."
Rem grabbed half a crust off the counter and bit into it like it owed him money.
"I thought you said not to embarrass you," he said around the bread.
"You embarrass me constantly," Livesey said. "That ship is halfway to the ocean."
Rem swallowed. The grin didn't go away.
He turned toward the door.
"Rem," Livesey said.
Rem stopped in the doorway. Half inside the clinic, half in the morning street.
Livesey wasn't smiling anymore.
There were moments when Livesey's age showed. Not on his face, not in his body. In his gravity. In the way the room felt heavier just because he had decided to say something important.
"Find it," Livesey said quietly.
Rem blinked. "My footing?"
"Your reason," Livesey said. His eyes did not move off Rem's face. "Before someone with money gives you theirs. Do you understand me."
Rem swallowed. Something low in him reacted to that. Not fear. Recognition.
"Yeah," he said. "I get you."
He didn't hug Livesey. They weren't built like that. But he nodded, and that was enough, and he stepped out into a city that suddenly felt too clean.
The Academy district was a different country from the river streets.
Down by the clinic the stones were cracked and patched, the alleys were loud, someone was always shouting about fish or debt or luck, and every surface had been touched by too many hands. Up here, nothing had fingerprints. The streets curved for beauty, not for function. The light hit polished stone and stayed there. Ironwork fences threw long, careful shadows across walkways that had never seen mud in their lives.
The air even smelled different. Less sweat. More perfume. More flowers bred to be expensive.
Students moved in small clusters ahead of him, all in matching slate jackets and perfect collars. They walked like they knew where they were going and assumed everyone would get out of the way. Some of them laughed too loud. Some of them laughed softly in the way noble kids are taught to laugh, so the chin never drops.
They saw him as soon as he passed under the first arch.
Eyes slid, fast. Collar first. His was open. Immediate judgment. Jacket next. Unfastened. Disrespectful. Untrained. Then his face. Not one they recognized from banquets. Not the son of anyone important. Then the blade hung across his lower back in the brace.
That changed the air.
He watched it happen. He had grown up in places where you learn to read a room before a room reads you. This room did not see a peer. It saw a variable. It didn't know yet if he was interesting, embarrassing, or dangerous. He could feel the building trying to decide.
Good. Let it work.
Cecil was waiting just past the second iron gate, on Academy ground but not acting like he belonged to it.
House Verran's chief of security did not bother dressing like a student or a teacher. His coat was dark and military. His gloves were worn in. His sword sat on his hip in a sheath with no rune locks at all, like he dared anyone to complain. He was standing like a man who had spent most of his life on guard and had never quite unclenched since.
When Cecil saw Rem, his face shifted. Not quite a smile. More a short flicker of pride.
"You didn't run," Cecil said.
Rem snorted. "You would have hunted me down if I did."
"Correct," Cecil said, pleased.
His eyes swept Rem head to heel, slow and deliberate. Open collar. Loose jacket. Blade braced low like an animal sleeping. Shoulders broad. Posture relaxed in that way that's not actually relaxed at all.
Cecil let out a low breath through his nose. "You're going to make half this place very uncomfortable."
Rem rolled one shoulder. "They can look away."
Cecil's mouth twitched. "I will say this once. After this gate, my hands are off. I have no authority in there. I can't pull you out of a problem. If you decide to piss off a noble boy whose father sits on a Council, I can't stop that wave when it comes down."
"I'm not here to start fights," Rem said.
"You are here wrapped in the House Verran name," Cecil said. "That is a fight, whether you like it or not."
Rem shrugged. "I just walk where they tell me and swing at monsters. That's all."
Cecil barked a single laugh. "Keep telling yourself that, kid. Maybe the world will believe you for a few more hours."
He clapped a big, scarred hand on Rem's shoulder. It wasn't light. It was solid. Approval. Warning. Blessing.
"And Rem," Cecil said, voice dipping without really dropping. "Try not to embarrass the young miss. She spent more effort than you'll ever know to get you in here without them chewing you apart."
Rem blinked.
"She did what," he said.
Cecil just smiled that not-smile again. "Figure it out yourself. I'm not your babysitter."
He let go and straightened. Someone with a ledger and a pinched, glass-clean voice was already approaching. Cecil took two long steps back and leaned against a stone pillar like a piece of furniture. He wasn't leaving. He was just pretending not to hover.
The woman who came up to Rem looked like she could cut paper just by looking at it.
"Rem Avern," she said, pen already poised. "Provisional placement, combat track, final year. Confirm."
Rem stared at her for a beat. "Confirm."
"I am Proctrice Miriel," she said. Her voice was dry and exact. "Administrative oversight for this intake. You will listen when I am speaking. You will not interrupt me while I am speaking. Acknowledge."
"Yeah," Rem said. Then, under her raised eyebrow, "Acknowledged."
Miriel made a tiny mark in her ledger. "Weapon. Declare."
Rem tipped his chin at the dagger across his back. "Blade. One. Heavy."
"Classification," she asked.
"It cuts," he said.
A pause. Her eyes flicked up to his and actually held for half a heartbeat. Not annoyed. Curious.
"Has it been bound," Miriel asked.
"They locked it," Rem said. "Academy brace. They can relax. I'm not going to slice your hallway in half for fun."
Miriel's jaw moved like she had to work not to say what she was thinking. She wrote again.
"You will be assigned a liaison," she said. "For acclimation and conduct. The liaison will walk you through final-year orientation, rules of engagement, campus boundaries, and schedule. The liaison will co-sign your clearances until your place is formalized. You will remain within arm's reach of your liaison until I state otherwise. Is that clear."
"Do I get to pick the liaison," Rem asked.
"No," Miriel said.
A low voice floated in from his left, carrying that bored confidence Rem had learned to respect in fighters.
"That means they already picked for you," the voice said.
Rem turned his head.
The man leaning against the carved stone arch looked like he'd been punched in the face a lot and had enjoyed most of those fights. He wore an instructor's sash loose across his chest, uniform sleeves rolled to the elbow. There was a white scar bridge across his nose and a sharp humor sitting just behind his eyes.
"I'm Instructor Ardan," he said. "Combat track, final year. I handle discipline and practical assessment. You'll say 'yes, Instructor' when I ask you for something, you'll answer like a person and not like a brick, and we'll get along fine."
"And if we don't," Rem asked.
Ardan smiled with only the corner of his mouth. "Then we'll still get along. It'll just be louder."
Rem snorted. "Yes, Instructor."
"Good," Ardan said. He glanced at Miriel. "Where's our noble?"
"Arriving now," Miriel said.
The far door opened.
Rem felt her before he fully saw her, which was annoying. He did not like that his body knew her presence faster than his eyes did.
Evelyn Verran walked through a breath later.
She wore the Academy uniform like it had been tailored to her ribcage. Jacket fastened all the way up to the throat without a wrinkle. Cravat tied in a perfect knot. Gloves fitted tight at the wrist. Dark hair braided back and pinned in a crown that did not move when she did. Her face was calm. Not empty. Controlled.
She did not look at Rem first.
She went straight to Miriel, dipped her chin with perfect respect, and said, "Proctrice."
There was a softness in the word that was pure manners. The girl who had stood in blood and cracked stone with her jaw set and her eyes burning was still there, Rem knew she was, but right now she was buried behind something drilled and polished.
"Miss Verran," Miriel said. Her tone shifted a fraction warmer. Of course it did. House Verran still meant something in this city, and Miriel was not stupid.
Only then did Evelyn turn.
When her gaze hit Rem, it was like somebody finally let air into a room and then snapped the window shut before anyone could see.
Her eyes flicked over him quick. Collar open. No cravat. Jacket unfastened. Blade heavy at his back. He could see the way her mouth twitched for just an instant, like she wanted to pinch the bridge of her nose and whisper what are you doing dressed like a delinquent in a nest of snakes, are you insane.
She did not do that. She lifted her chin the slightest bit.
"So," she said, voice smooth, almost bored. "You actually showed up."
Rem's mouth curved. He couldn't help it. "You didn't die," he said.
Her eyes flashed. For half a heartbeat, heat. Relief. It slid through and vanished so fast he almost doubted he'd seen it.
"And you still talk too much," she said.
Ardan made a sound like he had just watched someone toss a torch into a dry barn and was curious to see if it burned. Cecil, from his pillar, was trying and failing to hide the way his mouth had pulled into a tiny grin.
Miriel flipped a page. "Miss Evelyn Verran. You are being recorded as responsible liaison for provisional entrant Rem Avern, combat track, final year. You accept duty of orientation, behavioral sponsorship, and co-clearance. Confirm."
"I accept," Evelyn said.
Miriel angled the ledger. Evelyn laid her gloved palm against the rune in the lower corner. The glyph shimmered, flared, and went quiet. The binding took.
There. Official. Public. The Academy had just written in their books that Rem Avern, gutter-born, unranked noble nobody, belonged under the eye of House Verran.
Rem felt something hot crawl up the back of his neck that he did not have a word for. He recognized anger. He recognized shame. This was neither. This was almost worse.
He didn't like that her name was now connected to his on paper. It painted a target on her back he didn't think she deserved.
Ardan pushed off the arch. "Now that we all love each other," he said. "Good. Orientation comes after assessment. Standard procedure. We need numbers on him."
Rem frowned. "Numbers."
Miriel nodded. "Baseline classification. Strength, speed, mana channeling. Your file from the Association is incomplete."
"Because I just became a Hunter yesterday," Rem said.
"And the Association's report says you 'show unusual physical potential for a D rank entrant,'" Miriel said, reading off her ledger without looking at him. "Also says, and I quote, 'he has no sense of protocol whatsoever and required constant supervision during intake.'"
Rem blinked. "Who wrote that."
"I did," Ardan said, raising his hand lazily.
Rem squinted. "We met yesterday."
"You think I don't read my inbox," Ardan said. "Cute."
Evelyn exhaled through her nose, like this had already given her a headache.
She finally turned fully to Rem. For the first time since she'd walked in, her posture shifted off perfect formal line. Not relaxed, never relaxed, but angled toward him. She was talking to him now, not to the room.
"Listen carefully," she said in a tone that could have been mistaken for scolding if you were standing far away. Up close, it carried something tight and quiet under it. "From now on you stand next to me, not in front of me. You answer when they ask. You don't bark back. You don't swing at anyone unless they are physically coming for you or me. You follow, you nod, you keep your mouth mostly shut, and you let me handle the rest. Understand."
Rem huffed. "You talk like I'm a stray dog."
Her eyes narrowed. "You act like one."
That earned her an involuntary huff of a laugh from him, fast and low. He couldn't help it. Having her call him out in front of these people, like they had always done this, like she was allowed to talk to him like that, did something to the coil in his chest that almost felt like the pressure finally let out a little.
Miriel seemed satisfied. She snapped the ledger closed. "Assessment chamber B-3. Instructor Ardan will oversee. Miss Verran, you will remain with him as sponsor. After evaluation, we will finalize schedule and access. Walk."
Evelyn stepped back, the perfect Academy heir again. "Follow me," she said without looking to see if he would.
Rem fell into step beside her.
Cecil watched them go with the expression of a man who is proud and deeply entertained and also vaguely dreading what comes next.
Ardan shoved his hands into his sleeves and followed, whistling under his breath.
Behind them, Miriel marked something in neat ink. Rem didn't see it, but he could guess the shape. Two names under one line