Kael was already standing when the final boarding bell rang.
The skycoach shuddered beneath his boots, a low vibration traveling up through the soles of his feet and into his bones. Somewhere below the compartment, runes ignited in sequence—soft amber sigils blooming and locking into place with a sound like breath drawn through clenched teeth. The lamps overhead flickered, steadied, and filled the narrow space with warm, wavering light.
The seat beside the window remained empty.
Rain slid down the glass in thin, crooked lines, blurring the city beyond into a wash of height and shadow. Towers layered upon towers. Bridges stitched between them like afterthoughts. Far below, lights glimmered through fog, distant enough to feel unreal.
Kael kept his eyes on the opposite wall.
His hand tightened around the leather strap of his pack as the coach lurched, power gathering in the undercarriage. The instinct to sit—to claim the empty space, to anchor himself—rose sharp and insistent.
He ignored it.
Standing was worse. Standing meant swaying, adjusting, enduring the press of bodies as passengers settled into their places. But standing meant he didn't have to look out the window. It meant the city stayed peripheral, safely blurred, instead of yawning open beneath him.
"Last call," the conductor barked, voice rough from shouting over the rain. "Find your seats. We don't depart with loose weight."
Loose weight.
Kael exhaled slowly through his nose and shifted half a step farther into the aisle, blocking access to the window seat with his shoulder. His knuckles whitened where they curled around the overhead rail.
The glass tugged at his attention anyway.
Just a glance, some treacherous part of him whispered. You've done it before.
A memory flared—too fast to take shape. Stone giving way. Heat. Wind tearing a scream from his throat before he knew it was his.
Kael shut it down immediately.
He focused instead on the smell of damp wool and machine oil, on the rhythmic creak of the coach's joints, on the ache blooming in his calves. He chose discomfort. Discomfort was manageable.
"Sit down," the conductor said, squeezing past a pair of merchants arguing over luggage space. His gaze flicked to Kael, then to the empty seat. "Window's open."
"I'm fine here," Kael replied.
The conductor frowned. "You're blocking passage."
Kael lifted his shoulders in a half-shrug. "Coach shouldn't have built the aisle so narrow."
A few nearby passengers snorted. Others muttered.
"Provincials," someone said under their breath.
The conductor's eyes dropped to Kael's pack, lingering a moment too long. It was small, travel-worn, the leather darkened by rain and use. Too modest for the destination they were bound for.
Something inside it shifted as the coach jolted.
The wrapped object pressed against Kael's ribs—cold through the layers of cloth, heavier than it had any right to be. A faint vibration thrummed beneath his palm when he tightened his grip, like a heartbeat that didn't belong to him.
The conductor opened his mouth.
The coach lurched again, harder this time, and a ripple of unease ran through the compartment as someone yelped. The conductor cursed softly and moved on, attention claimed by a stack of unsecured crates.
Kael didn't relax until he was gone.
He edged sideways, squeezing himself into the narrow gap at the end of an already crowded bench. A woman there—middle-aged, well-fed, wearing a merchant's coat trimmed with fading fur—clicked her tongue sharply.
"Mind yourself," she snapped. "Some of us paid for comfort."
Kael offered her a thin smile. "Then you've my sympathy."
She sniffed. "Academy hopefuls," she muttered, eyes flicking over his worn boots and plain cuffs. "All thinking the world owes them a view."
Kael looked away before his expression could harden. It never took long for people to decide what he was. Where he belonged. What he deserved.
The coach rolled forward, motion smoothing into a steady glide. Light dimmed as they passed beneath a great arch of stone and steel, the lamps swinging gently overhead. The press of bodies grew heavier as gravity shifted, the smells sharper, the air warmer.
Someone behind him raised their voice. "Is that window seat going to waste, or what?"
Kael closed his eyes.
The voice that followed was different—calmer, carrying without effort.
"Excuse me."
Kael turned despite himself.
The woman standing in the aisle hadn't been there a moment before. She moved as if the swaying coach were an afterthought, boots planted with deliberate ease. Her travel coat was dark and finely cut, the hem marked with a crest stitched in silver thread. Academy colors.
Her gaze slid from the empty window seat to Kael, assessing.
"Are you planning to sit," she asked, "or are you guarding it for sentimental reasons?"
The corners of her mouth hinted at a smile, polite enough to pass for civility.
Kael held her eyes for a heartbeat, then looked past her shoulder. "Haven't decided."
Her eyebrow lifted. "How fortunate."
She waited.
He didn't move.
For a moment the air between them tightened, thin as wire. Kael felt it stretch, felt the weight of expectation pressing down—not just hers, but everyone else's.
"I'm doing the view a favor," he said at last. "Sparing it from disappointment."
A few quiet laughs rippled through the bench.
The woman studied him more closely now. Up close, he could see the ink stains on her fingertips, the faint glow of spellwork woven into the seams of her sleeves. Privilege, yes—but earned, not ornamental.
"Hm," she said. "How noble."
She brushed past him before he could reply, her shoulder grazing his. The contact was brief, unintentional—or so she made it seem—but Kael felt it like a spark along his nerves. She slid into the window seat with a fluidity that suggested practice, then leaned forward eagerly, palms braced against the glass.
The city opened beneath her.
Kael turned his face away, fixing his gaze on the floorboards. Even so, her reflection hovered in the window—bright-eyed, intent, utterly unafraid of the drop yawning beyond the pane.
He told himself he didn't care.
She shifted, crossing one leg over the other, and the faint scent of spell-ink and rain drifted toward him. "You know," she said lightly, "some people pay extra for that seat."
"I know."
"Then why—"
The coach dipped abruptly as it crossed a gap in the track.
The woman's hand shot out, fingers locking around the armrest. Her eyes squeezed shut for the barest instant before she caught herself, spine straightening, expression smoothing back into place.
Kael saw it.
Just a flicker. Just enough.
Their hands ended up close on the armrest, knuckles nearly touching. Neither of them moved right away. The contact wasn't quite there—but the awareness of it was.
She reclaimed the space first, shifting with deliberate ease. Her knuckles brushed his.
Kael stiffened, breath catching—not from attraction alone, but from the shock of contact. From the reminder of how long it had been since he'd let anyone that close.
She didn't comment on it.
Outside, the slums gave way to taller structures, cleaner lines. The city rose to meet them, spires piercing the cloud cover like blades. Lamps swung gently as the coach gathered speed.
Conversations drifted around them.
"…trials start at dawn—"
"…new edicts from the Throne—"
"…after what happened at Aris Bridge, they're tightening everything—"
Kael's fingers curled reflexively around the folded letter in his pocket. He didn't take it out. He didn't need to read it again.
An invitation. A summons. A chance.
Not for power. Never that.
For answers.
For control over the chaos that had taken everything and left him standing in the wreckage.
"The Skyfall was no accident," someone said nearby. "You don't lose that much stone unless something wants it gone."
Heat flashed behind Kael's eyes. Stone shearing away. The rush of air. A hand slipping from his grasp.
He focused on the ragged stitching along his cuff until the moment passed.
The woman at the window leaned into the conversation with easy confidence, speaking of exams and legacies and expectations. Of proving oneself on a stage meant for the worthy.
Kael listened in silence.
"For you," he thought, "it's a test."
For him, it was a line he could not afford to cross and fail.
"If this scares you," she said suddenly, not looking at him, "you'll hate what's waiting at the top."
"The top's where everything falls from," Kael replied.
She glanced at him then, something unreadable flickering in her eyes.
The object in his pack pulsed faintly as the coach passed beneath a warded span, warmth blooming through the fabric. Kael pressed his palm against it until the sensation faded.
Her gaze flicked down, sharp.
She said nothing.
The conductor's call echoed through the compartment. Lights flared ahead. The destination drew near.
Kael straightened, jaw setting. He would not turn back.
The coach emerged into open air.
Gasps rippled through the passengers as the High Span revealed itself—nothing but runed stone and shimmering force-fields suspended over an endless drop. The abyss yawned on either side, clouds drifting far below like shattered thoughts.
Bodies shifted for a better view.
Someone stumbled. Kael was jostled forward, shoulder striking the window frame. Cold glass seeped through his sleeve.
The void rushed up to meet him.
Stone falling. Wind screaming. The moment of weightlessness before the world broke.
His breath stuttered. Sound dulled. The coach's sway became the remembered plunge.
"If you faint," the woman murmured beside him, "aim away from my boots."
Without ceremony, she angled herself just enough to block part of the view. Her shoulder was solid, real. Her hand rested on the armrest where his could reach it if he chose.
He didn't.
Instead, Kael forced his eyes open.
He looked.
The object in his pack flared hot against his chest, pulsing in time with something deep beneath the bridge. The coach shuddered. Lamps flickered. Somewhere below, something moved in the mist—vast, circling, gone before he could be sure it was real.
An alarm bell clanged.
The coach lurched hard enough to send passengers screaming as runes along the track guttered and flared.
Kael clutched his pack, understanding crashing into him with sickening clarity.
Whatever was wrong on the bridge—
It was responding to him.
And the abyss waited, wide and patient, beyond the window.