To Choose Where the Knife Lands

Akalis sat with her spine perfectly straight, the tips of her fingers resting on the carved armrests of the Lunar Triad’s council table. The stone inlay glimmered under the high windows, precise, symmetrical. She approved of the room’s craft. Less so of its current company.

Mador of the Golden Tower slouched opposite her, wearing a coat that had once been elegant but now sagged from careless laundering. Golden trim frayed at the cuffs. Flame of Form magic was about precision, beauty, symmetry,in Akalis’s opinion, and so was she. Mador’s failure to meet the standard was, in her mind, an insult.

Beside him sat Orsel of the Silver Tower, soft-voiced and faraway-eyed, her fingers idly tracing patterns on the tabletop as if sketching clouds only she could see. Akalis disliked her before she even had a reason to. And she had plenty of reasons now thanks to Kade.

They had no cause to summon her. Which meant they had a cause they did not want named outright.

Mador began with the kind of formal pleasantries that felt less like conversation and more like fencing, feints and parries without intent to strike. He thought himself good at it. He wasn’t.

Then he changed tack. “Akalis, your wards are… unmatched. I’ve heard requests from the southern coast, Ralensa, even Kalyros. If you’d be willing to… loosen certain restrictions, we could see you gain lucrative contracts. More than double your current export.”

There it was. Bribery dressed as opportunity. She let a thin smile curve her lips. “I’m satisfied with my contracts.”

Orsel’s voice floated in, dreamlike. “We aren’t here only to discuss your work.” Her gaze sharpened despite her tone. “We’ve heard about Kade Badania's failed alignment.”

Akalis met her eyes with a passive expression. “And?”

“Unprecedented,” Mador said. “Properly documented, he could change our understanding of magical inheritance.”

“And the faith implications are… delicate,” Orsel murmured.

Akalis let them circle the subject, her own silence inviting more.

Mador finally gestured, and the side door opened.

Velis stepped in, red of the Inquisitors marking him like a drawn blade. His expression was neutral, but his posture said he’d rather be anywhere else.

“I was in the middle of an investigation,” he said flatly. “This had better be worth my time.”

“They want your account,” Akalis said, entirely unfazed.

He inclined his head once. “I saw the Ritual. That’s all there is to tell.”

“That’s not all,” Mador said. “The boy should be… observed. Studied. For the good of the Orders.”

Akalis’s smile turned to steel. “No.”

“Akalis,” Orsel said gently, “this isn’t a threat. But we believe you don’t understand the full picture.”

She leaned back. “Enlighten me.”

“Kade is Elsen’s son,” Orsel said. “So is Galir.”

Akalis stilled.

“Elsen served in more Callings than any other recorded sorcerer,” Orsel went on, her tone almost lulling. “Exposure changes a person. His first son, Unblessed. His second, Marked without alignment. A pattern worth studying. Both sons, ideally. But we’ll settle for the younger.”

The words landed with surgical precision. Orsel wasn’t simply proposing a study, she was planting a knife in the table and inviting Akalis to choose whether it would be turned toward Kade or Galir.

Her eyes lowered for the space of a single breath, though not in submission. She was buying herself a heartbeat to push down the surge of heat in her chest.

Because she could still see Kade’s smile.

The boy who had suffered in this woman’s care so much that he had his magic rewrite his memories.

But ever since she brought him to the Badaina state, he was bright in the unthinking way of the very young, or of those who had known hunger for warmth and found it at last. He had grinned up at her when she’d asked about his room, his voice eager to tell her about the view of the rooftops. A boy’s delight at such a small freedom.

And she remembered the other thing.

The way his body had gone still in the corridor to the infirmary, his eyes snagging on the doorway. How his shoulders had drawn in, making himself smaller, as though bracing for a hand that might seize him. She hadn’t spoken then, but her gaze had slid sideways to take in every twitch, every shallow breath.

He had not wanted to cross that threshold.

She knew why. She knew what Orsel’s “examinations” meant, the careful voice, the instruments too cold for the skin, the way every question pretended to be a kindness. She had heard whispers from healers who’d assisted, the ones who left those sessions and washed their hands as though from blood.

To be someone with the gift of healing yet so cruel was not just an insult to Mother Moon herself, but a failing to the system that keeps rewarding her with more responsibilities.

Orsel would put Kade there. That same gentleness that could press a child into stillness, break him all over again open under the pretense of study.

Not while Akalis drew breath.

When she looked up, the emotion was gone from her face, buried under Flame of Form steel. Her voice was clear and perfectly even.

“You built your theory on supposition and hearsay,” she said. “The kind of work that would embarrass a first-year apprentice.”

“It fits the evidence,” Mador countered.

She let her lips curl, just barely. “If you want the boy, you bind yourselves first, to a Flame of Will Oathbinding. No harm will come to Kade. No coercion, nothing that is not freely given.”

The air in the chamber shifted. Flame of Will Oaths did not bend or excuse. They required intent so clear that the magic itself would spit out a liar like rotten fruit. Breaking one meant death of a kind more final than a blade.

Mador’s mouth closed. Orsel’s eyes lowered as though in consideration.

Velis, silent until now, spoke. “I’ll witness it.”

Akalis’s gaze flicked to him, her surprise hidden behind the faintest tilt of her head. His voice had changedno trace of earlier reluctance, no suggestion he was here under sufferance. “You’ll want it written with precision. I can make certain the magic leaves no… gaps.”

Orsel’s fingers tapped once on the table. “An Oath is not a thing to give lightly.”

“And yet here we are,” Akalis replied.

“I’ll pray on it,” Orsel murmured, the edges gone from her voice, smoothing into something almost serene again.

The meeting closed without signatures. Without victory, but without surrender.

Akalis rose, smoothing the fall of her sleeves, the golden thread of the Marked coat catching the light as she moved. She left the chamber without looking back, her mind already arranging contingencies like pieces on a gameboard.

****

Kade still saw the expressions from the ceremony when he closed his eyes.

The polite silence. The faint shuffle of feet. Whispers beginning at the edges of the hall like wind raffling trees.

He remembered the priest afterward, face grave, voice gentle. “You have a place. You are Marked.” He’d said, “Your light answered Mother Moon’s call, and that was enough. The rest, you would have to discover on your own.”

So he’d nodded, because nodding was easier than asking the questions stacking in his mind. And he’d smiled, because smiles were like shields. They kept the air from growing too heavy around him.

Velis had left without a word, though Kade was certain nothing escaped those sharp eyes. Akalis had looked at him as though weighing two stones, worry in one hand, disappointment in the other. Bilia had been effervescent. Hanel… quiet.

And now Kade stood before that same quiet man in the training yard of the Badania estate.

It smelled faintly of cedar, and, underneath, ozone. The scent of magic burned into the air, crisp and metallic, like the first breath after lightning.

Hanel’s eyes swept over him once, measuring with no judgment. “Tell me everything your magic has done so far.”

Kade rocked on his heels. “Alright. It… warms me when I’m cold. Or when I need it. It answers when I’m happy. Or… sad.” His voice dipped. “Sometimes, it makes shapes. From my head. Like pictures. But not just to see, they’re… there. You can touch them.”

That caught Hanel’s attention. “Shapes,” he repeated. “Not illusions?”

“No. They’re there.” Kade moved his hands vaguely, as though that explained anything. “I made a…well, an image of a boy and a girl once. Not real people. Just something I saw in my head. Like a story... You know?”

Hanel tilted his head, thinking. “That’s unusual. The three alignments we know, Flame of Grace, Flame of Will, and Flame of Form, they each manifest in set ways. Flame of Will is will and passion given force. It bends to a person and even to words, pure force. Pure intent. Flame of From,” he raised his hand and a narrow ring of light shimmered between his fingers, perfectly even, “is structure and precision. It holds form because the caster modes it to shapes. Flame of Grace is… different again. Healing, insight and illusion.”

“So… mine’s… what?”

“Not one of them. But,” Hanel said, “it may share something with Flame of Grace; the tie to projection images. And Flame of Form in the way these images held shape. All kinds of magic respond best when the intent is clear. It doesn’t like hesitation.”

Hanel smiled a little as he added, "Although, my daughter would disagree as Flame of Grace aligned."

“You have a daughter?” Kade’s face lit. “What’s her name? How old is she?”

“Ayen. She is fifteen.”

“That’s a nice name. Could I meet her?”

“Perhaps,” Hanel said, tone easy but final. “Another time.

Kade bit back his questions and instead watched as Hanel traced a sigil in the air. It glowed, a clean, perfect arc that bent at exact angles, light pooling at each point. The lines hung there, humming faintly, as though eager to be told what to do.

“Try to follow it,” Hanel said.

Kade gathered the warmth in his chest, tugging at it with his thoughts. It streamed from his fingertips, sluggish at first, then eager, and began to follow his imagined pattern. For a moment, it almost worked. But then a curve sagged, a point wobbled, and the light unraveled.

“It’s like drawing with my left hand,” Kade muttered.

“Practice,” Hanel said. “Not a picture in your head. A command. Let us see if your magic can do a Flame of Form sigil.”

Footsteps crunched across gravel. Galir strode in, two practice swords dangling from his hands. He didn’t even glance at Kade.

“You ready?” Galir asked Hanel.

“In a moment.”

Kade brightened. “Hey.”

“Hey.” Galir’s reply was clipped.

“You been training all morning?”

“Yes.”

“…You must be tired.”

“I’m fine.”

The space between the words felt colder than the morning air.

“Keep at it,” Hanel told Kade, then stepped opposite Galir.

Hanel’s expression didn’t change. “Ready?”

Galir drew both swords in answer.

They didn’t bow or posture. The spar began in a heartbeat.

Galir lunged low, blades a silver blur. Hanel pivoted, one hand cutting an arc in the air. A wall of light flared up, Galir’s strike glanced off with a sound like a struck bell. He didn’t retreat, pressing the attack before the shield could harden, one sword cutting high, the other low.

Hanel’s fingers flicked, light coiling to meet each strike. Sparks of pure energy leapt from the impact points, the air buzzing with every connection.

Galir feinted left, spun right, and came within a finger’s breadth of Hanel’s coat.

Then Hanel changed the rhythm. One sweep of his palm, and the air solidified. Lines of radiance shot upward, curving overhead until they joined in a seamless dome. Trapping Galir inside. The yard was suddenly awash in a golden glow, like sunlight caught in crystal.

Galir didn’t stop. He struck the dome hard enough to send ripples racing across its surface. The magic flexed but held. He stabbed for the seams, nothing.

Breathing hard now, Galir stepped back, then charged, bringing both swords down in a two-handed blow. Sparks flew, dazzling white. The dome remained whole.

“Force alone won’t work,” Hanel said, voice calm, though sweat trickled down his temple. His eyes unfocused slightly, holding the sigil in his mind like a weight. “You’ll only tire yourself.”

Galir’s jaw tightened. “Then I’ll find another way.”

Kade’s fingers itched. His magic hummed in his chest, responding to the clash of wills like a drumbeat he couldn’t quite ignore.

He wanted to do this too.

He wanted to fight like that.

But he needed to learn first.

And he would. No matter what it took.

****