The second day I'm back to my own devices, attending another class that talk about how to use magic. How to properly channel the energy around us and shape it the way we want it too. Unfortunately, I don't understand a thing Morcant said. Everything just went from my right ear and out of my left. Then, when it came to practice I totally tanked every tasks.
Others were doing it with such ease, from lifting a simple rock, throwing darts, moving a glass of water to another table, to a more bizarre things like reblooming a withered flowers to flying. I can't even move a rock.
I sat on the edge of the practice mat, staring at the rock that refused to move. It was gray, unremarkable, roughly the size of my fist. Three hours ago, Morcant had placed it in front of me and it still stays like that.
I watched a boy two mats over lift his pebble six inches, wobble it through a crude figure-eight, set it down with a gasp of effort and a grin of triumph. A girl near the wall had managed continuous levitation for nearly a minute before concentration broke. Even the ones who failed did so actively, their pebbles twitching, rolling, responding to their reach however imperfectly.
Mine sat there, smug in its silence.
"Basic telekinesis," Morcant had explained at the start, "is not Affinity work. Every Ælytheran, regardless of lineage or Affinity talent, can learn to move matter through will alone. It requires no particular gift, only focus, practice, and correct technique."
She'd demonstrated with the same pebble she gave me, lifting it without gesture, without visible effort, floating it in patterns while explaining the mental posture, reach and hold, visualize the object's compliance, maintain consistent pressure without forcing.
I'd tried. For three hours, I'd tried. Trying to make it move with my mind until my temples throbbed, my eyes watered, holding postures that felt increasingly ridiculous as nothing happened. Not resistance. Not partial success. Just... nothing. Like shouting into a void that returned no echo.
"Again," Morcant said. She hadn't moved from her observation post near the wall, arms crossed, serpent pin catching the fluorescent light. "The pebble is not heavy. Your mind makes it so."
"My mind is doing exactly what you said." The words came out sharper than intended, defensive. "Reach, hold, visualize. Nothing happens."
"Because you're not focused." She finally approached, heels still silent, and crouched to my level. Uncomfortably close. I could smell her perfume, something herbal and sharp. "Your Affinity power—" she said the word with deliberate weight. Yes, Alexander had also explained it to me this early morning that my power mimic my mother long lost lineage of Kane's family Affinity where they can absorb and disperse power. It was a unique ability that make its users able to take any kind of energy and make it their own. I don't really understand what it meant but it also kinda why even my teacher is afraid of me.
I stared at her. "You said this was basic magic."
"It is." She picked up my pebble, held it between us, then set it down and lifted it again without touching it, she is demonstrating it so easily. "When you reach, you have to visualize what you want that rock to do, and expect it to follow."
"I don't understand."
"Your brother," she said, and I flinched at the comparison already forming, "has mastered this techniques with such ease. You'll be able, too. Just like any other student in here," she paused, selecting words with the precision of someone who rarely bothered with gentleness, "Focus. If it doen't move than it's something in your head that's preventing it."
The pebble twitched.
I gasped, breaking concentration, and it stilled. But Morcant had seen. Her eyes narrowed, not with surprise, but with confirmation.
"So, you get it. What did you do just then?" she asked.
"I don't—" I tried to explain it. "I thought about... about, I don't know. I don't know what I'm doing."
"It's okay." She actually sounded satisfied. "Basic telekinesis is the first step to unlock your full magical capabilities, you'll master it in no time."
"That's absurd expectations."
"That is a fact. All Hightowers are gifted more that any other families." She stood, brushing invisible dust from her skirt. "Practice it. Failures are just a temporary transit to success, so don't wastes both our time there."
She moved to the next student, leaving me with a pebble that had twitched. Actually moved and leave me with a lot more questions than answer and a bunch of high expectations. I was supposed to imagine? How does one make an inanimate object to move themselves through imagination?
I spent the remaining hour trying to replicate the moment. Some attempts produced small results like the rock rolling a millimeter, trembling without lifting. Other time when I tried to move other things, nothing happened. By the time Morcant dismissed the class, my head ached with effort and my hands shook with frustrated exhaustion. But I'd moved it. Once. However briefly.
The afternoon session was different. Sara found me in the cafeteria, picking at something that claimed to be pasta, and informed me to attend special lecture in the main auditorium. Whatever that means. She just gave me a building number and when I found it, Jake already seated among two dozen other students, ranging from younger than me to older than me by apparent years.
"Emily." He shifted, making space on the bench. "Sara said you'd be here. I heard this is basically politics 101."
I slid in beside him, grateful for familiar presence. The room was bigger than Morcant's court, and this one look like a proper lecture hall, with a circular table at the center where seven chairs stood empty. More students filling in the seats until finally its full from top to bottom. But before I can come up with a stupid retort to crack a joke, suddenly Elara sat next to me.
"Hi, I heard you had a hard time practicing. If you want I can help you. We can meet in one of the study corner and I can teach you a trick or two,"
Elara's tone was light, almost friendly, like we were discussing homework and not my humiliation.
I forced a small smile. "Thanks. I'll… survive."
She tilted her head, studying me in a way that felt too perceptive for someone I'd met yesterday. "You can moved it, though."
My spine stiffened. "You saw?"
"Everyone saw." She said it without cruelty. Just fact. "Morcant doesn't hover like that unless something interests her."
Great. I was interesting again.
Jake leaned slightly forward, inserting himself subtly between us. Not aggressive. Just protective.
"Hi, I'm Jake," he said politely.
"Yes, I'm … um, Voss, Elara Voss." She replied, equally polite but clearly she's nervous.
Before anything else could be said, the lights dimmed. The door opened. Seven people entered, quickly walking down the stairs, not in procession but with the unconscious coordination of long practice. They took the center chairs without speaking, and I recognized Alexander immediately. Third from left, his expression professionally neutral. The others ranged in apparent age from a sharp-featured woman who looked barely thirty to a man whose white hair and weathered skin suggested centuries rather than decades.
"Welcome to High Council Overview," the woman said. "I am Councilor Veyra. You are here because The Academy dictates that you understand how the Aeternum Order functions at its highest level. So, all of you need to focus on this lecture as this is not an elective subject."
She gestured, and the air above the table shimmered into seven symbols, matching the pins I'd seen, the crests on robes, the marks of lineage.
"The Order is not a democracy. It is not, strictly, a meritocracy. It is a balance of seven great families, each with specific responsibilities, each with veto power over actions affecting their domain. Learn these. Respect these. This is what we expect from the younger generations so none of you find yourself on the wrong side of ancient agreements."
The symbols resolved into names as she spoke. Hightower is Alexander's, marked by the crowned heart I'd learned to recognize. Veyra, her own, a stylized eye with a spiral pupil. Korvin, represented by a man with scarred fists and vines. Then there is the serpent consuming its own tail, Morcant's pin, I realized. Severin, the white-haired elder symbolized with a a tower struck by lightning. Yao, a woman who hadn't spoken yet has two dragons intertwined. Orlov, is a big man but somehow very still in his chair is the owner of a wolf's head howling. And Tremaine, youngest-looking of all, with a smile that didn't reach his eyes, has a logo with an empty scale.
"Each family maintains specific functions," Veyra continued. "Hightower oversees thresholds. The gates between spaces, the boundaries that keep our many planes in this world separate. Veyra handles intelligence and information. Korvin manages internal discipline and training. Severin maintains our archives and historical continuity. Yao negotiates with external powers such as vampires, angels, the few demons who are in good terms. Orlov commands our enforcement arm. And Tremaine—" she paused, something flickering, "Tremaine handles our laws and science."
Tremaine's smile widened. I disliked him immediately.
"Your placement in this class," Veyra said, "indicates potential membership in this structure. Of course, some of you will marry into families. Some will serve as adjuncts. Some will found new lines, if your power proves sufficient and your loyalty unquestioned."
I felt Jake tense beside me. We hadn't even knew that this marriage, alliances, the uses of family connection is even a thing. We'd been too busy surviving this new place and just the thought of political marriage and everything in between just make me nauseous.
For the next hour we just heard a bunch of nonsense of many laws and regulations that dated back to the BCs and my head is starting to spiral. I want to lay down so badly and never getting up again.
I slumped lower in my seat, the soft cushion digging perfectly into my spine as Veyra droned on about jurisdictional disputes from the Byzantine era. My temples throbbed in rhythm with her voice. Turns out human history has more holes in it because what she said is somehow more thorough. She even displays pictures and testimonies from other witches who were at a certain events.
My eyelids drooped. I caught myself, straightened, forced attention back to the lecture. Something about bloodline inheritance and contested thresholds. Jake's pen moved steadily beside me, taking notes with military precision. Elara sat utterly still, absorbing everything, occasionally glancing at Alexander or me with an expression I couldn't read.
"—the Accords of 1847 established the current enforcement protocols," Veyra continued. "Article Seven specifically addresses unauthorized dimensional bleeding. Violations are to be reported immediately to Hightower or Orlov representatives, with no independent action permitted."
My head nodded forward. I snapped it back, blinking at the sudden vertigo. The room tilted slightly, then steadied. I needed air. I needed my bed. I needed to not be in this place where everything I did was measured against centuries of expectation I hadn't known existed yesterday.
"Emily." Jake's whisper, barely audible. "You okay?"
"Fine," I lied, not looking at him. "Just tired." More like bored.
He didn't believe me. I could feel his attention shift. It made me want to scream. I didn't need protection. I needed to be good at something. Anything.
Veyra finally paused, consulting a tablet. "We will break for fifteen minutes. Upon return, Councilor Korvin will discuss disciplinary structures and advancement pathways."
The room erupted into movement, students stretching, murmuring, clustering in groups I wasn't part of. I stayed seated, staring at the seven symbols still hovering above the central table, trying to make them mean something.
Elara turned to me, her yellow eyes bright with an energy I envied. "The advancement pathways are what others will pay attention to," she said quietly. "They're how people like us get anywhere."
"People like us?"
"I'm sorry, I mean like me, without guaranteed position." She glanced toward the Councilors, who had retreated to a corner for their own consultation. "Obviously not all families can be High Councilors. My family has never been granted an Affinity. We serve where we're permitted, hope for recognition, build connections where we can." She smiled, small and sharp. "I'm going to serve the Hightowers. Officially, if I pass the test. It will be my honor."
I blinked at her directness. "Why tell me this?"
"Because up until yesterday you're not exist. I was hoping you or your brother could trust me someday to be your right hand." She stood, smoothing her skirt. "And because other councilors is either scary or a complete ass. Alexander is regarded as the most respected because of his power and transparency."
She walked away before I could respond, leaving me staring after her. Jake returned from wherever he'd gone, two cups of water in hand.
"Here. Drink."
I took it, grateful for the cold against my palms. "Elara just told me she's planning to serve our family. Whatever that means."
"Damn." Jake sat, his shoulder brushing mine, solid and real. "I guess we're a royalty in this place."
"That's an understatement."
He shrugged. "People want to know what we'll become. I heard Alexander is the last one. No relatives. So, guess that makes us a surprise heir for everyone."
"What if I don't become anything?" The words slipped out. I stared at the water, watching light refract through it. "What if this is it? Drowning in a place I don't care about?"
Jake was quiet for a moment. When he spoke, his voice had dropped to something rough, almost broken. "You know what I thought, when I first realized what I could do?"
I shook my head.
"I thought I was being punished." He laughed, humorless. "I'd walked out of that fire without a scratch. And instead of gratitude, I felt... separated. Like the universe had noticed me and decided I didn't get to be normal anymore."
I finally looked at him. His jaw was tight, eyes fixed on the Councilors across the room talking among themselves.
"I spent a year hiding it," he continued. "I can't even get drunk. So, naturally I just picking fights. Ethan almost left me before I told him. Before he convinced me to let anyone help." He turned to me, and his expression made my chest ache. "I don't want that for you. It's a very lonely place, thinking you have to figure it out alone."
"But you did figure it out," I said. "You're here, flying, making snow, being what they want. I'm just... tired."
"You're on day two, Mily." He grabbed my hand, squeezed hard enough to ground me. "Day two of me is feeling confused and angry because I can't get drunk after chuging a bottle of vodka. I failed many times but Damien, Oscar, Ethan, and the rest of my team was there. I want to be that for you, too."
The bell rang, signaling return to session. Students filtered back, but neither of us moved.
"What kept you going?" I asked. "When you wanted to stop?"
Jake's thumb traced my knuckles, a childhood gesture he'd never outgrown. "You," he said simply. "The thought of you, thinking I'd abandoned you. I learned my powers so I could come back. So I could be your brother again, even if I was different."
He grabbed my hand. "So I'm selfish, really. I need you to keep going because I can't do this without you. This place, these people, this," he gestured at the Councilors, the symbols, the weight of everything, "I need my sister to be here and see me just as Jake. Not Hightower heir. Just the idiot who taught you to throw a punch in our backyard."
My throat tightened but I can't help me laugh a little. The exhaustion was still there, the desperate wish to disappear into my laptop and fictional worlds where I controlled the narrative. But beneath it, something else. Recognition that I wasn't the only one drowning here. That Jake, who seemed to master everything, was also building himself from fragments, also afraid of becoming unrecognizable.
"Okay," I whispered.
"Okay?"
"I'll keep going. For now." I managed something almost like a smile. "But you're buying me actual coffee after this. Not this bean sludge."
Jake's grin broke through, real and relieved. "Deal,"
We straightens in our seats as Korvin began speaking, some other student between us and Elara now. I tried to focus on the lecture of disciplinary structures, advancement pathways, the competition for positions that determined whether you'd spend your service in archives or field operations, in safety or danger.
But my attention kept drifting to Jake's profile beside me. To the way he'd said you, like I was answer enough. Like my existence justified his.
I was well on my way to resenting him for being ahead. For the years of secret. But he'd been alone too. I took a sip of water when Korvin mentioned the examination schedule for advancement consideration, I actually listened.
Not because I suddenly cared about Order politics. Fuck that, I don't care. Because Jake needed me to try. Because Elara's transparency felt like an invitation I might eventually accept. Because somewhere in this exhausting, impossible place, there might be something I could become that didn't require me to stop being Emily first.