The White Mansion hadn't changed. The polished marble floors still reflected the disapproving portraits of ancestors. The air still smelled of lemon oil and cold ambition. Yet, I walked through its halls differently. Two years ago, I was a ghost, flinching from my own shadow. Now, my footsteps were measured, my back straight. The E-rank strength humming in my limbs wasn't just physical; it was the quiet confidence of a path found.
I was led not to the Baron's office, but to the small, south-facing salon—a room for receiving minor guests. A calculated slight, but a revealing one. He was acknowledging my existence, but not as family.
Baron Boron White sat in a high-backed chair, sipping from a crystal glass. He looked the same—a block of disciplined muscle in noble cloth. His gaze, however, held a new, analytical sharpness as I entered and gave a shallow, correct bow.
"Roy." He didn't invite me to sit. "Reports reach my desk. You have attained E-rank. You have developed a... knack for herbology. You are spoken of at the guild as 'reliable'." He said the word as if it were a mildly surprising flavour. "Explain."
"I trained, my lord. As you advised. To become strong enough to survive." I kept my eyes on a point just above his shoulder, the picture of respectful detachment.
"Do not be glib," he said, his voice low. "Support Magicians with C-rank Potential do not jump a full sub-rank in months. They do not create new plant variants that interest the alchemist's guild. They do not have retired temple herbalists taking them as apprentices." He set his glass down with a soft clink. "What are you doing?"
He had been watching. Of course he had. I was a piece on his board, however insignificant, and a piece that had started moving on its own was a piece that needed reassessment.
"I am applying myself," I said, choosing my words with the care of a botanist selecting a rare seed. "The 'Greenwarden' techniques I am piecing together focus on efficiency, symbiosis, and the subtle manipulation of life force. It is less about raw power and more about... precision. It allows for advancement within the constraints of my Potential." This was the public story. Let him believe it.
The Baron leaned forward, his eyes boring into me. "Symbiosis. Manipulation of life force." He tasted the concepts. "Can these techniques be applied to crops? To livestock?"
There it was. Not concern for a son. Interest in an asset. He was a landholder. Yield, health, profit—these were his languages.
"They can, my lord," I admitted. "In theory, I could increase disease resistance in grain, or encourage faster wool growth in sheep. But the techniques are experimental, personal, and require deep attunement. They are not yet... scalable." This was true. My power was an art, not a factory process.
He leaned back, steepling his fingers. The calculation in his eyes was almost audible. "Yet you are scalable. Your time is."
A cold knot formed in my stomach. "My lord?"
"You are twelve. In two years, you will be of an age where certain... arrangements can be made. A minor noble house, perhaps a wealthy merchant with poor land, might see value in a consort with practical, land-enhancing skills. It would be a favourable match. It would bring connections to this House."
He was planning to marry me off. To use my unique skills as a dowry to buy political or economic favour. I was to be cultivated, like one of my own plants, and then sold.
The old rage, the fury of the boy beaten and left in a dusty room, surged. I forced it down, letting it cool into something harder, sharper. I met his eyes for the first time. "My goal is the Dragon Academy, my lord. I intend to test for admission."
He blinked, genuinely surprised. Then he let out a short, derisive laugh. "The Academy? With your Potential? Roy, ambition is commendable, but delusion is not. The Academy accepts only the exceptional. You are... diligent. There is a difference."
"The Academy values unique skills and proven resilience as much as pure Potential," I countered, quoting the publicly known admissions guidelines. "My path may give me a chance." I didn't need him to believe it. I just needed him to see it as a possibility that delayed his marriage plans.
He studied me, the mockery fading back into calculation. The Academy was a wild card. If I somehow succeeded, the prestige for House White, however minor, would be significant. If I failed, I would return humbled and more pliable. It was a risk-free gamble for him.
"Very well," he said, as if granting a favour. "Pursue your... Academy dream. You will retain your independence. But understand this: your efforts reflect on this House. Do nothing to bring shame. And," his voice hardened, "any significant discoveries, any marketable techniques you develop, you will bring to me first. The resources of this House sheltered you for ten years. A debt is owed."
It was a leash. A light one, but a leash nonetheless. He was claiming a future stake in my work.
"I understand, my lord," I said, bowing again. The debt was a fiction, but the threat was real.
"Dismissed."
I turned to leave.
"And Roy," his voice stopped me at the door. "Your hair. The green strands. See that it does not become... excessive. Weirdness is not a virtue in nobility."
I didn't reply. I walked out, the ghost of a smile on my lips. Excessive weirdness was my only path to survival.
As I crossed the main hall, I encountered the source of my childhood misery. Kris, now fourteen, taller and broader, was practicing aura strikes with a blunted sword against a training dummy. Melinda, twelve and already wearing the disdainful expression of her mother, watched from a settee.
They fell silent as I passed. Kris's eyes swept over me, noting my posture, the simple but well-maintained gear, the lack of fear in my gait. He saw the E-rank solidity I now carried. His lips curled, but the mockery didn't come. There was a new, wary confusion in his eyes. The trash was no longer cowering.
Melinda sniffed. "Still dressing like a commoner, I see."
I paused and looked at her. Not with anger, but with a detached curiosity, as if she were a mildly interesting insect. "It is practical for my work," I said, my tone utterly flat. Then I continued walking, leaving them in a silence more unnerving than any retort.
The encounter with the Baron had been a raid on my plans. He had thrown a net of obligation and future expectation over me. But he had also, unintentionally, given me a deadline and a shield. I had two years until the Academy admissions to become too valuable to be sold off quietly, and my stated goal provided a reason for my intense, strange focus.
I returned to my cottage, to my crystal, my journal, and the living shield pulsing gently in Mara's garden. The outside world was starting to press in: the Church's suspicion, the Baron's greed, the guild's curiosity.
My time of quiet, isolated growth was ending. The garden was about to face its first real storm.
I had seventeen months until the Gravewyrm Bloom.
I had twenty-four months until the Academy.
And I had a Baron now expecting a return on his "investment".
I looked at my hands, the faint green tracery visible along the veins. The path of the heretic was never meant to be easy. It was meant to be necessary.
And it was time to start growing thorns.
-