Morning light spilled over Caerleon and scattered the last of the shadows clinging to the Crossroads City, drawing the streets, wards, and crowded districts out of darkness as the sun rose above the rooftops. There was still warmth in that first light, though it had grown gentler with each passing day, softened by the chill riding down from the north and the slow turn of the season. Fall waited just beyond the horizon, already brushing the leaves in amber and gold, and all across Avalon, people had begun reaching for heavier cloaks, thicker scarves, and the kind of small comforts that came with shorter days.
Within the city, talk had already shifted toward the upcoming mayoral campaigns, and with Mayor Ramonda's seat now drawing serious attention, every street corner, café, guild office, and public square seemed to carry some new rumor about candidates, speeches, town halls, and the debates that would eventually decide who the people believed fit to lead Caerleon. Each of the three candidates appealed to a different part of the city. The younger crowd gravitated toward Jacob Ramonda, drawn by his charisma, his achievements, and the simple fact that he felt closer to their generation than the old powers that had long shaped Avalon from above. Those who remained loyal to the Ramonda name stood with him as well, unwilling to abandon a family that had carried the city through storms most people still spoke of in lowered voices.
The wealthier circles, naturally, turned toward Matthias Greymark, a member of the Entitled and a noble of Avalon, and though few were brave or foolish enough to say it aloud, his allies within the Guild were practically salivating over the pledges he had made behind polished smiles and carefully worded promises. The third candidate, Tengen, drew support from those who wanted neither legacy nor aristocratic ambition, but a third force that claimed to offer the best of Ramonda's stability and Greymark's influence without fully belonging to either. All of Avalon had its eyes on Caerleon's election, not merely because the city was still reeling from the aftermath of the Siege, but because whoever claimed the mayoral chair might bring changes that would reach far beyond its walls and shape the realm for an entire generation.
Meanwhile, inside Castle Excalibur, the Great Hall buzzed with its usual morning noise as the student body gathered for breakfast. Conversations rose and tangled beneath the vaulted ceiling, some students discussing assignments, essays, and homework they had put off until the last possible moment, while others traded theories on whatever mysterious ailment or personal grievance had made Professor Rasputin even grumpier than usual that morning. Naturally, there were also quieter conversations about the Congregation, with students grumbling about the difficulty of balancing schoolwork with contracts, comparing rankings, and speaking with thinly veiled ambition about how far they needed to climb before the better jobs, higher rewards, and more dangerous opportunities began opening to them.
The Marauders sat in their usual corner at the far left of the Great Hall, where Godric buttered his toast while Salazar, Rowena, Jeanne, and Helena drifted in and out of their familiar banter. The subject moved from schoolwork to the Congregation, then from the Congregation to the coming election, carried along by occasional laughter, a few well-placed remarks from Rowena, and the inevitable scowls that followed one of Salazar's sharper jabs. By all appearances, it was just another morning at Excalibur, yet Godric's crimson eyes eventually settled on Helga, who had been strangely quiet for far too long.
She sat with her amber gaze lowered to the sunny-side eggs on her plate, her expression solemn as she pressed the tip of her fork into the yolk and watched it spill slowly across the porcelain. Normally, by this point in breakfast, Helga would have been halfway through a mountain of food and already plotting whether she could justify a second helping before dessert, but today her plate remained almost untouched.
"Hey, Helga," Godric said, still holding the butter knife in one hand as his concern drew the attention of everyone at the table. "Something bothering you? You seem kind of down."
Helga's expression went slack for a moment, as if the question had caught her before she could decide what face to wear. She blinked at him, then looked down at her plate again.
"Now that you mention it," Salazar said, leaning slightly in his seat as his gaze traveled over the tragically underused breakfast before her, "it is rather peculiar. Ordinarily, your plate would be stacked to such astonishing heights that future scholars might mistake it for an architectural achievement. By now, I daresay the dishes before us would be as desolate as a pillaged village."
Rowena looked past him with a concerned frown. "Salazar's awful choice of wording aside, he does have a point," she said gently, her eyes settling on Helga. "Are you feeling sick? Do you need to go see Doctor Adani?"
"What? No!" Helga blurted, and the sharpness of her answer made all of them look at her more closely. She exhaled, forcing her shoulders to relax as her gaze lowered again. "I'm fine. I'm just not hungry, that's all."
Salazar's eyes widened with theatrical horror. "By the Old Gods," he said, one hand drifting to his chest as though he had just been told the sun had failed to rise. "Helga Hufflepuff, not hungry? My word, that is not a symptom. That is an omen of the coming apocalypse."
Helena gave him a level stare from across the table. "Oh, grow up, Slytherin."
"Are you sure you're all right?" Jeanne asked, her concern quieter than Rowena's but no less sincere as she leaned forward beside Godric. "It wouldn't hurt to visit Doctor Adani, even if it's only a stomach bug or something small."
"No, please, everyone, I'm okay," Helga said, lifting a hand as a nervous smile tugged at her mouth and failed to stay there for long. "Really. I've just got a lot on my mind."
Her words faded as she glanced over her shoulder toward the other side of the Great Hall, where clusters of Prefects sat apart from the rest of the student body, their badges catching the morning light while the conversations around them carried an edge that felt sharper with every passing day.
Lucian Greymark and the newly established Disciplinary Committee sat at their new table, positioned barely a stone's throw from the Visionaries, with tall-backed chairs of nearly the same shape and make. It was impossible not to notice the message it sent. All across the Great Hall, eyes drifted toward the Head Prefects before sliding toward the Visionaries in comparison, and though most students tried to be subtle about it, they were not subtle enough. Between every bite, every sip, and every lowered whisper, glances moved back and forth across the hall, and with each passing minute, the mood surrounding the Visionaries seemed to darken.
Godric noticed Artoria first, because even by her usual standards of stony displeasure, she looked dangerously tense. Arthur sat beside her, trying to calm her with a nervous smile and a quiet hand on her arm, but the faint twitch in his eyebrow betrayed how poorly he was managing his own temper. Genji remained still in that cold, disciplined way of his, while the other two Visionaries shared the same controlled silence, their expressions giving away almost nothing. Corvus, however, made no attempt to hide the devious glint in his dark eyes, as if the entire situation amused him for reasons no one at their table would enjoy discovering.
Godric also caught the growing concern in Helena's expression, and he did not need to ask why. She knew the Visionaries well enough to recognize that this was not their normal demeanor.
"Blimey, is it just me, or does Artoria look like she's ready to walk over there and carve Lucian up like a Yuletide ham?" Godric muttered as he folded his toast in half, his eyes still fixed across the hall. "I mean, stony and grumpy is pretty much her thing, but she looks way more wound up than usual."
"You're not wrong," Helena said, turning back toward him with a troubled look. "I've known the twins for years, and I don't think I've ever seen Artoria this angry. Not that I blame her, really. They gave the Prefects their own table, and whether Headmaster Blaise meant it that way or not, it sends a very clear message that the Disciplinary Committee is being placed on the same level as the Visionaries."
Her hazel eyes lifted toward the other table again. "You know what it takes to become a Visionary. To them, this isn't just a misstep. It's an insult."
"Oh, my dear Helena," Salazar said with a sharp grin as he lifted his goblet and took a measured sip, his emerald eyes glinting above the rim. "I think you and I both know well enough that it was very much the intention."
His gaze shifted toward the professors' table, where Headmaster Blaise sat with a spoonful of pottage lifted calmly toward his mouth, though his eyes remained fixed on the Prefects and Visionaries with far too much awareness for the gesture to seem casual.
"The man is as intelligent as he is powerful," Salazar continued, lowering his goblet. "More importantly, he is as shrewd as they come. I will admit, if Blaise possessed the same ambitious rot that lived in Lamar Burgess, he might very well be the most dangerous individual in all of Avalon, perhaps one none of us could hope to withstand if he ever chose to share the same darkness."
Jeanne lowered her spoonful of oats back onto her plate, her expression tightening with unease. "Surely you don't actually mean that, Salazar. Headmaster Blaise has made his disdain for the High Table clear, but even he would know it's in poor taste to rile them up further with something this obvious."
"But that is precisely why he would do it, Jeanne," Salazar replied, turning his attention to her with the patience of someone explaining a rule he found unpleasantly obvious. "In fact, I would wager he intends to provoke them for that exact purpose. A wound to the body, whether accidental or intentional, does not always produce retaliation. A wound to the pride, however, burns, festers, and has a remarkable talent for driving otherwise clever people into doing profoundly foolish things."
He set one hand lightly against his chest, though his gaze returned to the Visionaries' table. "Look at it this way. If the Visionaries become angry enough to retaliate, it reinforces Blaise's mandate. By then, he has an excuse to strip them of their positions, limit their authority, or bring the Congregation under a level of control he would never have achieved without first making them prove his point for him."
"So, you're saying he might be goading them into doing something incredibly stupid," Godric said, taking a bite from his toast as his expression darkened. "And not just them, either. The rest of the Congregation too."
Rowena's face tightened as she moved a piece of ravioli around her plate without eating it. "I don't know about the rest of you, but the idea of dangling the Prefects as bait does not sit well with me." Her gaze shifted briefly toward the new table, where Lucian sat rigidly among the other Head Prefects, every bit as aware of the tension as the students watching him. "We just survived one war, and now it feels as though another has been invited through the doors and given a place to sit."
"I've heard that several professors aren't thrilled with the Headmaster's plans either, especially Professor Serfence," Helena said, her attention drifting toward the brooding man seated at the professors' table. He was watching the hall with a tightness in his jaw that made his disapproval difficult to miss, even from a distance. She sighed, her shoulders sinking slightly beneath the weight of it all. "By the stars, sometimes I wish we could do without all this drama and just be students for once."
Salazar chuckled, his smirk returning as though the complaint itself had entertained him. "But my dear, where would be the fun in that?"
Helena shot him a flat glare. "Once again, Slytherin, grow up."
Salazar placed a hand over his heart in feigned offense, though the gleam in his eyes gave him away entirely. "You wound me, Helena. Truly, I may never recover."
Godric glanced between them, then back toward the two tables across the hall, where the Visionaries and the Disciplinary Committee sat beneath the same morning light and looked, to him, less like students at breakfast than opposing armies waiting for the first idiot to draw a blade.
"I spoke with him," Helga said suddenly, and the words cut through the table's conversation sharply enough that every pair of eyes turned toward her. She kept staring at her plate for a moment longer before looking up, her fingers tightening around her fork. "Lucian, I mean. I told him that what he's doing is stupid, that sooner or later it's going to blow up in his face in ways he and his Prefects won't know how to handle."
Her grip tightened further, and the metal bent slightly between her fingers without the slightest effort. "And by Bacchus' Butterbeer, he is so infuriatingly stubborn. I swear, I wanted to grab him by the shoulders and slap some sense into him just so he could understand how reckless he's being."
"Helga," Rowena said softly, placing a hand on her shoulder before the fork could suffer any more damage.
Helena's gaze drifted across the Great Hall toward Lucian, who sat at the table with his posture stiff, his chin lifted, and his eyes locked on Artoria's from across the hall. Neither of them looked willing to be the first to look away.
"I've heard Gabriel speak of Lucian more than once," Helena said, her words lowering as if she were careful not to sound too certain about another family's pain. "Apparently, their father, Matthias, isn't exactly the finest example of parenthood. Though, from what you've told me about yours, Salazar, I suppose Matthias is still at least one step above."
"No offense taken, Helena," Salazar replied, his expression perfectly level as he lifted his cup. "It is difficult to dispute a matter of truth."
"Anyway," Helena continued, giving him a brief look before returning her attention to Lucian, "Matthias has always been especially hard on him. You know the type. Noble family, impossible standards, constant comparisons. No matter what Lucian achieved, his father always seemed quicker to point out where he fell short, especially when Gabriel was standing right there as the shining example."
"Well, that would explain why he's got such a chip on his shoulder, especially when it comes to his older brother," Godric said, putting the rest of his toast into his mouth and chewing with a thoughtful frown. "By Charlemagne's Throne, it feels like father issues are practically a plague in Avalon."
Jeanne covered her mouth as a small laugh escaped her, though the humor did little to ease the tension sitting over the table.
"Yeah, and that's probably why Lucian always looks ready to charge headfirst into anything that gives him a chance to prove himself," Helena said. "It's not just that he has something to prove, either. I think he genuinely believes failure isn't an option, like one mistake is all it takes for everyone to decide he was never good enough in the first place."
Helga's expression softened, and some of the anger in her eyes gave way to reluctant understanding. "That does explain a lot," she said quietly, her gaze dropping back to the bent fork in her hand. "He always has this... I don't know, this weight on him. Like he's carrying more than he should, and if he slows down for even a second or lets anyone see that he's struggling, they'll all think he's weak."
She shook her head, her mouth pressing into a troubled line. "I think that's probably why he has such a hard time dating, too. Not everyone can handle how rigid he gets when he's trying so hard not to fall apart."
Salazar raised an eyebrow, and the grin that formed on his face was slow, wicked, and entirely too pleased with itself. "My word, Helga," he said, leaning slightly toward her. "You speak of him with such detailed insight that one might assume you have the man charted like a map. Tell me, by any chance, do you fancy him?"
Helga's face flushed so quickly that even Godric noticed, and she straightened in her seat as if the question had physically struck her. "Wait, what? No," she blurted, only for the denial to tangle almost immediately beneath her own panic. "I mean, I don't… he's just… Lucian is…"
Helena shot Salazar a sharp glare from across the table. "Lay off, Sal," she snapped. "It's way too early in the morning for that kind of talk."
"Oh, the pain." Salazar placed a hand over his heart with an expression of wounded innocence that convinced absolutely no one. "I merely asked a reasonable question."
"No, you poked her because you saw an opening," Rowena said, her tone mild but pointed as she squeezed Helga's shoulder once before withdrawing her hand. "There's a difference."
Godric glanced at Helga, then toward Lucian's table, where the Chief Prefect still sat locked in silent defiance with Artoria from across the hall. "For what it's worth," he said, "I don't think you're wrong to worry about him. Stubborn people don't usually notice the cliff until they're already falling off it."
Helga let out a quiet breath, her embarrassment fading back into concern as she followed his gaze. "Yeah," she murmured, watching Lucian from across the crowded hall. "That's what scares me."
"For what it's worth," Jeanne said, drawing everyone's attention toward her with a calmness that felt almost out of place against the unease gathering around the table, "I think it's far too early to start drawing conclusions from what could happen or what might happen. Besides, it's hard to steer people away from the proverbial cliff when they've already convinced themselves that walking over the edge is the noble thing to do."
Her amethyst gaze moved across the Great Hall, lingering briefly on the Prefects, then the Visionaries, and finally the professors' table, where every adult seemed to be watching the same tension from a different angle. "Everything happening right now is happening beyond our control. All we can really do is focus on what's in front of us and let the powers at play sort themselves out."
She shook her head softly, her expression troubled but steady. "Worrying ourselves sick over things we can't change is only going to give us anxiety none of us can afford, not when we already have so much on our plates."
"Jeanne's right," Rowena said as she lifted her fork and speared a piece of ravioli. "For now, we keep our heads down and our minds on our classes. Whatever comes after that, we'll deal with it when it reaches us." She looked around at her friends, and there was a quiet warmth in her eyes that eased some of the heaviness at the table. "So long as we remain steadfast and stay together, I'm sure we'll be able to handle it."
For a moment, they all shared a small smile, the kind that did not solve anything but made the weight of the morning a little easier to bear.
****
Then, from the far end of the Great Hall, the massive doors slammed open with a violent burst that thundered across the chamber and struck every conversation silent at once. Heads turned toward the entrance, expressions going slack and eyes widening as the echo rolled beneath the vaulted ceiling. Even the professors looked stunned, though Headmaster Blaise merely stared ahead with a half-lidded, deeply exasperated gaze as his attention settled on a face he had clearly feared would one day grace his presence again.
Godric blinked as a tall woman strode into the hall with the unmistakable bearing of a warrior who had never once asked permission to enter anywhere. Red markings framed her sharp blue eyes, which swept across the gathered students with predatory confidence, while a broad grin carved itself across her face as though she had arrived precisely where she wanted to be and expected the world to make room for her.
Her long, wavy vermilion hair flared outward almost like a lion's mane, catching the morning light with every step, and her robes carried the unmistakable refinement of highborn tailoring, fine fabrics layered over a white tunic, a long dark-blue coat with broad sleeves and a high collar, white slacks, black boots, and a purple sash tied at her waist. Around her shoulders hung a red cape bearing an emblem Godric did not recognize, though from the sudden stillness that seized Helena, the Visionaries, and Lucian himself, plenty of others did.
"Lady Mereoleona?" Helena breathed, the name escaping her before she seemed to realize she had spoken aloud.
"I'm sorry, who?" Helga asked, glancing between Helena and the woman now commanding the entire hall by presence alone. "Is she someone important?"
Helena looked back at her friends in surprise, then seemed to remember that none of them had been raised in Avalon and let out a quiet breath. "Right, sorry. That's Mereoleona Vermillion, a member of House Vermillion, one of the Twelve Imperial Families of Avalon."
Helga's eyes widened slightly. "Wait, so she's not just noble. She's big-deal noble."
"This is rather curious," Salazar said, his expression tightening even though his smirk remained in place. "What would a member of House Vermillion be doing here at this hour? Surely she cannot have lost her way between breakfast and political catastrophe."
"All these years, and nothing's changed," Mereoleona said as she swept her gaze across the tables, her grin sharpening with open amusement. "Students stuffing their faces first thing in the morning, then letting the professors lull them half to death by lunch. No wonder this city looks like it got its ass kicked through a wall and left there."
"Lady Vermillion," Headmaster Blaise said, rising from his chair with measured composure before offering her a formal bow. "I was not aware of your presence in the city, nor of your intention to visit Excalibur this morning."
Every professor at the table merely stared, bewildered by the sudden intrusion, though Professor Serfence watched with far more caution than surprise. Professor Ryan Ashford and Professor Workner exchanged quiet whispers, both of them looking as if they had just witnessed a storm choose a seat at breakfast.
"If I had been informed," Blaise continued, adjusting his glasses as his gaze remained level, "I would most certainly have welcomed you myself. Though I confess, I am thoroughly curious as to why you have chosen to make your entrance quite so dramatically and quite so early in the morning."
"Heya, Professor Blaise," Mereoleona said, lifting a hand in greeting as though she had not just kicked the entire Great Hall into stunned silence. "Still looking pretty spry for a man your age."
A few students made strangled sounds that might have been laughter if fear had not crushed them halfway out.
Mereoleona looked along the professors' table, her grin widening as she took in the unfamiliar faces. "New people, huh? I'd love to catch up, but I'm here on business."
Blaise's expression did not change, though the faint tightening around his eyes suggested that he already disliked where this was going. "And what business, pray tell, would that be?"
She turned from him and addressed the hall instead, her voice cutting through the vast chamber with effortless force. "Now, which one of you brats is Godric Gryffindor?!"
The Great Hall went silent in a way it had not been silent even when the doors slammed open. Then, as if pulled by a single invisible string, every eye turned toward Godric at the far-left edge of the hall. Godric turned completely white.
"The one they call the Lion of Ignis," Mereoleona continued, already striding between the tables with the swagger of someone who considered obstacles a personal insult. "The Hero of Caerleon. The kid who took down that bastard Grim Reaper Burgess. Somebody point him out for me, would you?"
Almost every finger in the Great Hall pointed toward Godric with immediate and shameless betrayal, while he slowly slid lower in his chair as though his bones had decided they wanted no part in the rest of the morning.
Helena snapped toward Godric with wide eyes, her words dropping into an urgent hiss as every gaze in the Great Hall seemed to pin itself to him at once. "Godric, what the heck did you do?"
"I know you have a talent for upsetting nobility," Rowena said with a slow exhale, looking from Mereoleona back to him with the strained patience of someone trying very hard not to panic on his behalf. "But upsetting a member of one of the Twelve Imperial Families? I thought even you would know better than that."
"Who, me?!" Godric hissed back, his hands lifting in frantic protest as his face remained several shades paler than usual. "I didn't do anything. I don't even know what I did. I don't know who the Vermillions are, and I've never met that woman in my life!"
Mereoleona's toothy grin sharpened when she spotted him. "There you are."
Godric swallowed hard as his friends stared at him in varying degrees of horror, sympathy, and poorly concealed panic.
Helga leaned slightly away from him as Mereoleona continued her approach, her amber eyes darting between Godric and the towering noblewoman cutting through the hall like a wildfire with legs. "Well, whatever you didn't do, she sure looks like she thinks you did it."
Godric scowled. "That is not helping, Helga."
"Sorry, Godric, I'm not trying to help," Helga whispered, tight with horrified fascination. "I'm trying to figure out whether we should run, duck, or pretend we don't know you."
Rowena shot her a look. "Helga."
"What?" Helga bobbed her shoulders. "I'm just saying, she kicked open the Great Hall doors and asked for him by name. That's usually not how good news walks into a room."
"See, word got out that you've been using my family's magic," Mereoleona said as she kept walking. "Now, we Vermillions don't usually care about that. We put our spells out there for anyone with the guts and discipline to learn them. We're not stuck-up bastards like some of the other Entitled families who act like every flame they spark was handed down personally by the Gods."
Her gaze narrowed, and the air around her seemed to warm with the edge of her attention. "But Calidus was always meant for bare knuckle. No one's ever made it work properly through a blade. So, imagine my surprise when I heard some dumb brat managed to tweak it for a sword."
Godric's mouth had gone dry, and he could feel every pair of eyes in the hall pressing against him as if the entire school had become one enormous witness to his execution.
"And before you get too proud of yourself, you're not the first one to try," Mereoleona added, her grin turning almost feral as she drew nearer to their table. "Plenty of people tried before you, and every last one of them failed, some a hell of a lot worse than others. But it sounds like you succeeded, and that got me and my brothers real curious."
Mereoleona stopped close enough that Godric had no choice but to look up at her, the shadow of her cape falling across the edge of the table while her sharp blue eyes swept over him with open, unapologetic appraisal.
"Huh," she said, her smirk widening as if whatever she saw amused her more than disappointed her. "Funny, everyone talks about you like you're the biggest badass this side of Avalon, but looking at you now, you're a hell of a lot shorter than I imagined."
Godric stared at her, still pale, while Salazar's smirk slowly returned beside him with the cruel delight of someone watching fate personally knock on his friend's door.
"Well," Salazar murmured, lifting his cup with elegant satisfaction, "breakfast has become considerably more interesting."
"G-Greetings, sir," Godric blurted before his mind caught up with his mouth, and he immediately winced as sweat trailed down the side of his face. "I mean, madam. Madam. Sorry." He forced out a nervous chuckle that sounded pathetic even to him, then lifted one hand in a stiff little wave. "Fine weather we're having, huh?"
Helena covered her face with one hand and shook her head as if she wanted to disappear beneath the table on his behalf, while Rowena stared at him with the flat, exhausted disappointment of someone watching a friend dig his own grave with impressive speed. Jeanne looked almost as nervous as Godric did, though whether she feared for him or for everyone seated near him was difficult to tell. Mereoleona merely raised an eyebrow, her grin lingering as though she had just found him more entertaining than she expected.
Godric swallowed hard, drew in a breath, and forced himself to meet her eyes even though every instinct he had told him to keep sliding lower in his chair until the floor took pity on him.
"Look, it's true," he said. "I did use your family's magic. I was in… a really bad place back then. Things happened, and I lost the person who meant the world to me, and after that I just let the grief turn into anger because anger was easier to carry."
His gaze dropped for a moment, shame flickering across his face before he made himself look back up at her. "I started looking for magic, powerful magic, the kind I had no business learning, much less trying to wield, and that's when I found your family's Imperial Artes. It took me weeks, maybe months, and every time I failed, I went back and tried again because I didn't know what else to do with all that hurt."
He flexed his fingers slightly, as if remembering the pain beneath his skin. "Even now, what I've got is barely more than the concept of a spell, and I can't hold it for long without singeing the skin off my fingers."
Then he bowed his head, the movement stiff but sincere. "Please, Lady Mereoleona, if I've offended you or your family, I'm sorry. I didn't mean any disrespect."
Mereoleona straightened, and for one uneasy second, the whole Great Hall seemed to hold its breath around them. Then she scowled and scoffed as if his apology had personally insulted her. "God, if there's one thing I hate seeing, it's groveling, especially when it's that damn sincere," she said, rolling one shoulder as her grin returned with a dangerous edge. "Pack it in, kid. I didn't come all this way to hear some shitty apology."
Without warning, she drew her right arm back, and her fingers curled into a fist. Around the table and across the hall, every eye widened as the air itself seemed to tighten. Headmaster Blaise's expression sharpened at the professors' table, his hand lowering slightly as though he were already deciding whether to intervene.
"I came here to see what you've got!" Mereoleona roared, and her fist ignited like a falling meteor, fire roaring around her knuckles in a violent spiral. "Vermillion Imperial Artes. Calidus Brachium!"
Godric's eyes widened as the flaming fist came down toward his chair, and in the same instant, Rowena, Salazar, and Helena ripped out their wands with practiced urgency.
"Protego!" they cried together, and the barrier snapped into place just as the blow struck, swallowing the first impact before the explosion ripped through the table and sent shattered wood, cracked stone, silverware, and what remained of breakfast scattering in every direction.
Serfence, Ryan, and Workner jumped to their feet at once, but they stopped when Headmaster Blaise lifted an arm, his expression tight behind his glasses. Professor Duchannes merely sighed and adjusted her spectacles with the weary composure of someone who had accepted that this was, regrettably, how the morning would proceed. Professor Rasputin, Lagduf, and Lotho wore expressions of grim resignation, while Professor Kyar smirked from her seat as though the entire disaster had just made her breakfast considerably more enjoyable.
From the smoke and splintered ruin, Godric leapt backward into the air with the scabbard of his sword clutched in one hand. He landed on his feet several paces away, boots skidding slightly across the stone, his eyes glowing as golden circuits traced down his body in bright, pulsing lines that flashed like lightning beneath his skin. His breathing steadied, his fear burned away beneath focus, and when he raised his gaze toward Mereoleona, there was no more nervous boy sitting at breakfast.
Mereoleona's laugh tore through the noise as she stepped out of the smoke with her grin sharper than ever. "So that's Vis Vitalis," she said, looking him over with open approval. "Heard that was your little trump card."
Her gaze shifted briefly to the wreckage of the table, now reduced to splintered wood and ruined food, before she glanced at Godric's friends, who were staring at her with varying degrees of panic, outrage, and disbelief. "Sorry about the table," she said, sounding only slightly apologetic. "I'll make it up to you."
Then her attention snapped back to Godric, and her fists slammed together hard enough to send another pulse of heat rolling across the hall. Fire wrapped around both hands, burning so fiercely that Helga noticed the eggs left on nearby plates beginning to fry, the bacon bubbling in its own grease, and the edges of untouched toast blackening where they sat.
"Like I said, I don't want your damned apologies." Her grin widened, fierce and delighted. "Calidus ain't for the faint of heart, kid. You wanna wield it, you gotta earn it."
Godric straightened, then swung the scabbard across his torso and clipped the belt into place with a sharp snap. His crimson eyes locked onto the woman before him, fear replaced now by the dangerous steadiness that had carried him through blood, fire, and every bastard who had ever tried to break him.
"As I told the knave who once stood at the top of the Clock Tower," he said, reaching over his shoulder as his fingers wrapped around the golden hilt of his sword, "and as I told every last whoreson in the Congregation who wanted a piece of me, sharpen your blades and tighten your fists."
He drew the sword in one clean motion, the blade leaving its sheath with a sharp trill like a reaper's scythe passing through the air, then brought it forward as light gathered along the steel. "Step up to the sands," Godric said, settling into his stance, "and bring it!"
Mereoleona's face lit with savage delight. "Now that's more like it!"
She exploded forward in a burst of fire, closing the distance between them with terrifying speed as lightning danced across Godric's body. The moment they collided, steel met fist, flame and light crashing together in a violent bloom that blasted through the Great Hall and tore between the tables in a wave of heat and pressure. Students stumbled from their seats, goblets toppled, plates clattered, and the surge of power screamed through the chamber before racing out through the open entrance, followed a heartbeat later by a shriek of panic from somewhere in the corridor beyond.
****
Salazar straightened as the barrier dissolved around them in a fading shimmer of light, leaving behind the sharp smell of scorched wood, spilled tea, and breakfast that had been violently promoted to debris. He let out a tight breath, slipped his wand back into his robe, and looked toward the smoke with the expression of a man who was both annoyed and entirely unsurprised.
"In all honesty, if I had a plata for every time some unhinged maniac attempted to kill Godric without warning, I would have two platas," he said, shaking his head. "Which is not a fortune, certainly, but it is deeply concerning that it has happened twice."
"I'll say," Helena muttered as she put her wand away, her eyes still fixed on the ruined table and the trail of heat Mereoleona had left behind. "First his little run-in with Cú, and now the eldest of House Vermillion. At this point, I'm starting to think trouble doesn't find Godric so much as it gets formally invited to breakfast."
"They're not going to kill each other, are they?" Jeanne asked.
Helga brushed crumbs and splinters off the front of her uniform. "I don't think so," she said after a moment. "Call it a gut feeling, but she's not swinging like she wants him dead. She's testing him." Her expression stilled. "Still, she's crazy strong. I don't think even I could take her in a fistfight."
Rowena massaged her temple, staring at the devastation where their breakfast had once been. "The more time I spend with the lot of you, the more convinced I become that I should have chosen better friends," she said, gesturing helplessly toward the shattered table and the smoking floor. "First, we get pulled into the Congregation, then a war, and now this. What exactly comes next?"
"Oh, I can think of several devious and deplorable possibilities we can all explore," Salazar said, his smirk returning with immediate and entirely inappropriate enthusiasm.
Rowena and Helena turned on him at the same time.
"Oh, grow up, Slytherin!" they snapped together.
****
Headmaster Blaise exhaled heavily as the blast of heat faded through the Great Hall, and with the weary composure of a man who had witnessed far too many gifted lunatics mature into even more gifted lunatics, he removed his glasses and began wiping the lenses with the hem of his robe.
"Honestly," he said, his gaze lingering on the smoke and scattered wreckage where a student breakfast had so recently existed, "that girl is every bit the bonfire she has always been, even when she and her brother were students."
He slipped his glasses back into place and turned toward Professor Serfence. "Edward, would you be so kind as to ensure that Lady Vermillion and young Gryffindor do not level the castle grounds, or worse, the rest of Caerleon? It would be most unfortunate, not to mention terribly awkward, to have another conversation with Mayor Ramonda should she wake to find her beloved city reduced to a charred mess."
Serfence rose from his chair with immediate precision, his expression calm but his eyes already tracking the path Godric and Mereoleona had carved through the hall. "At once, Headmaster."
With a slight tilt of his head, he gestured for Ryan and Workner to follow, and both men pushed back from the table without hesitation. Ryan made it three steps before doubling back, snatching a piece of toast from his plate, and then falling into step behind them as if no emergency, no matter how explosive, was worth facing on an empty stomach.
Professor Duchannes watched the three men depart and gave a soft chuckle, adjusting her glasses as she looked toward the lingering smoke with a faint smile of recollection. "It would seem she has grown far stronger since the last time she set foot in these halls. I do recall that she and her brother were quite the troublemakers in their day, although their duel for the Ignis Visionary chair was, admittedly, a sight to behold."
"Alas, Agatha," Blaise said, tucking his hands behind his back as the corner of his mouth lifted with old amusement, "the only things that burn brighter than the fires of a Vermillion are their tempers and their grit. I must confess, in its own destructive fashion, it is rather endearing."
"Endearing, you say?" Duchannes asked, one eyebrow lifting as she regarded him over the rim of her spectacles.
"Indeed," Blaise replied without shame. "For once upon a time, I too was quite the raging flame." He chuckled softly. "One does not earn the title Flame of the West through temperance, restraint, and a mild appreciation for proper conduct."
Duchannes looked toward the ruined section of the Great Hall, then back to him. "That explains a great deal more than you likely intended it to."
Blaise gave her a pleasant smile before lowering himself back into his chair and reclaiming his spoon with tragic dignity. "Perhaps it does." He glanced down at his bowl, and his expression fell with visible disappointment. "What is truly unfortunate, however, is not the interruption, nor the damage, nor even the likelihood that I shall have to explain this to the authorities before noon. It is the fact that my breakfast has now gone cold."
He stirred the pottage once, sighed with great solemnity, and lifted the spoon anyway. "A tragedy indeed."
****
The massive doors leading into the Excalibur courtyard exploded outward in a violent burst of dark oak, twisted steel hinges, and torn brass fittings, scattering debris across the loose stones that surrounded the fountain at the center of the yard. Beyond the castle grounds, the city of Caerleon stretched far and wide beneath the morning sky, its towers, rooftops, bridges, and distant walls glimmering in the pale light as though the entire Crossroads City had paused to witness the storm breaking loose from the academy. Godric and Mereoleona burst from the rolling cloud of smoke almost at the same time, and before Godric had fully found his footing, she was already lunging toward him with a grin carved across her face and fire coiling around her fist.
Godric's expression hardened, his jaw tightening as he brought his sword up just in time for her fist to crash against the blade with a deafening clang. The force tore through him from his hands to his shoulders, and his boots dug hard into the loose stones beneath him as the courtyard shuddered from the impact. Before he could shift his weight or find a proper angle, Mereoleona was already upon him again, delivering a barrage of punches that came so quickly they blurred through the air like streaks of flame. He deflected one after another, his sword ringing with every strike, the shock creeping up his arms until his bones felt as though they were being hammered from the inside.
Godric cried out as he lifted his blade and slashed forward, but Mereoleona had already vanished from the line of the attack, moving with a speed that made the empty space before him feel like a mockery.
He snapped around on instinct, swinging his sword across his body just as her fist came down again, and steel met flame with another brutal clash that sent sparks scattering across the courtyard stones. She was fast, faster than anyone he had ever faced, perhaps even faster than Burgess had been in that damned armor of his, except Mereoleona had no enchanted machine carrying her weight or hiding her weakness. This was raw power, honed skill, and the terrifying confidence of someone who had spent her entire life turning battle into instinct.
"What's the matter, kid?" Mereoleona shouted, laughing as she drove him back beneath another storm of flaming fists. "Having trouble keeping up? I'm not even breaking a sweat!"
She slipped inside his guard with frightening ease, her fist curling as she drove a punch toward his gut. Godric brought his blade down and caught the blow against the flat of the steel, but the force still sent him sliding backward, his boots carving a jagged trail through the stones as heat washed over his face and rattled the breath from his lungs.
He looked up at her through gritted teeth, golden circuits burning brighter beneath his skin as his crimson eyes sharpened with defiance. "Vis Vitalis, Secundus!"
The ground beneath him cracked as he burst forward in a surge of light, his body moving with sudden, explosive speed as he brought his sword around and thrust the blade straight toward Mereoleona. She spread her arms, planted herself with a delighted grin, and slapped her hands together around the steel, stopping the thrust dead between her palms as the force of Godric's charge drove them both backward. Her boots dragged across the dirt and loose stone, grooves tearing beneath her heels, yet her smile only grew wider, wilder, and far more pleased.
"That all you got?" she barked, releasing the blade before twisting into him again.
Godric answered with another swing, and from there the fight broke into a furious exchange of blade and fist, steel and fire moving so quickly that the watching students could barely follow the shape of it. His sword cut bright arcs through the courtyard while her fists crashed against the blade, the air filling with the metallic scream of repeated impacts and the deep, concussive thuds of magic colliding with magic. Stones burst apart beneath their feet, sharp slashes carved deep into the ground around them, and the fountain at the center of the courtyard began to crack under the pressure of their clash, its sculpted edges breaking away piece by piece as water spilled across the rubble and flashed into steam beneath the heat of Mereoleona's flames.
Godric pushed harder, every breath dragging fire into his lungs as the golden circuits along his body pulsed brighter, but Mereoleona matched him with savage ease, laughing through every strike as though the battle had finally given her something worth waking up for. Each time he found an opening, she crushed it. Each time she drove him back, he forced himself forward again, and the courtyard around them became a storm of shattered stone, burning air, and screaming steel while the city of Caerleon gleamed beyond the castle walls, unaware that one of its newest heroes was being tested beneath the shadow of Excalibur by a woman who fought like a living wildfire.
"Come on, Gryffindor, enough!" Mereoleona cried as she drove him back across the courtyard, her fists igniting until fire rolled up her arms in hungry coils. "Stop swinging that sword like you're trying to survive me and show me what I came here to see." She stepped in with a vicious grin, her next punch crashing against his guard with enough force to send him skidding over the stones. "Show me what you made out of our magic!"
Godric caught himself before his heel struck the broken edge of the fountain, breath burning in his lungs as he spun the sword once through his hand and shifted into a lower stance. The golden circuits across his body flared brighter, pulsing beneath his skin as he drew the blade back and forced the heat gathering in his chest down through his arm. "Calidus Gladius…"
Fire bloomed along the sword in a brilliant red glow, licking across the steel in bright, violent tongues that snapped and curled around the edge. Mereoleona's smirk sharpened the moment she saw it, not with anger or offense, but with the unmistakable delight of someone finally glimpsing the answer to a question she had chased all the way to Excalibur.
"Infernus!" Godric shouted as he swung the blade in a wide arc, unleashing a burst of flame that tore across the courtyard toward her.
Mereoleona swung one arm through the attack and scattered the flames with a simple wave of her hand, dispersing them into sparks and burning ribbons that vanished against the morning air. "That's it?" she barked, laughter spilling out of her as she looked past the dying embers toward him. "That's freaking it? What a—"
Her words cut off as Godric vanished from the ground in front of her.
A sharp cry from above drew her gaze upward, and there he was, descending through the smoke and sunlight with his sword lifted high over his head. "Calidus Gladius," he roared, and the flames around the blade erupted brighter, rising into a pillar of fire that turned the steel into a burning line against the sky. "Immanis Flamma!"
Mereoleona's grin widened.
She raised one arm as the blade came down, and the collision swallowed the entire courtyard in an explosion of fire, heat, and roaring pressure. Flames surged outward in every direction, reducing the rose bushes to cinders, blackening the stones, cracking the fountain, and hurling smoke and steam across the grounds in a blistering wave. The water in the fountain evaporated almost instantly, leaving behind only charred stone and broken marble, and when the blaze finally dispersed, the courtyard stood scorched and silent beneath a drifting veil of ash.
Godric stood amid the ruin, breathing hard, his shoulders rising and falling as sweat ran down his face and steam curled from the edge of his blade. He thought, for one brief and foolish moment, that the strike might have done enough, but when he looked through the smoke and saw Mereoleona still standing before him, his eyes widened.
She chuckled first, low and rough, before throwing her head back and erupting into full, booming laughter. One hand was wrapped around his blade, fingers closed against the burning steel as though it were nothing more than a branch she had caught in passing. The flames had singed the edges of her cloak and burned away parts of the fabric, revealing the bandages wrapped tight beneath her tunic, but she looked less wounded than thrilled.
"Not bad," Mereoleona said, her grin fierce as she looked from the blade to his face. "Not bad at all. Rough as hell around the edges, and you're leaking power like a busted furnace, but you've got something real going here."
Her grip tightened around the sword.
"But now," she said as fire began to rise from her body, "let me show you what Calidus looks like when it stops pretending to be gentle."
Flames erupted around them in a widening ring, crawling over the broken stones and rising from the cracks in the courtyard as the air grew so hot and dry that Godric coughed, his throat searing with every breath. Heat bent the space between them, turning Mereoleona's figure into a wavering silhouette of muscle, flame, and savage excitement as her smirk sharpened beneath the glow.
"Vermillion Imperial Artes," she said, lifting her burning fist as the fire climbed higher and brighter around her. "Mana Zone, Calidus Brachium." The flames surged, roaring up like the mouth of an open furnace. "Purgatorium"
Godric's gaze snapped to the courtyard around them as the heat continued to rise, and for the first time since the fight had begun, a cold thread of alarm cut through the fire in his blood. The stone beneath Mereoleona's feet had started to soften and melt, windows along the castle walls cracked under the pressure, glass sagging into molten streaks while nearby iron fixtures warped and dripped like black slag. Even the air had turned painfully dry, as if every trace of moisture had been burned out of the world around them. Godric immediately leapt back, putting several feet between himself and the inferno gathering around her as he landed hard on the broken courtyard stones.
Mereoleona's smirk widened as she clenched her fist, flame curling tighter around her arm with each breath she took. "Let's see if your Vis Vitalis can endure this," she said, shifting into a stance as the heat around her condensed into something far more focused and far more dangerous. "Mana Zone, Calidus Brachium... Coniectus!"
Her fists began to move at blinding speed, each strike thrown so quickly that it looked as though a thousand burning arms had materialized around her out of thin air. Godric caught sight of dozens of blazing points surrounding him in a wide dome, each one burning like a miniature star suspended in the air, and without warning, they all fired at once. Jets of concentrated flame tore toward him from every direction, converging on him with enough heat to turn the courtyard stones beneath his boots red.
Godric drew in a breath, exhaled slowly, and tightened both hands around the hilt of his sword as the golden circuits across his body burned brighter. Lightning crawled over his skin in thin, violent threads, his crimson eyes sharpening as the world narrowed to flame, steel, and the rhythm of his own heartbeat. "Vis Vitalis, Tertius... Maxima!"
The jets of fire descended, and Godric moved.
His blade became a blur, cutting through the air with such speed and pressure that each swing seemed to displace the space around it. Flames split apart before they could reach him, severed by the edge of his sword and scattered into harmless bursts of embers that vanished against the force of his movements. Mereoleona's smirk faltered for only a moment, surprise flashing across her face before delight twisted it wider than before.
"Interesting," she muttered, her fists moving even faster as more blazing stars erupted into being around him. "Now that's interesting!"
The next wave came harder, faster, and hotter, but Godric met every blast with the same impossible precision. His sword moved so quickly it nearly vanished from sight, nothing visible but the bright arcs left behind as he carved through flame after flame. He spun into the final movement, twisted his weight through his hips, and slashed across the air with enough force to tear through the dome itself. The remaining stars burst apart and dissipated, leaving the courtyard trembling beneath the aftershock.
The ground shattered under Godric's boots as he planted himself, fissures spiderwebbing through the stone while he lifted his blade over his shoulder. Heat still crawled over his arms, his lungs burned with every breath, and the strain of Vis Vitalis pulled at his muscles like hooks, but he refused to let his stance break. "Calidus Gladius..."
Fire ignited along his sword again, brighter and more controlled than before, and with a single step forward, he launched himself in a burst of jetfire. "Sol Adustus!"
Mereoleona lowered into her own stance, one fist drawn back as flames erupted around it in a brilliant, searing blaze. Her eyes shone with wild approval as Godric came for her, and her grin looked almost proud. "Come on!" she roared. "Come at me with everything you've got!"
A cry tore from both their throats as they rushed toward each other, flame and light gathering for a collision that would have torn the courtyard apart completely, when a voice cracked through the destruction with sharp authority.
"Arresto Momentum!"
The spell caught Godric first, locking around his body like invisible chains. His eyes widened as his momentum slowed to a crawl, the fire along his blade flickering, then thinning, before it burned out completely. Every movement dragged through the air as though the world had turned thick around him, and the full force of his attack dissolved before it could reach its target.
Mereoleona scoffed and turned her glare toward the man in black robes standing at the edge of the courtyard, his wand raised and glowing blue at the tip. "What the hell, Serfence? Stay out of this."
"I am afraid I cannot do that, Lady Vermillion," Serfence replied, calm and controlled as he kept his wand trained on both of them. "Now extinguish your flames and cease your destruction before this little demonstration becomes a municipal disaster."
Mereoleona's grin returned, sharper than before. "Make me," she said. "You might be the great Executioner of the Clock Tower, but not even you can take me alone."
The trill of a blade and the sharp click of something unfamiliar sounded beside her almost at the same time. Mereoleona's blue eyes shifted sideways as the hooked point of a pickaxe-scythe stopped an inch from her throat, while something jet black with a polished finish leveled directly at her head from the other side. Professor Workner stood with his weapon drawn and his gaze hard behind his glasses, while Professor Ashford flanked her with his gun aimed squarely at her temple.
"Forgive us for our impudence, Lady Vermillion," Workner said, adjusting his glasses without lowering the weapon at her throat. "But even we know how futile it would be to restrain you with a Freezing Charm."
"You ain't getting polite words from me, lady. Don't give a shit if you're royalty. Show up at my damned house unannounced and shit in my cereal? Back home, that's cardinal sin," Ryan said, rough and steady as his finger rested ready along the trigger. "And whatever you're thinking about doing next, I'd rethink it. You're fast, no question there, but I've got a whole lot of friends in this little thing that can move a hell of a lot faster than you."
"Lady Vermillion," Serfence said, his tone softening as he kept his wand raised, though the command in his posture did not loosen. "Mereoleona. I implore you, stand down."
His dark eyes swept across the courtyard, taking in the shattered stones, the charred walls, the melted glass hanging in warped streaks from the windows, and the fountain that had been reduced to blackened ruin. "You have done quite enough for one day."
With a controlled motion of his wand, the blue light around Godric dissipated, releasing him from the Arresto Momentum spell and dropping him back to his feet. Godric caught himself with a slight stumble, breathing hard as the last traces of fire guttered from his blade.
Mereoleona's expression tightened, and for one dangerous moment, it looked as though she might strike anyway. The heat around her flared once, bright and furious, before she drew in a slow breath and let it out through her nose. The flames around her fists faded, shrinking from roaring infernos to curling embers before disappearing entirely. Then, she straightened and gave Serfence a bow that was far too casual to be properly apologetic.
"Sorry," she said. "Got carried away. Like I said, I didn't come here to start shit."
Her gaze shifted back to Godric, and the smirk returned as quickly as the fire had vanished. "I came here to see whether the kid they call the Lion of Ignis was worth all the hype, and hell, you didn't disappoint."
Workner and Ryan exchanged a brief look with Serfence, and when the black-robed professor gave a small nod, both men stepped back and lowered their weapons. Workner drew the hooked point of his pickaxe-scythe away from Mereoleona's throat, while Ryan eased the barrel of his gun down with visible reluctance. Seeing his professors stand down, Godric slid his sword back into the scabbard across his back, though his eyes remained fixed warily on the Vermillion noblewoman.
"That being said," Mereoleona continued, stepping toward him as if nothing unusual had happened Before Godric could react, she snatched him up by the back of his uniform and heaved him over her shoulder as easily as if he were a sack of grain. "I'm taking him."
His expression went completely blank, one arm dangling while his brain tried and failed to catch up with what had just happened.
"Eh?"
Workner's expression slackened. Ryan's did the same. Serfence, however, merely stared with the weary resignation of a man who had been half-expecting this exact disaster and had hoped, foolishly, that the universe might show restraint.
"My family's gonna want to meet him," Mereoleona said, jerking a thumb over her shoulder as she started walking toward the main courtyard. "Don't worry, I'll have him back in a day… maybe two." She glanced back at the ruined courtyard and waved vaguely at the destruction with one finger. "Oh, and tell the old man I'm real sorry about all this. Send me the bill. Till then, see ya."
"Wait, what?" Godric cried as he finally understood that he was, in fact, being carried away. "Where the hell are you taking me? I can't just leave. I have classes."
"Classes, shmasses," Mereoleona said without slowing down. "Back when I was your age, I missed half of mine, and look how I turned out."
"Put me down," Godric snapped, kicking once in pure frustration. "This is kidnapping!"
Mereoleona barked a laugh. "Relax, kid. If I was kidnapping you, I wouldn't tell your professors where I'm taking you."
"That doesn't make it any better!"
Workner and Ryan could only stare as Mereoleona carried him away toward the main courtyard, where an automobile was already waiting with the emblem of House Vermillion etched proudly on its side.
Ryan lifted one hand and pointed after them, his mouth tightening as Godric's protests grew louder. "Um, shall we, you know... do something about that?"
Workner gave a nervous smile, the kind worn by a man very aware of how close he had come to becoming part of the courtyard rubble. "I'm sorry, but I was rather putting on a brave face. If Lady Vermillion had actually wished to continue fighting, I would not have stood much of a chance."
"Neither would any of us," Serfence said as he walked up beside his colleagues, his gaze following Mereoleona and her unwilling passenger. He sighed, though his expression remained grave. "Believe it or not, the Vermillions are renowned for their combat prowess. Their flame magic is unparalleled, even among the Imperial Families. I daresay that, even with the three of us, we would have barely escaped by the skin of our teeth."
His eyes shifted toward the devastation spread across the courtyard, where stone still smoked and the fountain hissed beneath the last curls of steam. "And Mereoleona Vermillion is the eldest of her siblings, as well as the most powerful. This was her holding back."
Ryan's expression went slack as he looked from Serfence to the ruined fountain, then back again. "Hang on. Back up." He pointed toward the destruction. "This is her with one arm tied behind her back? What happens if she actually goes all out?"
"Then the only person in this entire city capable of quelling the fires of a Vermillion would be the Lord of Ashes himself, Headmaster Blaise," Serfence replied. "He is the only person alive whom the Vermillions are genuinely afraid of."
Workner's expression dimmed as he stared at the scorched courtyard. "They do not call him the Flame of the West in jest. We saw what he was capable of during the Siege, and I sincerely doubt that was him at full strength."
Ryan drew in a deep breath and let it out slowly, his eyes following the automobile as Mereoleona opened the door and tossed Godric inside despite his continued protests. "Shit," he muttered. "The longer I stay in this place, the more I realize I'm surrounded by monsters. Man, Voldy would've absolutely shit bricks if he'd ever shown his ass here."
Workner blinked, one eyebrow lifting. "Voldy?"
Ryan waved a hand as if brushing away the name. "Some limp-dicked, noseless, mundane-hating asshat back where I'm from who thought he was hot shit. Story for another time." He rolled his neck, then turned toward the castle entrance as the Vermillion automobile came to life and began pulling out of the main courtyard. "Now, I don't know about you guys, but I'm still starving, and classes are about to start. I ain't teaching all day on an empty stomach."
"And I suppose Headmaster Blaise should be informed that a member of the nobility has decided to abscond with one of our students," Workner said with a faint chuckle as he turned to follow Ryan.
Serfence watched the automobile roll away, Godric's outrage still faintly audible from inside before the distance swallowed it. He pinched the bridge of his nose and let out a long, exasperated breath. "So, it would seem."
Then, with the resigned dignity of a man already anticipating the paperwork, he turned and followed his colleagues back toward the castle.