The fog hadn't lifted yet when Lita stepped outside.
She liked it this way — the garden in the early morning, before the house woke up, before the day had any demands. Just the cool air, the soft grey light, and the quiet rhythm of her own breathing as she moved through her forms. Her muscles were still a little stiff from yesterday, but she worked through it, letting the magic settle into her movements the way Flare had been teaching her.
After a while she stopped, sat down on the stone bench, and let herself just be for a moment. The fog drifted slowly. Somewhere in the mansion behind her, nothing stirred yet.
"Lita Valliere."
She was on her feet before she'd consciously decided to move.
The voice had come from nearby — soft, almost whispered, but somehow clear despite the fog. A woman stood a few feet away, dressed in dark clothes, her face hidden behind a black veil. She hadn't made a sound getting there. Lita hadn't sensed her at all.
She didn't reach for her hilt. Not yet. Something about the woman's stillness kept her from it.
"Lita," the woman said again. "It's me."
"...I don't know who you are," Lita said carefully.
The woman tilted her head slightly, something like amusement in the small movement. "I know. But I've been watching you for some time." She stepped a little closer, unhurried. "You're up early. Training alone?"
"Preparing for Ardent Peak," Lita said, watching her. "I like the mornings."
"Mm." The woman seemed to consider that. "Dedicated. As expected from a Valliere." A pause, and then her tone shifted — quieter, more deliberate. "But there's more to you than dedication, isn't there? You've felt it. That pull. Like you're meant for something you haven't been told about yet."
Lita's eyes narrowed slightly. "What do you mean?"
"Only that the power in you is greater than what you've been shown." She didn't press closer, didn't reach out — just held Lita's gaze through the dark veil. "Ardent Peak is one step. But it isn't the whole road, Lita. Not for someone like you."
"Who are you, really?"
The woman opened her mouth to answer — and then a door creaked somewhere in the mansion. Light footsteps on stone. Flare, early riser that she was.
The veiled woman seemed to hear it too. Her posture shifted almost imperceptibly, and something that might have been a smile crossed whatever expression the veil hid. "We'll speak again soon," she said, already stepping back into the fog. A small wave. And then she was gone, as quietly as she'd appeared.
A few seconds later, the garden door swung open and Flare emerged, still rubbing sleep from her eyes. "Lita? You're out here already?"
"Just training," Lita said.
Flare stretched, yawning. "Come on. Breakfast first."
Lita followed her inside, keeping her expression easy. But her mind was already turning the encounter over and over, looking for edges she could understand.
She knew my name. She knew what I've been feeling. She wasn't afraid of me.
For now, she kept it to herself.
It didn't stay that way for long.
Breakfast was quiet, the morning light falling soft through the dining room windows. Lita's mother sat across from her with tea and documents, as she nearly always did. Flare was at the sideboard. Everything ordinary.
Then Lita, almost without deciding to, set down her fork. "There was a veiled lady in the garden this morning," she said. "We talked for a bit."
The room changed.
It was subtle — her mother's hand paused on her teacup, just briefly, before setting it down with careful control. Flare's posture stiffened. The two of them exchanged a look across the table that lasted less than a second and said everything.
"A veiled lady," her mother repeated, voice even.
"She knew my name," Lita added. "She was strange, but she didn't feel dangerous."
Flare didn't say anything. She gave Lita's mother a small, deliberate nod — the kind that meant I understand and this changes things at the same time.
The rest of breakfast passed normally on the surface. But Lita noticed the way Flare didn't move more than a few feet from her for the rest of the morning.
The woman came back the next day.
Same fog, same bench, same hour. Lita had half-expected it. She turned when she heard the footsteps and found the veiled woman standing at the garden's edge, exactly as before.
"You came back," Lita said.
"I said I would." The woman settled into a relaxed stance, no rush to her. "Training again?"
"Always." Lita looked at her steadily. "You asked about my mother yesterday. Whether she talks about Ardent Peak."
The woman looked faintly pleased that she'd remembered. "Does she?"
"Not really. She mentions it sometimes, but never much." Lita paused. "You said there was a lot about her past I haven't learned yet."
"There is," the woman said simply. "But those aren't my stories to tell. You'll find them in time, when the people involved decide you're ready." Her voice was thoughtful, not unkind. "What I can tell you is that the path you're on is bigger than one academy, one year, one—"
She stopped mid-sentence.
Lita barely had time to register the movement before Flare was there — between Lita and the veiled woman in a single fluid motion, one arm pulling Lita back, the other already extended with a dagger leveled at the woman's throat.
"Leave." Flare's voice was quiet and absolutely final. "Now. Or I will kill you where you stand."
The veiled woman didn't flinch. She looked at Flare with what seemed like genuine interest, her head tilting slightly. "You have real spirit," she said, unhurried. "I can see why she keeps you close."
Then pain exploded at the back of Flare's neck.
It happened fast. Another figure — a second veiled woman, dressed as a maid, having appeared from nowhere — had driven a dagger into the side of Flare's neck. Not deep enough to kill. Exactly deep enough to mean she could.
Flare sucked in a sharp breath, her dagger hand dropping slightly. She didn't fall. Her eyes burned.
"Lay down your weapon," the veiled maid said, her voice flat and professional.
Lita stood completely still, her heart slamming in her chest.
The first woman watched the whole thing with quiet composure. Then she glanced toward the small garden table nearby — the one the servants sometimes set for morning tea — and back at Lita.
"How about we sit down," she said pleasantly. "We can have tea and wait for your mother to join us. No need to make this unpleasant."