Midnight. I was sitting on my bed waiting to see if Mable had taken the dare seriously.
She had. I knew she had. I'd told her plainly that if she didn't come to me, I'd go to her wing. That wasn't a threat. It was information. And Mable was someone who processed information carefully and then acted on it.
The knock came gentle and precise. I opened the door.
She had braided her locs back and was wearing a short light dress that made no concessions to the cold of the campus night, which was either confidence or a statement or both. She stood in my doorway with the quiet deliberateness of someone who had thought it through on the way here and arrived at a decision.
She looked at me. I looked at her. I stepped back and opened the door wider. She came in. I closed it behind her.
She stood in the middle of the room with the stillness of someone waiting to see what kind of host I was going to be.
"Here I am," she said. Like she was presenting evidence.
"Thought you didn't have impulses," I said, gesturing toward the bed. "Sit. You didn't walk all the way here to stand in the middle of my room and leave."
She sat on the edge of the bed. I sat on the table near the wall, close enough for conversation, far enough to not look desperate. The hole behind me was covered. Had been since the previous night.
"Why did you really come?" I asked, looking directly at her.
She smiled. Different from the library. More open. Less armor.
"To prove you wrong," she said. "You said you knew everything about me. You don't."
I almost let it go. Almost.
"That's not the only reason," I said, because in my extremely limited but rapidly expanding experience, no girl walked into a boy's room at midnight to make a philosophical point.
She tilted her head. "Then why did you open the door?"
[LEWD LEVELING SYSTEM]
[She's already where you need her. Use less words.]
"Because I heard a knock," I said.
[Wrong direction. You had her. Recover when the moment comes back.]
I know, I thought. I panicked.
Mable was quiet for a moment. Then something shifted in her expression, the armor coming down a layer, and she said:
"I was a level seven."
I waited.
"Illusion creation. I could build entire environments. Rooms, landscapes, people, weather. Hold them for hours without losing detail." She paused. "Now I can hold a single targeted illusion for maybe forty seconds before it collapses."
I thought about the classroom. The vision of Annabelle walking to the back of the room, stopping in front of me, delivering a message. Forty seconds, exactly enough, then gone.
[Subject is emotional. Wait for your moment.]
"I know Annabelle leveled up after coming to your wing," Mable said. "I don't know what happened. But I know you know something."
I looked at her steadily. "I have no idea what you're talking about."
She held my eyes for a moment, then something in her expression shifted. Recalculating. "I'm sorry, Bram. I thought maybe you'd brought something from outside. Something that helped her." She almost looked embarrassed. "Forget I said it."
"It's okay," I said.
She nodded. And then, quietly, without trying to hide it:
"I don't want to wake up one day and find there's nothing left."
The room was quiet. The fan wasn't running. The corridor beyond the door was still. I stood up from the table and sat beside her on the bed. Not close enough to crowd her. Close enough to mean something. I put a hand on her shoulder and pulled her gently into an embrace, the kind that didn't ask for anything, just offered something to lean against.
[Perfect timing.]
Finally, I thought. We agree.
She didn't pull away. She settled into it with the exhale of someone who had been carrying something alone for longer than they should have and had just found somewhere to put it down for a minute.
I didn't rush. Hunters don't rush. My hand stayed on her shoulder, not gripping, not moving. Just present. A weight that meant something without demanding anything.
She leaned into me slightly, her head near my chest. I could smell her hair. Something she'd put in after braiding. She had prepared for this. Not just the dress. Everything.
"You came here for a reason," I said quietly.
She didn't answer.
"I'm not going to pretend I don't know what it is."
Still nothing. But she didn't move away, which was its own answer. I moved my hand from her shoulder down her arm. Slow. Light. Just the backs of my fingers tracing the fabric of her dress. She shivered.
"Cold?" I asked.
"No."
I reached her wrist. Then her hand. I took it gently, turned it over, and placed my palm flat against hers. Her fingers curled around mine without being asked. Small automatic thing. She didn't notice she'd done it. I noticed.
"Your hands are warm," she whispered.
"Your hands are cold."
She almost laughed. Almost.
[Good. Keep going.]
Thanks. I know what I'm doing.
I let go of her hand and placed mine on her knee. Just resting. Not moving. Not yet. She looked down at my hand, then back at my face. Her breathing had changed. Deeper and slower.
"Is this what you came for?" I asked.
She didn't say yes. She didn't say no. But something in her expression told me that whatever had been happening with Mute lately had left something unresolved, and she had walked into my room at midnight looking for somewhere to put it down.
I moved my hand up her thigh. An inch. Then two. The fabric of her dress was thin. I could feel the warmth of her skin through it. She felt the touch and shifted. Just slightly. Just enough.
I leaned in and kissed her neck. Soft. Just below her ear. She tilted her head, giving me more room, her hand coming up to the back of my head, fingers threading through my hair.
"Bram," she breathed.
I pulled back just enough to look at her.
"We don't have to do anything," I said. "We can just sit here. Talk. Or not talk."
[You talk too much.]
She looked at me with something I couldn't fully name. Grateful. Surprised. Maybe slightly disappointed that I'd paused at all.
"I came here to prove you wrong," she said. "Now prove me wrong."
"How?"
She didn't answer with words. She kissed me instead.
[Finally]
Yes, finally.