Training began at dawn.
Aldric met me in the entrance hall. His wrong-angled shadow stretched behind him like a wound.
"You didn't sleep," he said.
"Patterns are loud here."
"The Covenant of Sight. Here, it's fully active. First lesson: control."
---
The Meditation Chamber was circular. Sand floor. Symbols shifting on walls. Captured starlight above.
"Sit. Close your eyes. Tell me what you see."
I sat. Closed my eyes.
The patterns exploded.
Atomic structure of sand. Air currents in spirals. Aldric's body—a tapestry with a hole where his shadow should be. The seam holding the Invisible City together.
"Everything," I said.
"Now focus on one thing. Push the rest away."
I tried. The sand. One grain. But the air pulled. The symbols whispered.
"I can't."
"You can. You've done it your whole life. In the asylum, you pushed patterns down to function. Same skill. Just louder."
I breathed. Oxygen. Hemoglobin. A simple pattern.
The others receded. Not gone. Quiet.
"Better. Now the mirrors."
---
The possibility chamber was narrow. Mirrors everywhere. None reflected accurately.
I saw myself older. Younger. Scarred. Screaming. One version stood in a burning city, silver fire consuming everything. Another laughed in a field of wildflowers.
"What are these?"
"Potential futures. Paths you could take." Aldric's reflection showed empty eye sockets. "Don't focus on any. You could pull it toward reality."
"Then why show me?"
"The Covenant of Sight perceives time. Past. Present. Futures. The Stillness doesn't just erase what exists. It erases what could exist. You need to understand what you're fighting to preserve."
I looked away.
---
The test chamber was black stone. Glowing wards.
Seraphine and Dorian stood apart. Liora waited at the edge.
"The wards hold a simulated fragment for five minutes," Aldric said. "Neutralize it. Seraphine burns. Dorian contains. You unmake. Liora provides tactical sight."
"And if I fail?"
"We try again. And again. Until you succeed."
The floor opened.
A Stillness fragment rose. Man-shaped absence. Sound died around it.
Focus. Filter. Find the seam.
I pushed everything away. Only the fragment remained.
I could see its core. A knot of absolute darkness. Concentrated absence.
"Unmake it," Aldric said.
I reached for rage. Nothing. The filter muted everything.
"Find another way," Seraphine snapped. "Rage was instinct. Find the method."
I stopped reaching for feelings. I just wanted it gone. With certainty. Conviction.
The core flickered. Dissolved.
Silver dust hit my skin.
A memory vanished. My first day at the asylum. Antiseptic. Dr. Voss's voice. Gone.
"Again," Aldric said.
---
Four fragments later.
I'd lost the taste of chocolate. Rain sounds. A nurse's name. Grass underfoot.
Small things. They felt like graves.
---
I sat alone in the Meditation Chamber afterward. Trying to remember what I'd lost.
Liora found me.
"Your mother's echo. I can show you. Her final moments."
I looked up. "Why?"
"Because she chose this. Seeing it might help you understand why the costs are worth paying." She paused. "Or it might break you."
"Show me."
She touched my forehead.
---
White room. Medical equipment. Stars through a window.
My mother on a bed. Sweat. Straining. Concentrating.
A silver-haired man: "The fracture is stable. If you do this, he'll carry the Covenant. He'll face the choice."
"I know." Her voice strained. "I've seen the futures. In most, he breaks."
"Then why—"
"Because in one future, he doesn't. He chooses differently." Her eyes found me—across time. "He'll be broken. Fractured. But the crack in his soul will be exactly the shape the universe needs."
She poured herself into the fracture. Into me.
"Find the other path, Kael. The one where you survive."
Then she was gone.
---
I opened my eyes. Tears.
"She gave everything," I said.
"She gave you." Liora's voice was soft. "Now earn it."