Chapter 5 Fangs in the Library

It began with footsteps, quick and too many for a single person.Too quiet for friends.

Kai woke before his eyes opened. That edge-of-sleep awareness that smelled of danger. His body, trained by fear even if his mind wasn't ready, jerked upright. Cold sweat clung to his spine. The shared dorm was dark except for the flickering blue of the ward-stone embedded in the ceiling.

The others slept but something was wrong.

He reached for the blunt dagger under his cot.Another step...too close.He moved without thinking-ducked, rolled, and barely missed a fist crashing down where his head had been.

He scrambled to his feet.

Five shapes.

All masked.

All silent.

Magic pulsed between them, low and crackling like a growl beneath the surface.

One of them spoke. "Tyrant's spawn."

The words weren't loud, but they carried.

Kai's breath caught.

He didn't ask questions. He bolted.

Down the narrow hallway, past the communal washroom, boots slapping hard on stone. The walls blurred beside him, but he knew the route.He knew where to go when he had nowhere else.

The library.

The main library of Arcadia was ancient, carved into the mountain's hollowed heart. It rose like a cathedral inside the stone, silent and dark after hours. None of the lights were on. No librarian to stop him. The archway let him in like it was waiting.

He slammed the doors shut behind him and threw the iron bar across them.

The heavy thud behind the wood meant the masked figures had reached the doors.

They didn't shout.

They didn't knock.

They just... waited.

Kai stumbled deeper into the library, past towering shelves of books so old they seemed to hold breath. The light here came from the glowing glass orbs high in the dome-dim now, barely pulsing.

He ducked into the forbidden wing. Past the faded warning sigils, past the velvet ropes no one enforced anymore.

This was where he'd found the book.This was where it had started.

The section of arcane history. Dark magic. Sealed texts. The "dangerous knowledge" professors mentioned in whispers.

The smell here was different. Not like dust and parchment-but metal. Smoke. Blood.

He didn't slow down.

Until something caught his eye.

A light.

Not glowing or warm-but pulsing. Erratic.

The book.

It was back where he'd left it, perched on the pedestal at the room's center.

Waiting.

Kai approached, slower now.

His heart raced-but not from fear.

From recognition.

He touched the cover.

Snap.

A sound behind him. Sharp. Close.

He spun-too late.

A figure lunged from the shadows.

Kai raised his arm, instinctually blocking with the book itself. It burned in his hand-sigils flaring red as the figure's blade connected and stopped mid-swing, as if caught in invisible threads.

The attacker jerked backward. "What?"

Kai looked down at the book. His fingertips glowed faint gold. Not red. Not dark. But... something different.

The figure didn't wait. He lunged again.

This time, Kai moved with intent.

He ducked, rolled under the table, kicked backward-connected with shin and heard a grunt.

He rose fast and hurled a chair across the room.

It shattered against the second attacker now entering.

Kai reached for a spell-not knowing how he knew, only that he did.

Words spilled from his lips like a song long forgotten.

"Armae Lux... Constrictum!"

The air snapped.

A glowing rope of light coiled around the nearest masked student, pinning their arms to their side. They shrieked, falling to the floor.

The others hesitated.

"Did you see that?!"

"He doesn't know that spell-he shouldn't-"

"That was from Rafe's lexicon."

"No," Kai whispered, voice hoarse. "It's mine now."

They ran.

Not all of them. One stayed-frozen. Unmoving. Kai recognized the hesitation.

A girl?

She wore the same mask, but her build was smaller.

He stepped toward her.

"Why are you doing this?" No response.

But her hands trembled.The blade at her side hung limp.

"Who sent you?" he asked again.

Nothing.

Until she turned and ran.

Kai didn't follow.

He couldn't.

His knees buckled.

The adrenaline faded.

Pain hit him all at once-his side where the blade had grazed him, his ankle from the sprint, his lungs from the cold air inside the chamber.

The book pulsed softly.

He looked back to it.

Then down at his hands,the gold glow had faded.

But something was still there. A faint shimmer beneath the skin.

He wasn't imagining it.

The magic had responded to him not as Rafe but as... something else.

Back in the dorms, dawn crept through the slits in the stone walls. The ward-stone blinked, signaling morning. No one spoke of what had happened.

No one had seen the attackers leave.

And Kai said nothing.

He woke before the others. Dressed. Limped through the hallways like a shadow.

The wound on his ribs bled slowly through the tunic. But he didn't stop.

He found the classroom before it opened. The hallway empty.

Professor Velin was there early, as always.

Kai stood before her. "Someone attacked me last night."

She didn't blink. "Who?"

"I don't know. But they called me Tyrant's spawn."

Silence.

Her eyes-cold, steel-gray-narrowed.

She stepped aside to let him in.

He sat at the back of the room, bleeding into silence.

Later, during break, Lina found him in the infirmary. He hadn't called for her. But somehow, she knew.

She always did.

He sat on the edge of the cot, tunic off, ribs wrapped in a half-effort bandage.

She gasped softly. "Why didn't you tell me?"

"I didn't want you involved."

"You think I'm not already involved?"

He didn't answer.

Her hands moved gently over the wound. Magic shimmered along her fingertips-healing light, soft and pale green.

"It's not deep," she said quietly. "But it will leave a scar."

Kai looked down at her.

She was focused and careful.....not angry not afraid.

"Someone's going to kill me," he said softly.

"Not if I can help it."

He smiled then.

Just a crack in the armor.

But it was real.

"You should be scared of me."

"I'm not."

"Why not?"

She met his gaze. "Because I know you."

He didn't believe it.

But it was enough.

For now.

By evening, the rumors had grown fangs.

"Someone broke into the restricted section."

"I heard a spell was used that hasn't been taught in fifty years."

"Headmaster is furious."

"They think it was a rogue professor."

"They think it was him."

Kai kept walking.

He didn't flinch when they stared anymore.

He just moved.

Silent.

Burning.

Becoming.