I waited until the corridor outside my room was empty and the Academy’s evening light had slanted into that soft, pearly dimness it got when the sprites hummed themselves toward sleep.
The hallway outside my bedroom looked like any other, with stone walls, intricate sconces shaped like unfurling leaves, and a runner rug that occasionally changed patterns when it was bored. Most people walked past it and never felt a thing.
I paused by the slightly crooked portrait two doors down, an old headmistress with a bun so tight it could probably deflect arrows, and touched the frame. My butterfly mark gave a little answering tingle, like recognition.
“Okay,” I whispered. “I’m here. And I brought anxiety.”
Something rustled. Not in the portrait, in the air, a faint fluttering, like paper wings.
I walked a little further down the corridor and stopped.
The key arrived a heartbeat later.
It darted out from behind the frame, a sliver of gold no bigger than my thumb, with filigree designs that flexed like feathers. Little hinged wings beat the air, scattering pinpricks of light. It circled my head once in admonishment, then hovered in front of my nose.
“Hi,” I said. “You’re looking luminous.”
The key bobbed, as if flattered. Then it zipped down the hallway, expecting me to follow.
“To be clear,” I murmured, “we are only doing mildly reckless things tonight. No full disasters.” The key did not dignify that with a response.
It led me past my bedroom door to the end of the corridor, where an unremarkable stretch of wall waited.
But the familiarity coated me like a warm cup of tea on a fall day.
Now, the stones shimmered faintly in my peripheral vision, like heat haze.
The key spun in a tight circle, then dove straight toward a particular mortar line. I pressed my hand over the spot it indicated.
“Owl and ember,” I whispered, then added, “and maybe a little mercy.”
The stones warmed under my palm. Lines of light traced outwards in a circle, forming the outline of a door that hadn’t been there a moment before. An ancient latch materialized, cool metal kissing my fingers.
The key slid into its keyhole with a satisfied little sigh.
“You’re a show-off,” I told it fondly, and turned.
The hidden door swung inward soundlessly, revealing the narrow passage beyond, lit by that impossible, pearlescent glow that belonged only to this wing.
I slipped inside the den, pulling the door almost closed behind me. The hum of the Academy’s normal life with distant voices, moving portraits, and the occasional disgruntled kettle, faded into a thick, reverent quiet.
The air changed.
Colder, a little, but not in the hungry, Shadowick way. This was the cool of deep caverns and untouched snow. It smelled faintly of old parchment and something metallic andclean—dragon-scent, weaved with magic older than the Wards themselves.
My anxiety, which had been a wild, tangled knot, eased as I walked.
The passage curved gently, tugging my thoughts with it, away from spiraling what-ifs and toward something steadier.
The corridor opened onto the dragon wing’s antechamber: a long, high-vaulted hall carved out of stone that glowed faintly from within, like starlight caught in crystal. The walls were lined with alcoves where dragons shifted in relief, moving slowly like murals in a dream.
At the far end stood the door.
The dragon chamber was many things at once.
It was a cavern, huge and domed, its ceiling lost in shadow, threaded with glints of scales and light and foliage. It was a library of knowledge without shelves carved directly into the stone, holding not books but artifacts—crystals, bones, old talismans that hummed softly. It was a nest, with raised platforms and ledges where bodies could coil or stretch.
And it was a sky.
