“You’re the new siblings Sebastian was talking about,” he says, voice gentle and unassuming.
The statement is so unexpected, so wildly inconsistent with the Sebastian I encountered earlier, that a small, startled laugh escapes me before I can contain it. Liam shoots me a sidelong look, puzzled by my reaction.
The blonde boy’s eyebrows lift in alarm. “I-I apologize. Did I say something amiss?”
His tone is so sincerely uncertain, so earnest in its confusion, that I instantly regret letting that sound slip from me.
“No,” I say quickly, softening my voice with what warmth I can gather. “Not at all. It’s simply that… Sebastian’s only interaction with me thus far was less than pleasant. I’m surprised he had anything to say about us at all.”
The boy tilts his head as though processing my words not with his eyes, but with his ears, weighing them carefully before replying. The light from his wand shifts across his features, revealing faint freckles and a worry-crease between his brows that deepens when he’s confused.
“I see,” he murmurs quietly, though the way his gaze falters suggests he is imagining the encounter rather than recalling anything Sebastian might have told him. “Sebastian… well, he can be brusque. Difficult, I suppose. But he rarely speaks about people he doesn’t find noteworthy.”
Liam’s brows jump. I feel a flush crawl up my throat, annoyance, confusion, and something unnervingly warm all tangled together.
“Noteworthy,” I repeat under my breath, uncertain whether to scoff or shiver.
The boy hums a soft, thoughtful sound, one that suggests he meant his words kindly. Then, shifting his grip on his wand, he steps closer to us with a cautious grace, moving in the direction of the faint sound my robe makes as it brushes the floor.
“I didn’t mean to intrude,” he says. “I only heard voices and wondered if it was the new arrivals everyone has been whispering about.”
His expression is apologetic. His posture tentative. Yet his presence feels strangely grounding after the intensity of Sebastian’s earlier attention, gentle where Sebastian was sharp, cautious where Sebastian was bold.
“For the record,” a voice cuts through the dim common room like a blade sheathed in velvet, “I wasn’t exactly thrilled to be speaking to you either, Whitlock.”
The words, arrogant and unbothered, strike with such precision that a cold prickle climbs the length of my spine. I turn, and there he is.
Sebastian stands just inside the archway, framed by the flickering crimson light of the lanterns, his posture effortless in its quiet authority. The black Vespera robe he wore earlier has been replaced by the academy’s formal uniform: pressed charcoal jacket, crisp white shirt, and a red tie knotted neatly at his throat, the color burning bright against his collar like a brand of his house. The absence of the robe reveals the sharp lines of his shoulders, the lithe strength in his frame.
A girl trails behind him with the stiff eagerness of someone desperate to be chosen, her presence clinging to his like a too-tight silhouette. She is pretty in a fragile, lacquered way, blonde hair pinned into perfect coils, posture rigid with practiced poise, yet her eyes betray her entirely. Loathing flares in them each time they flick toward me, thinly veiledby a brittle smile that fails to soften the hostility radiating from her.
The boy’s head tilts in acknowledgment as Sebastian approaches. “I heard it was you,” he says gently, “who was not very welcoming to our new friends.”
Sebastian’s expression remains unreadable, though a ghost of amusement touches his eyes. “Theo,” he murmurs, as though calming a child worked into worry. “No need to sound affronted. I assure you, they are nothing to lose sleep over.”
The girl behind him, Imelda, if the faint sneer on her lips matches the name whispered earlier in the hallway, steps forward with a sharp tongue. “Yes, do calm yourself, Theo. Truly, Sebastian is being generous. They’re hardly anything to marvel at.”
Her voice drips with affected sweetness, every syllable wrapped in jealousy so transparent I can see straight through it. My eyes meet hers, and the tension between us tightens like a thread pulled taut.
Slowly, deliberately, I arch a brow.
“Tell me,” I say, my tone polite enough to sting, “did he not give you enough pets before you followed him out here?”
The effect is immediate.
Color rises into Imelda’s cheeks, not the bashful pink of a flustered girl but the hot crimson of a woman who has been struck. She reels back half a step, eyes narrowing, lips parting around the first syllable of what promises to be a shrill retort.
“Devil-” she spits, stepping toward me-
But she gets no further.
Sebastian’s hand lifts, calm, unhurried, but with a finality that snaps her movement short. He doesn’t touch her; he doesn’t need to. His authority alone is enoughto halt her mid-breath. The girl freezes, swallowed by the invisible command in his gesture.
Theo, meanwhile, smiles in quiet amusement, crossing his arms. “You do sound rather desperate, Imelda,” he offers with gentle cruelty. “Why don’t you go make trouble somewhere else?”
Sebastian’s gaze slides to her then, not cruel but cool, disinterested, as though she is a minor inconvenience delaying something more significant. He gives a single nod. Nothing more.
And yet it is enough.
