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Aviel waved them off. “Go. Before Daven eats the rest.”

Daven smirked. “Tempting.” Then he tugged Ryneth toward the door. “Come on, baby.”

Ryneth shot him a look, but he didn’t pull his hand away.

The Academy felt louder than usual. Maybe Daven just noticed it more. Or perhaps it was because he was distracted.

They sat in the lecture hall after their final class had finished.

“You’re scowling.”

Ryneth stopped packing his stuff and snorted. “I’m not.”

“Yes, you are. What’s up?”

“Nothing. I’m concentrating.” He kept packing.

“On glaring?”

Ryneth shot him a look. “On surviving these classes. They are hard.”

Daven’s mouth curved as he got out of his chair, waiting for Ryneth to finish. “That’s why you have a private tutor.”

“It’s just…” Ryneth sighed, then slung his duffel over his shoulder. “It would have been easier if it was a topic that would interest me. Not this—” He gestured with his hands. “Politics.”

“Why? Politics are important.” Daven let Ryneth leave the lecture hall first, then grabbed his hand to guide him through the corridor. People ogled them as they passed.

“For someone like you, yes. Not for me.”

Figured. Daven had always known he’d wanted to be in the Luminary like Kylix and Helianth, or opt for another job in the government. But for Ryneth, it was different.

He just wasn’t ready to let Ryneth enroll in another course if that meant not having him by his side all the time.

You go where I go.

That was the point.

Still, Daven took note. Maybe later, once Ryneth stopped acting like a feral cat every time he offered him something, he’d loosen the leash a little.

“All right, what would you have chosen?” he asked as they stepped outside.

Ryneth hesitated. “Civil engineering,” he said finally. “Structural systems. Materials. Things like that.”

Daven glanced at him. “Buildings?”

Ryneth gave a small shrug. “Walls. Bridges. Reinforcement. I like knowing how things hold.” He looked out across the city as they walked. “The glass here is…different. The towers. The transit bridges. Even the ward barriers near the lower districts. On Düren, everything’s patched stone and scrap. Functional. But here…” He exhaled. “It makes me want to understand how it’s built.”

Daven looked at him for a beat. Of course Ryneth would want to build something that kept people alive. “You want to rebuild the world.”

Ryneth snorted. “Not the world. Just the parts that break first.”

A Luminary guard in black and gold stood beside a waiting hover car. “Sir?”

Daven gave him a brief nod. “We’ll walk.”

Ryneth glanced at Daven once they reached the path. “Are you always this arrogant?”

“Yes.”