Max followed, hands shoved into his pockets so she wouldn't see them tremble.
Alex snored on, oblivious to everything.
They passed rows of closed doors, the soft rumble of other boys sleeping. A few times Max thought he heard someone shift or murmur, but no one stirred enough to catch them. Victoria moved like she'd done this sort of sneaking around before.
Of course she has.
They reached the end of the corridor, and she glanced over her shoulder once, meeting his eyes like she was silently asking. You can still turn back.
He didn't.
She pushed open the side stairwell door, and cold air spilled in. Stone steps wound down, torches here unlit, only the moonlight from arrow-slit windows marking each landing. The academy outside was quiet, the kind of heavy quiet that made you forget this place housed hundreds of students and gods knew how many secrets.
"What did you tell your dorm mates?" Max asked, voice low.
"That I was going to the restroom," Victoria said. "They don't question me. Nobody does."
"Must be nice."
They stepped out into one of the outer courtyards, an open square of flagstones and trimmed hedges. Above them the sky stretched wide and sharp, constellations bright against the dark. The academy towers rose on all sides like watchful sentries, windows winking with the occasional faint light.
The night felt both too big and too small.
Victoria walked toward the center of the courtyard, then stopped. She didn't sit. Didn't lean. Just stood there with her arms at her sides, cloak shifting around her ankles.
"This better be important," Max said lightly, trying to cut the tension before it swallowed him whole. "Breaking curfew with you isn't on my list of ways to die."
"You've almost died in stupider ways," she said automatically.
He snorted. "Wow. Comforting. Considering you count as one of these 'stupid ways'."
She hesitated, then shook her head, some of the sharpness fading.
"I didn't bring you out here to fight," she said. "Not like… before."
The word before hung between them like a broken sword.
Max stared at her profile the line of her jaw, the faint shadows under her eyes. She looked like she'd spent every night since he disappeared arguing with someone only she could see.
"So why did you?" he asked quietly.
Victoria exhaled, a thin, shaky breath that didn't quite come out as steady as she probably wanted it to.
"I needed to… see you where I couldn't be interrupted," she said. "No professors. No classmates listening for gossip."
"You're very paranoid for someone who's top of her year."
"That's not paranoia," she said. "That's survival."
Max's chest tightened at that. For all her confidence, there it was again that crack in the armor.
"So talk," he said. "You said you wanted to… before you lost your nerve."
Victoria's fingers flexed once at her sides, like she was stopping herself from crossing her arms again.
"You scared me," she said finally.
It was not the sentence he expected.
"I—what?"
"When you vanished." She looked at him now, properly, her gaze not sharp enough to cut, just heavy. "I've seen accidents in duels before. Things get out of hand. People get hurt. Magic misfires. But they're handled. There's recovery, a report, a consequence. There's… closure."
"That's a really clinical way of saying 'oh no, someone exploded and vanished through a hole in the ground,'" Max said, because the alternative was saying nothing.
She ignored that. "With you, there was nothing. One moment you were there. The next you weren't. No body. No explanation. No trace. Just… absence."
[She missed you. How tragic.] Raven's voice curled lazily through his thoughts. [You should tell her you had a lovely time being almost killed.]
Not helping, Max thought.
Victoria looked back up at the sky, like if she didn't stare at him she'd say less dangerous things.
"I went to the duel records," she said. "The ward reports. I demanded to see the mana signatures from that arena. I spent three nights in the archives until one of the librarians threatened to report me. Everything was… wrong. It was like something had cut out parts of what happened. Like the record had… holes."
Max stayed very, very still.
"Maybe the recording crystal was damaged," he said.
"It wasn't." Victoria's eyes flashed. "I checked the enchantments myself. It wasn't failure. It was interference. Something erased you the moment you vanished. Or tried to."
That cold coil in his stomach the one that had been there since he'd woken up again twisted tighter.
"And you thought that was your fault?" he asked.
"Of course I did," she snapped, then immediately reigned it in. "I lost control. I was furious because you—because you kept pushing me. You wouldn't yield. You laughed when you should have taken me seriously. You threw yourself into attacks you couldn't fully control. So I—" She swallowed. "I overreacted. I'd never pushed that much power into a single strike before. I saw you go down. And then you were gone."
Max remembered flashes. Heat. Light. The sensation of falling for what felt like hours. Bloody and walking along the cold stone pathway under the school. The world folding inward and becoming hazy.
And then Raven.
"You're not the only one who lost control," he said quietly. "I did too."
Victoria shook her head. "You don't get it. I'm supposed to be careful. I know better. I don't get to lose control."
"Who said?"
"The council." Her lips twisted. "My family. This entire place. I'm not here because I'm fun at parties, Max. I'm here because they expect me to be perfect. To be better. To 'set an example.'"
Her voice softened in an ugly way around those last two words, like she was quoting someone she hated.
Max studied her for a long moment.
"Is that why you hated me?" he asked. "Because I wasn't perfect? Because I didn't do things the way you wanted?"
"I didn't…" She faltered. "I didn't hate you."
He raised a brow.
"I didn't," she repeated, a little desperately. "I just… couldn't stand you. You act like everything is a joke until suddenly it's not, and you're bleeding, and everyone's wondering who should have stopped you first."
[She has a point.] Raven sounded almost amused.
Max sighed. "So you resented me because I was reckless. But you also envied me because I didn't have to be… you."
She stiffened, like he'd pulled a blade on her.
"That's not—"
"Victoria," he cut in gently, "you snuck into the boys' dorm in the middle of the night to apologize. You risked your reputation, which you clearly care about way too much. You're pacing. You're rambling. You don't do any of that unless your life is falling apart."
She glared at him, but it was weaker now.
"I'm not falling apart."
"You're allowed to," he said quietly.
They stood there in the chill air, breath clouding between them. Somewhere far off, a bell chimed the late hour, soft and distant.
"I didn't just come to apologize," she said at last, voice raw again. "I needed to see… what you came back as."
Max blinked. "You say that like I'm a ghost."
"You might as well be," she muttered. "You disappeared in front of a fully warded arena. That's not supposed to be possible. And when you reappeared—" Her gaze sharpened. "You're different."
"What, taller?" he joked.
She didn't smile. "Your mana feels different. The way you hold yourself. The way you reacted to the headmaster's questions today. You're… calmer. But it's the wrong kind of calm. Like someone who's already watched the worst thing happen."
Max looked away.
[She is perceptive. I don't like that.] Raven's tone cooled. [Be careful what you give away, little mage.]
"You're not wrong," Max said softly. "Something did happen down there. A lot of somethings. I'm not ready to unpack all of them in a scenic courtyard under the stars."
Victoria's jaw worked like she wanted to argue, then didn't.
"Fine," she said. "Keep your secrets."
"You're the one who said I was unpredictable," he reminded her. "Can't ruin the brand now."
She exhaled, and for the first time that night, the edge of a real smile slipped in.
"You're infuriating," she said.
"You broke into my room at midnight," he countered. "Kind of feels like you like that."
Her cheeks colored faintly in the moonlight. She looked away too quickly.
"This is the part," she said, "where I do something I will definitely regret."
Max raised both brows. "Now I'm listening."
She stepped back, planting her feet shoulder-width apart on the flagstones. When she looked up again, the vulnerability had retreated behind something more familiar she showed focus, intensity, a spark in her eyes that matched the memory of spells crashing between them.
"Show me," she said.
"Show you… what?" Max asked, though he already knew.
"What you can do now."
He tensed. "Victoria. No. I'm not—"
"You said I'm not the only one who lost control," she cut in. "Prove it. Show me you're not going to do anything crazy next time someone pisses you off. Or that you are, and I'll drag you to the headmaster myself."
"That's very reassuring," Max said dryly.
[Rather bold of her to invite a demonstration when she barely understands what you are now,] Raven purred. [I like her.]
You would, Max thought.
He glanced around the courtyard. The wards shimmered faintly along the stone boundary, weak enough not to flare at minor magic but strong enough to scream if someone tried to level a tower.
"If we get caught, I'm blaming you," he said.
"You already blame me for everything," Victoria said. "This won't change much."
He rolled his shoulders, trying to calm the jitter in his limbs. The mana didn't sit in him the way it used to. Before, it had been like heat in his veins, surges he had to wrestle into shape. Now it was… quieter. Deeper. Like something sleeping just under his skin, waiting for permission.
[You welcome.] Raven said.
He stepped a few paces away from her, giving himself space. The courtyard felt suddenly too open, too exposed, like the sky itself was watching.
"Fine," he said. "You wanted to see. Don't freak out."
"I don't 'freak out,'" Victoria said.
"That duel says otherwise."
"Max."
"Okay, okay." He took a breath. "Just… stay there."
He closed his eyes.
The world sharpened at the edges.
He could feel the threads of ambient mana around them—thin strands woven through the air, humming in the stone, coursing through the academy wards. Before, sensing them had taken concentration. Now it was like listening for waves with his feet in the water.
[Easy,] Raven murmured. [Do not overreach. She's not ready to see everything.]
I'm not either, Max thought.
[Good because I'm not giving you everything either.]
He called, not outward, but inward.
A flicker answered.
It started in his chest, a small coil of pressure that uncurled through his ribs, down his arms, into his fingertips. The air around his hands cooled, then warmed, then settled into a strange, even hum.
"Max?" Victoria said cautiously.
He opened his eyes.
A faint glow traced along his fingers—not the usual bright element color, not flame or lightning or raw arcane white. It was darker, edged with violet at the borders, like light passing through deep water.
"That's not standard," Victoria whispered.
"Thanks," Max said. "I was terrified it'd be boring for you."
He lifted his right hand, palm out, and focused on the empty space ahead. Not on an opponent. Not on destruction. Just shape.
A thin line of energy slid out from his palm, slow and deliberate, like ink drawing itself in mid-air—except this time, it wasn't light forming a pattern.
It was water.
A single droplet appeared first, suspended in the air without falling. Then another. Then another—each one drawn from the moisture in the night air. The droplets spiraled upward into a smooth arc, curving with impossible precision.
The crescent formed, glistening like a fragment torn from moonlight reflected on deep ocean water.
Another crescent mirrored it, weaving around the first, meeting at a narrow point a motion so fluid it seemed alive.
The water didn't fall.
It didn't shake.
It didn't ripple with the unstable tremors most beginner water spells suffered.
It held.
It deepened.
The water thickened, shifting from clear droplets into something denser, darker. The courtyard behind it bent and blurred, as though seen through moving depth rather than still shape.
The edges weren't clean. Tiny filaments of water drifted outward, feathering through the air like tendrils, reaching for ambient mana—absorbing it, pulling it in the way a tide pulls sand from under feet.
"Max," Victoria said again, sharper now. "How long can you hold that?"
"I don't know," he admitted.
[Longer than you think.] Raven hummed.
He forced his jaw to unclench.
"Okay, that's enough," he muttered to himself.
The old Max would have pushed. Just to see what happened.
The new Max let go.
Victoria stared.
"That wasn't arcane," she said slowly.
"Technically it was."
"Not like any arcane I've seen. The way it pulled the ambient threads—" She cut herself off, eyes darting to his hands. "Your focus. That… calm. You're not straining at all."
He flexed his fingers. They tingled faintly, like they'd fallen asleep.
"It's easier now," he said. "Too easy. That's what scares me."
There. He admitted it.
Victoria's gaze flicked to his face, searching. Whatever she saw there made her shoulders relax by a fraction.
"Do you feel like you're going to lose control?" she asked.
"Not like before," he said. "Before it was… a rush. Like getting punched and deciding to punch back harder. Now it's… more like…" He frowned, looking for the word.
[Authority,] Raven supplied. [Like giving an order and having reality obey.]
"…like giving instructions," Max finished. "And everything listens."
Victoria's expression went from wary to alarmed.
"That's not better," she said.
"I didn't say it was."
They lapsed into silence again. Somewhere above, a night bird cawed once, quick and sharp.
"Do you feel… different?" she asked, quieter now. "Inside."
Max hesitated.
He thought of the darkness he'd floated in. The voice that had woven through it, not quite kind, not quite cruel. The bargain he wasn't sure he'd made and the marks it had left on him.
He thought of how, when the headmaster had looked him in the eye earlier that day, Max had felt utterly, absolutely certain that if the man had tried to dig into his mind, something inside him would have bitten back.
"Yeah," he said, because lying would be pointless. "I do."
Victoria's hands curled at her sides. "Does it hurt?"
"Sometimes," he said. "Sometimes it feels like I'm… standing in a place I don't remember walking to. Like I jumped ahead a few steps in my own life and I'm still catching up."
Her expression softened in a way he wasn't prepared for.
"I thought about that," she murmured. "What it would be like if you came back. If you did." She glanced away. "I didn't let myself imagine it much. Felt… too selfish."
"Me being alive is selfish?" Max said. "Wow. Brutal."
"You know what I mean," she snapped, cheeks coloring again. "I thought if you walked through the doors again, you'd be furious. Or broken. Or… the same."
"Sorry to disappoint?"
Her eyes met his, steady now.
"You don't disappoint me," she said.
The words hit harder than any spell had.
He swallowed. "You have a really annoying way of saying something nice and making it sound like a threat."
Her lip twitched. "Practice."
They stood there, this time without the anger, without the shouted accusations. Just two people who had nearly destroyed each other one physically and one mentally, standing in the aftermath of what that made them now.
Victoria cleared her throat.
"Again," she said.
Max blinked. "What?"
"Cast again. Something simple. I want to see if your control holds under strain."
"You're turning my near-death experience into a homework assignment," he said.
"I'm turning it into training," she corrected. "If you're different, you need to learn how to be different without killing yourself. Or anyone else."
He stared at her.
"You know," he said slowly, "if I didn't know any better, I'd think you were worried about me."
"Don't be ridiculous," she said too quickly. "You're an investment. I refuse to let you waste the trouble you've already caused me."
[She cares.] Raven sounded entertained. [It bleeds through every word.]
I noticed, Max thought dryly.
"Fine," he said aloud. "But if I accidentally blow up a hedge, you're explaining it to the groundskeeper."
He drew in another breath, this one steadier. Victoria shifted her stance again, watching him with a duelist's eyes—measuring, cataloguing, analyzing each motion.
"Left hand," she said. "You favored your right before. If something changed, I want to see if the imbalance is still there."
He raised his left hand. The motion felt… oddly natural. That was new.
He gathered power. Not as much as before; just a thread of it, enough to shape into a simple ball of water. The energy coiled obediently, not fighting, not clawing. It wasn't like pushing weight—it was like drawing a bowstring that always came back to center when he let go.
He flicked his wrist.
A narrow streak of dark-violet and sapphire snapped across the courtyard, striking the far training dummy someone had left leaning against the wall days ago. Instead of the usual crack and flare, the water hit with a muted thunk—and the wood around the impact point went gray, splintering inward like something had eaten through it from the inside.
Victoria sucked in a breath.
"That is not a standard water ball," she said.
"Yeah, I figured," Max said, staring at the dummy. "The color kind of gave it away."
She moved past him, crossing the courtyard to inspect the damage. He followed, heart beating a little faster now not from the magic, but from the look on her face as she examined the splintered wood.
"It didn't really get wet," she said. "Didn't freeze. Didn't crack with kinetic force. It… unraveled. Like it decided it didn't feel like being solid anymore."
"That's… concerning," Max said.
"Understatement of the year."
She straightened slowly, eyes meeting his again.
"Whatever happened to you down there," she said, "it didn't just change your power. It changed its nature."
Max forced a crooked smile. "So… do I pass your little midnight evaluation, Professor?"
Her expression faltered for just a moment, something like warmth flickering through.
"For now," she said. "You're not… completely out of control. That's… something."
"Wow. High praise."
"You're still a danger," she added.
"To others or to myself?"
"Both," she said. "But at least now I know what kind."
It should have stung. It didn't. Somehow, hearing it from her.
"What are you going to do with that?" he asked quietly.
She hesitated. Looked at him. Really looked at him.
"I don't know yet," she said. "But I know this."
She stepped closer, close enough that he could see the faint constellation of freckles across the bridge of her nose, the way her hair had slipped loose and a few strands went where they pleased.
"I'm not going to pretend you don't exist anymore," she said. "I'm not going to pretend that duel didn't happen. Or that you being… whatever you are now… doesn't terrify me."
"Is this you being comforting?" Max asked softly.
"Yes," she said, dead serious. "I'm terrible at it."
He huffed out something that might have been a laugh, might have been a breath that hurt too much.
"And I'm not going to let you handle this alone," she added, even quieter.
He froze.
"What?"
"You heard me." A faint flush crept up her neck. "Stop making me repeat vulnerable things. It's rude."
"You just said I'm dangerous," he said. "Terrifying, even."
"Yes."
"And you want to stand closer?" he asked. "That seems… unwise."
"That's new," she said. "You worrying about other people."
He opened his mouth. Closed it again.
[She has chosen her side,] Raven observed. [Interesting. You may need her more than you realize.]
"Why?" Max asked. "Why help me?"
She looked away, for once unable to maintain eye contact through harsh truth.
"Because I almost got you killed once," she said. "I'm not letting the second time happen because of something or someone else."
The words lodged somewhere in his chest.
"Victoria…"
"And," she said quickly, like she needed to bury that under something less raw, "because if you lose control, the academy is going to treat you like a weapon or a threat. And I refuse to let them make that decision without someone in your corner who actually knows you."
"You think you know me?" he asked, a challenge hiding under the question.
Her lips curved, sharp and soft at once.
"I'm learning," she said.
They stood there, closer than they'd meant to be, closer than friends were supposed to stand but not close enough to be anything else. The night wrapped around them like a secret neither of them was ready to share.
A distant door slammed. Voices echoed faintly from another courtyard.
Victoria stepped back, the spell of the moment breaking.
"We should go," she said. "If we're caught out here, even I can't talk us out of it."
"Sure," Max said, though his chest still felt a little too full. "Back to pretending we're just rivals who tolerate each other in public?"
She gave him a look. "We've never been 'just' anything."
He swallowed. "That's… vague and threatening."
"Good," she said. "Maybe it'll keep you on your toes."
They crossed the courtyard together, not quite touching, not quite apart.
At the stairwell door, she paused, hand on the handle.
"This doesn't mean we're friends," she said.
He smirked. "You said that already."
"It still doesn't," she insisted. "But it means… something. I don't know what yet."
He nodded slowly. "We can figure it out. Preferably without any more almost-murders."
"That's the goal," she said.
She opened the door, then glanced back at him one last time, eyes catching his in the dim light.
"Get some sleep," she said. "Tomorrow's going to be worse."
"Comforting," he said.
"I told you," she replied. "I'm terrible at it."
She slipped inside, the door closing softly behind her.
Max stood alone in the courtyard for a moment longer, the cool air brushing over his skin, the memory of warped water still lingering on his hands.
[You trust her too much,] Raven murmured. [She could betray you.]
She could, Max thought. But she didn't tonight.
Raven was silent for a beat.
[You're changing.] she said.
He looked up at the academy towers, then at the door Victoria had disappeared through.
"Yeah," he said quietly. "I know."
He turned and headed back to the dorms, his steps lighter, his fears not gone but no longer his alone.