The following day passed with little incident, though Godric could not help noticing that Professor Ryan Ashford seemed oddly chipper during Mundane Studies, moving through the lesson with the faint satisfaction of a man who had either slept remarkably well or done something he had no intention of explaining to anyone. The class itself had been interesting enough in places, although Godric still found himself racking his brain over certain parts of the syllabus that felt strangely out of place, and more than once he wondered whether any of it would ever prove useful beyond the walls of a classroom.
A part of him had already begun debating whether he should drop the subject at the start of the next term, especially with the workload from his other classes mounting higher by the week, because if there was one thing he truly despised, it was spending endless hours trapped behind a desk beneath a mountain of textbooks and parchments, completing assignments that felt less like academic training and more like some carefully designed instrument of torture.
There were moments when he regretted accepting Headmaster Blaise's offer at all.
When the bells chimed and released the students from class, Godric made his way out into the hallway with the rest of the crowd, falling into the stream of robes, satchels, murmured conversations, and hurried footsteps that filled the castle between lessons. Rowena and Helga were headed out into the city, enjoying what they had declared a girl's day on the town, and they had dragged poor Jeanne along with them despite her insistence that she needed to focus on the growing stack of assignments waiting for her, especially Charms. The thought drew a small chuckle from him as he imagined Jeanne trying to argue discipline and responsibility while Helga pulled her toward pastry shops and Rowena pretended she was not enjoying the escape just as much as anyone else.
The castle remained warm despite the chill of the fall air beyond its walls, though the season had grown colder with each passing day, carrying with it the scent of damp earth, old stone, fading leaves, and distant rain that seemed to seep even into the corridors. Godric smoothed the front of his robes and adjusted the satchel on his shoulder as he navigated through the mass of students, some laughing with friends, some muttering through private checklists, and others rushing along with their minds already fixed on the next lesson, the next essay, or the next obligation waiting for them elsewhere in the ancient school.
Through it all, he still heard the murmurs.
They followed him now with such persistence that he had almost learned to ignore them, though not quite. There were whispers of recognition, quick turns of the head, fingers pointed subtly or not so subtly toward the sword worn across his back, and glances that lingered on the royal blue and gold of the scabbard and hilt that had become as much a mark of him as his own name. The weapon carried too many stories now, each one adding weight to the monikers bound to the boy who had earned them in blood, fire, and steel.
The Lion of Ignis. The Hero of Caerleon. The boy who had won a Bellum Inter Duos against the Calishans, who had carved his way through the Congregation of Clans, who had defeated the infamous Grim Reaper of the Tower and dragged his own Clan, the Marauders, into a place among the rising greats. His name was spoken with reverence by students who had never shared a battlefield with him, and strangers looked at him as if heroism were something clean enough to admire from a safe distance.
Godric did not care for any of it.
Not the titles, not the reputation, not the reverence, and not even the time he had spent within the confines of Excalibur's ancient stone walls. He shifted the satchel on his shoulder and felt its weight settle deeper into his bones, his crimson eyes growing solemn as the chill in the air, the gold of autumn beyond the windows, and the faint scent of earth drifting through the corridor pulled something older and more painful to the surface. It was not merely nostalgia that came to him in moments like this, but the ache that lived beneath it, the kind that softened with time without ever truly leaving.
He looked ahead through the moving crowd and, for one painful second, half expected to see a white wolf therian standing at the end of the hall with golden eyes filled with warmth and recognition, waiting for him as if no time had passed at all.
Raine.
Godric remembered how he used to count the hours until class let out, not because freedom meant rest, but because it meant he could make his way to the pavilion by the lake where she would be waiting. Assignments had not felt quite so burdensome then, not when he could sit with a book open across his lap and Raine's head resting against his shoulder as she dozed in the afternoon light, her ears twitching faintly whenever the breeze moved through the trees.
He remembered the soft brush of her fur against his cheek, the warmth of her body beside him, and the scent of sunlight clinging to her snow-white hair after she had spent the day outside. In those days, even parchment, ink, and dense academic passages had seemed easier to endure, because she had been there, breathing quietly beside him and making the world feel less cruel by simply existing in it.
His hand moved almost without thought toward the locket hidden beneath his robes, and when his fingers closed around it, he held it gently rather than tightly, as if afraid that too firm a grip might turn memory into something sharper than he could bear. He was stronger now, and he knew that much was true, yet strength had not made the ache vanish.
It only made him better at carrying it. The pain came and went in waves, sometimes faint enough to ignore and sometimes heavy enough to steal the breath from him, and there was nothing he could do to stop himself from missing her when the season, the light, or the hush of a hallway brought her back so clearly that he could almost feel her beside him.
He had just lowered his hand from the locket when he stopped. Someone stood directly in his path, and for a moment the crowd seemed to blur around the edges of his vision.
Shana stood before him with wide eyes and a petrified expression, frozen so suddenly that it looked as though she had turned the corner and found a ghost waiting there. Godric's gaze flickered down before he could stop it, settling on the noticeable swell of her stomach, larger than the last time he had seen her, and he remembered what Sophia had told him about the child being due any day now.
"Shana," Godric murmured, instinctively reaching toward her.
The rabbit therian immediately took a step back, her ears flattening against the back of her head, and the movement struck him harder than he expected because it carried the memory of their last meeting with it.
Godric slowly lowered his hand, forcing a soft smile onto his face despite the awkwardness tightening between them. "You look well," he said, choosing the gentlest words he could manage. "Do you know when you're due?"
Shana looked away and held one arm against herself, her sapphire eyes fixed somewhere near the floor rather than on him. "D-Doctor Adani said it might be in a week or two," she said.
An uncomfortable silence settled between them despite the shuffle of students moving past on either side, and Godric cleared his throat as he searched for something that would not make her retreat any further. "It's good to see you," he said, though the words felt painfully small compared to everything left unresolved between them. "I tried visiting you in the quarters several times, but Sophia always said you were out."
He rubbed the back of his head with a weak chuckle that failed to lighten the moment. "I can't help feeling like you've been avoiding me."
Shana's gaze dropped lower, and the answer was clear enough even before she spoke.
Godric exhaled quietly. "Look, about last time—"
"I have to go," Shana said, turning away before he could finish.
"Wait," Godric said, reaching out and catching her hand before she could vanish into the stream of students moving through the corridor. "Shana, please... can we..." He swallowed, searching for the right words while the noise of the hallway pressed around them without ever truly reaching him. "Can we just talk?"
Shana remained with her back partly turned to him, her ears lowered, her shoulders drawn inward, and when she shook her head, the motion was so small that he nearly missed it. "There's nothing to talk about, Godric," she said, her words quiet and strained in a way that made his chest tighten.
For a moment, she stood there with his hand still around hers, before she gently pulled herself free. "It was foolish to believe this could be anything more than what it was, and I was a fool for allowing it to get this far."
Godric stared at her, the crowded hallway fading into a distant blur beneath the weight of those words. Students continued to pass on either side, robes brushing against robes and voices rising in casual fragments around them, but all he could focus on was Shana's face, the way she refused to meet his eyes for too long, and the fragile composure she seemed to be holding together with both hands.
"Sophia was right," Shana continued, her words trembled despite her attempt to keep it steady. "You're..." She stopped, as if the rest of the sentence hurt too much to say aloud, then looked at him once with sapphire eyes bright with tears she would not let fall. "And I shouldn't have..."
Godric's hand slowly lowered to his side, useless now that she had stepped beyond his reach.
"I'm sorry," Shana whispered, and the apology landed with the quiet cruelty of something neither of them knew how to undo.
Then, she walked away quickly, her pace careful but determined as she slipped into the stream of students. Once again, she had left Godric with more questions than answers, although the truth was not nearly as hidden as he wished it were. Whatever had passed between them, whatever pain, fear, or guilt lingered in the spaces neither of them dared touch, she had decided that distance was safer than conversation.
Godric watched until Shana disappeared around the bend, then drew in a slow breath and shook his head as the ache inside him changed shape, no longer fixed solely on Raine or the past, but tangled now with the quiet, painful certainty that Shana had chosen to keep some distance between them for reasons she could not yet bring herself to explain. He was about to turn down another corridor and let the current of the day carry him somewhere else when something made him pause.
He looked back over his shoulder.
Near one of the tall glass windows, half-bathed in the pale autumn sunlight bleeding through the panes, stood a young man who seemed oddly out of place despite wearing an Excalibur uniform. He looked a few years older than Godric, with the sapphire colors of House Ventus clear along his robes, yet there was something strangely washed-out about him beneath the light, as though the sun touched him without fully warming him.
His pale brown hair had been swept neatly to one side, his steel-gray eyes watched the passing students with a stillness that did not belong to the bustle of the hallway, and his height put him nearly a head above Godric, though his posture carried none of the easy confidence that usually came with being noticed.
Stranger still, no one else seemed to notice him at all.
Students passed within arm's reach without glancing his way, shoulders brushing the space around him as if he were no more than another shadow cast by the window frame, and Godric, feeling a prickle of unease work its way beneath his collar, turned fully toward him with one eyebrow raised.
"Hey," Godric called out, cutting through the hallway murmur. "You there."
The young man turned at once, and for a brief moment his eyes widened with such startled disbelief that Godric's confusion deepened. He looked left, then right, searching the crowd as if there might have been someone else standing behind him, and when he found no one answering the call, he slowly lifted a trembling finger and pointed to himself.
"Yeah, you," Godric said, his eyebrow rising higher as the young man's reaction grew stranger by the second. "What are you doing over there?"
Again, the young man glanced to either side, his expression caught somewhere between fear and astonishment, before he pointed more firmly at himself. "Y-you can see me?" he asked.
Godric blinked. "What are you talking about?" he said, the question leaving him with genuine confusion as he took a step closer. "Of course, I can see—"
Someone bumped into him from behind before he could finish, sending him stumbling forward with a startled breath as his gaze dropped instinctively to the floor. A student beside him muttered a quick apology and lifted a hand in passing, already being pulled along by the moving crowd, and Godric steadied himself with one hand against the strap of his satchel before looking back toward the window.
The young man was gone.
For a moment, Godric simply stared at the empty patch of sunlight where he had been standing, waiting for the figure to reappear from behind a passing group of students or step out from the angle of the window, but there was nothing. He searched the corridor, scanning the crowd, the alcoves, the turns in the hallway, and the gleaming reflection on the glass, yet the Ventus student had vanished as completely as if the castle itself had swallowed him.
Godric scratched the side of his head, his expression tightening with uncertainty, before he let out a quiet breath and rolled his shoulders beneath the weight of his satchel. Whatever that had been, it left the air around him feeling colder than before, but with no sign of the young man and no one else reacting to his disappearance, Godric finally turned away and continued deeper into the castle.
****
It was often said that the Excalibur Library was one of the most extensive libraries ever housed within a learning institution, if not the greatest of them all, surpassed only by the Library of Alexandria, which remained under the guarded stewardship of the Wandering Sea. The space itself was cavernous enough to make even the oldest students slow their steps upon entering, with shelves of dark oak rising several stories high in varying shades of polish, grain, and age, their towering frames stretching toward the vaulted stone ceiling where steel chandeliers hung in solemn rows and glowed with crystal lights that cast a familiar amber radiance across the ancient walls.
Several sets of staircases wound upward in graceful spirals, connecting the higher floors and shadowed galleries, while the bottom level was lined with dozens upon dozens of long desks and chairs arranged with such order that, during the busiest hours, the whole place could resemble a vast classroom dedicated entirely to silence, discipline, and the quiet struggle of students trying not to drown beneath their own assignments.
Between the marble busts of long-dead scholars, tapestries depicting the great houses and old academic victories, and glass cupboards filled with trophies, enchanted trinkets, ceremonial awards, and aged artifacts whose purposes had been forgotten by most who passed them, there stood rows upon rows of books gathered from across Avalon, from distant realms beyond its borders, and, according to some whispered accounts, from worlds and timelines that no longer existed in any proper form. It was a treasure trove of knowledge so vast that no student could hope to understand its full measure, with certain volumes rumored to predate even the Calamity, their brittle pages bound in treated leather, old vellum, silver-threaded cloth, or stranger materials that seemed to resist both dust and time.
Anything a student could require for their classes could be found somewhere within the library's endless shelves, from treatises on rare plant species used in common potions to defensive spell manuals detailing counters against hexes, curses, and more obscure forms of magical affliction. Most students spent at least three or four days a week there, either hunched over homework beneath the amber glow of the chandeliers or buried in notes while preparing for exams that always seemed closer than they had any right to be.
Of course, in a place where knowledge had been gathered so carefully and guarded for so many generations, there were bound to be stories about the knowledge that students were never meant to touch.
At the far end of the library, beyond the ordinary shelves and past the study alcoves where even the more reckless students tended to lower their voices, stood the entrance to the Restricted Section, locked behind a vault door that only the Head Librarian had the authority to open. Students were strictly prohibited from approaching the threshold, let alone crossing it, and yet that rule had only fed the imagination of the student body for generations.
Rumors claimed that the vault contained some of Avalon's most forbidden arcane arts, including grimoires on eldritch magic believed lost to the world, cursework so corrosive that it could stain the soul of the caster, ritual manuals written by civilizations erased from history, and sealed records of spells whose misuse could bring entire kingdoms to ruin. Whether such tales were exaggerations invented by bored students or warnings rooted in uncomfortable truth, no one seemed willing to confirm, and that silence only made the Restricted Section feel more dangerous.
After the Bellum Inter Duos between Godric, his friends, and the Calishans, those rumors had sharpened into something more immediate. Some students whispered that Volg had somehow gained access to forbidden material from the Restricted Section, citing his unsettling knowledge of dark magic once wielded by the Dark Lord Sarkon and his followers as proof that he could not have learned such things through ordinary study.
Others dismissed the claim as nothing more than fear dressed up as fact, born from the need to explain how a student could wield magic that should have remained buried in history. No official inquiry ever validated the rumors, and neither the faculty nor the Head Librarian offered any public answer, but within Excalibur Academy, silence rarely killed a story. More often, it gave the story room to grow teeth.
Godric had spent the better part of an hour searching for one particular book, moving from the alphabetized indexes to the numbered tags fixed along the shelves, only to find himself circling the same sections with a growing sense of irritation that no amount of academic discipline could soften.
By the time he had climbed the spiral staircases for what felt like the hundredth time, going up and down between levels while following references that led only to more references, his patience had worn thin enough that he was gritting his teeth with every breath. When he rounded the fourth shelf on the third floor yet again and swept his fingers across the spines of dozens upon dozens of books, he found only an empty space where the volume should have been waiting.
A frustrated cry escaped him before he could stop it, loud enough to cut through the sacred quiet of the library and send more than a dozen students turning in his direction with sharp, synchronized hisses of disapproval.
Godric's eyes widened at once, and he slapped a hand over his mouth as if he could somehow drag the sound back in, though the damage had already been done. Several students glared at him over their books while others shook their heads with the grave disappointment of scholars interrupted during holy work, and after offering a weak, apologetic nod to no one in particular, he sighed and started toward the staircase again, finally making a beeline for the one person he should have gone to in the first place.
He descended the spiral staircase toward the heart of the library, passing beneath shelves that rose high into the amber-lit gloom until he reached the broad open space at the center of the bottom floor. Above it hung a massive cluster of hexagonal crystals tinted white, yellow, and orange, suspended from the ceiling and growing downward in a spiraled formation that seemed almost organic, as if the stone itself had bloomed from the ancient architecture. The crystals glowed with a soft internal light, warm enough to bathe the circular counter beneath them in honeyed radiance, and although the hum they emitted was too low to be properly heard, Godric could feel it faintly in his jaw and bones, a subtle vibration that made the entire chamber seem alive with old magic.
Beneath the hanging crystal stood a circular counter carved from solid wood, polished by age and use until its surface held a muted shine. At first glance, the counter appeared empty, though Godric had learned long ago that appearances meant very little where Excalibur's Head Librarian was concerned. As he approached, he leaned slightly over the edge and looked toward the armchair tucked behind the desk, where Miss Carnahan sat with the solemn authority of a monarch upon a throne far too large for her body.
Godric still remembered how bewildered he had been the first time he saw her, and how long it had taken for his brain to fully accept what his eyes were showing him.
Seated in the armchair like a person was a housecat, or at least something close enough to a housecat that an inattentive person might have made that mistake before being thoroughly corrected. She was larger than an ordinary cat, with a gray coat marked by a clean streak of white that ran from her muzzle down her chest, and she wore a tiny pointed black hat along with a dark librarian's robe that covered her upper torso.
A fluffy tuft of white fur spilled from the collar, and the longer fur on her head fell to her shoulders in a manner almost like hair, tied neatly back into a short ponytail. Her tail flicked with measured impatience behind her as she wrote upon a sheet of parchment with a quill held in one paw, somehow managing the act with the refined ease of a scholar despite the obvious inconvenience of not having fingers, while her lavender catlike eyes scanned each line through a pair of tiny round spectacles balanced upon her muzzle.
Rowena had once explained, with the patient tone she used whenever Godric's confusion crossed into visible disbelief, that Beastias therians came in many shapes and forms depending on their tribes. Some belonged to larger species such as wolves, tigers, bears, and other powerful beasts, like Professor Kyar, while others resembled smaller animals, including dogs, cats, rabbits, and even mice.
If not for their intellect, speech, and culture, certain Beastias might have been mistaken for domesticated animals, and there were more than a few stories about some of the mischievous ones tricking unsuspecting households into caring for them under the guise of being ordinary pets, effectively freeloading in comfort until the truth revealed itself in some spectacularly embarrassing fashion.
The therian's ears twitched before Godric had even cleared his throat, and she looked up through her spectacles with the sort of calm scrutiny that made him feel as if she had known he was coming long before he arrived. "Oh, Mister Gryffindor," she said, reaching up to remove the glasses from her muzzle before setting them neatly upon the desk. "How may I assist you?"
"Good afternoon, Miss Carnahan," Godric greeted with a polite smile, resting one hand against the counter. "I was hoping you could help me, because I'm looking for a book."
Carnahan gave him a level stare that lasted just long enough to make him regret the phrasing. "Well, this is a library, Mister Gryffindor," she replied dryly. "I would be rather shocked if you were not."
Godric chuckled under his breath and rubbed the back of his head, conceding the point with a sheepish tilt of his shoulders. "Right, perhaps I should have been more specific. I'm looking for a book about the Order of Seven, and I've been all over this place trying to find it, but either the index is wrong or the book has decided to develop legs and walk off."
Carnahan's eyebrow rose with a faint arch of recognition. "The Order of Seven, you say?"
She rolled her eyes in a way that somehow looked even more expressive on a cat's face than it would have on a person's. "It seems you and that friend of yours share a single brain cell and have simply agreed to pass it back and forth whenever the need arises."
Godric blinked. "That… friend of mine?"
Rather than answer immediately, Carnahan slipped her glasses back on, shifted the parchment aside to reveal a book almost as large as she was, its brown pages thick with age and its cover worn smooth from years of use. Names, dates, and titles had been carefully written across the pages in neat lines, and she lowered one paw to trace down them as she muttered to herself, occasionally pausing to lick her feline nose with scholarly concentration.
"Let us see... ancient orders, pre-Calamity references, student inquiries, borrowed materials..." Her paw stopped, and she tapped one line with a soft, decisive sound. "Ah, here it is, and exactly as I had thought, Mister Slytherin had borrowed the volume not too long ago."
"Salazar?" Godric asked, his eyes widening with surprise.
Carnahan nodded, already looking as if she found the entire matter equal parts predictable and irritating. "And I would wager he is still here, since young Slytherin has a habit of selecting a book and then haunting the same miserable corner of the library until even the dust begins to recognize him."
Godric leaned slightly closer to the counter. "Do you know where?"
Miss Carnahan placed both front paws upon the desk and rose on her hind legs, bringing herself just high enough to peer at him over the polished wood. "Try the back of the library, close to the Restricted Section," she said, lowering her tone despite there being no one near enough to hear. "The boy has quite the fondness for that place, though whether that is because he enjoys forbidden knowledge or simply enjoys looking dramatic near locked doors, I have yet to determine."
Godric chuckled under his breath. "Knowing Salazar, it is probably a bit of both," he said, giving Miss Carnahan a short, respectful bow. "Thank you, Miss Carnahan, I'll get out of your hair."
The instant the words left his mouth, his expression tightened. "I mean, fur, or hair, or tail..." He stopped, and turned away with enough haste that his robes fluttered behind him.
Miss Carnahan lifted one paw to cover her snout, her whiskers twitching as she tried and failed to suppress a laugh, while her lavender feline eyes followed the boy's retreat with open amusement.
****
Godric hurried across the library floor with his attention already fixed on the rear shelves. In his haste, he nearly collided with Anton, only dodging aside at the last possible second with a sharp intake of breath and an apologetic wave. "Whoa, sorry, Anton," he called, already moving again before the older man could respond.
Anton watched him rush off between the tables and shelves, his expression hovering somewhere between amusement and curiosity as he adjusted the cuff of his sleeve. "It seems the gallant Lion of Ignis is in an even greater hurry than usual," he said as he stepped toward the circular counter. "I do not suppose you had anything to do with that, Miss Carnahan?"
"Pish-posh, Anton, you and I know that a boy like Gryffindor's hardly one to sit still," Carnahan said, settling back into her armchair. "I have known since the first day that boy stepped into my library attempting to file a permit for that awfully gaudy sword of his that he would become a household name sooner or later." Her ears twitched as she gave him a pointed look. "Though that is certainly not thanks to you and that foolish moniker you gave him."
"Foolish?" Anton lifted one brow with mock offense. "How dare you, madam."
"I speak only truth, Mister Buffer," Carnahan continued, her tail sweeping behind her with scholarly disdain. "Honestly, the Lion of Ignis? Juvenile, melodramatic, and entirely too pleased with itself."
"You are merely jealous that I have always been the more ingenious of the two of us, even when we were students," Anton replied, twisting the curled edge of his mustache with a faint smile. "I daresay nearly half the members of the Congregation owe their monikers to me, and many of those names have since entered the annals of Congregation history with all the dignity and permanence one could hope for."
Carnahan gave a soft snort, though the sharpness in her expression gradually yielded to something warmer and more contemplative as she regarded him from behind the rounded counter. "A word of caution, Anton," she said, her tail curling neatly around the leg of her chair. "I would not be so eager to wear that badge of honor too openly, not with the Headmaster's new directive hanging over the academy. Every one of us has been involved with the Congregation in some shape or form, or at the very least benefited from the traditions surrounding it, even the Headmaster himself, and though Blaise has never hidden his disdain for the institution, he has never confronted it quite as directly as he has this year."
Anton's expression softened into a thoughtful frown, and he inclined his head. "Alas, Miss Carnahan, you are quite right," he said. "I daresay the whole academy is caught somewhere between confusion and outrage, professors included. The last I heard, Professor Serfence, Professor Ashford, and Professor Kyar were unspeakably cross with the Headmaster, while the others have been more measured in their opinions, though even restraint cannot disguise displeasure forever."
"And what of you?" Carnahan asked, tilting her head as her lavender eyes narrowed with gentle scrutiny. "Where do you stand on the matter?"
Anton paused for a moment, one hand resting lightly against the edge of the counter. "Personally, I have always maintained that Headmaster Blaise is a man possessed of wisdom well beyond his years," he said at last. "Certainly, I do question his choice of friends from time to time, and I would be lying if I claimed not to have found some of his decisions rather questionable, but I do not question his leadership."
He drew in a quiet breath, then gave a small, rueful smile.
"I believe his decision will prove sensible in the long run," Anton continued. "At least, I hope it will."
Carnahan's expression softened, and the faintest smile touched her feline features as she looked at him with something close to fondness. "Wisdom is not lost on you either, Anton," she said. "In all honesty, when I heard Blaise had appointed you Caretaker, I could not think of a man better suited to carry the title."
Her gaze drifted briefly toward the shelves, and a scowl crept across her small feline features. "I always thought Creedy was a pitiful excuse for a groundskeeper, especially with the library falling into constant disrepair while he made excuses, dodged responsibilities, and somehow never had enough budget to fix anything properly. For the life of me, I could never understand where the money had gone until everything finally came out."
Her tail lashed once behind her, the motion quick and irritated.
"Selling Excalibur slaves, skimming the maintenance budgets, and pocketing stolen coin to fund his own personal indulgences," she continued, tightening with disgust. "To think that the madame at Le Soleil Levant knew him by name, and that his debauchery was paid for with money stolen from this academy, its students, and the people who trusted him to do his duty. How utterly appalling."
Anton bowed his head slightly, accepting the compliment and the anger behind it with equal grace. "You honor me," he said, before allowing a thoughtful sadness to soften his expression. "Yet the past remains the past, and there is little use in summoning the licentiousness of a man who is already in the midst of serving his time."
"I suppose that is true," Carnahan said, her irritation easing into a weary sigh. "Well, that unpleasant subject aside, would you care to give me an update on when my new shelves will be ready?"
Anton's expression changed just enough for her to notice, and the way he exhaled told her that the news would not be welcome. "Unfortunately, that is precisely why I am here," he said, folding his hands neatly before him. "I am afraid there will be an indefinite delay on your particular order."
Carnahan's ears angled forward.
"For you see," Anton continued, lowering his tone slightly as though the library itself might lean closer if he spoke too plainly, "our resident woodworker has been involved in a most unfortunate accident." He paused, looked around with theatrical caution, and leaned nearer to the counter. "And by accident, I mean the breaking-and-entering sort."
Carnahan's eyes widened. "Oh, dear. Is he alright?"
"No need for alarm. He is currently in Doctor Adani's care, along with his wife, while his son, thankfully, was unharmed," Anton said. "His wife suffered flesh wounds and heavy bruising, but nothing life-threatening, and by all accounts, she is expected to recover well enough."
Carnahan's gaze sharpened. "And Mister Mills?"
Anton's mouth pressed into a thin line, and for once, even his composure seemed touched by unease. "Mister Mills's wounds are not grievous in the sense that his life appears to be in danger, yet whoever attacked him made a ruin of his hand with extraordinary precision."
"By the Gods," Carnahan murmured, one paw lifting toward her chest.
"Doctor Adani believes magic can mend much of the injury," Anton said, "but whoever did this knew exactly where to inflict damage so that magic would not be able to restore the hand completely. Even with treatment, Mister Mills may require months, perhaps years, of physical therapy to regain the use of it, and that is assuming fortune proves kinder than the attacker was."
Carnahan stared at him, the full implication settling heavily between them.
Anton shook his head. "Tragic, really," he said softly, "given his trade."
"Any word on the identity of the perpetrators?" Carnahan asked. "And the intention? Certainly, the son would have seen the entire thing unfold."
"Evidently, from what little I heard from Professor Serfence and whatever connections he has to the Tower, the boy's far too traumatized to speak," he said. "But from the scene, it had looked like a simple robbery at first glance, given the increase in gang related activity in Caerleon," Anton paused. "But…"
"But?" Carnahan asked.
"He confided in me only as a matter of personal speculation, drawn from his years as an Auror," Anton continued as he leaned slightly nearer to the counter. "Nothing appears to have been taken from the home. His coin was left untouched, his possessions remained in place, and even several pieces of rather luxurious material in his workshop were ignored entirely."
Carnahan's ears angled forward, her lavender eyes narrowing with quiet interest.
"That would suggest," Anton went on, choosing each word with care, "and I stress again that this is merely speculation, that whoever attacked Mister Mills did not come for profit or opportunity. They came for him specifically, and given the nature of the injuries, the precision of the damage, and the sheer unpleasantness of the whole affair, one could almost say the matter was... personal."
"Personal?" Carnahan asked, one brow lifting as her tail curled slowly behind her chair. "That is rather odd. I know Mister Mills is not the most beloved man in Caerleon, especially given his vocal opinions on certain matters, but unpleasantness and prejudice are hardly rare enough in this city to invite such extreme retaliation on their own."
"Indeed," Anton replied, his expression settling into something graver. "Which is why Professor Serfence's speculation greatly troubles me. Evidently, and once more I say this as speculation rather than fact, there have long been rumors that Mister Mills served as an informant for Norsefire during the Siege."
Carnahan went very still.
"Of course, nothing was ever proven," Anton continued. "No charges were brought, no formal inquiry produced enough evidence to condemn him, and like many ugly things from those days, the story became one more whispered truth that everyone knew and no one could safely confirm. Yet one cannot help wondering whether someone, after all this time, finally decided that rumor was enough."
Carnahan gave a small shrug, though the breath that left her carried far more weariness than indifference. "By Freya," she murmured, her catlike pupils narrowing as they lifted to meet Anton's gaze. "It seems that with every passing day, we descend a little further into madness. It feels as though only yesterday one's greatest concern was something as simple and mundane as deciding what to put in the supper pot, and now we have gangs running amok through the streets, a city trembling on the edge of change, Avalon teetering toward all-out conflict, and both Headmaster Blaise and Lucian Graymark picking fights in places where restraint would have served them far better."
She pushed her tiny glasses higher upon her muzzle. "I fear we have taken the luxury of our comforts for granted, Anton, and now that the walls have begun to crack, everyone seems astonished that the wind has found its way inside."
"Indeed, we have, madam," Anton agreed. "Nevertheless, we continue forward, as we always have, and most importantly, we attend to those matters that fall within the proper confines of our responsibilities."
He reached up and twisted the curled end of his mustache. "The plain truth is that I am merely a groundskeeper, and you, despite the terrifying scope of your kingdom here, remain a librarian. Matters beyond these walls may concern us as citizens and as people of conscience, certainly, but they cannot be allowed to consume us completely, not when there are still floors to mend, shelves to build, records to keep, students to guide, and the ordinary machinery of the academy to preserve. It is not that we choose ignorance out of apathy, but rather that there are times when a carefully measured ignorance is the only thing standing between sanity and collapse."
"I suppose you are right," Carnahan said, shaking her head as some of the tension eased from her posture. "And at my age, any further stress would most certainly fade the colors from my fur at a rate far too alarming for my vanity to endure."
Anton's mouth curved with polite amusement, and Carnahan allowed herself a soft chuckle before her expression settled back into something more practical. "Jests aside, it would appear that we are in need of a new woodworker."
"Say no more, madam," Anton replied at once, inclining his head with professional assurance. "I am already sourcing alternatives as we speak, and surely there cannot possibly be only one competent woodworker in all of Caerleon."
He paused, then exhaled with a faint grimace. "Or perhaps there was not, before the whole sordid ordeal reduced the available pool of craftsmen rather more severely than any of us would have preferred."
Carnahan's tail flicked once, though whether in irritation or reluctant agreement was difficult to say.
"In any case," Anton continued, offering her a graceful bow, "I shall take my leave, madam. Please do not hesitate to reach out should you require any further assistance, whether regarding shelves, repairs, unruly students, or some fresh catastrophe that inevitably decides to present itself before luncheon."
"Likewise, Mister Buffer," Carnahan said with a dignified nod, the warmth in her eyes lingering despite her dry tone. "Do try not to let the castle fall apart before supper."
"I shall endeavor to disappoint disaster at every opportunity," Anton replied, before turning neatly on his heel and making his way toward the exit with the composed stride.
Carnahan watched him leave until he vanished beyond the rows of desks and shelves, then settled herself back into her chair beneath the softly humming crystal light. "Now," she murmured to herself, drawing the parchment back into place and reclaiming her quill with a practiced paw, "where was I?"
With that, the Head Librarian returned to her work, and the library resumed its ancient quiet around her as though the world beyond its walls had not grown any more troubled than it had been a moment before.
****
Godric made his way past rows upon rows of long desks and towering wooden shelves that lined the walls and stretched across the library floor, moving through the amber-lit quiet with the faint sense that the building itself was far older, deeper, and more watchful than any ordinary room had a right to be. Every now and then, his crimson eyes drifted across the spines of the books arranged neatly upon the shelves, taking in volumes as thin as a folded letter and others as thick as bricks, each bound in different colors, textures, and materials, from cracked leather and faded cloth to metal clasps, bone-white covers, and bindings that shimmered faintly beneath the crystal light. Some titles were written in languages he barely recognized, while others looked ancient enough that he half expected them to crumble into dust if curiosity ever drove him to pull them from the shelf and open them.
Rowena had once said that a person could spend an entire lifetime inside the Excalibur Library and still only scratch the surface of the knowledge hidden within it, and as Godric moved deeper through the endless shelves, he found himself believing her more with every step.
Even so, knowledge was not the only thing surrounding him.
He could still feel the eyes.
Students seated at their desks paused mid-sentence when he passed, their conversations lowering into whispers that followed him beneath the soft hum of the crystals overhead. Conversations shifted around him with the ease of water changing course, ordinary topics giving way to rumors, half-truths, admiration, speculation, and the strange hunger students had for stories about someone who was still alive to hear them.
Some spoke of the sword he carried on his back, of the blue-and-gold scabbard and the hilt that had become nearly as recognizable as his face, while others whispered fragments of his more tragic tale, tying his name to battles, bloodshed, loss, and victories that had grown larger in the telling. The first years were always the least subtle, asking questions with wide eyes and leaning forward to catch sight of him as though the Lion of Ignis or the Hero of Caerleon were not a tired third-year student searching for a book, but some legend from a tapestry that had stepped down into the halls and begun walking among them.
A part of Godric wondered if this was the life his Uncle Gareth had once lived in his youth.
Growing up in Dark's Hollow, all Godric had ever heard, learned, and known about his uncle came through stories told by villagers, old warriors, passing merchants, and people who spoke of Gareth Gryffindor with the reverence reserved for men who had left behind more deeds than explanations. They had spoken of his bravery, his skill with a blade, his stubbornness, his impossible victories, and his accomplishments, which often sounded less like real events and more like the kind of tall tales men invented beside fires when the night grew long and the ale ran low.
Yet as Godric walked through the library with his boots tapping softly against the polished marble floor, his thoughts began to sharpen around a realization he had never properly considered before. Everything he knew about Gareth began from the moment his uncle first came to Dark's Hollow, but almost nothing had ever been said about the life he had lived before that, about the halls he had walked, the people who had known him, the enemies he had made, or the kind of boy he had been before the world hardened him into the man everyone remembered.
Godric tapped his chin as the thought settled in, quiet but persistent, and for the first time the missing years of his uncle's life felt less like an absence and more like a door he had simply never thought to open.
It was then that he caught sight of a lonely row of desks near the far edge of the library.
The area was strangely empty compared to the rest of the floor, the surrounding chairs unoccupied and the nearby shelves wrapped in a stillness that felt almost intentional, as though the students had quietly agreed to avoid that corner without ever needing to say why. Godric raised an eyebrow, and sure enough, seated at the end of one of the desks was Salazar, tucked away near the rear of the library with exactly the sort of theatrical isolation Miss Carnahan had implied he favored.
Salazar sat slightly hunched over a large tome spread open before him, his posture composed but intent as one long finger moved carefully along the aged page. His lips shifted faintly as if he were reading the words to himself without sound, and after a moment he turned the page, the old parchment releasing a sharp, taut whisper that seemed louder in that abandoned corner than it should have been.
The book itself was enormous, its brown pages darkened by age and its binding worn by hands that had handled it long before either of them had been born, and beneath the warm glow of the library's crystal lights, Salazar looked less like a student finishing an assignment and more like someone consulting a relic he had no intention of explaining to anyone.
However, Godric's attention was soon drawn away from Salazar and toward something far more commanding that stood only a few paces behind him. It was less a door than a vault, immense and imposing, framed on either side by carved pillars whose sharp, immaculate designs gave them an almost gothic severity beneath the amber glow of the crystal lights.
The door itself was round and easily eight feet across, forged from carbon-dark steel that shimmered almost platinum where the light touched it, and its surface had been carved with figures whose identities seemed to belong to myth rather than history. Some wore armor, others flowing robes, and all of them were framed by aspects of the natural world, with trees, leaves, beasts, and mystical creatures twining around them in patterns so intricate that Godric suspected a person could spend hours studying the design and still miss half of its meaning.
Along the outer ring of the vault ran lines of runes that tugged faintly at his memory. Godric had seen similar markings before, though he scarcely understood what they meant, and Rowena had once explained that they were old Elvish, dating back to a time before the Calamity, before Avalon had become Avalon, when the world was still spoken of as an age of gods, monsters, and ancient powers whose names had either been forgotten or deliberately buried. The runes seemed to hold the light differently from the metal around them, not glowing exactly, but catching the eye with a quiet insistence that made them feel less like decoration and more like a warning written in a language only the dead still remembered fluently.
The vault was sealed tight, and everything about it seemed designed to discourage curiosity rather than invite it. According to academy rules, any student caught attempting to enter the Restricted Section would face immediate expulsion, without deliberation, leniency, or appeal, and that alone had done more to feed speculation than any official silence ever could. Generations of students had whispered that whatever lay behind those doors had to be dangerous enough to unmake careers, bloodlines, kingdoms, or perhaps even Avalon itself, because no school punished mere mischief with that kind of finality unless the mischief stood close to something truly catastrophic.
"I see that even the gallant Lion of Ignis cannot help but admire the sight of the forbidden," Salazar said, and Godric's gaze snapped back to him just in time to find those cool eyes already watching him over the edge of the open tome, a faint simper touching his mouth. "Or has your morbid curiosity already begun whispering sweetly in your ear?"
Salazar rested his head against one hand, his elbow propped upon the desk with the languid ease of someone far too pleased to have caught Godric staring.
"What? No, I mean..." Godric's eyes widened as he realized how quickly he had been caught, and he shook his head before stepping closer to the desk, one hand rising to rub awkwardly at the back of his head. "I was just looking, that's all. It's hard not to be astounded by something like that."
Salazar's simper deepened by the smallest degree. "How admirably innocent," he replied, his gaze drifting briefly toward the vault before returning to Godric. "One does hope the door appreciates being admired from a safe and legally permissible distance."
Godric removed his satchel from his shoulder and set it on the floor beside the desk before unfastening the sword from his back with practiced care, leaning it against the table. Once the weapon was settled safely within reach, he pulled out the chair across from Salazar and sat down, though his attention lingered on the vault for another moment before he finally looked back at his friend.
"It's just that everything I've ever heard about the Restricted Section has been nothing but rumors and hearsay," Godric said, lowering his words instinctively despite the distance between them and the rest of the library. "Forbidden spells, grimoires from lost ages, dark eldritch magic, and I don't even know what eldritch actually means."
"A direct definition would describe it as strange or unnatural, particularly in a manner that inspires fear," Salazar replied without hesitation. "In a more mythic and arcane sense, however, the term is often used to describe magic so ancient, obscure, and thoroughly forbidden that even the scholars of the Wandering Sea might quake and quiver at the mere mention of it."
His mouth curved into a faint smirk, his eyes glinting with the kind of curiosity that always made Godric wonder whether his friend's intelligence was a blessing, a danger, or some deeply inconvenient mixture of both. "Honestly, I find the idea of such magic rather fascinating."
Godric gave him a level stare from across the desk. "Speak for yourself, Salazar. If I could live the rest of my school years, or maybe even the rest of my life, without ever running into ancient forbidden magic that makes scholars tremble in their robes, I'd be perfectly content."
"As I have found myself so terribly familiar with saying," Salazar replied, allowing the pause to stretch just long enough to become smug, "where is the fun in that?"
Godric exhaled sharply, though the faint twitch at the corner of his mouth betrayed him before he could fully look annoyed.
Salazar's grin widened while his gaze settled more directly on Godric, the old tome resting open beneath one elegant hand as though he had already claimed temporary ownership over whatever secrets it contained. "That aside," he said, "what brings you to this hallowed hall of knowledge?"
He tilted his head, amusement sharpening faintly at the corner of his mouth.
"Certainly, it is not solely for the pleasure of my company."
"Well," Godric said, leaning forward with his forearms near the edge of the desk, "I was looking for a book on the Order of Seven, but imagine my surprise when I learned from Miss Carnahan that you'd beaten me to it."
A flicker of surprise crossed Salazar's face before it softened into a quiet chuckle, and he glanced down at the tome as if the coincidence amused him far more than it should have. "It would seem curiosity has gripped both of us since Professor Lotho's class," he replied. "And yes, I have been indulging in a bit of light reading, mostly in the hope of ridding myself of a rather nagging epiphany that seized me halfway through the lecture and refused to loosen its claws."
Godric raised an eyebrow. "And what have you learned?"
"First things first," Salazar said, flipping the pages back toward the front of the book with careful precision, mindful of the age-browned parchment beneath his fingers. "Let us begin with what we already know. The Order of Seven was a brotherhood of hedge knights who came together in the name of truth, justice, and honor, and their actions were instrumental in bringing an end to the Hundred Years War."
"Professor Lotho covered that part," Godric said, folding his arms as he leaned back slightly.
"Indeed, and with admirable brevity," Salazar replied. "In essence, after the war, the Order became synonymous with honor and chivalry throughout Avalon, less as a formal military institution and more as a living ideal that people could point to whenever they wished to remind themselves that nobility was meant to be more than bloodlines, land, and polished armor."
He tapped his chin, considering the comparison before continuing. "Think of them, perhaps, as Charlemagne and his Paladins, bound not merely by allegiance, but by a stringent code that governed what they fought for, what they refused to take, and what sort of men they were expected to remain once the sword was sheathed."
Godric's expression shifted with genuine interest. "So, the Order of Seven were more or less men of honor who lived by an unbreakable code."
"Precisely," Salazar said, flipping several pages ahead before turning the book slightly so Godric could see. "And this is where the matter becomes far more interesting."
Godric leaned in, his crimson eyes settling on the drawn emblems inked across the page, each one carefully rendered with old pigments that had faded but not lost their dignity. There were shields, beasts, colors, and inscriptions arranged with almost ceremonial care, and even before Salazar explained them, Godric could feel the old weight of the Order pressing through the parchment.
"Over the years, there have been many members and many leaders," Salazar continued, pointing to the page with one long finger, "but the number remains consistent. Seven knights. Seven individuals. Each one represented by a color and a beast, though the assignment appears to shift from generation to generation depending on the knight, the era, and perhaps whatever symbolism the Order deemed appropriate at the time."
He tapped the first line. "The colors listed here are blue, black, gray, gold, green, white, and, of course, red. As for the beasts, they are the wolf, the stag, the falcon, the dragon, the bear, the dove, and, naturally, the lion."
Godric's gaze lingered on the lion emblem longer than he intended.
"The colors and beasts may change from knight to knight," Salazar said, watching him notice it, "but the emblems themselves appear to endure as part of the Order's identity. A curious mixture of tradition and adaptability, one might say, which is far more sophisticated than most romantic tales would have us believe."
"That's actually pretty interesting," Godric admitted, tapping his chin as a small smile crept across his face. "If they were still around, I'd be half tempted to join them."
Salazar chuckled, his eyes briefly moving toward the sword leaning against the table. "Considering your preferred color and your increasingly unavoidable moniker, I daresay you would fit rather comfortably among their number."
Godric gave him a look, though the smile remained.
Salazar cleared his throat with exaggerated dignity before turning a few more pages. "As knights, they also had squires, and from what I can gather, they often traveled in pairs. In the aftermath of the war and the decades that followed, all seven knights and their squires traversed Avalon in service of those who required aid, whether that meant defending settlements, settling disputes, hunting beasts, escorting refugees, or answering pleas from villages too poor to afford mercenaries and too insignificant to command the attention of noble houses."
His expression shifted into open discomfort as he read further down the page.
"It says here," Salazar continued, tapping a written line with visible distaste, "that their code of honor forbade them from claiming wealth, land, titles, or even ordinary recompense for their service. Food and board could be accepted, but nothing extravagant, and any gift deemed excessive was to be refused or redirected toward those in greater need."
He rolled his eyes with such theatrical suffering that Godric nearly laughed.
"Honestly, such uncompromising virtue hurts me on a spiritual level."
Godric chuckled quietly to himself, though there was affection beneath the sound.
"Sounds a lot like my Uncle Gareth, actually. I can't even remember how many times he turned down bags of gold from people who wanted to repay him, and half the time he had to be thoroughly convinced just to take home a large cut of roast after saving someone's farm, family, or whole village from whatever nightmare had wandered too close."
Salazar's amusement faded just enough to become thoughtful as he looked from the page to Godric, and although he said nothing immediately, the silence suggested that the connection had not escaped him either.
"Anything about how they decided who took up the mantle?" Godric asked, his attention sharpening as he leaned closer to the open tome. "Their hierarchy, perhaps, or even where they gathered?"
"Easy, dear friend," Salazar said, raising one hand with faint amusement as though restraining a hound that had caught too strong a scent. "One question at a time, if you please."
He turned the pages with careful patience, his fingers moving over the aged parchment until he found the section he wanted, and then his eyes narrowed slightly as the text arranged itself into something useful.
"Ah, here we are," he said, tapping a paragraph near the middle of the page. "According to this, new members were typically chosen through nomination and vote. In simpler terms, an existing knight would present a candidate before the Order, speak on their behalf, and once the others had deliberated, the candidate would either be accepted into their number or quietly left outside the legend."
Godric's brow furrowed with interest. "So, someone already inside had to bring you in."
"Precisely," Salazar replied, his finger sliding down the page as he continued reading. "It was not a matter of walking up to them with a shining sword, noble intentions, and an intolerably heroic jawline. One had to be recognized, sponsored, and judged worthy by those already bound to the code."
Godric gave him a flat look, though the corner of his mouth twitched despite himself.
"As for hierarchy," Salazar continued, ignoring the look with obvious satisfaction, "they did not appear to maintain a rigid structure in the conventional sense, though they did elect a Master from among their ranks, someone who served as the Order's guiding authority, rather like a Lord Commander, if one were inclined to borrow from more militaristic terminology."
His gaze moved further down the text, and the faintest hint of disappointment touched his expression.
"Their headquarters, however, is far less helpful. Allegedly, they gathered in a secret location known only to members of the Order and their squires, which is precisely the sort of maddeningly dramatic answer one expects from men who wore symbols, traveled in sevens, and built their entire identity around chivalric mystery."
Godric sat still for a moment, crossing his arms while one finger tapped thoughtfully against his sleeve. The more Salazar read, the less the Order felt like a romantic tale from old history and the more it felt like something that had once breathed, judged, fought, and vanished with far too many unanswered questions left behind. "Still," he said after a moment, his gaze settling on the page, "to think they disbanded after all that."
His crimson eyes lifted to Salazar.
"Does the book say how or why?"
Salazar shook his head, though there was a subtle tension in his expression now. "Professor Lotho mentioned that no one knows the true reason, and unfortunately, this volume is no more forthcoming."
He pointed again to the page, his tone growing more thoughtful. "It does not even provide an exact date. It merely states that the Order ceased to appear in public record, ceased to answer petitions, and ceased to be referenced in official correspondence, as though one day seven of Avalon's most revered knights simply stepped off the road and allowed history to continue without them."
Godric's frown deepened. "And when was that?"
"The estimate places their disappearance nearly a decade ago," Salazar replied, his eyes lingering on the line as though he disliked the uncertainty. "Close enough to living memory that there should be witnesses, records, rumors, something more substantial than a dignified absence."
A quiet settled between them, broken only by the low hum of the crystals overhead and the faint whisper of students turning pages elsewhere in the library.
"However," Salazar said at last, drawing Godric's attention back to him, "it is not the Order itself that has been of great interest to me."
Godric looked up fully. "Then what is?"
Salazar's fingers rested against the edge of the tome, his expression shifting into something more intent as he turned one page back and stopped beside a particular name written beneath a faded red emblem.
"Rather, it is the mention of one particular member," he said, his tone lowering with the satisfaction of someone finally revealing the shape of his suspicion. "Arslan the Red."