It came back all at once.
A bright light and a white ceiling. The sharp scent of healing potions and fresh linen.
The Hospital Wing.
Rowan blinked, trying to focus. Every part of him ached in a way that had nothing to do with physical injury. His magical core felt enormous. Swollen, raw, like a muscle that had been stretched far beyond its normal range and was only now beginning to settle into its new shape.
He tried to sit up and managed it, barely. His arms trembled with the effort.
"Oh, good. You're awake."
A woman in healer's robes approached his bedside. She was middle-aged, with capable hands and sharp dark eyes that assessed him with quiet efficiency. A badge on her robes bore the name Noreen Blainey, Head Healer.
"How long was I out?" Rowan asked. His voice came out rough, barely above a whisper.
"Twenty-four hours. One of your dormitory mates, Hector Fawley, found you on the bathroom floor yesterday morning and carried you here himself." Blainey checked a diagnostic charm, frowning slightly at whatever it showed her. "You gave everyone quite a fright, Mr. Ashcroft. Magical exhaustion severe enough to render you unconscious for a full day is rare in students your age."
Hector had carried him. Not levitated him, not called for help first. Picked him up and carried him.
Rowan filed that away, and found it wouldn't stay filed.
"What happened to me?"
"That's rather what I was hoping you could tell me." Blainey's tone was patient but firm. "Your magical core is showing signs of significant expansion. Dramatic expansion. The kind of change we normally associate with major magical trauma or—" She paused, choosing her words carefully. "—deliberate intervention."
Rowan said nothing.
Blainey studied him for a moment, then pulled up a chair and sat down beside his bed. "I'm here to make sure you're not dead, Mr. Ashcroft, and right now you're alive and your core is stabilizing, which is the best possible outcome given what I'm seeing. But I need to understand what happened so I can monitor you properly."
"I was studying," Rowan said. "A theory I found in the restricted section. I think I pushed too hard."
It was vague enough to be plausible. Blainey didn't look entirely convinced, but she didn't press.
"All right. We'll revisit that when you're feeling better." She made a note on her clipboard. "For now, you need rest. Fluids. And I'm going to run monitoring charms every two hours to track your core stabilization."
Rowan nodded. He was about to ask when visiting hours were when the door to the Hospital Wing burst open.
Iris.
She was still in her school robes, her hair disheveled, her eyes red-rimmed. She spotted him immediately and crossed the room in quick strides.
"You promised."
The words came out raw. Angry and relieved and hurt all at once.
Rowan opened his mouth. Closed it. There was nothing to say to that. She was right.
"You promised you'd tell me before you did anything reckless. You looked me in the eye and promised."
"Iris—"
"You've been unconscious for a day," she continued, her voice shaking now. "A full day, Rowan. Hector found you collapsed on the bathroom floor and had to carry you here because you wouldn't respond to Rennervate. Do you have any idea—" She stopped. Took a breath. Her hands were gripping the edge of his bedpost hard enough to whiten her knuckles. "What happened?"
Blainey, reading the room with the practiced ease of someone who'd seen this scene a hundred times, quietly excused herself and moved to the other end of the wing.
Rowan looked at Iris. At the fear she was barely holding back, the anger underneath it, the stubborn refusal to cry that was so characteristically her.
"I found what was in the centaurs' box," he said.
He told her everything. The Spore Scrolls. The fungus. The stabilizer potion. The decision to drink it, alone, in the bathroom, at half past eleven on a Friday night.
He didn't edit it. Didn't shape the order or soften the edges. He just told her.
Iris listened without interrupting. Her expression shifted through several stages: shock, disbelief, a brief flash of fury, and then a complicated quiet that Rowan couldn't quite name.
When he finished, she was silent for a long time.
"You could have died," she said finally.
"I know."
"You knew that going in, and you did it anyway."
"Yes."
"Alone. Without telling anyone." Her voice was very quiet. "Without telling me."
Rowan didn't reach for an answer. Didn't deflect. He let the silence sit.
"Yes," he said. "I did."
She met his eyes. The fury was still there, but underneath it, relief. The raw kind that comes after genuine fear.
"Did it work?" she asked, after a moment.
Rowan held out his hand and cast a simple Lumos.
The light that erupted from his wand was blinding. He cut it off immediately, squinting against the afterimage, and heard Iris's sharp intake of breath.
"That was a Lumos," he said quietly.
"That was not a normal Lumos."
"No. It wasn't."
They sat with that for a moment.
"Your core expanded," Iris said. It wasn't a question.
"Significantly. Blainey said the readings are far beyond normal for my age."
Iris was quiet again, processing. Then: "You need to be careful. With how much power you're putting into things. Until you adjust."
"I know. I felt it when I woke up. Everything feels amplified. I'll need to recalibrate."
"Good." She leaned back in her chair, some of the tension leaving her shoulders. Then, quieter: "Next time you decide to fundamentally alter your magical core, you tell me first."
"Next time I fundamentally alter my magical core, I'll tell you first."
"There won't be a next time."
"There won't be a next time," he agreed.
And this time, he meant it.