ShadowBound: The Need For Power

The Magic Department was almost deserted by the time Liam reached it.

Compared to the dining hall’s restless noise and the tense quiet of Tactical Espionage, the department felt strangely hollow at that hour. Most of the day’s lessons had already ended, and whatever students remained were either leaving late, collecting forgotten materials, or passing through on their way to another part of the academy.

The lamps along the walls had already brightened for evening, casting steady light over polished stone floors and tall archways marked with department sigils. Doors that had been open during lesson hours were now closed. A few students moved in the distance, their voices low and fading quickly through the branching halls. It was not empty enough to feel abandoned, but it was close enough that footsteps carried farther than they should.

Among the few students still there, Lucian Kellor walked calmly down the corridor leading away from the Earth Magic classrooms.

He had light brown hair that fell neatly around his face, though a few strands had loosened from whatever order he had forced into them earlier that morning. His brown eyes were lowered slightly, attention turned inward as he walked with a book tucked under one arm and a narrow folder held in the other hand.

His uniform was neat, his posture composed, and nothing about him suggested he expected trouble. He looked like any second-year heading back to his dorm after the final lesson of the day, tired enough to want the day over but disciplined enough not to drag his feet.

Then he looked ahead.

A figure was walking toward him from the opposite end of the corridor.

Lucian slowed without meaning to.

Liam Hunter.

Of all the people to appear in the Magic Department at this hour, Liam was one of the last Lucian expected to see. He had never been someone who wandered this side of the academy, especially not after classes had ended. He had Fire Magic, yes, but that was earlier in the day. By now, there was no obvious reason for him to be here.

Lucian’s first thought was simple and immediate.

’Why him?’

The second was worse.

’Why now?’

Liam approached with the same calm pace he always carried, though the cold outside still clung to him in small signs. His coat shifted slightly as he walked, and there was a faint trace of irritation around him that had not been present during lunch.

He looked like someone who had crossed the open grounds in weather he personally considered offensive and had found the world guilty for it. When his red eyes settled on Lucian, his mood seemed to tighten further, not dramatically, but enough that Lucian felt the air between them change.

Liam stopped first.

Lucian stopped because continuing forward would have meant walking directly into him.

Seven feet remained between them.

Liam looked at him and said, "Time-saving."

Lucian stared. "What?"

For a moment, he wondered if Liam was even speaking to him. The word had come out too flat, too detached, and too strange without context. Liam’s gaze remained fixed on him, though, and that made the answer obvious. Lucian watched as Liam gave his coat a slight shake, as if trying to dislodge the last bite of cold air from the fabric.

Liam then spoke again. "I am glad I ran into you directly. You saved me a lot of time."

Lucian’s confusion hardened quickly into annoyance. He adjusted his hold on the folder beneath his arm and looked Liam over with guarded eyes. "What are you talking about?"

"I need to speak with you."

Lucian’s brows drew together. "Since when do you want to speak with me?"

"Since today."

"That does not answer anything."

"It answers your question."

Lucian’s eyes narrowed.

The irritation in him sharpened. This was Liam Hunter, the same person who had never spoken to him after Vlardia, not in public, not in private, not even with the kind of empty acknowledgment students sometimes exchanged when shared danger forced their names into the same story.

They had been in the same assessment. They had fought an Advanced Horror demon together. They had survived something that should have created at least a sliver of continued contact afterward. But Liam had never reached out. Never asked anything. Never shown interest.

And now he was standing in front of Lucian at the end of the day, in a nearly empty Magic Department corridor, speaking as if Lucian had been an errand he had finally caught.

Like hell he was going to entertain that.

Lucian’s voice turned colder. "I am not interested in whatever you have going on. Leave me alone."

He moved.

Lucian stepped past Liam, resuming his walk as if the conversation had ended because he decided it had. His shoulder did not touch Liam’s, but the distance between them tightened as he passed. For a few steps, nothing happened. Lucian kept walking, forcing himself not to glance back too soon, though every instinct in him told him Liam was still watching.

Behind him, Liam stared ahead for a moment.

Then he sighed.

It was a small sound, but in the quiet corridor, it carried.

Liam had expected this to take only a few moments. He had thought Edith’s information would allow him to approach directly, press once, receive what he needed, and leave before the cold outside became an even greater annoyance. Apparently, Lucian had chosen to make the matter less convenient.

When Liam spoke again, his voice had changed.

It was still controlled, still low, but the calm he had used at first had sharpened into something colder. "You would like to reconsider those words before others find out the real reason you are still beside Chris after all this time."

Lucian stopped.

The folder under his arm shifted slightly.

For a second, he did not turn. He only stood there in the corridor, back partly to Liam, body too still. Then, slowly, he looked over his shoulder. Liam was still facing him, his expression detached, red eyes steady and unreadable beneath the corridor lamps.

"What?" Lucian asked.

The word came out wrong.

Too quick. Too exposed.

Lucian heard it himself and hated it immediately. He turned more fully toward Liam, forcing his face back into order before the crack in his composure could spread. His mind moved fast, trying to understand the shape of the threat without letting it show. Liam knew something. Or he wanted Lucian to believe he did. Either way, panic would only confirm too much.

"If this is you trying to threaten me with some false rumor," Lucian said, his voice steadier now, "then go ahead. But you should know that false accusation is taken seriously under academy rules."

Liam’s expression did not change.

Not once.

That made Lucian’s words feel weaker than he wanted them to.

For a short moment, Liam only looked at him. Then he said, "Cut the tough-guy time-wasting act."

Lucian’s jaw tightened.

"I will get straight to the point because I have no time to be out here this long," Liam continued. "I want you to tell me what Chris has been doing recently. Specifically, I want to know if he is still being a pain and trying to sabotage Sheila."

Lucian stared at him.

The question was direct enough to be absurd. No attempt to soften it. No indirect approach. No pretending this was some harmless curiosity between classmates. Liam had walked into the Magic Department after class, waited until they were nearly alone, and demanded information about Chris.

Lucian forced himself to hold his ground.

"What makes you think I would tell you anything about what Chris has been doing?" he asked.

Liam stared at him with an irritated, judgmental look, as though Lucian had just said something impressively stupid. Then he sighed and muttered under his breath, "Such a sentient inconvenience you are."

Lucian frowned. "What did you just—"

"You do not seem to understand that you have no choice here," Liam said aloud, cutting him off. "If I do not get what I want, everyone will find out that Lucian Kellor is the son of a barely mid-class noble house buried in generation-ending debt, still tagging along with the Tempest prince in the hope that his worn-out, disgraceful family can receive aid."

The words struck the corridor like a blade drawn slowly across glass.

Lucian’s world seemed to fracture in an instant.

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