It feels having you this close.

  Not in the poetic sense books use, but in that other one, more physical, more real: the kind where the path feels longer because your presence weighs on me. Every step we take together falls with an almost identical rhythm, as if we shared an invisible cadence. You move like I do, but not entirely. There is something crooked in the way you walk, a completely deliberate lack of correction, as if you refuse to fit in even when you could do so effortlessly.

  I glance at you from the corner of my eye, and I see a reflection of myself.

  A distorted one. Hunched. With dark circles heavy with bad temper, shoulders tense as if always expecting a blow, slack when you are bored. And that smell of yours. Old nicotine, persistent, embedded in the fabric of your worn clothes. Will there ever be a single damn day when you don’t smell like an ashtray? It’s impossible to ignore. It’s impossible not to notice you.

  And yet.

  There is something about you that I admire, even if it irritates me with every fiber of my being to admit it, even if it makes me want to grind my teeth until they break.

  Your honesty. Your freedom. You say what you want, when you want, to whoever you want. You don’t calculate. You don’t measure. You don’t soften anything!

  You probably don’t even bother to think whether you should think. If you end up displeasing others, not only do you not care: you keep walking as if nothing happened. As if the world were optional background noise.

  Do you even have the slightest idea of the scandal that would erupt if I did what you do every single day?

  If I insulted someone in public, if I let a single word slip out of place…

  Gods.

  Of course in private I curse.

  I curse every paparazzi who points a camera at me for their mediocre magazines, every stupid journalist who thinks they know me because of a decorated headline. I curse the members of the other three houses, shamelessly comparing me to their mediocre heirs, inflated by surname and empty of real talent. But that stays between walls. Always between marble walls.

  You don’t have walls. You have windows.

  You stink of smoke.

  Your smell disgusts me.

  You have an unbearable temper.

  You are the only person I have met in my short life who has never called me by my surname, not even my name.

  I want to break your face when you beat me and dedicate that arrogant, crooked smile to me, as if the whole world were a private joke you have VIP access to. I want to return every victory with mockery, point at you with my index finger when I beat you in front of everyone, laugh in your face and say it out loud, shamelessly: that I am the best. Number one. That there is no possible argument about it.

  I can't control you, can I?

  You don’t care about being disliked.

  Or making people uncomfortable. Or provoking.

  In fact, I suspect you truly enjoy it. That as long as you manage to anger the other person, it is already a victory for you.

  You are so strange.

  You are also terrible at hiding things.

  Awful. Lamentable. Pathétique. The worst of the worst of the worst of the worst!

  I already saw who you text. You tried to hide it by covering the screen several times. You think it doesn’t show, but you are as subtle as the rehearsed smile of a politician in the middle of an electoral campaign. Your quick fingers betray you before your furrowed face does. Your attention fractures at the exact second you read her name again.

  You care about her, don’t you? She’s the one who makes you falter and suddenly become anxious. Softer. With me you are not like that. You insult me, I insult you. With her you are gentle, with me rough. Our hugs are blows, our “good mornings” are a discreetly raised middle fingers.

  Why are you walking with me? Go with her if you are so miserable in her absence. Don’t be more of an idiot than you already are, don’t pity me. I never asked for your help, nor do I need it. But, when you gave me that note in the courtyard offering to go to the terrace with me, I wanted… I wanted…to...

  “Are you going to writing to your baker girl, or at some point do you plan to look ahead?” Miria commented with carefully feigned lightness, the kind she used when she wanted to poke without admitting it.

  Feralynn snorted in annoyance.

  “Shut up. Stay out of it.”

  The third-floor hallway was empty except for the two of them. The calm winter afternoon light entered at an angle through the tall windows, filtering like silver dust stretching across the stone floor. The shadows were long, patient, as if the castle itself were staying still to watch them pass.

  Feralynn walked with one hand buried in the pocket of her black hoodie and the other busy with a task that seemed to absorb her completely: writing messages. She slid her thumb clumsily over the mirrorphone, checking again and again whether Annya had replied. Nothing. She wrote again. Deleted. Rewrote. Called. Waited. The device vibrated only with her own anxiety, as if it were mocking her.

  Miria advanced at her side, watching her from the corner of her eye, with a crooked smile that could not entirely hide her amusement.

  “Oh, come on,” she continued, clearly entertained. “I’ve never seen you this nervous about something. It’s almost… adorable.”

  “I said. Shut. Up.”

  Miria let out a brief laugh, satisfied, like someone who had achieved exactly the reaction she wanted. She took a couple more steps and frowned, this time with a different, more practical interest.

  “By the way,” she added, gesturing with her gaze, “why aren’t you wearing the uniform?”

  Feralynn lowered her eyes to her clothes as if only at that moment noticing the obvious.

  “Ah… well, uh, because classes are already over,” she replied after a minimal pause, shrugging. “It’s not like I’m breaking a rule or anything.”

  The lie was clumsy. Improvised. But it was much better than mentioning an “accidental” fire, the sprinklers soaking everything, or the silent sentencing stare of the headmistress drilling into the back of her neck.

  Miria watched her in silence for a few seconds, evaluating her. She knew how to recognize a poorly constructed evasion when she saw one from her own experience; she also knew when insisting was completely useless. She let the subject pass. Even so, another question, more persistent, slipped back into her mind.

  Why was Feralynn accompanying her in her punishment?

  Sorting hundreds of books wasn't an appealing plan for anyone in their right mind. It had no glory, no points, no spectators cheering you on. And yet there she was, walking at her side as if it were a casual weekend stroll.

  They arrived in front of the great doors of the library. Miria stopped. Feralynn, distracted checking her phone again, was about to walk past.

  Miria reached out and tugged her hoodie with measured brusqueness.

  “Hey, let go! I’m not your stupid dog on a leash.”

  You wish you were.

  “We’re here, idiot,” she said in a flat voice, releasing her immediately. “You were about to pass it.”

  They remained in front of the door a few seconds longer. Heavy. Unnecessary. For some reason difficult to identify, the idea of sharing a moment alone in a silent place caused an uncomfortable tingling at Miria’s fingertips. Feralynn arched a brow upon noticing that sudden shift in her usually refined posture.

  She shared that feeling.

  A shiver ran over Miria’s skin, raising goosebumps. She took a deep breath before pushing the large doors open with both hands, not realizing that she wasn't simply entering another room.

  Stillness.

  Serenity.

  The enormous school library invited them to isolate themselves from the entire world. If the enchanted books barely made a sound when returning to their shelves on their own, now, scattered and asleep everywhere after the students’ use, everything became intimate in a sweetly torturous way. Every step echoed more than expected. Every movement felt like it would be crucial.

  Feralynn lowered her gaze. She sighed in defeat over Annya, since now it was time to fulfill her part of the deal with Smiley.

  Let’s just get this over with quickly. I can’t stand these places.

  At the center, behind a circular desk polished by centuries, sat the elderly goblin, guardian for decades of the Academy’s arcane knowledge. His greenish skin had the dull tone of someone who had spent more time among pages than under sunlight. His long ears twitched slightly when he sensed them enter, and he looked up at them over tiny glasses resting at the tip of his nose.

  He looks like a dried olive, heh.

  Feralynn thought, narrowing her eyes in fun at the goblin’s tired gaze.

  When they approached, he received them, already aware of the punishment given to the young noble.

  “Good afternoon, Miss Frostweaver,” said the goblin with impeccable politeness, without needing to raise his voice. His tone was soft, polished by years of dealing with academic life. “Your catalyst gloves, please.”

  Miria searched in her pockets and handed them over with an automatic gesture, elegant even in its mechanics, as if her body remembered the protocol even when her mind was elsewhere. She placed them on the ancient wooden desk, aligning them carefully. The goblin observed them a second longer than necessary, nodded in satisfaction, and then turned his attention to the other girl.

  “And yours as well, young lady.”

  Feralynn tilted her head slightly, as if the question amused her more than it obligated her. She sketched a crooked smile, loaded with that juvenile arrogance she didn't know how to disguise even when it was convenient.

  “Don’t need 'em.” She pointed at herself with her thumb. “I’m a prodigy.”

  The goblin blinked slowly once without moving a single wrinkle on his face.

  “She is,” Miria intervened with impeccable calm, “although calling someone a prodigy who only knows how to set things on fire is… quite generous.”

  “Gah–!”

  "What's the matter, prodigy? Can't cast?"

  Younglings...

  She offered her a refined smile, perfectly polite, the kind that does not raise its voice nor change its tone, yet still makes it clear who won the conversation. A smile designed to dismantle any reply before it could even form.

  You might be reading a pirated copy. Look for the official release to support the author.

  Feralynn frowned, far more than annoyed. The gesture was instant, childish. She opened her mouth to respond, to return the blow somehow however ineptly, but Miria had already turned halfway and was advancing into the interior of the library with her chin high, steps steady, posture impeccable. A small victory, yes, but a victory nonetheless. Noble. Silent. Polished like her.

  “Fuck you…” she muttered through clenched teeth, flushed.

  “I will be watching you from here,” announced the goblin, settling into his chair with a slight controlled creak. “Any damage to the books will have consequences, young ladies.”

  Then he lowered his gaze back to his reading with absolute naturalness, and it became immediately clear that “watching” was an ambiguous term. As long as they didn't make too much noise, or burn anything, they would be fine.

  “Whatever…” Fer snorted, rolling her eyes and following Miria’s pace. “H-Hey, Frosty, wait up!”

  She ran, but her figure dissolved among tables and shelves.

  A labyrinth, without a doubt. Feralynn had not been here many times, only when she accompanied Annya. The memory of what happened afterward that day made her shake her head.

  “Frosty? Shit… How doesn't she get lost?”

  Perhaps centuries ago they had enchanted the place so it would grow as you explored it, because the more they walked through the corridors, the longer they seemed to become. You lifted your gaze and lost it among shelves filled with knowledge.

  She should have asked Rose for a map. Surely she would have one.

  Better focus on keeping up with her, although first she had to find her.

  “Hurry up,” Miria’s voice echoed, hidden among the shelves. “I trust you don’t need me to guide you by the hand like a little girl.” she let out a short giggle. “Or do you?”

  Before Feralynn could even growl a reply, she heard the soft brushing sound of a pair of books being pulled out beside her. The space between the spines opened just enough to reveal Miria’s face on the other side.

  She was smiling at her.

  Not an open or kind smile, but a small, mischievous one, clearly satisfied with having provoked her. There was in her expression an almost childish lightness, the silent delight of someone who knows she has pricked exactly where she should without needing a rapier.

  Feralynn clicked her tongue and answered instantly: she lowered her lower eyelid with her middle finger and stuck her tongue out at her without the slightest shame, exaggerating the gesture with deliberate brazenness.

  Miria, however, didn't take long to notice it. Because, despite the insult, despite the rude gesture, there was a minimal betrayal on Fer’s face: a barely perceptible curve rising at the corner of her mouth.

  And that, more than the gesture, was what betrayed her amusement.

  …

  …

  …

  The two of them began to arrange the books used by the students. They picked up volumes half-open on the tables, forgotten bookmarks, pages bent without any respect. It was just the two of them. The rest of the students had already gone home or to their respective clubs, pursuing louder interests.

  Those who entered did so without much fuss. They left or retrieved a book, received the goblin’s silent approval as he recorded each movement with ancestral efficiency, and departed without breaking the calm.

  They said nothing to each other.

  Nor could they think of anything to say.

  Miria glanced sideways more than she would like to admit. She did it almost without realizing. For a second she lost herself in Feralynn’s serene profile, in those red eyes that seemed to absorb light rather than reflect it, like extinguished embers that never quite cooled.

  She immediately shook her head, breathing deeply, forcing herself to focus on the task in front of her.

  Feralynn, for her part, was far away. Very far in her mind. She was thinking about the woman with the eyepatch. About the cinema. About that persistent feeling of having seen something that didn't quite fit in her memory. About how that woman knew her father. About how, in some unsettling way, she seemed to know her too.

  “Where did I see you before?” she murmured, as her hands brushed over the page of an open book, tracing caresses over the silhouette of a shadow with golden eyes. “Was that a dream…?”

  Who are you, really?

  What do you want from me?

  While they were arranging the books, Miria realized something uncomfortable: it was the first time they were together without duels, without shared strategies, without plans to sabotage the competition and earn points toward the vacant spots in the Elemental Tournament. There was no audience watching. No silent bets. There wasn'thing to win or lose.

  Just them. And the silence.

  Miria placed a thick tome on the correct shelf, making sure the spine was aligned with the others following the order of the volumes. She cleared her throat, testing the air.

  “It has been an intense week with the studies, hasn’t it?”

  “Hm.”

  “Everyone is quite distracted by the dance.”

  Nervous giggle. Dry response.

  “Mhm.”

  “Hey, Blackwood–”

  “Why are you so tense? You’re not usually like this.” Feralynn asked suddenly, breaking the ice of her thoughts without even looking at her. “Stop staring at me so much.”

  Miria cleared her throat, straightening her back, recovering her noble composure as one puts on a familiar mask.

  “I’m just concentrating.”

  Fer snorted, with a brief sarcastic laugh.

  “On me? Gods, how sweet.”

  “W-What?! Of course not, idiot.”

  Liar. She tried to force conversation, more out of genuine interest than to break the discomfort.

  “Blackwood.”

  “Hm.”

  Can you- UGH! Gods, could you not answer me like that?!

  WHY ARE YOU ANSWERING LIKE THAT?! DO YOU THINK YOU'RE SO MATURE AND COOL?! IS THAT IT?!

  "Tsk!"

  When she calmed down by taking a deep breath, she tried again.

  "Ahem. Tell me, do you enjoy… reading?”

  “Uuuhhh… yeah, kinda. Only things with pictures like comics and manga.” Fer answered without the slightest shame, carrying a stack of books against her chest. “Stories without images are boring.”

  Miria sighed, carrying a pile with both hands. It wasn't an exaggerated sigh, just a light one, almost indulgent.

  “I expected that from a cavewoman like you.”

  “Manga is literature too~” Fer sing-songed, smiling sideways.

  "Seriously, what do you see in them? They are...childish."

  "WHAT?!", because of her shout they heard the goblin telling them to keep quiet. "What do you mean they are childish?!" Fer now whispered, heartbroken. "They are so fucking cool!"

  "Uh-huh..."

  Why are their breasts so big? Yuck.

  Fer then she groaned in frustration when they moved on to the next table full of disordered books. “Damn it, if I didn’t only know how to make fire, I would have already arranged everything with magic and we’d be going home.”

  “Wow, and help me cheat in my own punishment? It shows how much you love me.”

  Be careful what you wish for.

  “Heh, not even in my dreams would I do it for you.”

  “Then why are you here?”

  The question came out in a softer voice than usual. Fer didn't need to turn her head to feel that Miria was looking at her, expectant for a genuine answer.

  “...Because I want to.”

  Because I saw you sad today. Because I need to forget the disaster I am, even if only for a little while.

  The answer came without harshness, but without openness either. Miria blinked once, processing it, and kept working.

  She realized then something that unsettled her more than she expected. With Annya, Feralynn talked. A lot. She laughed easily, explained things with wide gestures, even took the time to repeat them if necessary. Her voice changed rhythm, changed volume.

  With her, no. With her it was fragments. Monosyllables. Pauses as large as a glacier. The flame on the stove changed.

  Miria took another book, blew on it delicately to remove invisible dust, and tried again.

  “I suppose theoretical subjects must have left you exhausted.”

  “Nah. A bit.”

  She nodded, as if that answer were enough to sustain the conversation. It wasn't.

  “I was reviewing the syllabi last night,” she continued, measuring each word. “Advanced Conjuration Theory is particularly—”

  “Dense.”

  Miria closed her lips. Breathed through her nose.

  “Y-Yes,” she conceded. “Exactly. Precisely… dense.”

  She moved a few steps farther, climbed one rung of the ladder and placed several books in their proper spots. From up there, she spoke again, without looking at her directly.

  “So… how have you been, Blackwood? I mean, in general.”

  Fer took a second longer to respond. Too long. Miria noticed.

  “Uuuhh… fine? I guess. I think.” She paused briefly, as if only then remembering something relevant. “Bleeding out. And you?”

  Miria almost lost her balance on the ladder from the laugh she tried to stifle with a hand over her mouth. What kind of girl jokes about her own accident like that?! She pressed her fingers against the edge of the wood, composing herself before lowering her gaze toward her with a mixture of confusion and relief.

  “I meant… emotionally,” she clarified with forced patience. “How have you been emotionally speaking.”

  “Ah.” Fer thought about it. She really thought about it. “Also, bleeding out.”

  Miria’s soft exhale was heard as she stepped down a rung, catching the other girl’s smile.

  You're such a weirdo.

  “Do you… do you like this castle?” she asked, changing angle. “I mean, it’s different for someone who didn’t grow up in—”

  “It’s big.”

  “…yes.”

  “And it echoes!”

  Feralynn didn't wait for any confirmation. She gave a sharp, brutal clap with hands hardened by a life forged in combat. The sound exploded in the air and spread through the corridor of shelves like a cannon firing, bouncing against wood, multiplying until it was lost among the high arches of the ceiling.

  A second later, from the central desk, came the inevitable response.

  “Shhh!”

  The goblin’s reprimand was brief, tired, but firm, traveling back along the same path as the uproar.

  Miria gasped without being able to stop herself and closed her eyes for an instant, the startle running up her spine like a cold discharge. Her delicate pale hands gripped the edge of the ladder before she could think, and she shrank like a startled cat.

  “Oops!” Fer said immediately, with insulting lightness. “Did I scare you, your majesty~?”

  When Miria opened her eyes, she found her smiling at her. Not a wide smile, but crooked, loaded with satisfied mischief. That exact expression Fer used when she knew she had caught someone off guard and enjoyed every damn second of it.

  The blush rose quickly on Miria’s cheeks, treacherous. Without thinking too much, she grabbed the first book at hand and threw it with full force.

  Feralynn barely tilted her head. The book brushed her hair and crashed against a nearby shelf. Pure reflex. Effortless instinct.

  The old man’s second reprimand didn't take long to arrive at the new noise generated.

  “Idiot…” Miria muttered, looking away with wounded dignity, while Fer let out a low laugh, clearly pleased.

  “Wimp.”

  And silence closed again, this time with a new lightness floating between them. Fer looked at her from the corner of her eye, confused, as if she didn't understand what they were still talking about.

  “Did you get tired of the interrogation or are you already bored?” she asked without malice.

  Miria stayed silent for a moment. Then she lowered her gaze, arranged another book with impeccable precision and answered, honest at last.

  “I’m just trying to talk. Establish basic communication. It’s something normal people do.”

  “Do you really think I’m normal?”

  Miria blinked.

  “Only when it favors you.”

  “Heh. You could have been more direct from the start.”

  Miria watched her a few seconds longer. Then she shook her head, almost smiling, resigned.

  “You are… incredibly difficult to deal with.”

  “I know.” Fer tilted her head, proud. “They tell me that often.”

  And without realizing it, the tension began to relax. They kept arranging, changing corridors, changing tables. They took turns with the long ladder that Fer carried as if it weighed like a feather pillow. It was going well.

  Without defined rhythm. Without speeding up out of anxiety.

  “Hey, can I ask you something?”

  “You will anyway. Shoot.”

  “Do you miss anything… from your previous home?” she asked with curiosity, this time more slowly, measuring the terrain carefully. “Not to be intrusive, just… you know. Sometimes I forget that you’re not really from here. You have a very natural Larion accent.”

  “Well my dad was born here. I guess the tone stuck with me.”

  “Oh! You know, you’ve never really told me about him.”

  “He’s in the grave.”

  “…Oh. Gods, my apologies. I didn't...know.”

  "Why you apologizing? Did you kill him or something? Heh."

  "Ugh..."

  Feralynn arranged three books at once, one on top of the other, not caring in the slightest about the apparent order they were supposed to follow. She didn't even bother to verify the titles or categories. She just left them there, as if the mechanical act were enough.

  “Answering your previous question… no.” She shrugged with total indifference. “I don’t really miss anything.”

  Miria barely frowned.

  “Nothing in particular?”

  Fer thought for a second, genuinely.

  “Well, I guess not having to study stupid things like History or Algebra, or seeing your face every morning.”

  That, against all logic, drew a brief exhale of air through Miria’s nose. It didn't quite become an audible laugh. Not entirely. But it came dangerously close.

  “I don’t enjoy seeing yours either. Besides, you know they are important subjects,” she said, naturally recovering her didactic tone. “They are not simple filler.”

  Feralynn let herself drop onto one of the nearby chairs with careless ease. She shoved her hands into the pockets of her hoodie and, without asking permission from anyone or from common sense, propped her sneakers on the table with a dry thud. Not without first placing a good unlit cigarette between her lips.

  “Oh yeah?” She tilted her head. “And why?”

  The brazenness was absolute. The violation of rules, too. Miria cleared her throat forcefully, indignant. She frowned, straightening instinctively at the lack of respect.

  “Because, for example,” she began, “we should all know at least the basics of mathematics.”

  Well, I admit I calculated quickly how many rounds I had left in the rifles.

  Fer thought, conceding her half the point in her head.

  “Besides,” Miria continued, gaining confidence, “it is fundamental for any functional society to know about history. So as not to repeat the same awful mistakes of the past, like war—”

  The word fell like a dry blow, just like the unlit cigarette.

  Feralynn finished it for her, with a tone so grave that Miria was left breathless for a second. There was no mockery. No smile. Just an abrupt seriousness, uncomfortable, almost foreign to the body of a girl her age.

  “Do you really think wars stop just because people read books?”

  "A-Ah..."

  "You only know about them in pages, right?"

  Miria swallowed.

  Feralynn looked at her from the corner of her eye, expressionless. Without arrogance. Without irony. As if she had opened a door that should not be touched. Miria remembered then, late, as if her mind had preferred to forget it.

  She is not from here. She didn't go through the same thing as you.

  “I…” she tried to say something, anything. "Well, I..."

  “Forget it.” Fer stood up abruptly. The chair screeched against the floor from the brusqueness of the movement. “It seems you ignore that not all of us come from stable homes, like yours.”

  Feralynn didn't look at her as she left.

  She walked away with dry steps, the sound of her boots marking the distance that had just opened between them. Each footstep echoed like a badly placed period, one no one dared to correct. The echo took time to fade. When it did, it left something worse behind.

  Emptiness.

  Miria remained still in front of the disordered table. Her hands rested on the wood, tense, as if still waiting for an answer that would not come. She lowered her gaze slowly, following the crooked lines of the poorly stacked books, and felt something closing in her chest.

  It wasn't anger.

  It wasn't wounded pride.

  It was guilt.

  An uncomfortable, dense one, that didn't scream, but weighed.

  “I understand…” she murmured, more to herself than to the empty air. Her voice sounded small in such a large place. “That sounds… reasonable.”

  The words remained floating, clumsy, with no one willing to pick them up because they burned.

  Miria closed her eyes for an instant. She inhaled deeply. The smell of old paper and enchanted dust filled her lungs, but it didn't calm her. She thought of everything she had said without thinking. Of everything she had taken for granted. Of how easy it was to speak of mistakes of the past when you had never had to bleed for them yourself.

  It is difficult to get close to someone who never talks about herself.

  “Damn it…” she whispered to herself. “Great, Miria. You fucking ruined it….”

  And she remained there, surrounded by ancient knowledge, wondering how many truths of life are not taught in books.

  Ouch.

  ...

  ...

  ...

  

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