Chapter 4 CHAPTER FOUR

AERIS

After the Veil crossing, everything happened in a blur.

The mist dissolved behind me, and the bridge vanished as if it had never existed at all. I stumbled forward onto solid ground, the cold stone of Aetherian’s threshold biting through the soles of my boots.

I didn’t see Kaelia again.

Not the girl I crossed beside, either.

We were led through arching corridors carved from moonstone and obsidian, lit by floating orbs of pale blue fire. Runes glowed faintly along the walls, humming with quiet power. Magic lingered in the air like mist...old, patient, watching.

When we emerged into a vast circular hall, I finally stopped walking.

The space rose like a cathedral—ceilings lost in shadow, windows etched with shifting constellations. At the very center of the floor, a great crest had been carved into the stone: a ring encircling five beasts..an owl, a lynx, a hound, a fox, and a fang-baring wolf.

The five squads.

Around me, students filed in quietly. Most of them were pale, shaken, wide-eyed. I counted quickly...maybe fifty of us had made it. No more.

We’d started with nearly ninety.

I tightened my grip on my pack as the last footsteps stilled. The silence that followed was heavy. Expectant. Almost reverent.

Five figures rose onto a raised dais at the far end of the hall—each cloaked in a different color, each radiating something I couldn’t name. Power. Experience. Authority that didn’t need to be announced.

The Captains.

I’d read everything I could about them. Every recruit did. Aetherian didn’t just train magic knights—it forged them into weapons. And the Captains? They were the ones who held the hammer

The one at the center stepped forward first. A woman, tall and commanding, her hair twisted into braids coiled at the base of her skull. She wore silver-scaled armor and a deep grey cloak that swirled like mist behind her.

I knew who she was before she even spoke.

Captain Nyra of the Golden lynx..The tracker. The war strategist. The blade mistress.

I had read about all of them.

Every student at Aetherian was placed into one of five squads each led by one of the elite Captains. They were more than leaders. They were legends.

The Golden Lynx…the most elite squad in the academy

The Silver Hounds.

The Iron Fangs.

The Shadow Foxes.

The Storm Owls.

Five squads. Five paths.

And I was about to be thrust into one.

Captain Nyra’s voice rang out clear and clipped. “You have survived your first trial.”

A pause..

“Many did not,” she continued. “You have crossed the Veil. That alone means you are no longer children of bloodlines or titles. You are candidates of Aetherian. Recruits. Nothing more.”

Her eyes swept over us, unmoved by our bruises, our exhaustion, our haunted stares.

“You stand now where legends began. But do not mistake survival for success. Many of you will not last through your first year. Some of you will not last through this week.”

Another figure stepped forward—broad-shouldered, gold cloak, copper skin gleaming in the light. He gave us all a long, slow look, eyes lingering just long enough to unsettle.

Captain Rovan of the Silver Hounds. Charming. Brutal. Known for never losing a duel. And for never taking mercy.

Beside him stood the other captains.

A woman with wild dark curls and a jagged scar cutting across her jaw—Captain Sira of the Iron Fangs. All muscle and menace.

Next to her, draped in black and nearly blending with the shadows, was the infamous Captain Kaelith of the Shadow Foxes.

And finally, the youngest-looking of them all, with hair the color of storm clouds and a gaze like a gathering storm...Captain Neris of the Storm Owls. He looked like he could command thunder with a thought.

Each one of them was terrifying in their own way.

And each one would soon be assigned to us.

Captain Nyra’s voice cut through the silence. “Now begins your second test.”

A collective breath shuddered through the hall.

“You will showcase your power,” she said coolly. “Raw magic. We need to see what you are. What you are capable of.”

A pause.

Then her gaze snapped to me.

“You.”

My heart shrieked

No.

No, no, no.

Not me. Anyone but me.

“You,” she repeated, stepping down from the dais, her sharp silver cloak catching the light. “Step forward.”

Every eye in the room turned toward me. The weight of it was unbearable...thick, suffocating, like the Veil pressing against my chest all over again.

I didn’t move.

Not because I was defiant, but because I physically couldn’t. My legs had locked in place, trembling beneath the weight of fear and humiliation.

What would happen now? Everyone would see how weak I was...how unstable, how barely contained. Maybe they’d stop the test and ask me to leave.

Or worse… maybe they wouldn’t.

Maybe they’d execute me right here for being a magical liability.

Still, I walked.

One step at a time.

Captain Nyra watched me with a gaze that could slice through steel. Rumor had it she could see your magical potential the moment she laid eyes on you. That her magic allowed her to sense strength like scent on the wind. Maybe that’s what she saw in me—something unstable.

Or maybe she just saw the fracture lines and wanted to watch me shatter.

I reached the center of the ring. The silence was deafening.

“Begin,” she said simply.

I froze.

I didn’t know what to do. My magic wasn’t like theirs...clean, bright, precise. Mine flared without warning, cracked under pressure. It burned. It broke things. It broke me.

My hands shook at my sides, heat curling in my chest, rising too fast. Too wild. It wanted out.

But before I could summon anything, before the fire could rise—

There was a shift in the air.

A ripple through the hall, like a silent tremor brushing over every spine.

Then… someone appeared.

Another figure stepped into the chamber from the highest tiered balcony...unannounced, unhurried, and somehow, impossible to ignore.

He didn’t need fanfare. He didn’t need words.

Because the air itself changed around him.

Every Captain turned to look.

Every recruit stilled.

And I...my heart forgot how to beat.

In all my eighteen years of existence, I had never seen anyone command attention like that. Not even my father at his most terrifying.

He moved like a shadow wrapped in starlight...tall, broad-shouldered, clad in layered black robes etched with silver runes that shimmered faintly with every step. And though his face was obscured by an obsidian mask carved in intricate sigils, it was his eyes that stilled the world.

Emerald green.

Cold. Bright…

The most enigmatic figure in Aetherian Academy—the Golden Sovereign himself.

Kael Thorne.

The youngest Grand Sovereign in recorded history. Crowned at only twenty. Bound to more magic than most archmages could dream of. Rumors whispered he was soulforged, time-touched, and tethered to ancient blood. Others said he didn’t bleed at all. That his magic had replaced his soul.

Only a few had ever seen his real face. Fewer still had lived to speak of it.

Crossing the stage, Kael stopped beside Captain Neris and leaned in slightly. Whatever he said was barely a breath, but I saw Neris shift.. His storm-grey gaze sharpened as if the words unsettled him.

Then Kael’s eyes flicked to mine.

Just for a heartbeat.

I froze.

Maybe I imagined it. Maybe it was a coincidence. But in that moment, something flickered across his brow...something I couldn’t name. And just like that, it vanished.

One blink and both he and Captain Neris were gone.

No flash of magic. No burst of light. No sound.

Just… gone.