Velra’s “training yard” was not a yard at all.

  It was a stretch of cracked stone behind an abandoned warehouse on the edge of town, hidden from the main roads by leaning fences and stacks of rusted scrap. The air always smelled faintly of wet ash. Embershade’s smog dulled the sky into a bruised orange, but out here the wind had room to move, and that alone made it feel like a different world.

  Audree stood with his sleeves rolled up and his arm wraps tight, watching Lief finish the last drill.

  Lief’s breathing was steady. Controlled. In, out, in, out, like Velra had hammered into them until it became muscle memory.

  A thin sheen of mana glimmered around Lief’s hands as he guided a knot of vines out of the dirt. They rose in a curved pattern, not wild, not frantic. A living barrier with layers. Dense. The kind of shape that did not need to be pretty to be effective.

  Velra sat on a broken crate like a judge at an execution. Her red sundress and straw hat looked absurd in a place like this, but the staff leaning against her leg made the scene feel less ridiculous. The orb at its top swirled with dark liquid that Audree tried not to think about too hard.

  “Again,” she said lazily.

  Lief exhaled through his nose and did it again, staff glowing.

  The vines rose faster this time. Thicker. Less effort.

  Audree felt the familiar pinch of jealousy in his chest, the kind that used to make him sour and quiet. It came as a reflex, like his body reached for it automatically.

  Then he watched Lief’s shoulders tremble, just slightly, from the strain of channeling.

  He watched Lief keep breathing anyway.

  The jealousy faded into something warmer and more honest.

  Pride.

  Not the sin kind. Not the ugly kind.

  The kind you felt when your friend did something incredible and you knew, deep down, they earned it.

  Velra lifted a hand. The vines dropped and softened back into the dirt.

  She sighed, long and theatrical, then stood.

  “That’s it,” she said.

  Audree blinked. “That’s it as in… for today?”

  “That’s it as in I’m done,” Velra replied.

  Lief’s eyes widened. “Done?”

  She studied them both for a moment. Her gaze moved like a knife, not unkind, just precise. She took in Audree’s posture, the way his shoulders no longer hunched like he expected a hit. She took in Lief’s stance, calmer now, steadier. She watched the faint rhythm of mana in and out of Audree’s chest, the way he held it like a restrained breath instead of a wildfire.

  Velra rolled her shoulders like she was shaking off a weight. “That’s all I’ve got,” she replied. “There is nothing more I can teach you. I’m not a teacher. I’m just someone with experience and a questionable sense of responsibility.”

  Lief frowned. “You’ve been teaching me for two months and a half.”

  “Yes,” Velra said, “and I am now officially tired.”

  Audree crossed his arms. “So we’re done.”

  “We’re as done as you’re going to get,” Velra said. “If you want perfection, go find a real academy and become a proper nuisance in a city where people are paid to tolerate it.”

  Velra looked at him directly. “Audree. Your control is better. You are using Greed like a tool instead of letting it drag you around like a starving dog. At least in this mana-dead town.”

  Audree crossed his arms. “That was… not a compliment.”

  “It was the truth,” Velra said. “You still do not trust yourself with overflow, and you should not. But here, you are stable.”

  He still did not trust himself in a mana dense place. He could picture it too clearly: the way his arm would drink without asking, the way his body burned when mana tried to carve pathways it did not have. He had seen what happened when he overfilled.

  But here, in Embershade, he could function.

  Her gaze dropped to his belt, where glass vials clinked softly against leather loops. “You are prepared. Too prepared, in the way anxious people are prepared. Potion for this, potion for that, potion for the possibility that the sky falls on your head.”

  Audree could not help the small, annoyed huff. “Better than being unprepared.”

  His swordwork was still not elegant, but it did not need to be. Ina had beaten any elegance out of him with repetition.

  He could survive with it.

  And his eyes… his eyes had become less of a curse.

  When Alchemy stirred, the world sharpened. He saw flaws faster. Mistakes screamed louder. Sometimes it still made him sick, but he had learned how to step back before the disgust swallowed him whole. He had learned how to use it, like a lens he could raise and lower rather than a storm that happened to him.

  Velra’s mouth twitched. “Correct.”

  She turned to Lief. “And you…”

  Lief stood straighter without meaning to. Like her attention pulled him upright.

  Velra watched him for a long moment, eyes sharp.

  “In a short time,” she said, “you became a monster.”

  Lief’s expression flashed with alarm. “Velra.”

  “Relax,” she said, waving him off. “I mean it as praise. Your output is absurd. Your mana pool is growing. Your costs are dropping. Verdancy fits you extremely well. It likes you. It answers you. That is rare.”

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  Audree looked away so neither of them could see his face.

  Velra had been impressed with Lief from the start. Audree knew that. He had felt it in every correction Velra gave him, in every extra drill she assigned Lief, in every quiet nod that she never bothered giving Audree.

  And then there was the other thing.

  Velra had told Lief her keyword.

  Not Audree.

  Audree tried not to care. He really did.

  But the sting lingered anyway, sharp and petty.

  Velra’s eyes flicked to Audree like she could sense the thought. She did not comment. Instead, she continued.

  “That little confession I gave you,” she said to Lief, “helped you understand bloodwork. It did not magically make it yours. It still costs you more because it does not align well with Verdancy.”

  Lief nodded, rubbing his wrist as if remembering the ache of overuse.

  “But,” Velra added, “you can incorporate it. You can blend it. You can make it serve you.”

  Lief looked down at the staff, then back up. “It still feels… wrong sometimes.”

  “That’s because you are using something you were never meant to rely on,” Velra said simply. “Keep it as a tool. Not a crutch.”

  Audree’s eyes drifted to Lief’s staff again.

  If Audree ever fought Lief seriously, Audree would lose.

  He did not have to run the thought experiment for long anymore. He had done it too many times. Lief had range. Control. A real pool. A keyword that shaped the battlefield itself. Audree had a sword he was only decent with, potions that worked best when he had time to plan, and Bubbles.

  And he had Greed, which was powerful but short-lived when he pushed it.

  Audree could go all out for about a minute and a half before the stolen mana in his system burned out into nothing. Eyes swirling, body enhanced, brain moving too fast, disgust-flash insight from Alchemy kicking in until it made him sick.

  If he paced himself, he could stretch it. Maybe ten minutes. But then he became weaker in bursts. Barrier down. Eyes normal. Sword less useful. Potions more important, and potions did not stop a thorned vine from snapping your ribs.

  The only real advantage Audree had in a duel was ugly.

  If he got close enough, he could drain.

  If he held out his hand, he could catch pure spellwork and take it. He had learned that the hard way.

  He could disrupt mana flow. Make casting fail.

  But Lief’s Verdancy was not simple spellwork. It was growth. Motion. Living manipulation. Audree did not want to touch it.

  And Lief’s blood spells were fast.

  Audree hated how clear the conclusion was.

  But he also knew something equally clear.

  If he had to go into the woods, he wanted Lief with him more than he wanted any sword.

  He wanted that power beside him, not pointed at him.

  Velra stepped closer, voice dropping slightly. “You told me what happened with that knight a few weeks ago.”

  Lief’s jaw tightened. “I told you I was caught. I told you I fought.”

  “And you told me you were helpless,” Velra said.

  Lief’s hands clenched. Audree saw it. That frustration. That shame.

  “What,” Audree said, flat.

  Lief swallowed. “At night. He stopped me. I fought. I lost.”

  Audree’s hands tightened at his sides before he realized it. “Did he hurt you?”

  “No,” Lief said. “He… bound me. Rune rope. It suppressed everything. It felt like someone cut the world out of me.”

  Audree looked confused. “What happened after that.”

  Lief nodded. “He questioned me about you. About the disappearances. About the woods. About Haldo.”

  Audree’s stomach sank. “And you told him?”

  “I told him the truth,” Lief said. “That you had nothing to do with people vanishing.”

  Audree stared at him for a moment, then exhaled slowly through his nose.

  “And he believed you?”

  “Yes,” Lief said. “He seemed… tired. Suspicious. Like he was looking at something he wasn’t allowed to touch. He let me go but… that was a lesson.”

  There was a long silence.

  Audree understood that silence too well.

  That feeling of being trained and prepared and still helpless when it mattered. The first time the miners had jumped him had carved that lesson into his bones.

  Lief’s voice went lower. “He overpowered me so easily. It wasn’t even close. The gap was ridiculous.”

  Audree nodded, slow. “That’s how it feels.”

  Lief looked back at him. There was something hard in his eyes now, not anger, but a kind of resolve.

  “That made me want to get better,” Lief admitted.

  Audree let out a short breath that might have been a laugh if it had not been so bitter. “Welcome to the club.”

  Velra watched them both and sighed like she had been expecting this.

  Velra tilted her head. “That feeling should not crush you.”

  Lief’s eyes flicked up. “It doesn’t. It just… makes me want to get stronger.”

  Velra nodded once. “Good. Use it. But do not let it become obsession.”

  Audree almost laughed. Coming from Velra, that was rich.

  Velra turned away, as if done with the emotional portion of this conversation. She reached into a pocket and pulled out a folded strip of cloth, then tossed it at Audree.

  Audree caught it. “What is this.”

  “A bandage,” Velra said flatly. “For your face. You still look like you got dragged through a mine cart.”

  Audree frowned. “I’m fine.”

  “You are not,” Velra replied. “You are functional.”

  Audree opened his mouth, then closed it.

  Velra adjusted her hat and glanced between them. “You are going tonight, aren’t you?”

  Audree did not deny it. “Yes.”

  Lief hesitated for only a second. “Yes.”

  Velra’s expression turned mildly annoyed, like she had expected them to lie at least once for politeness.

  “Fine,” she said.

  Velra sighed, then nodded toward their bags. “Go on then. Gather your courage and your poor life choices.”

  Audree’s loadout was simple but heavy.

  Audree reached down and tightened his belt, checking each vial by touch.

  Potion belt.

  Notes bag, with space left for gathered materials.

  Sword at his waist, reluctant but real.

  Bubbles wobbled out of the bag’s opening, peeking up like it wanted to be included in the serious moment. Audree tapped its head gently and it made a small, pleased rumble.

  Lief adjusted his own belt and slung the extra staff Velra had given him across his back. It looked heavier than his old one, more carved, more deliberate.

  Audree’s eyes lingered on the staff for a moment longer than he meant them to.

  The runes along its length were clean. Professional. Balanced. Not scribbled desperation in a notebook. Not a wooden shoulder contraption held together by hope and nails.

  It reminded him of the spellbook idea he once had, back when he thought if he just wrote enough runes and believed hard enough, magic would bend to him.

  He had been so naive.

  He had treated mastery like something you could brute-force.

  Now he understood what Velra and Haldo had both tried to teach him in their own irritating ways.

  Power was not something you grabbed once and kept forever.

  It was something you earned. Over time. With humility. With repetition.

  Audree exhaled slowly.

  Then he looked at Lief.

  Lief met his gaze without flinching.

  No more blind following. No more pretending this was Audree’s journey and Lief was just along for the ride.

  They were going together..

  Audree tightened his grip on his bag strap. “It’s time.”

  Lief nodded, voice quiet but steady. “It’s time.”

  Tonight, they were going to find out what the woods had been hiding.