Velthur had stopped trying to sleep hours ago.

  The dormitory was quiet in the way only stone buildings could be at night. The other students lay scattered through the long room, some breathing evenly, some murmuring in their dreams. No one stirred. No one noticed the boy sitting upright on his bed with a scroll spread across his knees.

  A lantern burned on the desk beside him, its light low and steady. He had turned it down as far as he dared. Even so, shadows crept along the walls and across the ceiling, stretching and shrinking with the flame’s small movements.

  Velthur traced a finger along the writing.

  The scroll Justinius had given him was old. The parchment was stiff, the ink uneven in places. Some of the lines were cramped, others wide and loose, as though the writer’s thoughts had raced ahead of their hand. It did not read like a textbook. It felt like a conversation carried across time.

  He had been reading it over and over since receiving it. Every time he thought he understood a passage, another meaning seemed to slip free when he read it again.

  This is too much, he thought, not for the first time.

  The scroll spoke of the Arcana in ways Velthur had never seen in class. Not rules first, not caution, not the careful limits the professors repeated every day. It spoke instead of connection. Of listening. Of standing at the edge of the waking world and noticing what stirred just beyond it.

  There were sections he barely understood at all.

  Dream-anchors. Thought-forms. The shaping of intention before motion.

  He swallowed and forced himself to keep reading.

  Some passages frightened him. They described magi who had gone too far too fast. Those who learned to touch the Dreamscape before they learned how to return from it. The words were careful, but the meaning was clear.

  This is how people break.

  Velthur rubbed his eyes. They burned from lack of sleep, but he did not feel tired. If anything, his thoughts felt sharper than usual, restless and crowded.

  What am I doing with this, he wondered. I can barely manage a clean spark without shaking.

  He remembered his last lesson. How the professor had sighed when Velthur’s fire snap flared unevenly. How another student had smothered a laugh. He had laughed too, like it did not matter.

  But it did matter.

  He wanted this. He wanted it badly enough that the wanting sometimes hurt.

  His finger stopped.

  There, near the lower half of the scroll, was a section written in tighter script. The letters leaned closer together, as if the writer had not meant for it to stand out. There was no heading. No explanation. Just lines of text, arranged almost like verse.

  Velthur leaned closer.

  The words were old. Older than most of the language he had learned so far. He recognized parts of it, enough to grasp meaning, but not enough to be comfortable.

  He read the first line silently.

  Then again.

  It did not read like an incantation. There were no commands. No shaping words. It felt more like… preparation.

  Or permission.

  Velthur hesitated, then glanced around the dormitory. Everyone else slept on. No one stirred.

  He drew a slow breath and began to read aloud.

  His voice was quiet, barely more than a whisper. He stumbled over the sounds at first, the strange rhythm of the words catching on his tongue. He paused, corrected himself, and started again.

  This time, the line flowed more smoothly.

  He read it again. And again.

  The words began to settle into him, not as sounds, but as a pattern. He stopped thinking about their meaning and let their shape carry him forward.

  Something shifted.

  At first, he thought he was dizzy. There was a pressure in his chest, like air building beneath his ribs. He had not taken a breath, but it felt as though his lungs were full.

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  His fingers trembled.

  The lantern flame wavered.

  Velthur looked up, startled. The flame bent sideways, then straightened again. He swallowed and forced himself to keep breathing slowly.

  This is nothing, he told himself. Just nerves.

  He spoke the next line.

  The pressure grew stronger.

  The desk beside him creaked. He turned his head just in time to see it slide forward an inch across the stone floor.

  His heart leapt into his throat.

  “No,” he whispered, breaking the rhythm.

  The pressure did not fade.

  Instead, it spread.

  The floor beneath him seemed to thrum, not moving, but alive in a way he could feel through his legs. His thoughts scattered. The words he had been reading echoed in his mind even though his mouth had stopped moving.

  He tried to stand.

  The world tilted.

  And then everything gave way at once.

  The force that burst from him had no color, no sound he could name. It struck outward like a sudden release, knocking the lantern from the desk and sending it skidding across the floor. The desk toppled with a crash. Nearby beds rattled.

  Velthur cried out as he was thrown forward, landing hard on his knees. The breath tore from his lungs. For a moment, he could not tell where he was or what had happened.

  The pressure vanished as suddenly as it had come.

  In its place was emptiness.

  He gasped, clutching at the bedframe, his arms weak. His head swam. His body felt hollow, as though something vital had been poured out of him and not replaced.

  “I did not mean to,” he whispered, though no one had accused him.

  The dormitory door slammed open.

  Light flooded the room as more lanterns appeared. Footsteps hurried across the stone.

  Justinius stood in the doorway, his robe half-fastened over his night clothes. His hair was loose, his expression sharp and alert. Behind him were two elder magisters, both pale and tense, and two apprentices who looked frightened and wide-eyed.

  “We felt it,” Justinius said. His voice was low but intense. “All the way down the hall.”

  Velthur tried to speak and failed.

  Justinius crossed the room quickly and knelt beside him, placing one steady hand on Velthur’s shoulder and the other at his back.

  “Slow breath,” he said. “You are here. You are safe.”

  Velthur sucked in air, chest burning. His hands shook.

  “I did not know,” Velthur said at last. “I was just reading. I did not try to do anything.”

  “I know,” Justinius said.

  The elder magisters exchanged looks near the door.

  “That was uncontrolled,” one of them said quietly.

  “It was untrained,” said another. “And dangerous.”

  Justinius did not turn. His focus remained on Velthur.

  “Can you sit?” he asked.

  Velthur nodded weakly. With Justinius’ help, he managed to settle onto the edge of the bed. Someone draped a blanket over his shoulders. He barely noticed who.

  Justinius straightened and finally faced the others.

  “He did not force it,” he said. “He did not reach. He opened a door that was already there.”

  “That does not make it safer,” one magister replied.

  “No,” Justinius agreed. “It makes it real.”

  He turned back to Velthur.

  “You touched the Arcana directly,” he said. “Not through shaping. Not through rote. You listened, and something answered.”

  Velthur’s stomach twisted.

  “That is bad,” he said quietly.

  Justinius studied him for a long moment.

  “It is dangerous,” he said. “And it is rare. And it means your training must change.”

  The words hung heavy in the air.

  The elder magisters murmured among themselves. Velthur caught fragments of it.

  Too young.

  Dream-risk.

  Driax’s methods.

  Justinius lifted a hand, silencing them.

  “He will rest,” he said. “Tomorrow, we speak properly.”

  The magisters hesitated, then nodded. One by one, they withdrew.

  The door closed.

  The dormitory fell quiet again, though no one slept now.

  Justinius pulled a stool close and sat.

  “You scared me,” he said, not unkindly.

  Velthur let out a weak laugh that sounded more like a sob.

  “I scared myself.”

  Justinius nodded.

  “That is good,” he said. “Fear keeps you alive.”

  Velthur stared at the floor, where the scroll lay open, its ink faintly catching the moonlight from the high window.

  “I thought I was behind everyone,” he said. “I thought I was pretending.”

  Justinius followed his gaze.

  “Most breakthroughs feel like accidents,” he said. “And most accidents happen to people who were already walking toward something.”

  Velthur closed his eyes.

  “What if I cannot stop next time?”

  Justinius did not answer right away.

  “Then we teach you how,” he said at last. “Carefully. Slowly. Together.”

  Velthur nodded, exhaustion finally pulling at him.

  As Justinius rose to leave, Velthur whispered into the dimness.

  “I do not want to hurt anyone.”

  Justinius paused at the door.

  “Then you are still yourself,” he said. “That matters more than power.”

  When he was gone, Velthur lay back and stared at the ceiling.

  Something inside him was awake now. Not loud. Not demanding. Waiting.

  And somewhere at the edge of his thoughts, the Dreamscape stirred, patient and watchful, as if it had learned his name.