Sylric was asleep in the worst possible place.
Back against a stone bench. Cloak half-draped over his face. Boots kicked off beside a dying brazier. His head tilted just enough to catch the sun but not enough to be comfortable.
He'd been awake all night proctoring elemental duels.
He didn't open his eyes.
The sound came again, this time way louder. A hard crunch. Stone. Soil. Weight.
He frowned without moving.
Then something growled.
A gust of hot air blasted across his boots, carrying smoke and something sharp, mana-scorched and too old to belong to any student.
Saw a claw the size of a cart wheel.
Above him, towering against the sky, wings folding tight and steam rising from its nostrils—
He slowly reached for his boot. Didn't rush. Just pulled it on while the dragon settled beside the central courtyard's fountain like it belonged there.
Two figures climbed down.
The smaller one hit the ground with practiced steps.
Blond hair. Fire in his coat sleeves.
The other, darker cloak, calm posture, eyes scanning everything.
"Lindarion Sunblade," Sylric muttered, rubbing his temple.
He stood. Stretched once. His back cracked three times.
The dragon huffed again. It was watching him now. Not threatening. Just… monitoring.
Sylric didn't flinch.
He just stared at the dragon.
Then pointed vaguely at the courtyard.
"Could've used the main gate."
Lindarion slid off Ashwing's back as smoothly as possible for someone landing in a courtyard with two weeks of grime, frostbite, and emotional decay stuck to his collar.
The dragon's claws sank into the flagstones with a sound like slow thunder.
And sitting ten feet away, boots half on, blanket like a cape, eyes half-lidded like he hadn't noticed a full-grown dragon land beside him—
Professor Sylric Lirandel.
Still alive. Still exhausted.
Still everything Lindarion remembered.
The man didn't even reach for a weapon. Just pointed vaguely toward the courtyard wall and muttered, "Main gate was open, you know."
Lindarion dusted his coat off and tried not to visibly wince. "Didn't want to wait in line."
Lira dismounted behind him without a word. She gave Sylric a once-over like she was deciding if he was hallucinating them, or just used to worse.
Then stood slowly, like gravity owed him interest and stretched one arm behind his back.
"I assume this is yours?" he said, gesturing vaguely to Ashwing, who snorted once and coiled his tail closer to his body.
"Yes," Lindarion said. "He's with me."
"Right. Him. Did you name him…?"
Sylric scratched his beard. "Of course you did."
Then he blinked. Once. Twice. And finally, like he remembered he had a job, he waved a hand lazily toward the air.
The courtyard blurred around Ashwing like heat off stone. Not invisibility. Just presence erasure. Sound dropped slightly. The light around him bent.
To anyone more than a dozen feet away, Ashwing would register as nothing.
"Spatial dampening," Lindarion muttered. "Since when do you do that Professor?"
Sylric yawned again. "It's not spatial."
He cracked his knuckles. "It's silence affinity."
Lira's eyes narrowed. "That's real?"
"Apparently," Sylric said. "I didn't ask for it. It just shut everything else up."
Lindarion blinked. "How many people have that?"
"No idea," Sylric said. "It's hard to count them when no one notices us."
Ashwing flicked his tail inside the illusion, testing the edge of it. He didn't seem concerned.
Lindarion stepped forward. "How much time does that buy us?"
Sylric rubbed his eyes. "For you to explain where you disappeared, where you went after… and why your emotional support dragon is the size of a house…."
Lindarion didn't answer right away.
Ashwing had settled, tail curled neatly beside the fountain like he owned the entire courtyard. The thing Sylric used still held, muting the edges, warping the air. But it wouldn't last forever.
Sylric was watching him now. Not demanding. Not even curious. Just patient in that way tired people get when they've stopped pretending to care about ceremony.
Lindarion crossed his arms. "I don't want to talk about it."
"You were kidnapped," Sylric said. "You vanished during an active assault."
"You come back on a dragon."
Sylric let the silence sit.
Lindarion's jaw tightened. "Where's Thalorin?"
The shift was immediate.
Sylric's shoulders lowered a little. His mouth flattened.
"Missing," he said. "For a couple of weeks now."
Something cold pressed under Lindarion's ribs.
Lira didn't speak, but she stepped half a pace closer.
"You sure?" Lindarion asked.
"He left on some kind of a mission. Alone. Said it was nothing."
"And we haven't heard from him since."
Lindarion looked toward the far end of the academy. Thalorin's office, where the top windows always glowed like a lighthouse even at midnight.
Sylric stepped forward and dropped his voice slightly. "You're not staying, are you."
"Because they'll try again," Lindarion said. "Whatever hit the Academy, it was after me. If I stay here, they'll hit harder."
Just rubbed his eyes again. "You planning to vanish again?"
"Just long enough to find out who's behind this."
"And you think they won't notice a flying death machine crossing their borders?"
"They'll notice me less if I'm not under their roof."
Sylric tilted his head. "Then you need to meet the city's lead guard first. Make it official."
Lindarion frowned. "Why?"
"Because Eldenholm's council is on edge," Sylric said. "Someone needs to see you alive before they start building a conspiracy around your corpse."
"And if they try to hold me?"
Lira stepped forward now. "And if they do?"
Sylric looked at her, tired and unblinking. "Then you do what I think you're good at."
Lindarion sighed. "Fine. Where?"
"East ward barracks," Sylric said. "They'll be waiting."
He turned to go. Paused. Looked back once.
"Also—don't burn anything on the way."
"No promises," Lindarion muttered.
Ashwing exhaled a puff of steam like agreement.