The clouds rolled thick above the city, thunder growling in the distance. A drizzle turned to downpour, but I kept moving through my knife drills, weaving throws into my footwork until the rain ran in rivers down my arms. The storm sharpened everything. Every drop striking earth rippled through my tremor sense, painting the world in perfect detail.

  So much so that I knew immediately when the two figures stepped inside my range.

  I finished my last throw and turned, spotting Sirius and Thorn through the sheets of rain. Jogging over to the rickety porch, I saluted Thorn with the exaggerated flourish we both knew was a joke and pulled Sirius into a hug.

  “How are you feeling?” I asked. “Ready for wherever your father is sending you?”

  Sirius grinned, rain dripping from his hair. “Yeah. More excited than I thought I’d be. I know we don’t say it outright, but everyone can see it, Bryn. You’ve merged with a shard. That is why you train like no one else our age. I have been jealous, if I am honest. Thinking about what I might be able to do with a shard of my own… it thrills me.”

  “Wait,” I said, blinking. “You knew?”

  He stared at me like I had grown another head. “You heal in seconds. You fight with senses that are not even human. You did not think we’d notice?

  “Oh.” I rubbed my neck, feeling foolish. “I suppose it is obvious when you put it that way. Especially since you were the one who taught me everything about shards.”

  I drew in a breath. “Well, I think I know what I want to do.”

  Sirius leaned in, grinning. “Yeah? What is it?”

  “…the Noble Academy,” I said, half-question, half-declaration.

  He burst into laughter, pointing at Thorn. “I told you! I told you he would pick that!” Thorn only rolled his eyes, as if enduring the noise of a boy he had raised.

  Sirius clutched his side, still laughing. “Of course Asher told you all about the choices. And of course you picked the hardest one. Bryn, you only ever choose the hard way. Chores, training, books. It is like your regeneration twisted your brain to crave punishment.”

  I opened my mouth to argue, then shut it. He was right.

  “Fine,” I muttered. “Mister All-Knowing, what is this brilliant plan of yours to sneak me into the most exclusive academy in the empire?”

  “Simple,” he said, his grin widening. “You go as a noble retainer.”

  I blinked. “A… what?”

  Sirius straightened, tone turning serious. “Every noble house receives slots for retainers. Families who are not within their bloodline but who are sworn to serve their houses generationally. Tutors, guards, aides. Most fill them with servants trained to watch over their children, or escorts for caravans, or men-at-arms who guard estates. Those retainers train beside the nobles in the Academy, learning what they need to serve their house better.”

  I frowned. “But I don’t belong to a noble house.”

  “That is the clever part.” Sirius’s smile turned sly. “There is a rare allowance for unsworn retainers. People the nobility want to keep an eye on. People like you. A shard-bearer outside of noble blood, still young and unclaimed. You are exactly the kind of person they would rather watch closely than leave to grow unchecked. They will let you in, as a retainer, so they can measure the risk you pose or the asset you may become.”

  The rain roared around us as I tried to take it in. My heart hammered. “So I would be a known non-affiliated outsider watched at every turn to see if I could be useful or a danger to their power.”

  “Yes,” Sirius said simply. “But you would also walk the same halls as noble heirs. You would learn what they learn. Knowledge no guild, no academy, and no commoner would ever touch. If you can endure it, Bryn, it will give you a foundation no one else like you will ever have.”

  The storm rattled against the rooftops, thunder chasing itself across the sky, but all I could hear was the pounding of my own heart. Excitement, dread, curiosity — they all crashed together until I could hardly separate them.

  I narrowed my eyes at Sirius. “If the Noble Academy is so amazing, then why are you not going?”

  For once, he did not laugh or smirk. He glanced at Thorn, then back at me, and his voice came quieter. “Because my situation is different. What my father is arranging for me now… it goes beyond what the academy can teach at this point. I will be learning and training in ways that even those halls cannot offer me. The academy has value, but I can gain what it offers later, when I need it.”

  His gaze hardened, more serious than I had ever seen. “For me, this is the right path. For you, Bryn, the academy could be the chance that changes everything.”

  The rain masked the silence that followed, but inside me the questions roared. What kind of family did Sirius belong to that could give him training even greater than the Noble Academy? What kind of house had that kind of reach, that kind of power?

  I wanted to press him, to demand answers he had always kept just out of reach. The way Thorn guarded him, the way he carried himself even when he tried to hide it, the way he spoke of his father’s commands, all of it painted a picture I could not yet see.

  But he was my friend. My best friend. He had never steered me wrong, even if he kept more secrets than I liked.

  I let out a slow breath and nodded. “Alright. If you believe this is the right path, then I will trust you. Even with the downsides, it sounds worth it.”

  Relief flickered across his face, and a smile broke through like the sun parting the clouds.

  This story has been stolen from Royal Road. If you read it on Amazon, please report it

  The decision settled something in my chest. I had no idea what awaited me behind the walls of the Noble Academy, but I knew I would get everything I could out of it.

  “Well, you turn sixteen over the summer, and the first set of classes begins in the fall. That is when you will start. I won’t be here for your name day, but I went ahead and got you a gift.”

  As he spoke, he pulled out a piece of cloth wrapped around something and handed it to me.

  I stared at it, confused. “We’ve never given each other gifts. And I don’t have anything for you,” I said, the words tinged with sadness.

  He waved his hand as if it did not matter. “Don’t worry about it. I don’t need anything, and our friendship is deeper than gifts and trinkets. Open it.”

  I shook my head at him but began to unfold the cloth. My eyes widened when I saw what lay inside.

  It was a matching pair of dark bracers, made of a material I could not name. Faint silver runes shimmered across them like stars in the night sky. On each bracer, a blade matched the same dark surface and silver etchings.

  I could not find words. My mouth hung open as I looked from the bracers to Sirius.

  He laughed at my expression. “These are dwarven-forged bracers, made with astral raptor hide. They are nearly indestructible and will naturally repair themselves over time. You can bind them to yourself, letting them connect to you in a way not unlike shards. They will share in your abilities, and my guess is your regeneration will only make them stronger.”

  He let the words linger, then went on. “The blades you see are multifaceted. While wearing the bracers, you can call on the astral magic to port a blade into your hand, giving you instant access to ready-made throwing knives. They will strike, dissipate, and then regenerate, ready for use again. With your regeneration, I think the cycle will shorten, letting you throw faster than most could even dream. And the blades will not dissipate while you hold them close to the bracers, which means they can serve as small hand blades when needed.”

  His tone grew more measured. “I believe there are other traits hidden in them, but they only reveal themselves once bound. The binding is permanent. Once you claim them, they will answer to no one else. They cannot be stolen or stripped from you unless you will it. That means you will always have a weapon, whether in training, in the city, or in the wild.”

  He looked at me with pride, but also a trace of caution. “Bryn, this is a gift meant to last a lifetime. One I hope will keep my best friend alive until the next time I see him. I used nearly all the favor I had to get these for you. They are masterwork, dwarven-forged armor, rare beyond measure in this kingdom.”

  His smile softened. “As rare as the friends I have in Velmine.”

  For a long moment, I could not speak. The rain still hammered the rooftops and ran down the street, but all I could hear was the rush in my ears. I turned the bracers in my hands, the silver runes catching the light even through the storm, and I felt the weight of what Sirius had given me. Not just armor. Not just weapons. A lifeline. A piece of himself.

  My throat tightened. “Sirius… I don’t know what to say.”

  He clapped me on the shoulder, brushing it aside as if it were nothing. “Say you’ll use them well. Say you’ll stay alive until we meet again.”

  I nodded, swallowing hard. “I will. I promise.”

  The words felt heavy and sacred, like an oath.

  I slipped the bracers back into the cloth and held them close. In that moment, under the storm and the shadow of his departure, I realized what these truly were. They were more than steel and hide and rune. They were trust. They were friendship. They were a reminder that even when the path ahead was uncertain, I would not be walking it alone.

  I watched them fade into the curtain of rain until the drizzle swallowed their figures. Turning back to the porch, it felt different now, as if it had been marked as sacred ground.

  I unwrapped the bracers once more and stared at them in silence. Slowly, reverently, I clasped them to my wrists. At first, nothing happened. I only traced the etched runes with my eyes, their silver glow faint like starlight caught in stone.

  Then I felt it. A pull deep within me, not at my skin but at the very core of who I was. The last time I had felt such a tug was the day I had touched the wyrm’s shard, moments before everything went black. Panic stirred sharp in my chest, threatening to rise.

  Before it could consume me, a sudden flash crossed my vision. The runes along the bracers lit, silver lines pulsing steady and alive. The blades shimmered faintly, as if waiting for my command.

  The world shifted in my senses. Every drop of rain, every ripple in the ground, every echo in the storm grew sharper, clearer, drawn into me as though the bracers extended what was already there.

  I raised my hands, trembling. Fear and awe wrestled within me. They were bound to me now.

  And with them, my path had changed forever.

  —

  I trained relentlessly with my astral raptor bracers. Nearly every free moment was spent adjusting to their abilities, learning their rhythm, their timing, their precision.

  My skill with knives carried over, but the bracers were not the same. Their blades carried a different weight and balance, and the astral magic that infused them changed how they left my hands. It was not simply a release anymore. The magic seemed to hurl them outward, forcefully amplifying the power behind each throw.

  The added strength was staggering. Blades struck targets with more force than I could ever produce on my own, which meant I had to retrain my muscles and reflexes to handle the speed and momentum. Still, my regeneration quickened the process. It took only three seconds after a blade connected before it reformed, ready again in my hand. Three seconds. The speed was unnatural, nearly unthinkable. Unlimited throwing knives, each propelled with supernatural force, all tied to my body’s nearly endless regeneration.

  The bracers also altered my tremor sense. The astral magic wove itself into the rhythm of the earth and gave it new depth. Trails of motion appeared in my awareness, faint echoes showing me not only where something had been, but where it was moving. As if the space magic was leaning forward in time, predicting where something would be before it fully happened. My range stretched farther as well, though only slightly.”

  Then came the greatest surprise. Through the bond, I discovered something through intuition. The bracers had granted me a pocket of space. A cube, three feet to a side.

  I tested it cautiously, slipping small items inside and drawing them out again. But there was a cost. Unlike the knives, which drew from my regeneration, the pocket strained a separate well inside me. My aether reserve, I assumed. After using it only a few times, I felt drained, too heavy to try again.

  It puzzled me. Why did the knives draw from my natural regeneration while the storage strained my smaller aether pool? Only through working with the bracers did I realize that my aether did not recover with the same speed as my body. My regeneration mended flesh and mind, but my aether pools remained untouched by it.

  I could only guess that the runes etched into the bracers carried the burden of summoning and propelling the blades, linking them to my body’s natural renewal. The dimensional space, however, seemed to bypass that entirely, pulling directly from my aether.

  Whatever the case, I decided to keep it hidden. Coin pouches and travel packs with pocket dimensions were rare enough, but armor with such a gift? That was unheard of. I would not risk someone finding out, not until I knew more. The Academy may hold the answers.

  The summer vanished in a blur of training, broken only by chores and errands for Mistress Elora. When Asher had the time, he joined me in the yard or took me to the guild for specialized lessons that pushed me beyond what I could manage alone. Every day left me sharper, stronger, more aware of how far I still had to go.

  Before I realized it, the season had slipped away, and the Academy loomed just a week ahead. Excitement and worry wrestled inside me with every thought. Part of me longed to step through those gates and claim whatever future waited there. Another part wondered if I was ready at all.

  Either way, a new adventure waited just ahead. I had always thought my path would lead me into the wilds, hunting beasts and braving dangers beyond the walls. Instead, it seemed my first monsters may be the ones I faced inside the city itself.