Flinging Rocks at Bureaucrats in a Magical Academy

The field was emptying.

Instructant Aval had dismissed the class with a casual gesture, and the murmurs of conversation had soon scattered. Fabrisse stayed behind for a moment, kneeling to gather his scrolls at the edge of the chalk circle. Half of them were smeared with grass-stain, the other half crumpled from being sat on.

He needed them. He’d been jotting down notes about quartz grain behavior earlier in the Wing of Stratal Studies, especially that odd silver-veined cluster on display near the central archive case. He’d drawn a rough sketch, labeled it: Possible dormant-phase ferrite-quartz? Check heat sink response later.

As he rose with the scrolls under his arm, he heard rustling sounds nearby.

There was a quiet figure sitting cross-legged on the grass, half in shadow. He wore the standard robe like everyone else, but looser, like it didn’t really belong to him. Pale-banded gloves and longish fringe, his presence had gone completely unnoticed until now.

Fabrisse was sure he’d seen this guy in lectures before—always sitting alone near the eastern windows, near the back entrance. He thought for a second, then recalled a name.

Rimmar Ciemnosc.

The guy who channeled weird spells. His air currents had no tint. Even his wards shimmered in grayscale, which was supposed to be much more difficult, as an emotionless spell usually carried a lot less intent, thus a lot less aether. Still, the spells worked. Fabrisse didn’t remember who Rimmar’s mentor was, but if they hadn’t questioned it, it meant the spells weren’t that out-of-the-ordinary.

Fabrisse gave a polite nod and was about to keep walking.

Then Rimmar spoke, “It sucks, huh?”

Fabrisse paused. “Pardon?”

“Being the butt of the joke like that,” Rimmar said, not looking at him. His voice was flat. “Those snobs think they have it all just from being born rich.”

There was a beat of silence. Wind stirred the grass between them.

Fabrisse searched his memory for a protocol on how to respond to unprompted sympathy. There wasn’t one. He defaulted to honesty. “Yeah. It kinda does.”

Rimmar didn’t respond. He just tilted his head toward the sky like he was listening to something far away. Then he got up and walked off without another word.

Weird guy. It was hard to find someone weirder than Fabrisse, but that guy was pretty close.

A voice called from the sidelines. “Miss Montreal!”

Fabrisse turned to see a familiar figure in long rust-colored robes sweeping across the field with quiet command. Magus Instructant Affar Rubidi, the artifact mentor of the Montreal house, and Severa’s tutor in formal resonance mapping.

“Montreal,” Rubidi said briskly as Severa turned to her. “High Instructant Mustafa is already waiting. Remember, he came all the way from Ninnengrod. You’ll want to be properly attuned before the session.”

How many private instructants had it been this semester? Fabrisse thought. At this rate, Severa’ll collect them all and rune-stamp them like collectibles. What if they really are collectibles to her?

The image came unbidden—towering effigies of the High Instructants, cast in enchanted pewter, each adorned in their signature ceremonial robes, arms crossed sternly or raised during lectures. Miniature, lifelike crystal replicas arranged in neat rows across Severa’s dormitory shelf, some with moving mouths that recited wisdoms on loop, others enchanted to scowl disapprovingly at students who entered unannounced. The very idea of packaging centuries of arcane authority in bubble-wrap and shelf enchantments made Fabrisse wince. But then he imagined them being made of stones, prismglass, and infused ore, and that got him to smile again.

As Fabrisse gathered his belongings and stepped out of the practice field’s east wing archway, raised voices pulled his gaze toward the administrative colonnade.

Framed by the slope of the sun-drenched portico, stood two silhouettes locked in terse dispute—one tall and rigid, the other angular and sharp as a broken shard of glass.

Rubidi and Lorvan.

He stopped in his tracks.

Rubidi, ever in her rust-red robes and crested brass mantle, stood with arms folded, her tone low but tightly wound like a bowstring. Lorvan, by contrast, was literally and figuratively layered. He had three layers of clothing for possibly no other reason than his own fashion sense, and he looked completely composed despite the weight of fabric that would probably crumple Fabrisse.

Severa was nowhere to be seen.

“You’re overreaching,” Lorvan was saying. “You don’t get to question my student while you’re treating yours like a bonded adjunct.”

“Oh, my apologies, Lorvan. I forgot your supervision included exclusive jurisdiction over unremarkable improvement.” She flicked a hand, gesturing vaguely in the direction of the field. “If bonding with the Eidralith actually did something for your favorite student, I wouldn’t have to request supplemental reports from two departments just to verify he’s doing more than stone tricks.”

Wow. That’s actually an incredible insult if I wasn’t the target of it.

Fabrisse grimaced. Because the worst part—worse than being the target of passive-aggressive mentor warfare—was that Rubidi wasn’t wrong. But he hadn’t practiced every day. Not like Severa did. Not like Veliane probably did. He still let himself get caught up in random side discoveries, system distractions, and whatever odd little impulse seemed interesting at the time. And he still let Liene drag him off to avian-based hijinks under the pretense of ‘freckle research’.

He stared at his hand, clenching it into an amber-shaded fist. That shame sat heavier than any insult. This could not go on.

Lorvan’s brow seemed to have twitched; Fabrisse couldn’t be sure.

Rubidi’s smile sharpened. “And Miss Veist,” she added with deliberate slowness, “seems to have plateaued rather early. One might wonder whether the fault lies with the student or the mentor who keeps shielding her from challenge.”

There was a long pause, long enough that Fabrisse, watching from the archway, genuinely wondered if a ward duel was about to break out in the middle of the colonnade.

Then Lorvan spoke again, low and silken, “I’ve seen your kind of ambition before. It eats through everything it touches. Including protégés.”

Rubidi’s tone had stress markers but no raised volume; Lorvan’s cadence had changed by two syllables per breath, suggesting controlled escalation. No one was about to hex anyone yet.

The wrinkles on Rubidi’s forehead folded as she gave a narrow-eyed smile. “Your last graduate became a research clerk in outer Glyvan. You just want potential preserved in amber, Lorvan.” She turned before he could answer, robes swirling like a drawn curtain, and swept off toward the next column.

Fabrisse held his breath as Rubidi passed him without so much as a glance. Only when her footsteps had faded into the distance did Lorvan speak without turning. “Kestovar. Do you have some spare time?”

“Maybe? The dining hall sells mingleberry pies today, so . . .”

“I think you’ll like this more than pie,” he said. “Follow me.”

“Huh?” What could possibly be better than pie?

Lorvan strode toward the outer practice rings behind the administrative block. Fabrisse hesitated, half-worried he was about to get personally scolded for being bad at wind sports, but eventually followed. They passed through two archways, down a short slope of stairs, and onto the edge of the south plateau. This area was mostly unused, with only a ring of scorched dirt, old channel marks, and a single practice pylon long since warped from heat damage.

“Where are we going?” Fabrisse asked, glancing at the sky. It was still late afternoon. The glyphlights weren’t even on yet.

“You’ll see.”

They stopped near the circle’s center. Lorvan checked a pocketwatch and then looked up, scanning the sky with a small nod of satisfaction.

“Alright,” he murmured. “Right on time.”

Fabrisse was about to ask what was happening when a sudden flash burst across the sky. He turned to a line of fire through the clouds, followed by a trail of mint spark like that of a comet.

The fire trail twisted into a ribbon of incandescent crimson, coiling around a single, descending figure like a divine pyre. Fabrisse stumbled backward, shielding his eyes. Heat blasted outward in all directions, searing the edges of his sleeves.

The heat came first. Then the color. Too much of both. Fabrisse flinched automatically, then regretted moving. His mind was still catching up to his senses.

The man landed in a crouch. Fabrisse didn’t know if the scorched dirt could even be more scorched, but that man might very well have managed to.

And then the fire winked out. Then came the figure: long rust-brown hair half-tied, half-falling over one shoulder, sun-scarred skin, and a grin like he'd set the world on fire and was waiting for applause.

Fabrisse squinted past the haze and smoke.

“What’s cooking, dude?” the showy fire man called out to Fabrisse, brushing soot off his sleeve. Then he clapped Lorvan’s back. “Yo teach. Still looking keen. Though you might wanna take care of that single strand of greying hair behind your back.”

“Tom?” Fabrisse staggered back. That was definitely his old best friend, Tommaso Ardefiamme.

He should have felt excitement. Or joy. Or something. But it didn’t line up right. The fire arrival still had his brain buffering.

But . . . he just descended as a fire comet. How has he become so good?