“Yes, yes,” Marvek said, a faint smile forming. “And we’re quite glad you are since you’ll help us move on to today’s topic.Tell us, Princess, which traces have historically manifested in the royal bloodline?”
I forced myself to answer, keeping my voice even. “Sunbursting, the manipulation of pure solar energy. Time stoppers, which are self-explanatory. Magic suppressors, who can strip power from others. Invisibility. Memory wipers. Among a few other rare traces.”
Headmaster Marvek gave an approving nod. “Well said. Can anyone name a king or queen who possessed any of these rare traits?”
The girl lifted her chin. "The Velvet King used Sunbursting during the Purge. He also had the Sight. There hasn’t been a Solenhart born without the Sight."
Everyone knew that story. The Velvet King slaughtered hundreds of wildweavers during the Purge. A terrible name but fitting.
“You’ll do well in the Court when your mother passes the baton to you, Lady Aric,” the headmaster said with a note of pride.
I froze. Aric. My pulse jumped, a mix of surprise and something sharper. Envy or dread; I wasn’t sure which. The name landed like a measured reminder of expectation.
Of course—Camelia Aric, Zeci Aric’s daughter, my mother’s right hand, and court member. I’d seen her often, though never beyond the required polite exchanges. She was everything I was taught to admire and everything I quietly refused to become graceful and proper. The kind of girl I was never meant to be.
“How does the Sight work?” the young male who had been laughing earlier asked, cutting through the murmurs justas the headmaster was about to speak. “I mean, how can the Queen know everything that happens on the island? There are thousands of people, countless choices, the wildweavers and their shifting fates… there’s too much to see. I just know no one can use or even get protection heirlooms so that the queen can see all our fates.”
A ripple of interest moved through the hall.
“Very interesting question, Mister Radke,” Headmaster Marvek said, his voice calm but sharp enough to draw attention back to him. “Perhaps one that Miss Solenhart can answer better than I can. She’s been trained by the Glass Castle tutors and by the Queen herself for that magical trace to manifest.”
The room turned toward me as if a single breath had pulled them all in my direction. Dozens of faces, curious, skeptical, expectant, watched me. Some students leaned forward, whispering; others simply stared.
It seemed the Sight was still a mystery, even here.
"The Sight appears as visions," I said, careful but steady. "It’s not all-seeing. It ties to what the bearer loves—people, places, things that matter. For Rionis, that’s the island, court, bloodline. The Queen doesn’t see every choice, but threats to Rionis or her loved ones are revealed. Sometimes early enough, sometimes just before it occurs. With focus and touch, the Sight can reach further. But it demands intention, emotion, and sometimes sacrifice."
“Why I ask is because if that is the future she sees, how come we think it can be changed?” Radke, next to me, asked, smirking again, but this time the headmaster responded for me.
“Mr. Radke,” Marvek said with a faint smile, “you do love to question things. But a good question, nonetheless.” He clasped his hands behind his back and paced slowly before therows of desks. “The Queen’s Sight doesn’t show a single, fixed future. It reveals possibilities, paths that may shift depending on the choices made. That is why she keeps a full court to counsel her, to help steer those outcomes before they solidify. Through those endless glimpses, she can see when and where the wildweavers might strike and sometimes how to change it before it happens.” Marvek turned back to the board. “Now, this leads us to our next topic.”
“Why didn’t she see that the Princess was going to be called to Dragontail? That is a large imbalance.” Someone from the front seats asked.
“You all know the answer to that,” Marvek said, his tone firm but patient. “The queen could not see that future, at least directly since Miss Solenhart wore her protection heirloom as is customary. The heirs of the throne are required to wear their sunburst protections until their twenty-first birthday, until their magic has fully matured, and their resistance to coercion and other mental magics is strong enough to stand on its own. Only then are they safe to walk unshielded. There are very few protection heirlooms capable of blocking the Queen’s Sight, and every single one of them belongs to the royal bloodline. No one outside it is permitted to use them.”
A heavy silence settled over the room. The weight of it pressed against the walls until even the flames in the sconces seemed to still. Then Headmaster Marvek cleared his throat, breaking the tension with a single measured breath.
“We’ve derailed enough from the topic of today’s class,” he said evenly.
He tapped the chalk once against the board. Two words appeared in his precise, deliberate script:
Dormant and Lost Traces.
“Wildweavers,” someone said from the back.
“That’s an obvious answer,” Headmaster Marvek replied. “It was the reason for the Purge under the Velvet King, an offense to the Island of Rionis that still carries the penalty of death. Yet we cannot call it dormant, for by definition a trace is only considered dormant or extinct if it hasn’t appeared in over two centuries.”
A chill crept across my skin. Even now, people with such abilities still surfaced. People who could bend animals to their will, like Lorik’s sister.
On the board behind him, several names began to appear in neat, glowing script:
Magic Suppressors — two centuries dormant.
Sunbursting — three centuries dormant.
Echoes — three centuries dormant.
Shapeshifters — five centuries dormant.