The Villain Professor's Second Chance

Halfway across the first span, she noticed eyes tracking them—scores of them. Elves paused in mid-task, hands stilling on rope, on broom, on harp string. Some leaned against balustrades of braided vine, half-lit by lanterns, pupils glowing faintly in the luminosity. Their expressions varied: wonder from a few, trepidation from most, outright suspicion from a hardened handful wearing bark-plate armor at the shoulder.

But something else lived behind those gazes—hope, maybe? She couldn't parse it. They didn't speak, yet every tilt of chin, every tightening of a hand on a railing, seemed to ask the same question: Will this aberration hold or shatter?

Most eyes never lingered on her for long. They drifted down, past the gaps in the walkway, to the forest floor so far below. There, in the cool shadows beneath the bridge, a storm-blue silhouette paced with glacial patience. The Guardian's massive form ghosted through shafts of early light, sparks under its pelt dimmed to faint fireflies. It mirrored their route exactly—never more than a tree length behind, never closer than three. Each paw touched ground soundlessly, yet Sylara felt the tremor of its weight through the trunks.

In principle, no beast—bonded or not—should cross the threshold of the Heartgrove. Yet no one tried to bar its path. Wardancers flanked the lower walkways, bows held in that peculiar half-draw only elves could maintain for minutes at a time. The arrowheads pointed groundward, tips kissing moss. Not a threat, but a reminder: discipline here could turn to force faster than lightning could lick a blade.

The tension scraped along Sylara's aura, tugging at her core channels. She felt her spirit-field contract, curling tight to spine and sternum like a startled cat. Defensively small. Wrong move. She inhaled, forced shoulders back, and imagined her aura as gentle heat blooming again—room for breath, room for other energies to approach without collision.

It worked, partially. The pinpricks up her neck eased, though heartbeats still hammered like fists on a door. She focused on tangible details: the way morning mist beaded on her sleeve cuffs, the faint cinnamon smell drifting from a high balcony where an elf stirred sap-porridge in a copper cauldron. Normal things. Anchors.

Ahead, Draven's stride never faltered. Two paces exactly separated them—a distance he'd calibrated, she knew, to present as neither master nor subordinate but complementary halves of a whole. He carried no outward weapon beyond the twin hilts rising over his shoulders, yet something in his posture—shoulders set, chin level—radiated unspoken readiness. Predatory calm, held not in muscle but in mathematics. Each step was plotted, tested, confirmed.

A trio of aged lorekeepers shuffled from a side walkway and paused as Draven passed. One raised a knotted hand in restrained greeting; the others pressed fingers to temples, eyes narrowing as though weighing his very shadow. Draven inclined his head the barest degree—courtesy precisely measured to avoid debt. The lorekeepers murmured among themselves after he moved on, leaf-thin voices rustling like pages in an old codex.

Sylara trailed the exchange, noting how Draven neither slowed nor sped up. His awareness mapped the entire space—the distance to the nearest guard post, the angles of sightlines from upper balconies, even the torque variance in bridge cables judging by how he adjusted his balance on each uneven plank. She'd seen him navigate aristocratic ballrooms with similar elegance, but here the stakes felt higher. One misread weight transfer might signal threat; one over-eager nod might stink of weakness. And he danced it flawlessly.

I envy that composure, she thought, lifting her chin another notch.

They reached a wide landing—a hub where five bridges converged around a single enormous trunk. The tree's bark had been carved into a bas-relief depicting ancestral battles: elves astride luminous stags, arrows streaking like comets toward looming silhouettes that might have been human siege towers. Lantern-pods dangled from vine cables, illuminating the scene in shifting green-gold wash. Sylara's gaze snagged on one carving: an elf child clutching the antler of a Guardian much like hers. The child's face was carved in tender lines, but the Guardian's eyes were wide, almost pleading.

A chill slid under her skin. She wondered if some old wood-shaper had captured that moment from memory or imagination, and whether visions whispered similar truths long before she'd stumbled into them last night.

"Keep pace," Draven murmured, not looking back.

"I'm here," she breathed, lengthening stride to close the gap. Heat prickled her cheeks; she couldn't decide if it was embarrassment or lingering resonance. A pair of wardancers stepped aside to let them pass, their gleaming shoulder-rings chiming faintly. One darted a glance at her, lips parted as if to speak, but words died unvoiced. Respect? Fear? She couldn't tell.

They entered the next bridge—narrower, arcing high. Wind slipped through the lattice, carrying scents of wet moss and something metallic—tempered barksteel from distant forging tiers. Far below, the Guardian emerged from a break in underbrush, sun shafts striking its coat until it blazed like dawn over storm seas. Sylara's breath caught; something in her chest answered again, a comfort-pull that unwound tension in her shoulders.

She sensed, rather than saw, Draven register her relaxation. His head tilted a degree, recalibrating pace again—this time allowing her half-stride more to settle nerves. Subtle as dew, but she noticed. Always the professor, measuring constants, adjusting variables.

Overhead, a party of young elves in leaf-green tunics gathered on a balcony. They whispered, pointing at Sylara's still-glowing collarbone rune. One girl—barely into her first century by the smoothness of her skin—pressed both palms to her own chest as if feeling sympathetic warmth. Sylara offered a cautious smile; the girl's eyes widened, then she smiled back—quick, timid—before an elder ushered her inside.

Steps carried them on. The walkway began to angle downward, vines thickening as if to brace the weight of the council trunk ahead. From beneath came a low thrumming—ambient mana condensed by old root-glyphs. Each beat synced with Sylara's pulse in a way that was both grounding and disconcerting.

She stole a side-glance at Draven. His jaw was set, eyes scanning ahead, reading glyph after glyph without letting gaze linger long enough to seem intrusive. He was making mental notes—she could feel it. Every crest carved in bark, every guard rotation pattern, each subtle shift in temperature where hidden conduits bled warmth. She doubted he'd forget a single detail.

And maybe that was what unnerved her most. He could stride into a place designed to judge them, catalogue every weakness and strength in moments, and still walk as though the ground took orders from his feet.

I envied that.

_____

The council chamber swallowed Sylara's senses the instant she crossed the threshold.

Sound died first. Outside, bridges creaked and vine-lanterns chimed in the breeze; inside, every noise felt muffled, caught by the lattice of roots that made the dome. She heard the hush inside her own veins louder than the scrape of her boots on the polished wood.

Then came the smell—deep loam layered with resin, wildflower, and the dry sting of ozone. It reminded her of a summer storm caught beneath fresh-split pine, and it slid down her throat like memory.

Light followed: the soft glow of sap-veins winding up the walls, brightening and dimming with a pulse she could almost count against her heartbeat. Spirals of faint gold unfurled across the floor, coaxed alive by each step she took. They looked delicate, but heat thrummed under the top layer of bark as if molten circuits ran just beneath.

Five raised platforms ringed the space. They weren't thrones; they were parts of the trees themselves, coaxed into seats over centuries. The figures on them seemed carved from the same intention.

Velthiri occupied the tallest. Moonlight hair coiled down her spine in braids tight as vows. The leaf-green sash across her chest bore a single quartz shard that pulsed with her pulse—Sylara tracked the rhythm, surprised to find it slower than her own.

To Velthiri's immediate right crouched an elder seer draped in barkcloth so thin it moved like smoke when he breathed. His hood was thrown back, revealing skin patterned with branching scars that glowed the same color as the runes underfoot. Eyes milk-white, yet they tracked her with unsettling accuracy.

Beside him a second seer sat cross-legged, palms upturned. Glyphs shimmered over her open skin, crawling in slow constellations—one moment forming leaf veins, the next bird wings. Every few seconds she inhaled and the glyphs scattered like startled fireflies before resettling.

On Velthiri's left perched the war-warden. Bark-plate armor hugged him from shoulders to shins, deep grooves chiselled to mimic the ridges of antlers. A living vine cinched the plates together; its thorns glistened with clear sap that smelled faintly of iron. Unlike the seers, he did not watch Sylara—his gaze fixed on Draven with predator focus.

The last seat, half hidden in shadow, held something harder to name. A translucent silhouette flickered in and out—sometimes the outline of an elf, sometimes a hollow swirl of mist given posture. Where a face should have been, only light resided, bending and twisting like water around an unseen shape.

Every elder stared. No one spoke. Yet the weight of their scrutiny pressed on Sylara's chest until she fought to keep her shoulders from bowing.