Chapter Text
Jayce Talis believed history would eventually vindicate him. Professor Stanwick believed he should scrub the beakers first.
“You missed a spot,” Professor Stanwick said without looking up from the papers spread across his desk.
Jayce held the cylinder up to the afternoon light. “I did not.”
“There is blue residue at the bottom.”
“That is staining.”
“It was clear yesterday.”
Jayce rotated the glass between his fingers. The bottom was, admittedly, blue. He scrubbed harder.
Piltover Academy for Exceptional Youth was supposed to encourage innovation. This was written in enormous silver letters across the admissions building and printed in every brochure sent to prospective students.
Innovation. Discovery. Excellence.
Apparently innovation became considerably less desirable when it involved spontaneous combustion.
Jayce maintained that yesterday’s experiment had been entirely successful until the containment vessel failed. Professor Stanwick maintained that containment was generally considered part of an experiment. They had agreed to disagree, if one defined agreeing to disagree as Stanwick assigning six hours of detention and Jayce loudly objecting for most of the first two.
“The reaction itself was stable,” Jayce grumbled.
“The ceiling disagrees.”
Jayce glanced up at the black scorch mark spreading impressively over laboratory station four. “That’s cosmetic.”
“The fire suppression system activated on two floors.”
“Overreaction.”
“Three Vita students had to evacuate an anatomy practical.”
“They probably needed fresh air.”
Professor Stanwick finally looked at him. Jayce smiled.
“Talis.”
“I’m cleaning.”
He returned to the cylinder with slightly more enthusiasm than necessary.
The chemistry laboratory occupied one of the Academy’s older wings, where arched windows overlooked the eastern courtyards and copper pipes ran along walls of dark stone. Locked cabinets at the back contained chemicals that students under sixteen were technically forbidden to touch and students over sixteen were technically forbidden to touch without supervision.
Jayce had always considered technically an extremely useful word.
Above the cabinets hung a large brass plaque:
UNAUTHORIZED MODIFICATION OF ACADEMY EQUIPMENT WILL RESULT IN DISCIPLINARY ACTION.
The plaque had been installed during Jayce’s fourth year. He considered it one of his more permanent contributions to the institution.
Piltover Academy was not a normal school, although the faculty occasionally made the mistake of pretending it was. Children could enter as young as eleven and remain through eighteen, provided they survived the examinations, annual reviews, research requirements, and each other.
The Academy sat high in Piltover among gleaming towers and bridges suspended over the city. Piltover called itself the City of Progress and looked the part. Far below lay Zaun, crowded beneath industrial smoke, factories, and streets that rarely saw clean sunlight.
Most Academy students came from topside.
Very few came from below.
Getting in was notoriously difficult. Thousands of applications became hundreds of examinations, then interviews, faculty evaluations, and finally a painfully thin stack of acceptance letters. Once admitted, students were divided among four Houses: Forge for mechanical engineering, materials science, and experimental physics; Axiom for mathematics and theoretical physics; Vita for biology, chemistry, and medicine; and Nexus for computer science, electrical engineering, and information systems.
In simpler terms, Forge built things, Axiom explained them, Vita kept people alive, and Nexus usually knew more than it was supposed to.
Jayce had been Forge since he was eleven. Five years later, the Academy felt like home, and his family’s house felt more like somewhere he visited occasionally.
Everybody at the Academy knew Jayce Talis. Some knew him because he consistently ranked among the strongest engineering students in his year. Others knew him because he had once triggered the observatory alarm at two in the morning while attempting to measure the electrical potential of an approaching storm.
He was tall, dark-haired, clever, competitive almost to the point of pathology, and fundamentally incapable of accepting that something was impossible simply because several qualified adults had told him so.
Professor Stanwick placed another tray of dirty glassware beside him.
Jayce sighed and reached for a flask just as the laboratory door swung open. An admissions administrator stepped inside with a boy Jayce had never seen before.
That got his attention.
Jayce knew nearly every student at the Academy, or at minimum knew enough about them to decide whether he liked them. New students usually entered young. Transfers into the advanced years were rare enough to become gossip several weeks before the unfortunate person actually arrived.
This boy had, in fact, already become gossip.
He was thin—not merely slender, but narrow enough that the Academy blazer sat loosely across his shoulders. Dark brown hair fell over his forehead and around a sharp, pale face, framing pronounced cheekbones and deep-set amber eyes.
He leaned on a cane.
Professor Stanwick stood. “Viktor. There you are.”
So this was Viktor.
The Zaunite scholarship student.
The Academy awarded one full Zaun Scholarship each year to a student from what its brochures called a “less advantaged background.” There were years when they awarded none at all. The entrance examinations were the same as everyone else’s, the standards supposedly higher, and the scholarship covered tuition, housing, meals, textbooks, and the standard uniform.
Rumors about this year’s recipient had arrived before he did.
Perfect entrance scores. Self-taught calculus. Advanced placement into theoretical physics. Someone claimed he had challenged one of the examination questions and successfully forced the Academy to revise the answer key.
Jayce had assumed at least half of it was nonsense.
Professor Stanwick gestured toward an empty chair near his desk. “Come in. I wanted to speak with you before class. I spoke with Doctor Corin this morning. He’s agreed to oversee your care while you’re at the Academy, so you won’t need to travel back to Zaun for every—”
He stopped, his eyes shifting toward Jayce.
Jayce, who had stopped scrubbing entirely, resumed with immense dedication.
Viktor followed Stanwick’s gaze. Their eyes met. Jayce smiled innocently.
Viktor’s expression suggested this was not convincing.
Professor Stanwick sighed. “Perhaps we should discuss the details another time.”
“I do not mind,” Viktor said.
“I do,” Stanwick replied, with another meaningful glance toward Jayce. “Some people in this room have never encountered information they didn’t consider public property.”
“That seems unfair.” Jayce protested.
“You announced Professor Reveck’s engagement before Professor Reveck had announced Professor Reveck’s engagement.”
“He left the ring receipt on a communal printer. Philosophically, that raises questions about ownership.”
“It raises questions about why I continue teaching you.”
Jayce considered arguing further, but Viktor was still watching him and, for reasons he did not intend to examine, he preferred not to make his first impression substantially worse.
Professor Stanwick checked the clock. “Physics begins in fifteen minutes. Talis, take Viktor to North Lecture Two.”
Jayce blinked. “Me?”
Stanwick gestured toward the door. “Show him where it is. You can finish this tomorrow.”
Jayce had his gloves off before the sentence ended. “Professor, it would be an honor to assist in the orientation of a fellow scholar.”
“You called this institution tyrannical seven minutes ago.”
“People change.”
“Out.”
Jayce was already halfway through the door.
Viktor followed at a slower pace, the quiet tap of his cane accompanying his steps. Once they were safely in the corridor, Jayce noticed the limp but said nothing about it, or the doctor. If Viktor wanted to explain, he would.
More importantly, Jayce had just escaped three hours early.
“So,” he said brightly, “welcome to the Academy.”
“I have been here since this morning.”
“Yes, but now you have an actual tour guide.”
“I had a tour guide.”
“You had an admissions administrator. Completely different species. They tell you where the classrooms are. I tell you things you actually need to know.”
They crossed into the central academic building, where sunlight poured through tall windows over a steady stream of students moving between classes.
“This way,” Jayce said, turning left.
Viktor glanced at a sign pointing toward North Lecture Halls in the opposite direction. “It says north is that way.”
“It is.”
“You are walking south.”
“Shortcut.”
“This does not appear shorter.”
“You’ve been here one morning. Trust me.”
They passed beneath the central atrium, where four enormous banners descended from the vaulted ceiling. Forge hung in copper and crimson, Axiom in midnight blue and silver, Vita in green and white, Nexus in black and electric blue.
Viktor wore a small silver compass pin at his lapel.
Jayce pointed at it. “Axiom?”
“So I was informed.”
“My condolences.”
Viktor glanced at the copper Forge emblem stitched onto Jayce’s blazer. “Forge?”
“Obviously.”
“Yes,” Viktor said. “That does seem obvious.”
“Was that an insult?”
“I am still deciding.”
Jayce liked him slightly more for that.
They continued through another archway. “Dryer six will destroy anything you put in it, the laundry machines lie about accepting student cards, and the vending machine outside the Nexus stairwell gives you two snacks if you hit the right side just above the coin slot.”
Viktor stopped.
Jayce turned. “What?”
“That is theft.”
“It is a mechanical defect.”
“You are deliberately exploiting the defect.”
“I prefer applied engineering.”
Viktor considered this. “Where exactly do you hit it?”
Jayce grinned. “Right side. Above the coin slot.”
“Useful.”
Maybe Viktor had potential after all.
They resumed walking while Jayce continued imparting the information Admissions had apparently deemed unnecessary. The camera outside the second-floor east stairwell had been broken since April. The greenhouse doors unlocked automatically for ventilation at five-thirty in the morning. Professor Bolbok rarely checked homework before Tuesday.
Then they passed a bronze statue of Professor Heimerdinger.
Two younger students walking ahead of them each reached up and rubbed the polished top of the statue’s head twice before continuing.
Viktor slowed. “What was that?”
“Exam luck. Twice before an important test. Once is bad luck.”
“This is a school dedicated to scientific reasoning.”
“Only during business hours.”
Viktor studied the statue. “And students believe touching the bronze head of a professor affects examination performance.”
Jayce laughed. “There are hundreds of traditions. First-years steal a spoon from the dining hall on their first night. Nobody knows why anymore. Seniors put their initials somewhere on the bell tower before graduation. Forge steals Axiom’s ceremonial compass every Founders’ Week. Axiom pretends not to care and then commits several crimes getting it back.”
“Your traditions seem unusually dependent on theft and vandalism.”
“It builds character.”
They had reached the oldest corridor now, where polished brass and glass gave way to dark stone and narrow windows. Above them, the bell tower disappeared through several floors toward the roof.
Jayce glanced upward. “There’s one you’ll hear about sooner or later. The Thirteenth Bell. At midnight, the tower rings twelve times. Except sometimes, supposedly, it rings thirteen.”
“That is not a tradition. That is a malfunction.”
“That is what Axiom says.”
“That is what anyone familiar with clocks should say.”
“They’ve inspected it multiple times. Nothing wrong.”
“Then someone activates it intentionally.”
“Maybe.”
“When was the last reported occurrence?”
Jayce smiled. “Interested?”
“No.”
“You immediately asked for historical data.”
“I dislike incomplete explanations.”
“Nobody agrees exactly. There was one supposedly twenty years ago. Another maybe fifteen before that. The old records get strangely vague around the dates.”
That caught Viktor’s attention. “Vague how?”
“Students transferred. Withdrew. Took external placements. Depends which record you read.” Jayce shrugged. “The story says that if you hear the thirteenth bell, someone won’t finish the school year.”
“Conveniently vague.”
“Expelled, withdrawn, dead—”
“More conveniently vague.”
“I didn’t invent it.”
“Have you heard it?”
“Never. I’ve lived here five years.”
“Then we have a sample size of one and no event. Compelling.”
“You’re going to be fun.”
“I have been told otherwise.”
That, finally, made Jayce laugh.
They reached North Lecture Two with barely a minute to spare. Jayce pushed open the door. “Physics. Bolbok teaches this section. If he says something will be on the examination, he’s lying. The thing he calls ‘interesting but nonessential’ will absolutely be on the examination.”
Viktor paused. “Thank you.”
Jayce blinked. It sounded sincere.
“Oh. Yeah. Sure.”
Viktor entered, and Jayce had barely crossed the doorway before Claggor appeared and hooked an arm around his shoulders.
“Talis! You’re free.”
“For now.”
Mylo joined them and nodded toward Viktor, who had already chosen a seat in the back row and opened a notebook. “Is that the Zaun scholarship kid?”
“Yeah.”
“And?”
Jayce considered the dry responses, the vending machine betrayal, and Viktor’s apparent inability to accept a shortcut without questioning it.
“Annoying,” he decided.
Professor Bolbok entered before anyone could ask more.
Within five minutes, Jayce was bored. It wasn’t that he disliked mechanics. Mechanics was beautiful. Professor Bolbok spending fifteen minutes reviewing a transformation method Jayce had understood last year was not.
Jayce yawned.
Professor Bolbok stopped speaking.
Jayce knew immediately this had become his problem.
“Talis.”
He straightened. “Yes, Professor?”
“Am I keeping you awake?”
“Very effectively.”
Professor Bolbok stared at him with the exhausted patience of a man who had been teaching him for four years. “Perhaps you’d prefer to demonstrate the principle yourself.”
He turned and added a new equation to the board.
Rigid body rotation under multiple constraints.
Easy.
Jayce walked to the front, accepted the chalk, and studied the problem for a few seconds before writing.
Transformation. Substitution. Reduction. Boundary condition. Final expression.
Six clean steps.
He underlined the result and put down the chalk.
Professor Bolbok examined it. “Correct.”
Several Forge students knocked their knuckles against their desks. Someone muttered, “Show-off.”
Jayce grinned. “Can I go back to sleeping?”
“No.”
“Worth asking.”
He had taken two steps toward his seat when a hand rose in the back row.
Professor Bolbok nodded toward Viktor. “Yes?”
“It is not correct.”
The room went quiet.
Jayce turned.
Professor Bolbok frowned at the board. “The final expression is correct.”
“Yes. The answer is correct.” Viktor tapped his pencil once against his notebook. “The derivation is not.”
Jayce folded his arms. “What exactly is wrong with it?”
“It is inefficient.”
Someone near the front made a poorly disguised choking sound.
Professor Bolbok, traitor that he was, looked interested. “Explain.”
Viktor stood and made his way to the board, cane tapping softly against the floor. “He decomposed the matrix before applying the rotational constraint. There is no reason to do that. If the constraint is applied first, the second and fourth transformations become unnecessary.”
He reached Jayce and held out one hand.
Jayce looked at it. “What?”
“The chalk.”
There was something deeply offensive about this.
Jayce handed it over.
Viktor erased approximately half his work and rewrote the derivation in three neat steps.
Same answer.
Half the work.
Professor Bolbok stared at the board for a moment. “Very elegant.”
Jayce considered transferring.
“For those of you who haven’t met him yet,” Bolbok continued, “this is Viktor. He joined us this term through the Zaun Scholarship and has been assigned to Axiom House.”
Viktor gave the smallest possible nod and returned to his seat as though he had not just committed an act of academic violence.
Jayce hated him.
By dinner, the feeling had matured considerably.
The Academy dining hall was enormous, loud, and perpetually warm, with four long House tables stretching beneath exposed timber beams. That evening the kitchens had served roast chicken, glazed carrots, and potatoes crisped in enough butter to make Vita disapprove on principle.
Jayce normally loved the potatoes.
Tonight they tasted like three steps.
“So,” Claggor said, cutting into his chicken. “He used three.”
Jayce looked up slowly. “Thank you. I had managed to forget for almost twelve seconds.”
Mylo reached for another roll. “Was his method actually better?”
Jayce stared at him.
Mylo paused. “Scientifically speaking.”
“It was shorter.”
“So yes.”
“Shorter is not inherently better.”
Claggor nodded thoughtfully. “Was it more efficient?”
Jayce threw a carrot at him.
After dinner, Jayce found himself heading toward the library.
That alone should have concerned everyone.
The Academy library at night was one of the quietest places on campus. Enormous windows became black mirrors reflecting rows of brass lamps, while three levels of books disappeared upward into shadow behind narrow iron balconies.
Jayce went directly to advanced physics and pulled Applications of Rotational Dynamics in Non-Inertial Frames from the shelf.
“Of course.”
He turned.
Viktor stood behind him, attention fixed on the book.
Jayce tucked it under one arm. “No.”
Viktor blinked. “I have not asked you anything.”
“You want this.”
“I do.”
“No.”
“You have not opened it.”
“I was about to.”
“I came here specifically for that text.”
Jayce smiled. “That’s unfortunate.”
Viktor regarded him for a moment. “You are refusing to lend me a library book because I corrected your equation.”
“That is an extremely biased interpretation.”
“It is an exact description of events.”
“It belongs to the library.”
“Precisely.”
“And currently the library has entrusted it to me.”
“You have not checked it out.”
“Emotionally, it has.”
Viktor’s mouth twitched. “Fine. Enjoy your book.”
“I will.”
“I hope it has pictures.”
Viktor returned to the long table beneath the windows.
There were dozens of empty seats.
Jayce selected the opposite end of Viktor’s table and opened the book with unnecessary ceremony.
Pure coincidence.
Ten minutes passed before Viktor said, without looking up, “Page two hundred fourteen.”
Jayce kept reading. “What?”
“The section you want.”
“I know.”
“You are on page forty-three.”
“I like context.”
“You are reading the introduction to coordinate systems.”
“Foundation is important.”
“You are holding the book hostage.”
Jayce lowered it. “Do you always talk this much?”
“Only when someone makes being wrong unusually labor-intensive.”
The older student at the next table looked over. “Can you two keep it down?”
They both lowered their heads.
Jayce eventually reached page two hundred fourteen.
Unfortunately, Viktor had been right again.
Five minutes later, Viktor spoke without lifting his eyes from his notes. “That sign is wrong.”
Jayce checked his page. “You cannot possibly see my equation from there.”
“You write enormous symbols.”
“I do not.”
“You do.”
Jayce checked.
Damn.
He corrected the sign.
Viktor resumed reading as though he had just performed a minor public service.
“You know,” Jayce whispered, “most people wait until someone asks before criticizing their work.”
“Most people appear grateful when prevented from repeating an error.”
The older student looked over again. “Seriously.”
Both boys returned to their work.
The library slowly emptied around them. A prefect made a final round shortly before midnight and reminded the remaining students that the academic building was closing soon.
Jayce finally slid the book halfway down the table.
Viktor glanced at it. “I thought the library had entrusted it to you.”
“We’ve grown apart.”
“How tragic.”
“Take it before I reconsider.”
Viktor did. “Thank you.”
Jayce somehow found those two words irritating too.
By then, the library had emptied and the old academic wing had fallen quiet beneath the bell tower. Jayce packed his bag, then paused before leaving.
Viktor seemed to have forgotten the rest of the world existed.
He sat beneath the brass lamp with one hand resting against his temple, completely absorbed in the text. He read with the intensity of someone personally offended by any sentence he did not understand immediately, occasionally pausing with his pencil against his lower lip before returning to the page.
Jayce had the deeply inconvenient thought that he looked almost cute.
No.
Absolutely not.
Rejected.
Methodologically unsound.
This was the same boy who had erased half his derivation in front of thirty people. Nothing about him was cute.
Viktor finally lifted his head. “Are you leaving?”
“Yes.”
“Good. Then I can finally study in silence.”
“You have spoken to me at least as much as I have spoken to you.”
“That seems statistically unlikely.”
Jayce opened his mouth to object when the clock began to strike midnight.
One. Two.
The deep sound rolled through the empty library. Viktor lowered his pencil.
Three. Four. Five. Six.
Outside, the courtyards were empty. Warm lights glowed in the dormitory windows across the grounds.
Seven. Eight. Nine. Ten.
Eleven.
Twelve.
Silence.
Viktor leaned back in his chair. “Your terrifying Academy legend appears disappointingly functional.”
“I told you I’ve never heard it.”
“You spent fifteen minutes this afternoon attempting to make it sound mysterious.”
“That was before you publicly criticized my mathematics. I’ve become much more skeptical since.”
“That was physics.”
Jayce looked at him.
Viktor almost smiled.
Then—
Dong.
The sound rolled through the building.
Both boys went still.
One clear, heavy strike came from the tower directly above them, deep enough that Jayce felt it faintly through the wooden floor.
Thirteen.
The sound faded into the stone.
For a moment, neither spoke.
Viktor broke the silence first. “You said you’ve lived here five years.”
Jayce nodded.
“And you have never heard that before.”
Jayce looked up toward the tower.
For once, Jayce Talis had absolutely nothing clever to say.
“No,” he said quietly. “I haven’t.”