The carriage rolled forward, and the forest began to thin around them.

Luna sat beside Ken, her eyes moving to the small window every few seconds like she was trying to memorise everything passing outside it. Leo sat across from them with his arms folded and his jaw set, the grinding of his teeth audible enough that it filled the small space between them.

Ken glanced at him. "You’ll break your teeth if you keep that up."

Leo’s glare could have cut glass. "Know your place, human."

Ken smiled. "My place." He let the words sit for a moment. "I’m not the one who manipulated his way into coming along. You were never part of the choice. It was always me."

Leo’s expression darkened several degrees, but he said nothing. He unfolded and refolded his arms and looked away, and Ken let him have the silence because there was nothing left to add. Leo had seen the fight with Sierra. He had heard what happened in the town. Whatever he felt about Ken’s presence here, he was smart enough to keep it behind his teeth.

For now.

Ken looked out of the window after a moment. "Have either of you seen the capital?"

Luna shook her head, her expression brightening immediately at the subject. "No. After living in hiding for so long, I’m eager to see what it looks like." She smiled, and the bubbly warmth of it filled the carriage in a way that made the tension from a moment ago feel very far away.

Leo clicked his tongue. "I’m sure it won’t be much. I’ve seen what the capital of the elf continent looks like." He settled back with a smug ease, clearly content to let the implication speak for itself. "I’m fairly certain nothing the humans have built can compare to that."

Ken nodded slowly. "The elves are more advanced. That much is obvious."

Leo blinked, not expecting agreement.

"Which is what I find strange sometimes," Ken continued, his eyes still on the window. "If the elves are that far ahead, how did they end up the ones in hiding?" He said it the way he said most things, without heat, just turning it over.

"The story never fully made sense to me. The elves allied with the demons to fight the humans. But why would the elves need the demons at all? Against humans?" He paused. "And if the elves and demons had fought together properly, there should have been nothing left of the humans to push back. Something in the history doesn’t sit right.

There’s a gap somewhere between what actually happened and what ended up being told."

He stopped there and went back to looking outside.

The carriage rolled on.

Luna and Leo sat across from him in complete silence, both of them staring at the side of his face. The same thought was visible on both of them, the quiet stunned look of people hearing something said plainly that they had never once thought to say themselves, the words landing and then continuing to land.

Neither of them responded.

Ken didn’t seem to notice, or if he did, he gave no indication of it, his eyes following the passing trees like the conversation had simply concluded and he had already moved on to whatever came next.

[....]

In the first carriage, the four sat inside calmly in silence.

Kira was the first to speak.

"That human." He didn’t frame it as a full question, just set the words down in the middle of the carriage and waited to see what happened with them. His gold eyes moved to the suited man across from him. "Who is he? Where did he come from?"

The suited man adjusted the cuff of his sleeve before answering. "That is precisely the issue. We don’t know." He said it plainly, without any particular alarm in his voice, just the measured tone of someone delivering a fact they found mildly inconvenient. "Lady Lumeria offered no background, no lineage, no record. Simply that he is the girl’s closest companion and will be acting as her personal guard."

Mira’s brow lifted slightly. "A human acting as guard to an elf of that bloodline." She let the observation sit in the air without finishing it, which was its own kind of commentary.

"It is irregular," the suited man agreed.

"Irregular." The princess spoke for the first time, the word leaving her mouth with the particular lightness of someone who found the understatement almost charming. She was looking out of the window, her posture perfectly arranged, her expression carrying that settled and untroubled superiority that seemed to be simply how her face rested. "It is a problem. Sending an unknown human child into the Royal Academy with no background and no record, vouched for by an elf. The academy has a standard.

There are people who have spent their entire lives preparing for that entrance. Their families have invested everything." She glanced away from the window briefly. "To have that space potentially taken by someone who simply happened to befriend the right person would not sit well with anyone."

"I share the concern," Kira said, folding his arms. "We cannot simply allow it."

The suited man looked between them carefully.

"With respect, declining outright was not something we were in a position to do. Lady Lumeria’s backing in this arrangement is not a small thing. The entire agreement rests on goodwill that we cannot afford to damage before it has even properly begun."

"So we allow it," Mira said.

"We allow the process," the suited man replied. "The academy entrance examination exists precisely for situations like this. Every candidate sits it regardless of who vouches for them." He paused. "I’ll be candid with you. I was standing close to that boy for the entirety of that meeting. I could not sense anything from him. No significant mana, no particular presence that would suggest someone capable of meeting the academy’s standard."

He settled back slightly. "If he sits the examination and falls short, the decision removes itself from our hands entirely. Lady Lumeria agreed to that condition herself."

Kira said nothing, but the line of his shoulders eased slightly. 𝒻𝑟𝘦𝘦𝘸ℯ𝒷𝑛𝘰𝓋ℯ𝘭.𝘤𝘰𝘮

The princess returned her gaze to the window.

"Then it will resolve itself," she said simply. "He’ll be sent back, and that will be the end of it."