The Villain Professor's Second Chance

"It has begun," he muttered, voice swallowed by storm wind rattling the high shutters.

Below, Helyra's moon-staff tapped mosaic. A chime like struck glass resonated through hidden silver veins. Under polished marble, circles of sigils flared—first dull pewter, then bright as lightning, then dimming to ember as they bit into the palace wards, prying them open.

Draven let his lips form the silent order. Shadows that had pretended for hours to be motifs on cornices peeled free, stretching into lean silhouettes. Nine wraiths glided along the rafters, their bodies less substance than hunger. Talons brushed mezzanine railings, whisper-soft, before sinking into flesh. A guard gargled behind a pillar, the sound lost beneath orchestrated applause.

Lirael watched none of this directly. She felt it—air pressure shifting as guards above gasped, the hush of silk when nobles stiffened at movement they could not name. But her focus drilled into the iron circlet descending toward her brow.

The moment the Storm Crown's cold kiss met her skin, darkness slammed through her skull. It was like being punched by the ocean—pressure, roar, then dizzying stillness. Knees buckled; she tasted copper where teeth cut lip. Lightning burst white behind her closed lids, splintering outward like frost on glass.

And then—

A sharp, ringing crack. A split she had prayed for in midnight silence. Warm metal shrieked as the flaw gave way, cleaving spine to brow piece. Auric's hands jerked with the recoil; sparks leapt outward, bright insects skittering away from flame.

Both halves of the Crown sheared down, clanged against marble. One point sliced her palm as she caught it on reflex, hot pain blooming up her wrist. The pieces spun once, twice, small suns of broken promise, then stilled. Sparks skipped across the steps, tiny red firebirds flattening against stone and dying in curling smoke.

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Silence held for the length of a heartbeat—long enough for dust motes, jarred loose by the explosion of sorcery, to hang in the torchlight like tiny stunned fireflies.

Then Lirael straightened. Vertebrae clicked, echoing faintly above the crackle of burning banners. Her fist curled around the front spike of the shattered crown, metal biting deeper until fresh blood beaded between her knuckles and dripped in ruby rivulets onto silk that was never meant to belong to her. She felt each drop soak through the fabric and slide, warm, along her shin. The pain grounded her—proof she still guided her own flesh.

One step took her onto the lowest stair of the dais. Polished quartz glimmered beneath her bare foot, slick with scattered sparks. Somewhere a noble coughed, harsh and ragged, as smoke clawed down from the rafters. Another attempted to muffle a scream behind a jeweled sleeve. Lirael ignored the scatter of human noises; she fixed her eyes on Auric's pale, furious face.

"Your king promised my chains would make you safe," she said. She didn't raise her voice. She let it carry in the sudden hush the way moonlight crosses water—soft, unstoppable. Every person straining to hear her found themselves leaning forward, breath locked behind their teeth. "Look around. Do you feel safe now?"

She uncurled her fingers. The spike slipped from blood-slick skin and rang out as it struck the first marble tread, then another. It bounced, spun, and rolled to a rest against Auric's gilt-toed boot. The clear, bright note was a little mocking bell in the stillness.

Spearmen closest to her faltered. Armour creaked where shoulders sagged beneath the sudden weight of doubt. One soldier—hard jaw, eyes too young—slowly lowered the pike meant to guard her flank. His stare darted upward, toward the mezzanine where wraiths flitted in every direction, bladed silhouettes of shadow snatching crossbows from veteran hands and dropping the weapons over the balustrade like discarded toys.

A matron-duchess on the second tier released a thin whimper and clutched at her husband's brocade sleeve, knuckles white. The husband attempted comfort, but his fingers shook so badly that her lace cuff shivered like trapped moth wings. Behind them, three younger nobles in sleek midnight jackets spun away, boots skidding on marble, only to find exit doors chained and glowing with sigil-burn. Kaela's handiwork locked the portals shut, her smoke-ravens circling like watchful omens overhead.

In that vacuum of disbelief, Draven materialized beside Lirael as if her shadow had condensed into flesh. Twin blades caught errant torchlight—quick, silver glints like ice under moon. His arrival spoke for him: no flourish, no vocal challenge, only presence, absolute and calm. A silent sentence on anyone who thought to test him.

The crowd's fear thickened, first into murmurs then into crackling shrieks as a tasseled stage curtain behind the choir loft burst into flame. Orange tongues raced upward, devouring velvet, throwing hot light across frescoes that showed Valaroth kings triumphant. Under that sudden flare, the painted eyes of conquered angels seemed to weep with melting varnish.

Wind, born of fire's hunger, flung torches sideways. They guttered, sputtered, and died, until only the roaring curtain and scattered sconces left illumination. Shadows stretched and writhed, and in every twisting dark some courtier imagined Draven's maskless face.

Smoke crawled low over the floor. It licked at silken hems and feathered slippers, gathering swirling patterns that turned granite underfoot into a night sea. Spectators backed against balustrades, coughed behind scented scarves, eyes darting to find leadership among the chaos and failing.

Draven moved first. One fluid slash, barely seen—just a flash of steel and the whisper of sundered links—and the rune chain at Lirael's throat parted. It fell in two dead coils, each link sparking violet before extinguishing with a hiss. Lirael's breath drew in sharply, free of magic's barbed wire for the first time in days. The air tasted of cedar smoke and panic—and possibility.

"Left corridor," Draven murmured. No wasted syllables. No explanations.

Sylvanna answered before Lirael could nod. Her disguise—a velvet case cradling an ornate lute—was already discarded at her feet, strings humming where they had snapped in the drop. She caught Lirael's elbow, grip firm yet respectful, and guided her toward a servant arch half-veiled by billowing smoke. Through the haze, her eyes glinted owl-bright, eager for flight rather than fear. "Head low, breathe shallow," Sylvanna said, soft but urgent. "Follow my heel prints exactly."

Behind them, Draven pivoted to face the hall. His cloak snapped like a raven's unfurled wing, then settled. In the whirl of blackening smoke, he was a single calm axis. Soldiers seeing him wavered; courage shattered under that violet gaze as surely as glass meeting hammer.

Embedded allies triggered their marks. At precisely timed beats, metal grates slammed into place, locking side passages. Iron braces groaned into sockets, echoing like distant drums of war. From fresco niches high on the pillars, wraiths spilled, gliding above panicked heads to corral nobles away from unbarred doors. They guided, not slaughtered—Draven wanted fear, not corpses. He wanted stories to bloom after tonight, rumors so wild no decree could stamp them out.

Kaela moved like a phantom across the choir loft. She crushed a fistful of sigil-ash and exhaled its powder into the furnace draft. Runes flared white within the soot, then sank into every coil of smoke. The plumes twisted, morphed into shrieking raven-shapes—smoke given talon and shrill cry. They swooped over helmets, raking fear into the last defenders. A sergeant jabbed upward with a partisan, but the raven dissolved, re-formed behind him, and screamed directly in his ear. He bolted, dropping the weapon that clattered down the marble steps.

Below the dais, Auric roared for Orvath, voice cracking around the consonants. He spun, cloak swirling embers from fallen braziers. "Magister!" he howled again. Only silence answered—the kind of silence that tasted like abandonment.

Vostyr was nowhere in sight; if the general heard, he chose not to appear. Auric's fury turned raw. He seized a guardsman's spear, shoved the trembling soldier aside, and rammed the blade through a wraith's chest. Shadow quivered, parted, then fused again around the iron tip. It flitted behind him, whispered like parchment tearing, and left a shallow trail of frost across his cheek. The king flinched as if bitten.

Draven's backward retreat looked unhurried, a dancer's measured pacing. Any soldier forcing collision met clinical precision—hamstring neatly opened, windpipe nicked to bloodless silence, artery pressed closed to redirect spill. Victims folded in his wake, and he vanished into shifting smoke even before their knees struck stone. He never glanced to confirm kills; efficiency trusted itself.

Meanwhile Lirael ran. Smoke stung her eyes, but after the collar's muting, every sense felt astonishingly sharp. She sensed the stone cool beneath her bare feet despite the heat of flame, counted each footfall echo bouncing from narrow servant walls ahead. Sylvanna ducked low beams without pause; Lirael matched her, surefooted.

Behind them, the grand doors began to thump under battering rams wielded from the outside. Reinforcements. Draven's timing, as ever, bordered on prophecy: corridor exit just ahead before hall became a meat grinder.

A single wraith skimmed past the two women, guiding like a mute shepherd dog. Where its claw grazed an iron sconce, sparks spat, marking the turn they should take. Lirael filed the detail. This was more than savagery; it was choreography.

They reached a narrow stone throat sloping downward. Blue witch-lamps burned at long intervals, leaving pools of deeper dark between. Sylvanna paused only to whistle twice—high, then higher. The hiss of shifting scales answered: chimera falcons slipping from vents to escort overhead, their mirrored feathers reflecting just enough glow to trick the eye into thinking constellations moved underground.

Back in the throne hall, spears hammered the barred doors. Iron hinges squealed, then surrendered; the wings burst inward on a roil of smoke. Auric stood alone amid toppled braziers, mosaic sunburst scarred by wraith claws and char. Banners hung slack and half-burnt, their embroidered wolves sagging like slain beasts. His cloak flared—the cut edges testified to near-misses.

Broken halves of the Crown, blood-glued to each other, rested in his shaking grip. The shards dug new grooves into his palm with every heartbeat. A ring of empty floor yawned around him as if even echo feared to share the dais.

Vostyr arrived at a run, twenty infantry tight at his back. Their boots skidded on slick marble, eyes widening as they took in toppled tables, gutted braziers, nobles scrambling for overturned benches that offered scant shelter. One veteran knelt beside a coughing baroness, lifting her free of a fallen standard. His hand trembled. Order had cracked.

Vostyr drew breath, sword half-raised for commands he'd shouted all his life—Form ranks. Advance shields. Secure the king. But Auric's eyes met his, blazing accusation brighter than any torch. Where were you? they demanded. Vostyr's mouth dried. No words came.

"Bring me the magister's head," Auric hissed. The shout finished as a rasp, his throat raw. Blood dripped from his sleeve cuff.

Vostyr's sword dipped an inch. Doubt quivered along the steel, visible to every soldier watching. Their gazes flicked from king to general and back, seeking an anchor.

Servants approached with stretcher cloths, but bowed instead of stepping fully onto the dais—uncertain if proximity might draw the Hunter back. Masks and fans lay crushed at their feet, fragile identities discarded in flight.

Auric watched a tattered banner loosen from wall rings. It billowed like a dying dove, drifted down, and landed against his shin. He ground it underboot, gold threads ripping loose with soft pops, yet the act brought no comfort. He squeezed the cracked crown halves until spikes bit deeper, welcoming the pain that proved this ruin was real, not nightmare.

He lifted his face to smoke-hazed rafters, forced a smile—too wide, too many teeth, edges wetted by his own blood. His voice, though thinned, still wielded a blade's menace. "Find them," he commanded, turning the order on air, on Vostyr, on whichever gods still deigned to listen. "Find them, and let the world see what becomes of legends."

But the torch flames guttered, and banners lay like shed skins, and more than one soldier glanced toward the shattered doors as though contemplating flight instead of pursuit. Auric's threat tasted of ash and desperation, dissolving on tongues before reaching hearts.

Beyond those doors, the palace corridors already pulsed with rumor—a broken Storm Crown, an elf princess walking free, a hunter of silent footsteps who taught fear to change allegiance. Servants whispered even as they swept soot. Stable hands saddled horses with trembling fingers, unsure who might claim them by dawn.

And somewhere in the depths of Valaroth, twin halves of an iron crown wept rust into a king's bleeding hand