SSS Talent: From Trash to Tyrant

Zafira was finally back, after nearly two weeks spent in Zar’khael territory. She stepped through the gate with the case of someone who had walked the path too many times to count, stretching her arms above her head as a quiet ”hmpf” escaped her lips.

The trip wasn’t over yet. She still had to catch the train to the academy, and the only thing that truly appealed to her right now was the thought of her own bed.

Her father crossed her mind while she walked toward the platform. Malakar had taken the news well when he learned she had finished third in her entire year; he had expected nothing less from his daughter, and he made no effort to hide it.

With the calm curiosity of a merchant skimming through an inventory list, he asked about the two names above hers. He wanted to know whether there was any talent worth keeping an eye on, some thread that could be pulled discreetly toward House Zar’khael.

Zafira answered without dressing it up: Alfons in second, Trafalgar at the top.

Malakar’s expression hardened at once. Not out of disappointment; his daughter was never the problem. It was the surnames. Few people were aware that the Vaclions and the Morgains had been measuring each other for years, a quiet friction that never reached the formal halls but simmered beneath every polite greeting. He said nothing. There was nothing worth saying.

The train hissed to a stop and Zafira stepped down through the warm haze of steam drifting across the academy platform. She crossed the campus toward the dormitory building with her hood lowered and her satchel slung over one shoulder, walking briskly past the few students still wandering around at that hour. Once inside, she headed straight for the usual circular platform. ”Wait!”

She turned with a raised eyebrow. She hadn’t expected to run into Trafalgar, and least of all to see him jogging toward her with his hair slightly disheveled and the kind of breathing that betrayed haste, even if his face would never admit it.

”Trafalgar? Where are you coming from? You look like you ran here.”

”Oh,” he replied, adjusting the collar of his jacket. ”I’d gone out with Barth and Xavier. I wasn’t expecting you back yet.”

”I got in a little while ago.”

He gave a single nod, as though fitting a piece into place.

”That’s actually why I came looking for you. Mariven Port. You said you wanted to buy items as well and, well, you already met Augusto.”

Zafira allowed herself half a smile, amused by how he circled his way into the subject.

”Yeah. I’m free now, we can go whenever.”

”Tomorrow, then.” Trafalgar gave a small shrug, the kind that belonged to someone who had already mapped out the route before even opening his mouth. ”We’ll stay at some hotel in Mariven. I know the lord of Mariven. He’ll give us a decent rate and a proper place to rest.”

”You know him?”

”Long story.” He paused briefly, with no flair attached. ”Some idiots in Mariven thought killing me was a good idea.”

Zafira went quiet for a few breaths, the question forming on its own across her face. That wasn’t the answer she had been prepared for, especially not delivered with the ease of someone commenting on the weather.

”What happened?”

The platform began to rise before he answered. Trafalgar spoke in that tone of his, the one he reserved for minor inconveniences rather than stories of life and death. A mine. Resources that someone coveted more than was wise. A poorly calculated attempt by men who assumed a boy with no name weighing on his shoulders made for easy prey.

The outcome had turned out to be the opposite of what they expected, and now the same man who had wanted him dead trembled at the mere mention of

his name.

”I don’t know what they were expecting, honestly,” Zafira muttered, more annoyed by the stupidity of it than impressed.

”Well, Trafalgar answered, speaking up toward the metallic ceiling of the rising platform. ”They didn’t know who I was, so making a mistake like that was reasonable enough. But every action has its consequences. And they always arrive.”

She watched him for a couple of heartbeats. There was a weight beneath that line that wasn’t threat or arrogance. It felt closer to a natural law, the kind of thing you’d say when describing how rain falls or why iron rusts. Trafalgar never needed to raise his voice to close an idea.

The platform halted at the top floor with the soft click she had come to recognize. The whole level was wrapped in an almost excessive stillness. Only three people lived in a space that covered more ground than some southern manors, and that night the floor felt emptier than usual. Alfons au Vaelion had been gone for days, called back to his own territory, according to the rumors circulating on the lower corridors.

Trafalgar stepped off first and, without fully turning around, raised his hand in a brief farewell.

”I’ll wait for you here in the morning. I doubt we’ll need much time to handle what we have to handle, unless Augusto decides to invent something out of thin air, which, knowing him, is always on the table. See you tomorrow.” Zafira gave a short nod in return and made her way toward her room. Once inside, she let the satchel slide off her shoulder onto a chair, unclasped her cloak without hurry and draped it over the backrest. She started picking out what she’d wear the next day almost absently, her hands moving on their own while her head drifted somewhere else.

Because the truth was simpler than the one she’d given at the platform.

The items, the shopping, the polite ”yes, I still want to go” had all been a convenient cover. She did want a couple of things from Mariven Port, but not enough to justify a whole trip on their own. What she actually wanted was to spend the day with him. Nothing more complicated than that. A day outside the academy, without exams hanging over them or heirs watching from the corners, where she could simply share the hours with Trafalgar and see where

the day took them.

Trafalgar, for his part, was the one who genuinely needed to buy. She knew that much. Which made the whole thing easier to slip past him, since he would hear ”I want to go too” and take it at face value without digging any deeper.

She let out a small breath that was half laugh, half sigh, set the folded clothes beside her bag and sat on the edge of the bed for a moment, looking up at the

ceiling.

Tomorrow, then.

On the other side of the floor, Trafalgar had none of those considerations occupying the upper levels of his head. His mind was doing what it always did, running several corridors at once, none of them closed. He went through what he needed to pick up in Mariven. Reserves. Consumables. A couple of support artifacts for the kind of situations that, when they arrive, don’t bother announcing themselves. He wanted to be ready for that narrow instant where being ready was the entire difference between walking away and being carried. He pulled open one of the drawers by the desk and began counting what he kept aside for this sort of trip. Fear moved prices in odd directions. Sometimes down. Sometimes up, just to avoid looking weak.

’Guess I’ll have to bring a fair amount, he thought, sliding the drawer shut

again.

He walked to the window and rested a shoulder against the frame. The

academy slept on the other side of the glass, breathing its usual wind, its lanterns scattered across the gardens like low constellations. He weighed the coming day without urgency, with the cold measure of someone sizing up the hours before a serious wager.

Mariven Port was waiting for him.

And Augusto, knowing him the way he did, was already waiting too.