**Chapter 3B: First Frosts**
Rin’s gaze flicked to her for the first time. “We’re not the same.”
The words hung between them, soft but sharp. Lily flinched almost imperceptibly, as though the sentence had struck a nerve she hadn’t known was exposed.
Albert rose as the headmistress dismissed the assembly. He made his way to them quickly, his usual easy smile replaced by something more guarded.
“Diamond,” he said to Rin, tone light but eyes searching. “Not even Heart or Clover. Straight to the tower with the highest wards.”
Rin met his gaze evenly. “They decided where I belonged.”
Lily stood, clutching her cloak. “It’s impressive,” she said quickly, as if trying to smooth over the sudden tension. “Really. I’m… happy for you, Rin.”
Rin did not respond.
They stepped out into the crisp afternoon air. The four dormitories stood at the cardinal points of the central quad: Diamond’s indigo tower rising in the north, Clover’s green spire in the east, Heart’s crimson building in the south, and Spade’s black structure in the west, reserved mostly for faculty.
Rin paused at the base of the Diamond tower. Its doors were guarded by two stone frost-wyrms whose eyes glowed faintly when she approached. The wards recognized her blood.
Albert stepped closer, voice low. “You know you could have asked for Clover. Or Heart. The family could have pulled strings.”
“It is the same no matter where it is,” Rin replied. “A place where I fit.”
Lily hovered a step behind Albert, eyes darting between them. “But we could have been together. In the same dormitory. We could have looked out for each other.”
Rin turned to her fully now. Her silver-blue eyes were cool, almost dispassionate. “I don’t need looking after. And you already have a family that looks after you.”
Lily’s face paled. The unspoken truth—that she was not a Frost by blood, only by upbringing—lay between them like a blade. Albert’s jaw tightened, but he said nothing.
Rin inclined her head slightly. “I’ll see you in class.”
She pushed open the heavy doors and stepped inside without another word.
Behind her, Lily stared at the closed doors, eyes glistening. “She hates me,” she whispered. Her gloomy expression for Albert to see.
Albert exhaled slowly. “She doesn’t hate you. She just… doesn’t know how to be part of us.”
He placed a hand on Lily’s shoulder. “Come on. Let’s get you settled.”
As they walked toward Heart Dormitory, Lily glanced back once more at the indigo tower. Somewhere inside, Rin was unpacking her single chest, arranging her few belongings in a room that had been prepared for someone exceptional—and dangerous.
No one in the Frost family knew the full truth of Rin’s abilities. The entrance examiners had seen only water and ice—hallmarks of the Frost lineage. They had not detected the void magic that could swallow light, nor the wind that answered her call in silence. Those gifts had been hidden, locked away behind a natural veil that even the Academy’s detectors could not pierce.
Only Rin knew how much she was still concealing.
And only time would tell whether the Diamond Dormitory would be a sanctuary—or a cage.