*LORD OF DESTINY: Chapter 25: A Day With No Pulls
The capital was quiet.
No chains. No cages. No crying in threads.
For the first time since the scar appeared, Kael didn’t feel a tug.
He woke to sunlight on his face and nineteen kids already awake.
No lessons.
No training.
No "small pulls."
Just... a day.
*Morning:*
Mira taught Jorin how to skip stones on the fountain.
He got three skips and screamed like he’d won a war.
Nira braided Ella’s hair. Badly. Ella didn’t care.
Toven fell asleep in a patch of sun with two other kids using him as a pillow.
*Afternoon:*
Coren tried to cook. It was terrible. Everyone ate it anyway.
Selin and the other former Menders sat with Lyra and just... talked. No spindles. No white eyes.
Mara laughed. For real. Kael had never heard it before.
*Evening:*
All nineteen of them piled into the big courtyard.
No circle. No formation. Just a messy, loud, human pile.
Kael sat in the middle of it.
The knot in the Spire, miles away, pulsed once. Soft.
Not a warning. A heartbeat.
“Teacher,” Ella said, leaning on his shoulder. “Are we safe now?”
Kael looked at them. Nineteen threads above, spinning lazy and slow.
Black, white, gold, thin, thick. All tangled together.
“Yeah,” he said. “For today, we are.”
Mira crawled into his lap. “Can we do this again tomorrow?”
“Tomorrow we go home,” Kael said. “Back to the Spire. Build it bigger.”
Jorin yawned. “Can we bring snacks?”
Everyone laughed.
The scar on Kael’s chest was warm. Not burning.
The gold line pulsed once, in time with the knot.
Through the rope on his wrist, he felt it.
No tugs.
No pulls.
Just nineteen kids, breathing.
Consequence could wait.
Fate could wait.
The Weaver could wait.
Tonight, they were just a school.
And that was enough.