Celeste stepped out first—and immediately bumped straight into Silver.
“Oh—stars, I’m sorry!” she blurted, instinctively reaching out.
Silver had already stumbled back a step, more surprised than hurt. “It’s—fine,” he said automatically.
Celeste didn’t seem convinced. She caught his sleeve and helped steady him anyway, small hands firm and warm. “Right,” she said briskly, as if nothing awkward had just happened. “That’s the team. Let’s go find your room.”
Silver blinked. “Find?”
“Yes,” Celeste said, like she’d just explained how doors worked. “When you live here, the tree finds you a room. Or grows one. Or… does both? Mine’s up the stairs.”
Silver stared at her. “The council would have a field day with this place.”
She nodded cheerfully. “It’s huge inside.”
“Yes,” he said slowly, looking around. “I noticed.”
“It’s bigger inside than outside,” Celeste added. “We don’t know how it works and I’m not questioning it.”
Silver glanced at her sideways. “Do you question anything?”
She hummed, thoughtful. “Honestly? Since the apocalypse, nothing surprises me anymore.”
They passed a wide balcony overlooking the central pillar of the base—an enormous living column of wood and crystal where light filtered down like sunlight through leaves. Massive doors branched off from it, corridors spiraling in impossible directions.
Rooms bloomed everywhere.
Some curled up spiral staircases. Some hid behind bark that peeled back like curtains. Some were aggressively cute—lanterns, ribbons, carved heart-shaped knots. Others looked half-eaten, jagged and raw, slowly regenerating as if the tree itself was healing.
Silver slowed despite himself, eyes tracking it all.
“…It’s alive,” he murmured.
“Very,” Celeste said fondly.
Then—just a little way from her room—the tree shifted.
Wood unfurled. Sugar-glass veins traced outward, catching the light. Bark parted with a soft creak.
A new room emerged.
Near windows.
Lots of them.
Silver stopped.
Inside was beautiful—ornate bark shaped into clean lines, sugar glass forming elegant panels that refracted light without clutter. Functional. Open. A wide balcony curved outward, overlooking the bay and the base below.
Air. Space. Sightlines.
The tree had listened.
Silver stepped inside slowly, like the room might vanish if he moved too fast.
“…It knows,” he said quietly.
Celeste smiled, small and proud. “It usually does.”
He walked to the balcony, resting his hands on the railing. The openness tugged something loose in his chest—freedom, maybe. Or the illusion of it. Either way, it fit him unnervingly well.
Silver exhaled, a genuine sound this time.
“…I’m pleased,” he admitted.
The tree’s glass chimed softly, as if it agreed.
Celeste hovered in the doorway of his new room, rocking slightly on her heels.
“Um—do you want to come to my room?” she asked. “I’ve got some video games.”
Silver’s brain immediately went somewhere else.
Ah. This, said the internal voice that sounded suspiciously like Lysander Whytemere. No standards. Predictable.
He straightened his shoulders, already preparing a polite deflection—then followed her anyway, because curiosity has ruined better men than him.
Her room detonated every assumption he had.
It was… enormous. And aggressively cute.
Plushies everywhere. Shelves of figurines. Posters—actual posters, which suddenly made Celeste’s earlier confusion painfully relevant. Soft lantern light. Ribbons. Stacks of sketchbooks. A half-finished quilt draped over a chair. It looked less like a bedroom and more like a kawaii nerd sanctum that had achieved sentience.
Celeste, entirely unfazed, dragged out a beanbag with a little grunt and plopped onto the floor. Then she shoved another one beside it, sat back up, and crawled over to a cabinet.
“Hang on—oh! Yes.” She tugged out a console and set it down, fingers moving with practiced ease. “This is the one you mentioned earlier.”
Silver froze.
“…That’s,” he said slowly, “that’s the exact edition.”
She beamed. “Mm-hmm! Arcade modded it a bit so it doesn’t explode.”
“…Doesn’t explode,” Silver repeated faintly.
“It only did that once.”
She handed him a controller like it was the most normal thing in the world, then produced a little bowl of strawberry sweets and nudged it toward him.
“Mostly the kids play with me,” she added. “Or Arcade. Sometimes Mezzo, but he just button-mashes and yells. It’s mostly casual.” She smiled, soft and hopeful. “You’re the first person I’ve met who likes the same kind of games, so… I thought you might want a friend here.”
Friend.
Silver’s brain short-circuited.
Trap, said the paranoid part of him. Social maneuver. Leverage. Don’t relax.
His dragon side, far less impressed, rumbled: You are afraid of a girl who trips over her own tail.
Silver tried to sit.
Maintaining noble posture on a beanbag is an act of war against physics.
He lowered himself cautiously, sank far more than anticipated, stiffened, then gave up and accepted defeat with what dignity he could salvage.
Celeste watched, trying very hard not to giggle.
He took the controller. Then the sweets. Still cautious. Still braced for consequences that never came.
“…So,” Silver said, clearing his throat. “Which mode?”
Celeste’s eyes lit up like she’d just been handed the keys to the universe.
“Oh! Co-op story. Obviously. I’ll be the healer—unless you want to, but I warn you I panic less.”
Silver glanced at her. At the room. At the beanbags. At the controller warm in his hands.
This was not a trap.
This was worse.
This was… nice.
And that thought unsettled him far more than danger ever had.
Celeste kept her healer glued to him, hands flickering across the controls with quiet focus. Every time his knight took a hit—flash, healed. Again—flash, healed.
Silver absolutely did not smile.
He also absolutely was having the time of his life.
He leaned forward, elbows on knees, trying very hard not to look excited as he timed parries and counters. “You know,” he said casually, “for someone who claims to panic less, you’re hovering.”
Celeste squinted at the screen. “I am supporting. Also your knight has the survival instincts of a soggy biscuit.”
Silver huffed. “He’s brave.”
“He ran into fire.”
“For honour.”
“For vibes,” she corrected, then immediately healed him again.
They played like that for a bit—bickering softly, falling into rhythm. It felt… easy. Dangerous, that.
Silver cleared his throat. “You must be proud,” he said, choosing the words carefully. “Being given charge of a military unit. Like your father.”
Celeste blinked, then laughed—light, almost embarrassed. “Oh. Um. It’s… okay? I kind of got thrown into it.”
Silver glanced at her. “Surely, as a… common hybrid,” he said, the phrase slipping out the way it had been taught to him, “you see the benefit of such a station.”
Celeste snorted. “Common hybrid makes me sound like a crafting material.”
She nudged the controller with her thumb, eyes still on the screen. “Honestly? Lately it feels more like pest control. Zombies here, zombies there. Mostly I’m winging it.”
That landed wrong.
Silver’s smile tightened, just a fraction. In his head, the council chamber reassembled itself: whispers, smirks, raised brows.
Winging it?
If she doesn’t know what she’s doing, I’m doomed.
He straightened slightly. “Hybrids would normally be… eager for such positions,” he said, unable to stop himself. “Pureblood posts, especially. It’s… advancement.”
Celeste shrugged. “It’s nice. I’ve got friends. A place to stay. That part matters.” She hesitated, then added quietly, “I just don’t love people looking up to me so much. I don’t really know what I’m doing.”
Silver’s internal monologue screamed.
Stars above. I need to fix this. Immediately. If this unit looks like a joke, I’m a joke by association.
He inhaled, recalibrated, and put on his most diplomatic tone. “If I may,” he said, “I do have some ideas that could… help the Knights. Structure. Presentation. A little polish.”
Celeste paused the game.
She stuffed three strawberry sweets into her mouth at once, cheeks puffing out like a determined squirrel, then gave him a very sincere thumbs-up.
“Mmmf. That would be gweat.”
Silver recoiled—visibly.
This was going to be much trickier than he thought.
Celeste heard raised voices drift up through the open window—sharp, raw, familiar.
She paused mid-sentence, frowning. “Sorry—one sec.”
She padded over and carefully poked her head outside.
Below, in the courtyard, Topsy was pacing like a shaken soda can, hands flailing, while Plum stood between her and a stiff, red-faced arcbracer recruit—Arch—trying very hard not to get flattened by the emotional crossfire.
At first Celeste couldn’t quite make out the words.
Silver leaned over her shoulder. “You’re being nosy.”
Celeste startled, squeaked, and immediately grabbed his sleeve and yanked him down so they both vanished below the windowsill.
Silver hit the floor in a very un-noble heap.
“Shh!” she hissed. “She’ll see us.”
From below—
“You lied, Arch!” Topsy shouted. “You lied and got me kicked off the team, you big stupid head!”
Celeste froze. Silver went very still.
Plum’s voice cut in, strained. “Topsy—please—”
“I just wanted them to listen to me,” Topsy continued, voice cracking. “And instead I get turned into a battery. A battery, Arch. Do you have any idea what that—”
“I got carried away,” Arch snapped. “Alright? But I couldn’t risk my career.”
Topsy laughed—a sharp, broken sound. “So you destroyed mine?! I worked my ass off to be the best mana surfer on my street. My whole block came out to cheer me on. I lived and breathed Skyrush. And you lied.”
Silence. Then Arch, defensive and brittle:
“Look—no offence—but you’re better off as a hybrid on a pureblood team. It wasn’t a good look for the rest of us.”
Celeste’s ears flattened.
Topsy went very quiet. Too quiet.
“They weren’t the problem,” she said. “You were. Because my goal technique was flashier than yours.”
Arch scoffed. “Your technique was crap anyway.”
Plum snapped. “Enough! Both of you! Every zombie in five miles can hear this!”
Too late.
“Oh, good,” Topsy said brightly.
She hopped up onto a crate.
“HEY EVERYONE!” she yelled. “ARCH IS A BIG FAT LIAR WHOSE TACKLE TECHNIQUE IS SUBPAR AND WHO GETS OFF ON FRAMING HYBRIDS FOR CRIMES THEY DIDN’T DO.”
There was a stunned pause.
Topsy dropped her rolled-up newspaper at Arch’s feet, hopped down, and dusted off her hands.
“I hope it was worth it,” she said flatly. “Because now no one cares about mana surfing. And you’re stuck guarding people you hate.”
She walked off without looking back.
Arch growled under his breath, fists clenched. “If I had a choice, I’d be gone.”
Above them, Celeste stayed crouched, heart hammering.
Silver didn’t say anything.
For once, he didn’t have anything clever to say at all.
