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“My Shards,” Ivain muttered. “And here I thought we’d moved beyond having hormones dictate every lesson.”

Taly bit her lip, hiding her smirk. It seemed she wasn’t the only one distracted today.

But Ivain was scowling, as if to say,Do you want him to lose an arm?

So, she swallowed her smile—and the temptation to test this newfound power of distraction—retreating to the edges of the workshop.

She sidled closer to the Mechanica. While her mind worked through the most efficient way to remove the breastplate, she kept one eye on Skye.

Ivain stood beside him, arms crossed. “All right, let’s try this again. Keep your breathing steady. You’re manipulating the essence that sustains you—aether and matter, one and the same. Start with aether, trace it, collect it, then pull it free. Slowly.”

Skye’s face was a mask of concentration. Narrowed eyes. Shoulders taut. Sweat tracking down his neck. Beneath the skin of his forearm, a faint, glowing shimmer began to emerge.

“Good,” Ivain murmured, calm, steady, with that familiar guiding edge. “Remember, at its core, biological manipulation is about learning control. Aether isn’t separate from your body—it’s woven into every part of you. It’s interlaced with your bones, your muscles, your very cells. And just like the aether you pull from the air, it’s there for you to command.”

Skye nodded, his breath evening out. His fingers flexed, as if bracing for another go.

“Now, refine the focus. I’ll keep you steady until you find your balance. Your veins are conduits—direct it there. Feel the aether moving through every pathway. Trace each divergence, learn the structure.”

The light beneath Skye’s skin shifted, gathering into a concentrated glow that pulsed along his veins. Taly watched as the aether illuminated the intricate network running through his forearm—a thin, glowing web threading itself through muscle and sinew.

“This is your body’s natural flow, but be careful. Expanding a vein isn’t like shifting muscle. Too much, and you’ll rupture it. Too little, and there’ll be no benefit.”

The veins along Skye’s forearm stood out, swelling as though forced to carry more than they were ever meant to. The aether wasn’t just flowing—it was building pressure, forcing every channel to expand.

“Good. Now, take it deeper—the muscles. Aether infuses every fiber. It’s part of the very makeup of your strength. Feel each strand of protein. Find the connection. Grab it.”

The glow dimmed, sinking beneath the surface like light filtering through water. It barely peeked through his skin now, a soft shimmer where before it had burned bright.

But beneath that—something shifted.

Not just a twitch, not just a flex, but a true, deliberate movement beneath the skin. The muscle fibers weren’t reacting to force; they were reorganizing. Realigning.

Taly stared, breath held.

“Careful,” Ivain murmured. “You don’t need force, just exactness. You’re used to working broad strokes—manipulating aether like a tide. But now, you need to tighten the lens. Focus on the individual molecule. It’s not about shoving or pulling everything at once. It’s aboutguiding. Precise adjustments. The gentlest touch.”

Skye’s brow furrowed, the strain visible in every line of his body.

“Once you figure out how to manipulate the muscles, we can move on to bones. After the bones, it’s the cells. And you keep going deeper, until there’s nowhere left to go...”

Ivain’s voice faded into a distant hum, moving smoothly into more details. Taly could feel her attention slipping, the same way it always did when the lecture turned to the finer intricacies of the lesson—concepts that required a practical understanding of shadow magic she simply didn’t possess. She fought to keep up, but the words blurred, melting into background noise.

She settled onto a stool at a cluttered workbench, hands automatically straightening scattered papers, sorting small bits and pieces into neat piles. She’d grown up watching Skye train, endured endless hours of lessons, throwing in the occasional comment but otherwise content to observe from the sidelines.

Now, her gaze felt glued to him.

She started with his shoulders, broad and steady. The light caught the definition of his back, every sinew standing out.

Her eyes slipped lower—along his spine, a smooth line that led downward.

Still lower. To the slim, tapered angle of his hips, where his skin glistened slightly with sweat.

A sharp, knowing ache coiled low in her belly. She exhaled slowly, schooling her breath, her scent, everything. Her interest was entirely clinical. She could remember the weight of him, the press of muscle, the heat of his breath at her ear, and feel absolutely nothing.

She could even think about the way he’d felt moving inside her and not—

Skye sucked in a sharp breath.