Chapter 18 – Warmth in the Cold
The months that followed were quiet.
Too quiet.
Catherine's routine never changed. Precision ruled the halls—schedules carved to the minute, evaluations delivered in curt phrases, and emotions filed away like irrelevant paperwork.
Thomas watched it all, day by day.
He mapped every face that entered or exited Catherine's office. He memorized voices behind closed doors. But opportunities were scarce—her office was now two corridors away, and his new schedule left no freedom for midnight searches or stealthy detours.
So, he waited.
He listened.
He adapted.
What changed… was Thomas himself.
In the absence of Sister Mary, and in the suffocating silence that crept into every room, he stepped forward.
Not because he was told to.
But because no one else would.
He began telling stories to the younger ones—especially Daisy, Johnny, and the two newly transferred boys, Milo and Brent. Before bed, after the rigid schedules were done, he'd gather them in the shared dormitory and whisper tales from memory.
Some were old fairy tales, like The Little Match Girl or The Wind and the Sun. Others, he made up entirely—adventures across distant galaxies, children who outsmarted tyrants, rabbits who escaped cages.
Anything to make them smile again.
"What happened next?" Daisy would whisper, eyes wide.
"The rabbit found the door," Thomas would answer softly. "But he waited. He waited until all the other rabbits could follow him too."
And when Johnny gave a faint chuckle again, or when Milo fell asleep with a peaceful sigh, Thomas would let himself feel—if only for a moment—that he could make a difference.
That he was making a difference.
He missed Sister Mary terribly.
But he now understood what she had always carried—the weight of being the only adult in a room full of fragile hearts.
Thomas wasn't an adult.
But his soul was far older than six.
And so, he became what the others needed: a flicker of warmth in the cold.
At night, when all was still and he lay in his narrow bed, Thomas focused inward.
His magic, quiet but ever present, pulsed faintly beneath the skin.
There was something new.
If he breathed evenly—if he emptied his mind—he could feel the room around him.
More than just sight. More than just sound.
It was... spatial perception.
He could sense the dimensions of the dormitory, the outline of the corridor, even the faint shifting of weight when someone walked past the far end.
He stilled his breath.
Beyond the wall—down the hallway—someone moved.
He couldn't hear them.
But he felt them.
A new sense... like seeing without eyes. Feeling without touch.
It wasn't yet controllable, but it was real.
Another thread of space magic, emerging from silence.
And perhaps, if he trained it…
He wouldn't need to go to Catherine's office to know what was inside.
He just needed to reach far enough.