The Academy: long time coming;

"He made himself velocity, sudden light."
“Yes,” he answers truthfully, for he has friends among the sea-horses and their names fly through his thoughts on easy, good-natured wings. He is oddly content, for as she goes on, he has found love too, though it is not shared or spoken of. “I have no need to seek what is already found,” he answers, slightly mischievous in the glint of his eye and the smile that touches his lips. “If not love or friendship (besides knowledge for he seeks that even now), what else is there to be found?” he asks her, suddenly grave and thoughtful as to what could be missing in a life that feels strangely whole to him. He looks to her, then gazes out upon the gardens and breathes in deeply of the peaceful air here that settles a strange and unfamiliar turmoil in him.

Lightning I