Dream Records

Aerisday, Septis 18

I unpacked slowly when I arrived to our quad in the Goldspire. Not because I had much to put away—I never do—but because there was something about returning that made everything feel thinner, like the world had worn itself out over break and had not fully sewn its seams back together.

The others talked around me, voices carrying through the quad’s common room as they settled in. In the room across from mine, Ardorion flopped dramatically onto his bed like he was staging a fire-themed performance piece. Shara moved with calm purpose, always neat, always intentional. Garnexis had already tossed her boots against the wall and was digging through her bag like it had wronged her personally.

I smoothed the corner of my blanket. The threads there were frayed in the shape of a leaf I’d dreamt about two nights before. A sign, maybe. Or nothing at all.

Ardorion stood and tossed his cloak onto his bed and said, “We should check on Aster. Maybe her face will finally crack if we ask the right question.”

Shara gave him a look, one that said tone it down, but even she seemed to agree. The air around us still carried the silence of Halven’s absence. It had followed us back like fog on our boots.

Even though Halven and I dated, each of my quadmates had their own relationship with the Air Fae. He was truly remarkable, born of resilience during the Galestone Wars before he found peace here. It wasn’t fair if he’d made it all this way, just to have something terrible happen to him.

“Maybe we should go,” Shara said gently. Halven had been her best friend. She turned to me. “Rielle, would you want to? I mean, you and Halven were close once.”

More than close.

I still remembered all of his sweet kisses. So soft from a boy who’d live through a war.

I hadn’t told them the full truth yet, and I wasn’t sure I ever would. Not about how it ended, not about what I’d seen in my dreams during the weeks he’d been gone. Some things stay quieter when buried.

“I’m not sure.” My voice felt like a memory.

But I went.

Goldspire Tower holds all the second-years, and Halven’s quad was just across the hall. The same stone arches, the same high ceilings and carved door frames. Aster was already there. She stood near the window, motionless and cold, framed in pale light like a figure inside a painting. Her skin shimmered faintly in the morning air, and her pale blue hair clung to her shoulders like frost clings to glass but it moved like running water. Her eyes—those deep violet pools—watched us with something unreadable.

She didn’t stop us from entering, but she said nothing at all.

After Garnexis and Shara, Ardorion crossed the threshold like a flame looking for dry tinder. He stopped in the doorframe to lean against it, with me out in the hall still, looking at his black silk shirt. But I waited patiently for his posturing to end.

“Well, look who decided to keep the icicle throne warm while the rest of us were actually worried,” he said.

“And look who decided to speak without thinking. Again.” Aster’s voice floated to me in the hallway.

Ardorion’s back tensed. “You know, for someone who’s supposed to be calm and collected, you’re awfully quick with the frostbite.”

“Forgive me if I’m not impressed by theatrics in leather and flame.” A chill hung in the air with Aster’s words.

Sighing, I pushed Ardorion from behind. Not that I really had the strength to move him—being part human and also part Moon Fae, the smallest of the fae—I’d have to use magic to actually move the Fire Fae male, but my push alerted him to the fact that I was stuck behind him, and he finally moved inside the quad’s main room.

“Oh, come on,” Ardorion said. “Just admit you missed me.”

Aster rolled her eyes. “I missed the silence more.”

“Forgive me if I thought maybe you’d stopped pretending you didn’t care.”

“I care,” she said evenly. “I just don’t shout about it like a Summer Fae with something to prove.”

Their voices rose, sarcasm layered over tension, over something even older than that. Heat and frost colliding as they always did. The words didn’t matter as much as the weight behind them.

While they argued, Shara drifted toward Halven’s room. She moved softly, reverently, like she didn’t want to wake something.

My gaze followed her while I stayed near the door. She stopped. Bent down. Picked up a scrap of water-warped paper from beneath the bed.

“Guys,” she said, holding it up. “I found something.”

Everyone gathered around, and Shara read the smeared ink aloud. The words were panicked, fragmented. Something about an Emberglyph. Something about voices. And then the line that stopped my breath: “Do not trust—” followed by a wash of water damage.

The silence that followed felt heavier than any argument.

“We should copy this,” Garnexis said. “Create one for all of us.”

Before anyone could reply, someone new entered the quad and with a booming voice, yelled, “Ardorion!”

“Elio!” Ardorion shouted.

I turned as the Stone Dragon burst through the room like a gust of summer wind, warm and confident and loud. His gray-touched hair curled wild as always, his smile blinding. He slapped Ardorion’s shoulder with the kind of affection that made the whole room shift.

“Hey, strangers,” he said, looking around at the rest of us.

Elio was one of Halven and Aster’s quadmates.    

Ardorion and Elio caught up fast—too fast. The energy in the room crackled now, not just with tension but with life. It was overwhelming. I took a step back and let their voices wash over me.

Elio told us Lo, their last quadmate, had gone to the Spring Quadrant to speak with Halven’s adoptive parents. Still no word. Still no sign of anything.

Aster finally spoke again, low and tight. “I’ve brought this to Lady Isa. Told her it’s not natural, this disappearance. She brushed me off.”

Our eyes met for only a moment, but I saw it. The edge of something breaking. The fear she would never admit.

I watched her, and I missed him. Halven. The way he used to place his hand on my back without needing a reason. The way he used to whisper into my dreams.

I pressed my fingertips into my palm. I didn’t want to remember.

When we left the quad, I didn’t follow the others right away.

The room had felt wrong. Still. Frozen in a way that wasn’t just time. Something about it had sunk its weight behind my ribs.

Whatever had happened to Halven... it hadn’t started when he disappeared.

It had started before.

I couldn’t say how I knew. But I knew.

That night, sleep came softly, like fog curling in from the lake. I didn’t fight it. I never do. Dreams have always come to me easily—too easily, some say.

In the first, Wintermere met me.

Halven stood at the edge of the lake, barefoot on the ice. The lake was frozen in perfect stillness, reflecting stars that looked wrong—too many, too close, as if they had slipped through some crack in the sky.

He had his back to me, shoulders stiff. I called his name.

He didn’t turn.

Fog drifted in tendrils around his ankles. He was speaking but I couldn’t catch the words in the wind.

When I reached him, the air grew colder, sharp enough to sting. He finally looked over his shoulder, and his eyes were blank. Not empty, but echoing. Like something else had taken root behind them. His mouth opened, and I could barely hear him.

“You should not follow.”

His voice was soft, but the sound cracked like ice underfoot. Before I could speak, the lake around us shattered in silence.

I woke gasping, tears streaking down my face, the corner of my pillow rimmed in frost.

I wiped it away with the sleeve of my sleep shirt and curled beneath my blanket again.

Sleep found me fast. It always does, when it wants to. When it makes me Moon Walk.

The second dream felt different. Heavier.

I was back in Halven’s arms—but younger, the way it had been our first year at the academy. We were laughing, breathless, pressed together beneath my blankets in my dorm. His lips found mine like they used to—tender, then greedy. The way only someone who knows your secrets can kiss you.

But it didn’t last.

His skin paled. The rhythm of his breath changed. His hair darkened but a wash of blue shimmered along his strands. His arms grew stronger. Broader. I blinked, and he was no longer Halven.

I didn’t know who he was.

But I did.

I’d dreamed about him before.

Our limbs entwined just as they had when he was still Halven. I moved to pull away, but his large hands found my hips and drew me back down onto him. In the darkness under the blanket, I caught the barest hint of a smile, the rest of his face in shadow.

The faint scent of leather filled my senses as I collapsed onto his chest. I kissed him, pulled by a yearning I’d never known. One hand tangled in my hair, the other pressing me as close as humanly possible.

Then the scene changed.

We stood by the lake again. Wintermere.

I felt drawn to him even though I still could not clearly see his face, but I knew his voice before he spoke.

“You pulled me into your dream again,” he said, tilting his head. “You’re persistent.”

I stepped back, startled by the depth of his tone—low, smooth, with a strange warmth under the chill.

He turned away and knelt by the frozen earth, dragging a fingertip across the frost to draw a sigil. I gasped.

I recognized it.

The same one from Halven’s torn journal page.

“What does it mean?” I asked.

“An Emberglyph.” He said nothing more.

Even with his face still hidden in shadows, I knew that he looked up at me, almost curious. Then he dragged his foot across the glyph, erasing it completely.

He stood slowly and stepped forward, close enough that I felt the cold leave him in waves.

“You shouldn’t be dreaming about me like this,” he said, a smile in his voice. “Not when you’re the one who started it.”

I opened my mouth to reply, but I couldn’t. His fingers brushed mine, and my whole body felt like it was melting through the snow.

He leaned forward, close enough to kiss me.

“I want to finish what you started,” he murmured.

And then I woke up.

Not in my bed.

In the kitchen.

And my mouth was full with the last bite of something sweet. I blinked at the empty teacup in my hand. The light from the wall sconce glowed a soft gold. My hand trembled slightly as I set the cup down.

Sleepwalking. Again.

The dream still clung to me like mist to skin.

I remembered the glyph the stranger had drawn. The one he also erased.

I found a crumpled parchment and a smudged chalk pen someone had left near the spice jars. I began sketching the Emberglyph from memory, quickly before it could dissolve.

Just as I finished, my elbow knocked over a half-full mug of warmed cider.

It spilled straight across the parchment.

The ink bled instantly. The glyph blurred. A familiar theme.

Still, I had written enough to remember.

I folded the damp note and tucked it into my robe.

Something told me I was going to need it.

Terrasday, Septis 20

I was tired for our first day of classes yesterday, but I enjoyed attending the new Elemental Alchemy: The Art of Binding Nature to Magic class taught by Professor Veyn. I agreed to take the class with Shara—because I felt responsible for them breaking up two years ago right before he disappeared—but I learned a few new things.

Plus, Shara pulled out Halven’s torn journal page, and I reconfirmed the same sigil had appeared in my dreams. I told her it was an Emberglyph. She didn’t ask me how I knew, and I didn’t offer the information but I suggested asking Ardorion. Summer Fae were the only fae to use glyphs.

I was able to forget about my dreams and the sexy man whose dream kisses had been better than any real-life ones I’d experienced and concentrated on my classes. I thoroughly enjoyed my Cycles of the Moon & Dream Theory class even if we only touched on the basics. By that evening, I was ready for a deep dreamless sleep.

When I returned to our quad, the stars had started to blur behind the clouds.

The hallway lights were dimmed, enchanted to mimic moonlight. No one was in the quad yet, and I felt disappointment at not being able to share my findings, but I couldn’t keep my eyes open any longer.

Moon Walking was not true sleep. It could only be done during sleep, but it was the soul leaving this realm for another. Most of my ancestors could do this easily. But the artform was being lost along with my race, and I had no idea how to control my Moon Walking.  If I didn’t get real sleep soon, everyone would be right to assume my sanity was not intact.

I tucked the crumpled parchment—the cider-stained glyph—beneath my pillow.

Just in case.

Metisday, Septis 21

Tonight, we all made into our quad around the same time. No one had suggested it. No one had knocked on doors or passed notes. We just… showed up in the common room. One by one. Like something inside us had synchronized while we weren’t watching.

The air was heavier than usual. Not bad. Just thick. Like the moments before a storm or after a secret.

We sat in a loose circle, cross-legged or leaning back, our backs on soft couches and knees pulled in tight. There were no candles lit, no spells flickering. Just breath and silence and something waiting.

Ardorion spoke first.

He told us about the lake—how he had gone there to cool off after arguing with Aster the day we went to Halven’s room, only to find something strange. A piece of parchment, or maybe metal, lying in the snow. It had a glyph on it. The same one from Halven’s page.

 “I tried to grab it, but I wasn’t alone.” His short fire hair whipped around his face, showing his agitation.

My heart tightened. Was my mystery dream man there? “What do you mean?”

He shifted, arms crossed, golden eyes darker than usual. “There were sprites. Wandering ones coming out of the Wintermere’s fog. I know they were trying to be playful, but I almost sparked a fire just to see them turn into steam.”

Shara furrowed her brow, a small vine with baby leaves caressed the side of her face. “Did they speak?”

He shook his head while pulling out a scrap piece of paper with the Emberglyph in his handwriting, the paper edges scorched. “No. They just watched. Hovered around it. Every time I reached for the glyph, they yanked it away. I backed off and drew what I remembered.”

Garnexis let out a sharp breath and pushed her curtain of ruby-colored hair behind one ear. “That’s funny because I did grab it.”

We all turned to her, while she showed us this same metallic scrap.

She explained how she had found it, how she had touched it to the lake—and how it had burned the glyph into her wrist. The mark was faint now, fading like a bruise made of light.

“It’s fading now. But it wasn’t just a sting. It felt like a promise. Or a warning. Either way, it’s the same Emberglyph.”

She also told us how Orivian had shown up and tried to take it, but she had taken it back by sheer force of will and one well-timed distraction.

Her satisfied smile combined with a wine-colored blush under her metallic-gray skin. I recognized the feeling, having just had the same experience with my mystery man.

Before I could say anything, Shara pressed hands to her cheeks. “Oh, gods and goddesses, did you kiss Orivian?”

The blush deepened before she pocketed the metallic-like parchment and crossed her arms. “I use any tools I have to get what I want.”

Nothing could stop Garnexis from getting what she wanted, but she was also a loyal friend. She collected all of us to her side, and she remained fervent in her protection of her friends. Halven had also been included in our friendship group.

Now it was my turn to share what I could with the group. My fingers curled slightly where they rested on my knees. “I also found myself by the lake, but in my dreams. I had two of them. The first was of Halven, standing on the ice. He told me not to follow.”

They listened while heat crawled into my cheeks.

“The second dream was of someone else. A man I don’t know but I’ve dreamed of him before. This time he was writing the same sigil into the ground by the lake. When I asked him what it meant, he covered it. Then he... well you don’t have to know that part.”

Surprise lifted Shara’s eyebrows. “Did everyone except me kiss somebody in the first days of school?”

Ardorion snorted. “There’s no one I would kiss.”

Garnexis’s laughter made her arms loose. “You mean you wouldn’t survive the frosted kiss of the one woman you can’t have.”

We all joined in the laughter except for Ardorion. His short fire hair frothed into higher flames.

“I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

Ardorion couldn’t hide his attraction for the Water Fae. She returned all of his heated words. She might not admit, but she was also drawn to the Fire Fae. Those two were an explosion waiting to happen.

When the laughter died away, I continued. “When I woke up from my second dream, I was in the kitchen. Sleepwalking. Again. While there, I wrote down the sigil while it was still fresh, but I spilled my drink across the paper.”

I pulled out the smudged parchment from my robe and showed them my glyph. It was almost lost in the cider stain, but we all recognized it. Same as Halven’s page. The same as Ardorion’s memory. The same as Garnexis’s wrist.

“Do you know what it means, Ardorion?” I asked.

Ardorion gave half a shrug. “The Gemina Flamma. The twin flames, but that’s just a guess. This is an older Emberglyph and not one we use today.”

“I know what it means,” Shara said. We looked at her with surprise. She smiled like she was withholding a secret. “I found it in a book. You know, in that place they call a library.”

We waited for her explanation when she paused.

Garnexis crossed her arms with a moue. “Well, keep us in suspense then.”

Shara nodded. “I mean, I have the literal translation, but I’m not sure what it actually means. The text says it means to split strength, ground your fire, and ignite the center.”

Ardorion raised a single fire-red eyebrow. His fiery hair had calmed down. “What are we supposed to do with that?”

“And why would Halven—an Air Fae—be writing a Emberglyph over and over?” Garnexis added.

No one answered right away.

“Maybe it meant something to him,” Ardorion said, quieter than usual.

Shara then reached into her journal and pulled out a spiral-shaped leaf. My breath caught, recognizing it from my dreams from nearly a week ago, but I held my words. I had no idea what any of it meant, and we already had too many mysteries.

Turning the leaf over, she revealed another glyph. We looked to Ardorion and he shook his head.

“I don’t know that one,” he said.

Shara ran a finger over the glyph. “I think this has something to do with the Gemina Flamma but I couldn’t find it in any of the texts.”

I tilted my head, trying to figure out what Shara was not telling us. “Where did you get that?”

The Wood Fae grumbled, but said nothing else.

“Does it matter if we don’t know what it means,” Ardorion asked.

I frowned at him. Of course it mattered because the source could give us a clue as to what it all means. Before I could say anything, Garnexis cut in.

“Maybe we can find out in our Runes and Sigils class. Class is on Sylsday, right?”

My gaze narrowed on Shara. She was hiding something. Even if she thought it wasn’t much, it could mean something when came to finding Halven, and I was determined to find him.

Even if it meant more dreams of a certain sexy mystery man.

Ardorion leaned an arm on the table next to him and tapped his fingers against the table. “I guess this is it then. We’re really doing this. We’re looking for Halven and not giving up like everyone else has.”

I glanced down at the edge of my sleeve. Did Ardorion not want to look for his study buddy? “Wouldn’t you want him to do the same for us?”

“Of course. I don’t want to give up,” Ardorion replied. “But we’ve got classes. Exams. According to Aster, Lady Isa is not concerned. So, if we screw this up... What if we disappear like he did?”

“We just have to be smart,” Shara said. “And careful.”

I straightened my shoulders, happy that everyone would be helping to find out what happened to Halven. “We should make a pact. No one investigates alone. No more secrets.”

That means I coming for your secrets, Shara!

“And if one of us goes missing?” Garnexis asked.

“Then the rest of us will know why,” Shara said. “And we won’t stop until we bring them back.”

“A pact,” Ardorion said, holding out his hands.

One by one, we nodded and linked our hands. Wood, Metal, Fire, and Moon Fae, bound not by magic, but by the bond between us as friends.

And it was stronger.

It was choice.

This sensitve information has been filed away under a separate location. If you find it, you can access the records with the passcode "notadream."

Septis 31

Several days had passed since we read Professor Tilwyn’s letter, and Halven was still gone.

The first week of classes had closed with the opening sessions of Practical Duels & Spells Synthesis or PDSS. It was dazzling, as always. Fourth-years conjured storms and illusions like it was second nature. Someone twisted the battlefield into a spinning chaos maze. Another turned the air itself into a mirror, reflecting and refracting every bolt of magic.

I watched from the stands with the others, trying to be amazed. I even smiled once or twice. But it felt like watching a story I wasn’t in. All I could think was how much Halven would have loved it.

We’d shared so many firsts together. Our first year here at the academy, watching our first PDSS together, our first dance.

We’d danced at the Spiral of Seasons last year. He’d taken my hand under the twilight torches and whispered that we would remember the moment forever. I had, along with our first kiss.

He hadn’t even been missing a full month yet, but the space he left had started to reshape us. Quietly. Like frost creeping across a window.

Tonight, we gathered in our quad without ceremony. The others had scattered parchment and spellbooks across the table. I had brought nothing but myself. I didn’t need paper to feel the edges of something coming.

Shara sat closest to me, thumbing the spiral-shaped leaf again and again. Her face was calm, but her fingers betrayed the storm. Garnexis was at the window, idly toying with her bracers like she always did when she was overthinking.

Ardorion lounged with practiced drama, swirling tea in a mug he probably didn’t remember reheating.

It was quiet. Not heavy, just dense with the things we weren’t saying.

“So,” Ardorion said, breaking the stillness, “Aster says the Water Fae had glyphs.”

Shara looked up first. “Yes, that’s what you told us.”

“I never heard of anything like that,” Garnexis said.

“But what if there are other types of glyphs out there?” Ardorion asked.

“Why would that matter?” Shara asked. She stopped moving the leaf and turned it over in her palm. The glyph on the underside caught the light.

I leaned forward, drawn to it again. The curves, the shape. I wished I could read it.

On Slysday, we gathered for Runes and Sigils, the one class that threaded all four of us together. I thought about asking Professor Ilham. Truly, I did. But after Lady Isa found us in the library and gave her quiet, unmistakable warning, the words slipped away like water. None of us said a thing about the other glyph.

“That glyph doesn’t match anything we’ve studied,” I said quietly.

“Uh-huh, exactly, and—”

“The glyph could have been one of the Water Fae glyphs!” Shara interrupted.

Ardorion’s annoyance rippled through the room like heat. He didn’t say anything, but it was there, disappointed that he hadn’t been the one to say it aloud.

I touched the leaf’s edge. “We need to go back to the library.”

Shara nodded but then hesitated. “The Fall Equinox celebration is soon. Less than a week before the Spiral of Seasons Dance.”

I blinked wondering if Shara could read minds. “Already? That came fast.”

Too fast.

I remembered the way Halven’s hand fit against my lower back as we turned across the floor, how he smiled like there was no one else in the room. I remembered the scent of honeyed pine and the flickering firelight in his hair when he bent to kiss me for the first time.

A cold ache followed in his absence.

By the other’s faces, I knew they were remembering similar memories.

Shara and Halven sneaking sweets from the Fall table and dancing in every group dance until the night had deepened.

Ardorion and Halven’s laughter as Halven spun those pastries through the air, and Ardorion lighting them just enough to make them shimmer like little stars on fire. Everyone gasped. One even hit a professor’s hat.

For a moment, it felt like magic was just fun. Like it was supposed to be.

Then Halven joined Garnexis, off to the side of the dancing. She looked calmer than usual, less like she was bracing herself, more like she was just there.

Halven had that gift. He didn’t need to fill silence. He just made space for it.

That night, I think Garnexis finally let him in.

Now Garnexis groaned. “I love my season’s celebration but I could do without the dancing. Do I have to wear a dress?”

I managed a small smile.

“Who will you pair with for the open dance at the end, Ardorion?” I asked, more to distract myself than anything else.

He raised an eyebrow. “You’re assuming I’m planning to stay long enough to dance with anyone.”

Shara wagged a finger at him. “You better not leave without one of us, which means you’ll be staying a while.”

We were not to be alone for fear our investigation would lead to one of us disappearing, too.

“I’ll skip out on the end dance with you,” Garnexis added.

Ardorion thumped a hand over his chest in mock devotion. “You are my true love, Garnexis.”

Garnexis shook her head and moved toward us, sitting on the floor. She began adjusting her bracers again, tightening and loosening the straps with careful rhythm. I didn’t comment. We all had our rituals.

“Do you really think going back to the library will be helpful?” she asked. “Aster said only oral stories were passed down about the glyphs they used.”

Shara flipped a page and tapped it. “There has to be some record of the Water Fae using glyphs. We’ll just have to dig deep for any reference. I’ll go with you tomorrow, Rielle.”

“Hurrah!” I said, letting just a little of the delight in. A faint spark of magic arced through me but I quickly quelled it, hoping no one witnessed my lack of control. I steadied my breathing and let it pass.

“Great,” Ardorion muttered. “You two run off to the quiet corner of the stacks again. I guess someone needs to keep an eye on Garnexis before she tears the place apart.”

“I’m right here, Flameboy,” she said flatly.

“I know. That’s why I’m volunteering.”

For a second, none of us spoke. The candlelight swayed in the silence.

Then Shara’s voice picked up again. “Has anyone figured out anything else with Professor Tilwyn’s letter? Or that story? What was it?”

“‘Chaos’s Revenge for Sygilla,’” I answered.

“That’s the one.”

Garnexis looked at Shara. “Orivian believed Halven was looking into Wintermere’s history so why was he reading that story?”

Ardorion shrugged. “No idea what he was thinking. I read the story twice. It’s either a metaphor or a warning or both. And it’s old. Old like Professor Tilwyn. Which is saying something.”

Garnexis leaned forward, the metal on her bracers catching the light. “But what if Halven reading it is the reason he disappeared? Orivian thinks it’s all related because the library was the last place he was seen.”

“The library?” Shara echoed.

“I say we go back to the library,” Garnexis said. “Just to look around. See what Halven might’ve left behind or see what happened to him.”

Ardorion sighed with theatrical flair. “Fine. Shara and Rielle will search scrolls and whispers, and I’ll babysit Garnexis while she glares at shelves.”

“Try to keep up, hothead,” she said, a slight grin on her usually stoic face.

Ardorion grinned. A spark of flame danced between his fingers, there and gone again.

“Always do,” he said.

Septis 36

We had been back to the library four times in the last five days.

Each time, we found nothing. Or almost nothing. Theories stacked on theories, none of them real. Just tangled language and overly confident scholars trying to define things they’d never seen. Sometimes I wondered if the glyph on the back of Veyn’s leaf had ever really been there at all.

But then I’d found something. A name.

Ayzella dal Mirava, of the Second Crescent Moon Clan. A Moon Fae like me, though she lived nearly six centuries ago and had done something most of us never dared. She’d gone to live with a Water Clan, one that isolated itself from the rest of the Winter societies.

And then I dreamed of her.

Not metaphorically. Not vaguely.

I saw her. Standing at the edge of a tidepool, parchment soaked through in her hands, her expression still and sure. Her eyes were the exact color of frosted water in starlight. When I woke, her name was still on my tongue. Whispering. Refusing to leave.

I believe she has something to tell me.

So we came back again, myself and Shara. Because neither of us could seem to stop.

We sat side by side in the northern wing, scrolls and bound folios spread around us like the debris of forgotten minds. I sifted through old indexes, tracing references, hoping for something. Shara had picked up a thin, leather-worn volume of Ayzella’s essays.

We worked in silence, but then her mood shifted beside me.

Then Shara gasped and said in an urgent whisper, “Rielle, listen to this.”

I looked up.

She read aloud from the page, her voice just above a breath:
“Of all the things I was never meant to write, the glyphs remain the most sacred. But I could not let them be lost to breath alone. I wrote them anyway, in the smallest of hours, in secret. The record remains hidden. My mourning in ink. A Winter Record of Forgotten Water Glyphs.”

The words struck something in me. Like a note I’d never heard played aloud until now.

“That’s it,” I said, sitting up straighter.

She was already nodding. “It has to be.”

“I haven’t seen that title anywhere. Should we check the Shadow Index?”

She nodded again.

We didn’t speak after that. We didn’t need to.

We left our table and crossed to the eastern stair. The stone beneath our feet absorbed our footsteps like it had done for centuries, silent and sure.

The Shadow Index lived on the upper level of the Library of Seasons, tucked behind an archway marked with dragons carved into glass. Most students didn’t know it was there. Fewer still dared to ask what it was.

But we did.

The space beyond was limned in violet light. Soft as twilight, but heavy with something older. The air hummed like a closed mouth holding a secret.

She was already watching us when we entered.

The librarian.

She stood behind a black obsidian desk with a presence that made you stand straighter without realizing it. Black braids fell over her shoulders, revealing rounded ears. With her dark skin and a sense of magic to her, she had to be a hybrid fae. Her gaze didn’t challenge, but it didn’t yield, either.

“Welcome, seeker, to the Shadow Index,” she said.

Shara hesitated. I didn’t.

I stepped forward. “We’re looking for a record. A Winter Record of Forgotten Water Glyphs.”

The librarian didn’t move for a beat. Then, she raised one hand.

A shimmer bloomed in the air, warping light. The space bent—not drastically, just enough to feel like something was waking.

The temperature ticked upward.

Magic stirred.

And then, from somewhere unseen, a scroll slipped into view, gliding along the invisible current of the room until it hovered directly in front of her.

She caught it. Effortless.

“I will need it back,” she said. “Unmarked. Unspoken of. And it doesn’t leave the library.”

We nodded. There was no other answer.

She handed it to me, and I took it with both hands.

We didn’t say anything as we stepped away. The silence felt sacred now, not empty.

I could feel it. This was the moment everything would shift.

We sat at one of the tables just beyond the alcove and unrolled the scroll. My hands tingled the moment my fingers touched the parchment. Whether from anticipation or magic, I couldn’t say.

At first, it read like a travelogue. Observations. Rituals. Quiet love.

But then came a name—glyph-keepers—and I knew.

Shara looked at me. I didn’t say a word. We both understood.

We weren’t just reading now. We were listening to something that had been hidden too long.

I wanted to read all of it. There was something in the way Ayzella wrote that wrapped around me like salt air. I wanted to know her. Know the rituals. Know the man she wasn’t allowed to love.

But I didn’t need to get far.

There it was, just before the middle of the scroll.

The glyph.

Theralen.

Exactly as it had been on the leaf Veyn gave to Shara.

To release flow.

I leaned closer. The lines of the symbol burned into my thoughts. It wasn’t random. It wasn’t aesthetic. It was a message.

“This doesn’t feel like an accident,” I whispered.

I didn’t just mean the glyph.

I meant the leaf. Veyn. The dreams. The silence. The timing.

All of it.

Shara nodded. “He must have known. But what is he trying to tell me with the Theralen?”

I didn’t have an answer.

Before I could try to find one, something shifted in the space beside us.

Movement. Soundless.

I turned.

A black cat sat at the end of the aisle. Perfect posture. Golden eyes locked on us. It blinked once. Then stood. Then walked a few steps, slow and graceful.

It paused. Looked back.

I didn’t hesitate. When something lost calls to you like that, you answer. “I think we’re supposed to follow it.”

Shara didn’t argue. She didn’t ask why. She just looked down at the leaf Veyn had given her, then to the glyph still inked onto the scroll and nodded.

After returning the scroll, we followed the cat.

It led us swiftly through the quiet halls, tail flicking behind her, ears forward. We trailed her through the narrowing corridors of the library, slipping past the doors just before they closed for the night.

Golden light outside spilled across the academy’s stone floor like it was waiting.

We followed her past the courtyard, then down along the path that hugged the western wall. A cool wind stirred the hedges.

That’s when we saw them.

Ardorion and Garnexis, standing by the greenhouses, their backs half-turned, their bodies still. They didn’t notice us at first. They were watching something ahead of them.

The cat.

It was walking again, unbothered. Unafraid. Like we were finally where it meant for us to be.

Ardorion turned toward us finally. “Queenie?”

The cat’s tail swished in response.

Shara asked, “You know this cat?”

“I thought I did but she disappeared. I named her Queenie.” Ardorion crouched in front of her. “Queenie, is that you?”

She yawned, like she had all the time in the world.

“If it is you, what are you trying to show us?”

She didn’t answer. She just turned and padded toward the greenhouses again.

We followed her.

No one ever went near that last greenhouse, the one built into the edge of the outer hall. It was overgrown, partially sunken, practically forgotten. The glass was copper-runed and choked in ivy. In all my time at the academy, no professor had ever mentioned it.

The cat led us through a gap in the hedgerow next to it, onto a winding path I never knew existed. We moved as one, the four of us ducking beneath thorns and into a world that didn’t feel like it belonged to the academy at all.

Then we were there.

A hidden conservatory rose before us, ribbed in gold, crowned in glass. Light flickered along its walls like breath. I hadn’t known it was back here.

When we stepped inside, it was like walking into a different season. The heat wrapped around me instantly, humid and suffocating for someone like me, a creature of Winter. The faint scent of scorched cedar and citrus assailed me. My skin prickled with it, not from fear, exactly. I recognized magic, but it was far from being Moon magic. This was the magic that killed my people.

I gasped in the heat, trying to draw a full breath. Shara grabbed my hand and squeezed, giving me her support.

I just wanted to get out of there, so I whispered to the cat, “Queenie,” but it had already stopped.

She sat at the foot of a nest built of Ashwood.

And inside it was the creature from our story, the Firebird.

He was more than any of us had imagined. Larger, older, and very real.

His wings were tucked, but the power radiating from him made the air shimmer. His feathers shifted constantly—reds, oranges, deep golds—living flames that held no destruction.

His eyes were molten gold. And they were watching us.

We didn’t move.

Ardorion had joked once about summoning a phoenix. This was not a phoenix. This was a god born of Fire and Chaos, something made of fire-song and impossible time.

Not just a legend but something ancient.

When Garnexis whispered, “That’s him,” I barely nodded.

Ardorion stepped forward. One step. Brave, or foolish. Maybe both. But then again, he was Fire Fae. This god-like creature had the same magic.

The Firebird tilted his head.

Then he lifted one wing.

Several glowing feathers drifted down like falling stars, embers trapped in slow motion. No one moved. No one dared.

Then came the voice.

Not a sound out in the open, but in my mind. A pressure inside the skull that reverberated.

Take them. You need to keep them sleeping.

The words echoed through me. Not just in my mind, but in memory, vibrating in my bones. Something I could never forget.

The day a god spoke to me.

But what did he mean? Were the feathers living entities because he said to take them and that we needed to keep them sleeping. For some reason, the ambiguous pronouns didn’t seem to be pointing to the same noun. So, if we were to take the feathers, who were we supposed to keep sleeping?

And why did the word them touch on another memory I couldn’t quite recall?

Ardorion dropped to one knee and picked up the feathers. Hands steady, but breath held.

Then the Firebird tucked his wing and closed his eyes.

That was it, so we left.

Outside, the wind returned like a welcoming aunt. Cold froze the sweat on from my skin, and I sighed in relief.

We were halfway back to Goldspire when Shara finally asked, “What are we supposed to do with them?”

Them.

So ambiguous.

I added my own question. “What did he mean... keep them sleeping?”

Shara threw her hands up. “Just more mysteries!”

She didn’t usually raise her voice, which meant she felt it just as deeply as the rest of us.

Then her tone softened as she spoke to Ardorion and Garnexis. “We might’ve found something, though.”

I nodded. “We found the glyph from Veyn’s leaf in a hidden scroll. It’s called Theralen. It’s a Water Glyph.”

“It means ‘To release flow,’” Shara said. “But it still doesn’t clear up any of these mysteries.”

Ardorion exhaled, feathers still glowing in his grip. “I think I might know what to do. Maybe.”

He looked at Garnexis for help.

“There’s a portal,” she said. “In the library floor. And it asked for a Firebird key.”

Shara stared at them. “You think the feathers are the key?”

They exchanged a glance, and Ardorion answered.

“Halven was researching in the library and read the story ‘Chaos’s Revenge for Sygilla’ which mentions the Firebird being the key. Then Halven went missing, last seen in the library, where there happens to be a portal that needs a Firebird key, which also happens to be where Queenie found me.”

Shara’s eyes widened. “Wow, you put all that together yourself?”

Sparks danced across Ardorion’s hair, flickering like a lit fuse. “What does that mean?”

Shara touched his arm. “Not how you took it, Ardorion. What I mean is that all these little mysteries had become so convoluted, I couldn’t see where any of it connected, but you were able to. You’re amazing.”

His fire fizzled, softened into something warmer than flames.

“We should go to the library now. Try out the Firebird’s feather,” Garnexis said.

“The library’s closing,” I said softly. “We don’t have time tonight.”

Everyone turned to Ardorion.

He threw up his hands. “Hey now, I didn’t call myself the genius, so why look at me?”

“I didn’t say you were a genius, loony-bird.” Shara bumped his arm. “But I’ll give it to you.”

He smiled. Not just smugly, genuinely.

“Tomorrow then,” I said. “First light. Before the rest of the school is up.”

No one argued.

The feathers still glowed faintly in Ardorion’s hands.

They didn’t feel like keys.

They felt like a warning.

And we were about to open the door.

Due to the ceremonial nature of the Fall Equinox celebration, the following entry has been archived outside the primary log for preservation and discretion.

Relive the memory of that night by going back to the site of the dance and speak these magic words: Little Moon

Octis 15

I tried to focus on the words I was writing in my journal, but the frantic scratching of Shara’s quill from across the table was a constant pull. Shara hunched over the stolen scroll, A Winter Record of Forgotten Water Glyphs, her whole being focused on copying its secrets before they could be taken from her.

The air in our common room felt thick with her quiet determination, the low fire crackling in the hearth, and a worry that coiled in my own chest.

I watched her for a moment, the intensity in her posture almost painful. I pressed my own journal to my chest. “Shara, please be careful. If they find out you took that…”

“I know.” She didn’t pause, her words a determined whisper. “But we need to know everything we can before they realize it’s gone.”

I said no more, turning back to my journal, describing the wolf that appeared in my dreams at the corners of my eyes. From the couch, Ardorion and Garnexis argued as they often did, their voices an easy rumble of friendship disguised as disagreement.

“I’m telling you, it’s going to be a practical,” Ardorion insisted. “The midterm for Elemental Fusion has to be. Something about offensive combinations.”

“You always think it’s about offense.” Garnexis polished a bracer, her expression one of patient amusement. “It’s called fusion, flamebrain, not annihilation. It’ll be about structure. Theory.”

“The professor said pairs have to be from different seasons to work on the midterm. Does that not suggest to you something practical?” Ardorion leaned forward, igniting small flames at his fingertips. “We should practice early. Midterms are only twelve days away.”

Garnexis rolled her eyes, crossing her arms defensively. “We don’t even know what the assignment is yet. Calm down.”

Ardorion’s hair flared brighter. “I just don’t want to fail.”

Garnexis sighed, waving a dismissive hand. “You won’t fail with me as your partner.”

Ardorion’s eyes brightened, a genuine smile curving his lips. “You’ll be my partner?”

She gave a slight smile in return as if she was holding back a secret. “There’s no one else I’d want to work with.”

“Good,” Ardorion huffed, flames settling. “My fire, your metal. We’ll build the most offensively structured thing the professor has ever seen.”

I smiled, warmth rising in my chest at their familiar exchange. Their bickering was a constant, but beneath it was a loyalty as strong as Garnexis’s metal. Besides, Ardorion drew arguments out of all of us, but Garnexis seemed to enjoy them most.

I shifted, closing my journal, the silence of my own thoughts feeling too heavy. “We should talk again about the tunnels. About what we found down there.”

“We’ve talked it to death,” Garnexis replied flatly. “The Seal’s door is locked. And we each saw something different in that mirror inside the Docilis Vault. End of story.”

I shook my head, frustrated by our collective lack of clarity. “I don’t think we’re talking about the right thing or asking the right questions. None of us has asked if all it takes to enter that room and see visions is to put in our Docilis ID number, then anybody with our numbers could go in there and pull up visions about us or somehow related to us. So, who else is going there? Who knows things about us that we don’t even know?”

“We did find that map on the ground that someone drew. But when had it been dropped there?” Garnexis asked thoughtfully.

“If it was recent then who was just there?” I raised a brow, excitement flaring as Garnexis joined me in my questioning.

Ardorion yawned theatrically, his gaze fixed absently on the ceiling. “I mean think about it, who has ever seen anyone going through that portal?”

“They don’t have to go through the portal during the library’s open hours,” Shara leveled a look at him. “Not if they’re faculty.”

Garnexis frowned. “Then are we saying that the faculty are spying on us?”

Shara’s frustration bubbled over, her tone sharp. “Who knows what we are saying? It seems like the more we learn the less we know.”

Ardorion groaned. “It’s not fair.”

Garnexis slapped the back of her hand on his stomach lightly, startling him forward with a shocked look. “What was that for?”

“We’re not in your head so you need to explain what you mean.” Garnexis crossed her arms. “And don’t look so hurt, you’ve got abs of pure steel, no give.”

His smile returned, cocky and pleased before remembering his complaint. “It’s not fair that you all saw someone you knew. Halven, Master Thalric, Neir. I got some strange woman spouting riddles. It was completely senseless.”

At the sound of Neir’s name, my heart gave a familiar flutter. The image from the mirror filled my mind: his wolf form, so immense and graceful, his coat catching an imagined light. Golden eyes luminous with secrets I still couldn’t fully understand. He was so beautiful, even in visions, even in dreams that left me aching and uncertain.

It’s too soon, he’d said. The memory was as vivid as the dreams he still visited every night.

Shara’s quill stilled. She glanced up, her expression thoughtful. “Your vision might be the most important, Ardorion.”

He stared, surprised. “What do you mean?”

“You said the Fire Fae woman in your vision spoke about fire remembering the shape of a spell, and water remembering the feeling. Together, they remember truth.” Shara tapped the scroll. “Ayzella wrote that the Water Glyphs are shapes of feeling. Water has memory.”

Silence descended as we absorbed her words. I didn’t know what Shara was trying to say and how Ayzella’s words clarified Ardorion’s vision.

Ardorion threw up his hands dramatically. “Well, that explains everything.”

“You’re the one connecting things, Shara,” Garnexis said, her voice curious. “But you have to see that the rest of us have no idea what you’re understanding.”

Ardorion groaned louder. “It means I got a vision that should have gone to Shara.”

“I feel sorry for her,” Shara murmured suddenly, annotating the scroll. “She loved him, this Mizunomi man. But she was going to leave him anyway, for her duty.”

Who? Ayzella, the Moon Fae in the scroll?

The words sank into me then, a heavy stone in my chest. Duty. I knew that weight. I remembered the long, agonizing nights spent talking with Shara, trying to reconcile my deepening love for Halven with the future I was bound to. My people needed me. My line needed to continue. Choosing Halven would have meant turning my back on them all. The memory of our last conversation, of the hurt in his eyes when I told him it was over, was a wound that had never truly healed. Sometimes, in the quiet moments, I wondered… if I had never broken up with him, would he still be here? Was it my fault he was gone?

My throat tightened, emotions swelling within me. “Even six hundred years ago, there were not many Moon Fae left. Duty is a heavy thing to carry. I understand her choice.”

Shara suddenly shot to her feet, voice clear with excitement. “Listen, everyone! Ayzella wrote about another glyph called Nivareth, meaning ‘Bound reflection.’ She says this glyph is both Water and Fire, writing: ‘I am sure of it. I’ve seen it burn in steam and settle in frost. It belongs to both, and neither. I do not know if it is a union or a farewell. But I know it is mine. I gave it to the Mizunomi.’”

Each of us looked here with a mix of confusion and anticipation on our faces.

Garnexis held up a hand, palm open. “Enlighten us, Shara. What does any of that mean?”

Without another word, she held the scroll out, showing the sketch next to the entry. It matched exactly the Gemina Flamma.

We crowded close, staring at the familiar shape.

“That’s the Emberglyph,” Ardorion breathed.

“Nivareth,” I whispered.

“Bound reflection,” echoed Garnexis.

“It’s a Water Glyph, too?” Ardorion asked.

A sudden chill swept through the room. The fire in the hearth flickered and dipped low. Ardorion’s head snapped toward the door, and we all turned with him.

Aster stood there, her violet eyes fixed on the scroll.

“Nivareth has another meaning,” she said, her voice calm as she glided into the room. She stopped beside Shara, looking down at the drawing. “An older Water Fae story speaks of heartbreak and healing. ‘Balance the halves. Pour stillness downward. Release the frozen heart.’”

Shara sank back, deflated. “Just more mysteries.”

I glanced at Aster, thoughtful. “Have you ever been taught that water has memory?”

Aster shook her head. “It’s a children’s story. A folk tale. Nothing to be taken seriously.”

She peered longingly at the scroll. “I’d like to read this—”

“No one else will read that scroll!”

A sharp voice cut through the room. The librarian from the Shadow Index stood in the doorway. She held up a hand, and the scroll flew from Shara’s grasp, rolling itself shut as it shot across the room into her waiting palm, where it vanished in a shimmer of light.

“Do not,” she said, her voice like ice, “borrow from my library again.” And she was gone.

“Gods and goddesses,” Shara breathed bitterly. “We’re back to nothing.”

“We’ve learned nothing anyways.” Ardorion paced, frustration radiating.

Garnexis sat forward again, determined. “Maybe not nothing. Perhaps it’s like we’ve been learning in our Elemental Fusion class. Maybe we need to fuse Fire and Water together.”

Ardorion stopped. “We don’t know how to do that. It’s not something we’ve learned yet.”

“It was just an idea,” she grumbled.

Raising my gaze with quiet hope, I smiled softly. “The theory is sound. What if it’s not a fusion but just a pairing? Water and Fire magic used together to open the Seal?”

Ardorion’s face lit up as he turned to Aster. “Looks like you’ll finally be able to join us with your contributions, icicle.”

“If Aster is helping,” Garnexis cut in, crossing her arms, “then Orivian is, too. We have been sharing information anyway.”

A silent current seemed to pass between Ardorion and Aster, drawing them together.

I gave a gentle nod, warmth blooming at the thought. “Orivian is a lovely person. I think that is a wonderful idea.”

The heavy air in the room began to lift, replaced by a fragile, thrilling hope. For the first time in days, it felt like we were not just stumbling in the dark, but taking a real step forward.

Shara looked at each of us, her eyes bright with a new resolve. Her voice was steady when she spoke.

“Then let’s go to the tunnels.”

Octis 23

 Like last time The Seal’s door carried a chill, but today it seemed to seep straight through to my bones. Maybe it was because we’d waited eight days to return, or maybe it was because I knew, deep in the marrow of my being, that today something would shift.

Normally I’d welcome the cold, but I was afraid to accept it this time.

The five of us, Shara, Garnexis, Ardorion, Aster, and me, stood before the sealed door, a shared, nervous energy binding us together. Ardorion stepped forward, a determined set to his jaw as he glanced at Aster.

“Alright, icicle. I’ll lead. Watch closely.” He spoke with that same self-assured tone he always used, but something in it softened when he glanced at Aster. His hands sparked with fire. “The Emberglyph means to split strength, ground your fire, ignite the center.”

His body answered the invocation with a blaze of heat. An oppressive raw power that felt wrong in cold tunnel. His golden eyes shifted, not just bright but molten, like raw amber melting under pressure. His hair ignited into untamed flame, spitting embers in every direction.

The sight of it made my pulse spike. Magic like his was a warning to mine, the opposite season. Summer’s fire, uncontrolled, consuming—had consumed my people beyond Nythral’s borders. Ardorion and his magic was everything my nature opposed, but he was my friend.

His voice dipped low, all sharp focus and confidence. “I start on the outside, where the magic is split until reaching the middle.”

The heat radiated out in waves, not painful but too close, too wild, and I took an involuntary step back. Veins of fire shimmered beneath his skin, etching themselves into his arms like fissures through obsidian. As his arms swept outward, flame followed, running the outer glyph lines.

When he reached the spirals, he turned the fire inward, drawing it through the triangle and down into the base circle. All of it loud and blazing.

Then Aster stepped in, and the air shifted. “I think I have it.”

She sounded sure. Not proud, not nervous. Just certain.

“Nivareth translates to balance the halves, pour stillness downward, and release the frozen heart.”

Her magic rose to meet Ardorion’s Fire, and the oppressive heat in the tunnel was instantly soothed. Her presence didn’t demand attention. It invited it. A quiet peace settled over me as she drew on her power.

Her violet eyes shifted, transforming into mesmerizing whirlpools of deep violet and shimmering blue, with tiny flecks of liquid gold swirling in their depths. Her magic was beautiful, familiar, a reflection of Winter’s grace.

A soft, lavender glow, like moonlight on a frozen lake, gathered in her hands. “I must also split my magic like yours.”

The lavender glow curled in her palms, soft at first, then expanding like breath into the space between us.

Her aura rippled outward, steady and fluid, washing over the fire’s edge. Within the lavender, golden waves moved like soft currents, an echo of the ebb and flow of tides. Her light blue hair fell around her in long, wet strands, too fluid to be hair at all, splashing onto the stone floor.

It was a beautiful, hypnotic display, a comforting presence that called to the Winter in my own soul. My magic stirred in quiet recognition.

Aster’s light flowed through the glyph like a mirror to Ardorion’s fire, not consuming it, not overtaking it, but matching it. Meeting it. A perfect balance.

They worked together, Water and Fire, opposites flowing in the same motion, tracing the same path.

“Bound reflection,” Shara whispered.

I looked at her, seeing the orange and violet magic reflecting in her brown eyes.

Her voice grew clearer as she nodded toward Ardorion and Aster. “The Mizunomi’s translation. Ayzella wrote that Nivareth means bound reflection. She said it belongs to both Water and Fire. Both, but neither. This is them reflecting each other. Bound movements.”

Ardorion and Aster exchanged a glance, a small smile passing between them.

The way they moved, each adjusting to the other, reacting in sync, it shouldn’t have made sense. They argued more than they agreed. But somehow, this worked. Like two pieces of a puzzle that shouldn’t fit, but did anyway.

They were natural enemies, Summer and Winter, Fire and Water. Outside of Nythral, their connection would be forbidden. The world would hate them for being what they are. Water and Fire. Enemy blood. But not here. Here, they had the chance to be more. Here, in this sanctuary, it was beautiful.

My throat tightened.

I hadn’t thought I’d ever find my own matching piece. But I almost had. Once. Halven had come so close. And I’d let him go because I was supposed to. Because I had to. Because love wasn’t enough, not for someone who still carried the remnants of a dying people. Not for someone who was expected to carry on her clan.

The glyph pulsed with light.

Steam hissed as Fire and Water met at the end. A brief, violent struggle before they twined together, a perfect braid of fire and frost. The glyph on the door pulsed with a brilliant light. A heavy click echoed, and the door groaned open, a mist of cold air breathing out into the tunnel.

Ardorion went in first, Aster behind him. Garnexis slipped through next with Shara following. I was the last one in, my steps hesitant.

Magic rushed toward me, dense and ancient. Not the flare of Aster’s water or Ardorion’s fire, but something deeper. Something old.

The room opened wide in flickering candlelight. Ardorion had already lit several, and now he moved to the torches on the wall. Flames answered.

The light fell across the chamber, and I stopped moving.

There he was.

Halven.

His name whispered in my mind, echoing with long sounds as if I would always hear his name.

He was here.

But he was gone.

Frozen. Trapped in a block of crystal ice, his face a mask of terror, one hand pressed to an inner wall of ice as if reaching for something just beyond his grasp.

I pressed both hands to my mouth. The voices of my friends faded into a distant murmur. All I could see was him. The world narrowed to the ice, to the fear etched on his face. Every word the others spoke became distant. Everything slowed.

He died down here. Alone. Because of me.

I had pushed him away. Told him I couldn’t be with him. That I had to marry a Moon Fae. That our people needed a future. That I couldn’t love him even when I always would.

He had come down here alone because I let him. Because I wasn’t brave enough to choose him.

Time became dream-thick. The world a blur of muted color and distorted noise. The same cycle of my dreams, the endless loop of regret and what-ifs, became a waking nightmare. I was trapped in it, drifting, unable to breathe.

A warm touch on my shoulders. Shara. She was standing in front of me.

What is she saying?

Shara’s voice came through as a babble. Muffled, as if I were underwater.

Then, with a sudden rush, everything came crashing back. The vibrant, flickering torchlight. The cold air. And her voice, clear and urgent.

“—He’s alive.”

Alive?

A sob escaped me, a sound of immense, painful relief. Tears I hadn’t realized I was crying streamed down my face. Breath slammed into my lungs.

He was alive.

My gaze darted back to Halven.

Still trapped.

I lowered my hands.

Magic swirled around the chamber, thick and restless. It pressed against my skin, power I didn’t understand but instinctively recognized.

So much Moon magic, radiating from the wall of ice. A signature I nearly knew. Almost.

But it was more than that. So much more, but frustration brought fresh tears.

I didn’t have the strength to sort it apart. My control had never been strong. My teachers said my potential was there, but I’d always fallen short. Now that lack stung worse than ever.

“Who did this to him?” My whisper was raw. “There’s so much magic here. I can feel it.”

“I have a pretty good idea who or what.” Garnexis held up a faded newssheet.

She scanned the header as we gathered near the desk, except for Aster, who stayed by the ice wall using her magic while she touched it. Did she recognize Water magic from the ice? Perhaps touching it would help me figure out what I felt from the Moon magic present there, but with a glance at Halven, I shuddered. I couldn’t go any closer. Not right now.

Garnexis’s voice cut through my thoughts. “Year six-thirty-nine”

My voice broke before I could think. “The Moon Fae Massacre.”

The words settled in the air like the ash and fire that had killed my people. “It’s the same year. The year most of the Moon Fae clans were wiped out during the Summer Fae Wars.”

That year was etched into every history of my people. I hadn’t lived through it, but its shadow clung to all of us who had come after. The loss. The fire. The silence.

We stood in that silence until Garnexis read more of the newssheet “Students at the academy have reported hearing voices… the infirmary is full… by order of Lady Isamore, the academy will be shut down…”

“Voices?” Ardorion echoed. “Didn’t Halven mention voices in the journal page under his bed?”

Aster stepped away from the wall while gesturing to the ice. “This is Wintermere. Halven said in the journal page he heard voices and he went to Wintermere.”

That could be true on both accounts. It wasn’t surprising that we were all looking at part of the frozen lake considering we were underground and the lake surrounded Nivara Hall.

What voices had Halven heard, and why hadn’t he told anyone about it? Why didn’t he tell me?

I swallowed the wave of fresh tears to add what I knew—the little I knew about what I felt in that chamber. “There’s Moon magic in the ice.”

Aster nodded. “There’s a lot of magic. I feel two signatures of Water magic. One of them is Lady Isa’s.”

Two signatures? Maybe I felt more than one signature of Moon magic, but then that thought was swept away by Aster’s second revelation. Of course she would know the Grand Magister’s Water magic signature with Ice Dragons being creatures made of both Water and Air magic.

We all took stuttering breaths.

The Guardian of Nythral was part of this, but how?

“Maybe that makes sense? Lady Isa founded Nythral. She was part of whatever was done with the magic here to make it safe for us. Maybe the lake is part of the magic.” Shara looked between Aster and me. “But have you felt her magic in Wintermere before?”

I shook my head along with Aster but she was the one to respond. “From the surface there’s not even any residue, and with how old and powerful the second signature of Water magic is, I would have expected to feel something. It’s like it’s purposefully being masked, hidden from us. But why?”

Too many questions of how and why.

“Well, I hate to break it to you all, but I have more to add to the mystery.” Ardorion gave a quick smile before dropping it. “There’s Fire magic, too. In the ice. Kind of like the Firebird. Not exactly. Similar, though.”

Fire? In a medium thick with Water and Moon magic? It made no sense. The elements were opposites; they would have become volatile, destructive.

Shara approached the wall of ice as a copper aura encased her. Braver than I, she touched the ice.

I really didn’t need to touch the ice. Moon magic reached out to me, inviting me closer. I tried to sift through it, to understand its familiar pull, but my own magic felt too weak, too uncontrolled. I cursed my own limitations.

Then Shara released her magic and faced us, her gaze landing on Garnexis who studied the newssheet with a frown. “Garnexis? Any Metal magic in the room or in the lake?”

The Metal Fae shook her head. “None.”

Shara had that look again, the one she got when her mind was already three steps ahead, gathering pieces the rest of us hadn’t even noticed or figured out. “So, there’s powerful Water, Moon, and Fire magic inside the lake itself. None of us have felt it above ground.”

“Lady Isa’s magic is also part of what encases Halven,” Aster said. “The only Water magic. But there’s another magic mixed in.”

I reeled back, nearly hitting the wall. Lady Isa was responsible for making Halven... I swallowed hard as I looked at him. She was responsible for freezing him?

Lady Isa had always been the protector. The builder of peace. The reason any of us had been born into safety. But if her magic encased Halven…

“Veyn,” Shara said, confusing me until I remembered Aster said there was a second magic in the ice. “There’s Wood magic in the ice around Halven. Somehow, Veyn is part of the spell. I don’t know what it’s meant to do.”

No? My eyes widened at Shara. Did she just refuse to see what I saw. Or was the betrayal too hard?

At this very moment in their semester, Veyn was teaching us about binding magic to nature, and water was part of nature.

Shara took a deep breath. “Lady Isa knew where Halven was this whole time. She told us to stop looking because she trapped him here. So the question is, why? And is Veyn helping her, or is he trying to help Halven?”

My heart twisted.

Yes, Veyn has to be helping her, but I couldn’t say that and shatter Shara right now. I’m sure we were all shattering just a little to know that Lady Isa was involved because if our Guardian of Nythral was responsible, then everything we’d trusted about this place cracked wide open.

Instead of saying any of that, I asked my own question. “Why was Halven even here?”

Garnexis lifted the newssheet. “The voices.”

“He followed them,” Shara said. “Same as before when he followed them to Wintermere. This must be where he came at the end when his spells didn’t work above ground.”

I thought back to the burned glyph Ardorion and Garnexis had found at the shore of Wintermere. The same glyph Halven had written into his journal over and over.

Then I shattered with a gasp, my hands flying to my mouth. I couldn’t save myself as my gaze locked onto a picture on the back Garnexis’s newssheet. “Turn it over.”

Lady Isa. And standing beside her, so close they could have been more than friends, was Neir.

The frozen Wintermere behind them.

“Neir,” I whispered, but it was loud in the quiet chamber.

Betrayal was a bitter, burning poison in my veins.

I knew Neir was no good for me, but I’d still accepted him into my dreams every night.

Yet, he had been lying to me. Infiltrating my dreams, my thoughts, likely trying to learn what we knew about Halven. He had acted as if he’d never heard Halven’s name, but he had known all along.

Anger, a rare and searing emotion, flared inside me. I was tired of the secrets, the half-truths.

My hands dropped to my sides as I finally figured out a part of the magic in the chamber. “I wasn’t sure before. I’ve only felt his Moon magic once, but now I’m certain. It’s in the lake. It’s in this room. He’s part of this.”

Shara’s voice came steady. “You said he was a guardian of old magic. Maybe he meant the lake.”

My eyes refused to stop looking at the picture of Neir with Isa, their closeness, their smiles. I wanted to read the article but couldn’t concentrate on the words. All I saw was them—her, Isa. The woman whose magic was holding the man I once loved in a frozen prison. The woman who had a history with a man I was inexplicably drawn to.

“The Water magic feels old,” Aster added. “Perhaps it’s the same with the Moon magic and he’s tied to it?”

My fingers ached with how tight I’d clenched my fists. I finally forced my gaze away from the picture, knowing I’d keep seeing them together in my dreams.

I looked up at the others, the fire of my anger burning away my tears “He said he came to check on the magic surrounding Nythral. If he spoke the truth, then it’s all connected to Wintermere. Or he’s lying.”

Shara’s gaze swept across us. “What we know is Lady Isa, Veyn, and Neir have all been here, and they know something of what’s going on. And they haven’t told anyone.”

Ardorion shoved through papers to grasp something beneath them. He held up a familiar spoon, engraved. Isa always used these spoons. “I would say your assumptions are sound, Shara. This desk belongs to Lady Isa.”

I looked to Aster who nodded once. “If she owns the desk, and her magic froze Halven, then can we trust her at all?”

“Or any of them,” Shara said, rubbing her chest. “They could be working together.”

The words twisted in my gut. Veyn, Neir, Isa. All of them moving in the shadows, all of them hiding the truth. I wanted to throw up.

Garnexis picked up the half-empty tea mug, smelling it. “I think the more important question is, how long ago was she here?”

Aster looked toward the doorway. “And when will she be back?”

A heavy pause. All of us knew what it meant.

Ardorion rushed to restore the desk, his hands moving quickly. “I don’t want to end up as an ice cube for standing in the wrong place.” He wiped his palms on his robes. “Let’s get out of here.”

We left in a blur of motion. The door sealed behind us with a hollow click.

“We have to help him,” I whispered, the words a desperate prayer in the echoing tunnel.

Shara gripped my hand. “We will.”

“I don’t plan on leaving him there either,” Garnexis said. “But we can’t help him if we get caught. We need a plan.”

No one disagreed.

The people we were supposed to trust had imprisoned Halven.

Fire burned in my chest, and for once, I wasn’t afraid to let it burn.

The things I dreamed... and what happened when I finally found him outside of them... they’re not something I can explain here. I’ve placed the memory where it belongs, just not here. You should have received directions in your packet. If not, speak with the archive attendant. They’ll know what to do.