The wake of Lunarseve, she heard the scholars call it. It was a fitting name.

Cateline stood in the center of the western wing landing with her hands held outright. She snapped her fingers together a few times, a warm feeling brewing at the tips. She didn’t have reason for being back up here—outside of curiosity, of course. What a fickle, sickening feeling.

Lunarseve started less than four days ago, shortly after she saw the ghastly woman standing alongside Headmistress Leolina and Jaspar. Ever since, each morning she woke with this pestering urge to explode. She had only experienced her magic in instances where it was accidental or uncontrollable. Now… Now she could feel the energy flowing through her veins.

Each time she snapped, little sparks erupted into the air. It made her chuckle beneath her breath, and after another dozen attempts, a ball of light formed in her palm. When she opened and closed her hand again, the light diffused and bled through the cracks of her fingers.

“The gift of light,” Cateline whispered. She took a few steps toward the door now, opening it carefully so it wouldn’t fall off its hinges. Inside was just as dusty as it was before, damp mildew overtaking her senses as she entered the attic. Sunlight escaped through the stained glass windows, casting hues across the old floorboards beautifully. After taking a moment to admire, she turned toward the only thing in this messy room that was worth her attention.

The mirror glistened, burlap tarps still laying under it as a sign that the room had been untouched since her last visit. Approaching the object, she stared at her reflection. This time, there were two people—the picture perfect image of Cateline, and the chiseled, rough features of Varin. They both stared at her. Initially, her twin was the only one mimicking her movements—from her breathing to her flickering gaze—but after a while Varin did too. Mockingly so.

“I see you’re just as sassy as he is.”

This earned a smile from both of them which shocked her at first. She had to press on, though.

“Good, good. You can hear me. I have a favor to ask.”

Cateline’s twin stopped mocking her, her eyebrow raising at the statement. She took this as a sign to continue.

“Last time I was here, you showed me a glimpse of my home. Of Axulran. Was that real?”

They both nodded.

“Was it current?”

This earned a shrug. Here, Cateline hesitated. Even the past was worth seeing—she had to find out how she got here, and what led up to it.

“Can you take me back?”

Her twin reached out her hand, the palm resting on the other side of the dimensional barrier. A mischievous twinkle sparkled in the eye of this doppelganger, and for a second she wondered if it was her own gaze or the gaze of this copycat.

“I do not know what you can control, but show me anything from back home. I need to know about my past, about what got me here. I need to see my family...”

After the twin nodded, Cateline rested her palm on the same spot and the entire world vanished into a void. Still conscious, Cateline started to panic and spin around. There was no light, no tangible item to grab onto. There was nothing.

Until there was.

Suddenly, there was a door that opened in this void. Without hesitation, Cateline sprinted toward it in an attempt to be in the light. The darkness consumed her, reminded her that she was vulnerable and inferior to the mysteries of Denzethea. To the mysteries of magic.

The second she entered the doorway, the void behind her vanished and she was against a stone wall. Looking down, she was in a familiar gown that once hung in her closet back home.

Taking a step into the hallway, a rush of relief came over her. The grandiose walls made of limestone crawled to the vaulted ceilings, large archway windows lining the opposite side. It was light outside, and as she approached the aperture she saw that familiar frost that covered the grounds beneath. It was warm out, a telling sign that she was home.

No matter the temperature, may it be the heat of the summer or the chillest moments of winter, there was an eternal frost that cursed her kingdom. It was the one thing that would always remind her of home.

The lands were sculpted with rolling hills that led to the horizon of icy mountains. When she was young, her mentor Alleyn would tell her about what existed beyond those icy caps. The stories of ogres, elves, and dwarves. There were skeletons hiding in caves, protecting the jewels of fallen kings. Dragons lived at the peaks of those mountains, supposedly, and only came out in times of war.

He called them the protectors of Denzethea, her father called them myths. Cateline was left somewhere in between those two ideologies, but after Seraphine spoke that nonsense about the Silver Dragon, she was inclined to believe Alleyn.

Although she was unsure if she would call that dragon a protector if Seraphine was involved.

Pushing herself away from the window, she strolled down the familiar corridor happily. There were chirping snowbirds nearby, a blue-tailed one even flying into the hallway and landing on the steel casing of an unlit sconce. The most telling thing about snowbirds were their red eyes and black beaks—they could be seen miles away, despite their puny size. Mean little things, too; if you got too close to their nest, they’d peck your eyeballs out.

Turning around the corner, she caught sight of somebody she doubted she would ever have seen again. His bouncing head and jumpy walk was as youthful as his personality, that blonde head of hair glistening in the sunlight. He was kicking a ball around in the courtyard nestled in the center of the castle. He looked sad, with his head hung low and lips puckered into a pout.

Approaching him, she struggled to find her voice. “Gawain? Brother!”

The words were like brittle glass, snapping at the slightest breath. At this point, she wasn’t sure if he ignored her, or could not hear her. Either way her heart ached.

Picking up the pace, she joined him in the courtyard and held her hands over her chest. Gawain was her younger brother, with sandy blonde hair and tanner skin that she envied so deeply. Both of her brothers had that light hair and tan skin with such dark eyes. Where Terrence had forest green eyes, Gawain had brown.

Those eyes held so much youth though, and in the sun there were specks of gold floating about that shimmered to life.

This was home. Not this castle, not the servants and guards running about, but this. Standing before her younger brother with a longing heart, all while wondering and hoping she would run into Terrence.

“Gawain, Gawain. I have missed you so,” she whispered. “Can you hear me?”

Nothing. She took a few more steps, going to rest her hand on his shoulder but was sucked in a breath when the tips of her fingers went through him like a ghost. For a second, she thought he felt it when he turned his head in her direction. The sunlight peeked through the western and eastern towers, the shadow of the walls overtaking the green yard. A tear trickled from his eye, one that he wiped away with haste.

He sniffled and moved through her as she clutched at her stomach. Her heart fell, a gasp escaping her lips as she spun on her feet. “Gawain! You have to see me, it’s me… I’m home!”

He kept on. So, she sobbed and chased after him. Naturally, given her clumsy and chaotic nature, she tripped and fell to the ground. Cateline accepted this for a moment, leaving her cheek against the cool shards of grass and warm sun. Frost coated the courtyard, despite the fact that it was mostly enclosed. She reached out to pinch the element between her fingers and let it rime her skin.

Pushing herself up from the ground, she looked ahead of her and noticed that Gawain had vanished. With a trembling pout, she bolted toward the entryway and peered down both ends of the halls. To the right she saw the tail of a coat flapping in the wind before disappearing into the war room, a guard swiftly following. To the left, she saw her brother sadly longing after something in that direction before turning his head and continuing down the next hall.

Pursing her lips into a straight line, she turned back to her right and stopped in front of the same door the guard entered. As she took hold of the door handle she noticed it was impossible to grasp, just as her brother’s shoulder had been. Taking a deep breath, she closed her eyes and prepared to slam her face through the door as she made the leap through it.

She could feel everything: the warmth of the sun, the blades of that overgrown courtyard grass, and the icy touch of frost. Nothing was hers in this dimension, though…

Cateline was the ghost that haunted these castle walls and kept her up at night, the same ghoul who her elder brother said would scare her at the dead of night. Nothing but a figment of what had been, not what was.

When her feet planted on the ground, she opened her eyes and looked around the war room. In the corner stood her father, with his back turned toward the door, and her elder brother. This was a place her father never let her in, saying it was for the future leaders of Denzethea. Cateline’s father had this goal that he would once be the ruler of all, not just of Axulran.

This room was his passion, and when he was in there in the wake of the night, planning his next siege, she would sit outside the door until the next guard made way during their rounds. She couldn’t hear much when she did, but it was enough to know he was obsessed.

This room had three tables spread apart from each other. The first held a small map, and as she approached it she noticed the familiar icy mountains and long coastal line. Axulran did not have much land, but King Airen did all he could to build the mightiest army. A compensation for the natural curse that froze the land.

There was a red piece placed over the castle’s symbol. A crimson moon.

Eyes widening, she lifted her gaze to look at her family with disgust. ‘In the coming weeks, our Blood Moon will rise and the powers of the firstborn will flow through our veins.’

Yet, her father forbade magic. This was not a coincidence.

So, she moved onward. The next table had a larger map—the Region of Ellixus. Before she arrived at Traburg, she overheard her father planning Terrence’s rule. Ideally, King Airen would send Terrence to the surrounding kingdoms after their siege and have him act as their ruler. That left Axulran to Airen's sick, twisted rule until he died.

From there, she did not know what he planned. Perhaps Terrence would take over, or perhaps Gawain would have a claim to the throne. Regardless, it never involved her… the cursed witch of the family.

There were no game pieces here, but this region piqued her curiosity. She leaned over the table, her fingers tracing over the coastlines of the surrounding territories. To the left was Axulran, Traburg across the parting seas that were separated with a large chunk of unmarked land. The two competing kingdoms where one sought peace, and one sought control.

What bemused Cateline was an island that she had never heard of. Even when Alleyn told her of the regions that stretched across the world, from deserts to coastal forests, he never mentioned this.

A charcoal black piece of land sat between the Emerald strait and the 'Lost Sea.' There were no mountainous regions on this land, a single lake sitting at the lower end of the island. “The Fallen Kingdom,” was handwritten onto this map in writing that did not match the rest of the labels. Below that, in a formal banner, read: “The Land of the Forsaken.”

Again, in a different handwriting than the rest.

Instead of a movable piece resided a symbol, one that resonated with her. It was foreign, never to have been shown to her in the past, but she felt drawn to it. Resting her finger over it, she lifted her gaze back to her father and brother once more.

They stood over the third table, her fathers hands waving around frantically as her brother stood calm, arms crossed over his chest and eyes focused on the map. It was terrifying, really, approaching them when Cateline knew in her heart she had never been allowed in this room before.

She wondered how often her brother had been let into this room, how often he planned the demise of Denzethea. There was so much she did not know, so much that she could only guess had happened.

This table held a map of the world, regions spanning further than she could have ever guessed. Names like Yulia, Starisque, and an ‘Empire of Wisers’ struck her the most. So unfamiliar, so foreign, so far.

Varin once spoke to her of a Yulia, she recalled, but outside of that she knew nothing. They were names, but they were names she wished to know more.

Cateline’s father was a tall, angry looking man. With broad shoulders and an overgrown beard, she could only notice how tired he looked. He had bags puffed beneath his eyes, cheeks rosy and tainted with frown lines. She was told he had blonde hair in his prime, but now he was nothing but a gray, old man. One that deserved to rot after the things he had put her through, but nobody would know her disdain toward him.

Cateline would take that to her grave.

Her brother, Terrence, on the other hand intrigued her. He was thinner than King Airen, yet to have earned that gluttonous belly. Those eyes were kinder, too, his curious green irises always speculating and observing. Still, he was the King’s son and was to be raised as such.

That could only mean so much, and most of the outcomes meant terrible, terrible things.

He nodded, and when he opened his mouth to speak her heart crumbled.

“Lunarseve?” he whispered. “I thought you said that to be myth… we have beheaded people, our people, for speaking of such a thing. What are you on about, father?”

“Legends come from truth. Much like you, my son!” her father roared, slamming a hand on his shoulder. “You will be a legend one day, too. The great ruler of Denzethea, rightful heir to the throne. It is time to know what is in your way, Terrence.”

“A myth would not keep me from my throne.”

King Airen boomed a gutteral laugh before slamming his other hand onto the table. “But, it will! Tell me—where do you think Cateline ran off to that night?”

Terrence’s face went from that stern, contemplative glare to a jutted jaw and contemptible frown. “What did you just ask me?”

“I asked, boy, where do you think Cateline ran off to that night? Clear the dust from your ears.”

Terrence took a step back, hands dropping to his side in a fist. He struggled to find his words, which was rare—Cateline always envied how well spoken and prepared her elder brother was. “We don’t know where Cateline is, father. Mother has been a wreck since she disappeared.”

“Disappeared… Terrence, you know your sister. She is kind, but she is ill-prepared for our world. She is different, which means she is called to things that are lesser to us in normal times. We are in an era of war, son, and this war is brewing beneath our nose. Cateline is irrelevant now, but one day she may threaten your throne.”

“She would never. Father, where is Cateline?”

This was when Cateline’s hands began to tremble. On one hand, she felt assured that her brother had no knowledge of her whereabouts—as did her mother—but the way her father spoke… it was like she was as good as dead. An enemy to her own blood. An enemy to the family throne.

“Don’t believe him, Terrence!” she cried, taking a few clumsy steps back.

King Airen’s jaw clenched, eyes flashing this crazy look before he pointed back to the map. “Do you want to worry about that witch’s whereabouts and curse your own future, or do you want to plan our siege?”

“Who cares about Lunarseve? It is fake, father. You have told us all our lives that magic is cursed and the rituals they practice are to never be spoken of. You said that, and preached that to me at such an early age. Made me think lowly of my own flesh and blood because she was cursed. But, now you stand all high and mighty. The tyrant of Axulran is here to curse her daughter and begin a war of magic? You’ve gone mad.”

Cateline screamed when her father drew his hand back and slapped his son with the back of his hand. It was such a mighty slap that it sent him on his side, the only thing saving his face from crashing into the splintered wood floorboards was his quick reflexes. Terrence pushed himself up just enough to look up at King Airen, his cheek reddened and raw as tears welled at the ducts.

“Pay mind, boy, I do not put myself above smashing your skull against the table that holds this very map. If you think to get in my way, you will serve the same fate as that sister of yours. She is no flesh and blood, she is not my daughter. What do you think would happen to you if you threatened me like her?”

“What? She is your daughter—” he started, pulling himself up by the edge of the table. The King slammed his fist on Terrence’s knuckles, earning a cry as he fell back down. He drew his hand to his chest and held it close as he wept, Airen laughing over his son before turning toward the door.

“Weep when you have reason, son. We will revisit this after your tantrum has ceased. I will not tolerate the future rulers weak tears, so they best not exist when I return.”

Cateline trembled in the middle of the room, staring her father head on as he walked toward the door. His eyes, gray and void of all sympathies and emotion, did not falter as his son sobbed behind him. Within an instance, any guard who stood in the room exited alongside him and they were left alone.

Joining her brother on the ground, she reached out to him and flinched when she could not physically console him. With an aching heart, she lowered her stare and shook her head. “I’ll come home to you, Terrence. And Gawain, too. I promise!”

And, with that promise, the vision vanished and she was left trembling on the floor in the attic. She clutched at the first material thing that was in her reach, sobbing as the visions of her brother's broken knuckles clouded her mind.

Sniffling, she opened her eyes and eyed the box she had pulled close to her chest. Sitting up, she wiped her eyes and rubbed the wooden splinters that poked out of the aged walnut material. Opening the lid, she lifted a few envelopes from it and went slack jawed.

The crest of the wax seal was all too familiar—the lion and rose sloppily displayed on royal wax. Her family crest. Sifting through the rest of the miniature chest, she found dozens and dozens of letters that had familiar handwriting on it. Snatching a key from the bottom and holding all of it close to her chest, she stood to her feet and looked in the mirror again. Varin’s twin stood alongside her own, smiling viciously toward her as she let a tear freely fall down her cheek.

Her clone began to speak, and although she did not understand what she mouthed, Cateline was comforted by an eerie whisper. One that called for her in the bathhouse, and then again when the headmistress announced the Lunarseve ball.

“A war is coming… Approach the Silver Scaled Dragon at the peak of the Blood Moon, and we will welcome you. The Firstborn shall rise again.”