The clock was ticking. In their private dining room, Aura and President Adler were sitting at the table opposite of each other. Two chairs occupied the seats between them, dust gathering on the seams.

With her knife, Aura cut through her steak. She grabbed the meat with her fork and bit into the meat, letting her tongue savor the texture.

Both their eyes concentrated on the plate in front of them. A few minutes passed until President Adler looked up. “Have you packed for your trip to Kemet-Raa?”

“I have, father.” Aura nodded and ate another slice of meat. “I’ll fly in two weeks.”

“Good. Remember, you’re there on a diplomatic mission alongside Adam Saber. With the current chaos in the world, we have to give the Pharaoh a good impression of Midgard. Something we constantly failed in the last century.” He crunched with his teeth. “Even if It was Vaix’s Monster of Baghdad, Diavolo Arturo, who had released the poison gas, Kemet-Raa continues to hate us.”

“Don’t worry, father.” Aura smiled. “Diplomacy is my specialty.”

“That’s true. Anyway, after your visit to Kemet-Raa, you two will fly to Avalon.”

“To Avalon?” Aura raised her brow.

“Don’t act so surprised.” Her father took his glass from the table and rocked the whiskey inside it. “You probably have already heard about it from your own channels, but I want you to attend the “Once and future” Ceremony.”

“I did.” Aura took her own glass and held it against her father’s. “But hearing it from the President makes it official. So, what will this ceremony be about?”

The President clinked his glass against Aura’s, and both drank. “I can’t tell you details, but it’ll change the way we look at the world.”

Aura cast an illusion as she rolled with her eyes.

Again, a refusal to reveal more. If the event was important, her father should give her more details. Trying to pry information from him would be useless. He should be aware that more data would help her with the task. But he still chose to remain silent. Whatever risks arriving at the ceremony without intel could entail, he considered knowing about the ceremony’s purpose to be a greater danger.

“What about you? If the ceremony is so important, shouldn’t you attend as well?”

“The Archimago specifically asked for you to represent Midgard. And only you.”

Aura narrowed her eyes. “As much as I am flattered, I doubt that the Archimago already considers me the President. I suppose he didn’t tell you why he wished me to have at the ceremony.”

“Given the nature of the ceremony, your presence makes more sense than mine.”

“I understand.” Aura smiled. “In that case, I’ll represent Midgard to the best of my ability. Can you send me the exact dates, please?”

Some would describe the atmosphere at the diner as cold. But she had never minded their relationship. There was nothing wrong with some family members being not as close as others. Her father had provided for her. In exchange, she fulfilled his expectations and grew up into an individual who excelled in every aspect of life – besides the arts. She would have done it, anyway, as not reaching the apex of one’s abilities wasted one’s life.

If outsiders looked at them, they would call them dysfunctional and their relationship a cold one. But who said family had to be warm? Who said it wasn’t working? She didn’t feel unhappiness in their current relationship. Humans had such difficulty understanding happiness that wasn’t their own. And instead of understanding, they ought to “correct” it. Rather should other people be correct than happy.

“Of course, I will,” said her father.

“Good. Is there anything else I should know?”

“Actually, there is. By the end of the ceremony, Avalon will open its borders to the entire world.”

֎

Aura walked into her chambers, her arms hanging from her body like a puppet without strings. The lights automatically went on, and her body fell into her bed. Aura bounced against the mattress. The fatigue she had ignored the rest of the day started to creep into her muscles and cast a blanket over her shoulders.

Ah, how soft.

She buried her head into her duvet and let the fabric tickle her skin.

Finally, she could get some rest.

Aura rolled over her bed and stared at the ceiling. Two months after the attempt at her life, the renovations for her room had ended. Her chambers shone in their once pristine light. Outside her windows, the night had darkened the world. Neither the moon nor the stars could one see. Pitch-black darkness surrounded the castle.

Aura chuckled.

This darkness was the natural state of the world, yet humans feared it. They gave light to their world because they couldn’t bear living in it otherwise. The desire to change the environment to accommodate one’s needs has dwelled within humanity since its inception. If an aspect that proved humanity superior and more dangerous than any other living species existed, then it lay in their ability to change the world to their needs.

Every other being had to submit to the whims of the environment. Mankind tried to subdue Aes to their whims. At first, it worked because it was willing to play along. But now, the world was starting to subjugate humanity. And like a corned animal, man was trying to strike back.

Humans were ridiculous, and if it weren’t for Ragna, that behavior would have driven her insane.

Aura stood up from her bed and set on its rims.

She had never told Ragna that she had stabbed the bird they had found with a knife. Its life was over, and nothing Ragna could have done would have changed its fate. To end the bird’s suffering was the logical choice, wasn’t it?

Would Ragna have cried if she had told her the truth, or would she have hidden her sadness behind a smile? No, she would wallow in tears.

“It’s okay to cry when you’re sad.”

Ragna once had told her these words, during the first and last time in Aura’s life that she had shed tears. It was the moment she started to like Ragna.

She held her palm against her forehead and rubbed her eyes.

“What’s with all these memories about Ragna today? Am I so tired?” She looked to her side, and an illusion manifested. A woman was sitting next to her. Most people who looked at the fake wouldn’t realize that this person wasn’t Princess Aurelia Adler.

A select few would see in her a ghost from the past.

“What do you think?” Aura asked the illusion.

But in front of her eyes sat the most wonderful woman in the world. She could recognize every difference between the two of them. Everything they shared and everything they didn’t was visible to her eyes.

Aura reached with her hand towards the illusion, and with a sudden movement, enclosed her in her embrace. For a second, it seemed that the woman had grown solid, but in the next, Aura slipped through it and fell on her bed.

“I really could need you right now,” Aura said as the fabric muffled her voice. “I can’t stop missing you, Freya.”