Chapter 1 'Aryna'
A book dedicated to love that was lost. Never forgotten.
“One hope for the future, one for the present, but the two don’t exist”
Chapter 1: ‘Aryna’
“The wish”
“Look, Aryna,” my mom said, setting down the lopsided chocolate cake she’d clearly stayed up late making—complete with uneven frosting and slightly smudged “Happy 18th Birthday” written in shaky pink letters—her cheerfulness seemed forced
“let’s try to make today as fun as we can.” She said
I love my mom, I really do, but sometimes she drives me absolutely crazy.
“Honey, I’m not upset you were out with your friends last night. I just wanted to know where you were.”
“Disappointed, then,” I said, unable to keep the snark out of my voice.
“Aryna!” She gave me that look—the one that said I was pushing boundaries we both knew I shouldn’t cross.
Mom walked around our tiny dining table, probably to avoid saying something she’d regret. She worked two jobs while Dad pulled night shifts, and they could barely make ends meet despite doing everything they could for me. I knew that.
Our apartment was so cramped that the dining room table took up most of the kitchen-dining room combo, leaving barely enough space to walk around it. On nights like this, with tension thick in the air, it felt even smaller. I could feel the frustration steaming from me.
I look down at the table. The chocolate cake sat in front of me, eighteen candles flickering in the dim light of our cramped apartment kitchen. Mom’s face glowed with pride across the table, her tired eyes momentarily free of worry lines. Dad stood beside her, his arm draped around her shoulders, a rare moment of peace between them. Arguing about money was what I normally heard.
“Make a wish, Aryna,” Mom said.
I closed my eyes, feeling oddly self-conscious. Eighteen. A legal adult as of today, yet I felt no different than yesterday. What does one wish for when standing at the threshold of adulthood? College acceptance letters had already come and gone—mostly rejections with two waitlists. My part-time job barely covered gas money.
*I wish for something extraordinary to happen*, I thought, surprising myself with the childish desire.
*Something to make me special.*
I leaned forward to blow out the candles.
The first breath sparked something inside me—a strange vibration beneath my ribs. I paused, confused, my lungs still full of air. I looked at the clock, “7:13pm,” the very moment I was born- Mom and Dad every year would do the same birthday blowout candles, exactly when I was born. I felt guilty because all I wanted to do was be with my friends, but I was stuck with them.
“You okay, sweetheart?” Dad asked.
“I— I’am fine” not wanting to tell the truth. My chest tightened.
“Mom…Dad, I don’t feel..”
My chest got heavy. Panic attack. Fuck.
“Focus,” I said to myself, Just breath, it’s okay.
The vibration intensified, spreading through my chest like an electric current. My fingertips tingled, then burned. The air around me seemed to thicken.
I started getting lightheaded.
“Aryna?” Mom’s voice sounded distant now.
I tried to move, but my legs wouldn’t move. The room began to spin, candle flames stretching into long ribbons of light. A high-pitched ringing filled my ears.
“Something’s wrong,” I managed to say, my voice sounding foreign to my own ears.
I reached out to put my hands on the table, but I kept missing like my hands were going right through it.
My parents’ faces contorted with alarm, mouths moving but words drowned out by the ringing. I reached for them, but my hands passed through what should have been solid flesh. They appeared to be moving in slow motion now, while I felt suspended in amber.
I’ve had panic attacks but nothing like this before- What the actual fuck is happening!
The kitchen dissolved around me. The colors looked like a painting that someone poured water on, and it dripped down the canvas.
The last thing I saw was my birthday cake, candles still burning, as the world I knew ripped away like tissue paper.
Then came darkness, a sensation of falling, of being pulled across an impossible distance. My body felt stretched, atomized, then violently reassembled.
I landed hard on cool stone, the impact knocking the breath from my lungs. Above me stretched a vaulted ceiling of ancient gray stone. The air smelled of dust and something else—something electric and foreign.
“Owww” I hurled out a long, painful sound.
As I struggled to sit up, a figure in flowing robes approached, their face obscured by a deep hood.
“Aryna Teller,” the figure said, voice neither male nor female. “Welcome to the Mage War College. Your true education begins now. Get up”
I tried to speak, to ask how they knew my name, to demand what was happening, but no words came. I’m dreaming, right? I must be dreaming.
Instead, power surged through me again, lifting me inches off the ground as blue light spiraled from my fingertips.
“Im fucking dreaming!” I barley got the words out.
The hooded figure nodded, seemingly satisfied.
“Right on schedule,” they said. “The awakening has begun.”
