Woven by shadow and chime,
I sit on my throne of hemlock here at the edge of time.
But whence comes this hateful light that I see?
How dire shall the dreaded sentence be?
When the butterfly broke from the gilded cage,
And the sparrow devoured the finch in rage,
I was cursed to usher the end of an age.
The flowers taint my soul,
The roots, they bind my hands,
My eyes burn in the light,
Imperious. Punishing! BRIGHT!
I howl. I howl. I howl…
January 20th
03:00 |
The shrill noise of a mechanical siren pierced the silent night. A shrill noise that she had come to detest with all her heart, but one she could not dispense of nonetheless. Not today. Not now.
Asher awoke with a start, bathed in darkness barely pierced by what scarce moonlight dared cross the window. After but a second spent easing back into consciousness, she lunged for the alarm clock, flicking it off before it managed to echo a third time. The immediate matter resolved, she paused. Only the silent night remained, ever enveloping, almost deafening in the wake of the alarm, and she dared not move nor even breathe as she kept her ears open for any signs of life. Long seconds she held vigil, listening. At last when it became apparent that not a thing moved and not a soul stirred, the red haired girl allowed herself to relax for a moment, taking a deep breath.
Alright. That's the first part done.
She took a long look at her room. It was… spartan, bluntly put. To a degree that she could not deny she resented. There was a time when there had been much more here, not just belonging to her but to her brothers as well, but those years had long come and gone. Bare walls remained, of fine craftsmanship yes, but stripped of decor and identity. There above her bed had been a poster. On the nightstand, a photography she had since put away. Wallpaper that had once added color to the wooden walls had long been removed. An ornate wardrobe. A terminal. A small garden, hanging by the window. An old guitar case.
Well, at least she knew where to find one of those things.
Picking herself up, she moved aside her pillow and grabbed the knife underneath. Then, she turned on her heel and counted. One. Two. Three. Looking down, she saw the off-tone floorboard and crouched beside it, using the knife to pry it free. A small cache laid in the hollowed out space beneath, perhaps nothing others would find noteworthy, but a trove of personal treasure to her nonetheless. A guitar case covered in pins and other decals. A box full of memories. An old portable terminal, still fully functional. All sorts of odds and ends, hidden away beneath the house. Years ago she would have never thought that she would have to safeguard the things she valued so, concealing them as though they were full of shame just so that she could keep them close. She stared for a moment and then, with a sigh, she slung the case across her back and began packing her things into a rucksack. Her clothes and other personal effects were already inside, put away beforehand.
As she finished her task, she froze for a moment, a shiver running down her spine. Eighteen years of her life, and everything she owned and cherished fit neatly into a bag, with some space to spare.
It's a big bag. She told herself, as if trying to argue the point.
I'm pretty organized. She continued, a little less enthusiastic. Fittingly it didn't do much.
The sight of the room she'd lived in all of her life, now well and truly bereft of any trace of her presence, was… a conflicting sight, to put it mildly. Haunting and cathartic at once. This place’s past was very dear to her, and yet, if she only had a bottle of aqua vitae, a rag and a lighter…
Stop. She shook her head and turned around. Just leave.
She crept into the hallway like a thief unto the night, and though the darkness was thick as old blood, she moved decisively, without hesitation. She knew this hallway, these steps and turns. They were what was left of the home she once knew. The shape, and nothing more. She passed the studio, the storehouse, the now defunct art room mother had insisted on. When she slipped past the master bedroom, she kept an ear out. The old man always snored, and it was three in the morning. The old man was snoring now as well. That was good. A moment later she was past the living room and into the foyer. A few more steps took her outside at last.
The outdoors was not a panacea for all that ailed her, but still, the cool breeze of the early morning and the light that reflected off of Phos’ satellites did help to lift her spirits a little, or perhaps what they did instead was to ease the burden on her shoulders. Whatever the case, she couldn’t just stop here. The future awaited her, and it crept ever closer, one second at a time. But just for a moment she feasted her eyes on the landscape, knowing that it would be a whole year before she would get to see it again. The red mountains peaked in black and white that dominated the horizon, the clouds that clustered around the ridge’s crown, the sole river that descended and passed through the town of Third, splitting it in half. And then, of course, the town itself, with its black stacks and speed tracks, its humble locales of wood and stone and neon, its quarries that delved into the vowels of the earth. And then just west of there, the tall walls of the garrison, the rooftops of the hangar and armory barely visible above.
It wasn’t much. Not to anyone born in the high towers of Clarion or the fierce ramparts of Alecto certainly. But it was everything, too.
She turned her gaze back, just for a moment, to the lonely house atop the overlooking mesa. Not tall but spacious. Not luxurious, but dignified. She wondered if she would be coming back here, one year from now, or if the new life that awaited would take her further. Higher.
Then the moment was over, and her steps led her to the workshop next to the house. Her keycard let her through the lock, and inside, amid wall shelves stacked with tools and supplies and spare parts were two pegasi. The first was a newer model, sleek and stately, painted with the colors of the Order of the Phantom Blade and bearing their insignias. The second was an older relic, though it had been worked on so extensively that it hardly looked the part. Sylvalladine’s silver and Kaios’ black mixed with fiery orange and electric blue; retrofitted thrusters and stabilizers bulked up the frame, and the original seat had been replaced with something more comfortable and adapted to the shape of its rider.
Said rider immediately walked inside, grabbing a few other possessions of hers. A gray belt, a black cube, a silver pole, a helmet. She then hopped onto the older pegasus and set it to hover. An audible hum began emanating from the underside of the vehicle as it began floating a few inches off the ground, but it was nothing that couldn’t be muffled by the wind; certainly it was nothing compared to the sonic boom that would surely take place otherwise, as rather than fly past the open door and into the sky, the redhead led the machine outside as one would lead a beast of burden, closing the door behind her. Out on the mesa again, and down the lonely path that led down below.
Go all the way down, take off, take it slow. I can go faster when I’m out of earshot, don’t want to cause a rude awakening…
Immersed in her thoughts, she failed to notice unusual shadows by the old trees that flanked the path until it was too late.
“Ash! Didn’t plan on leaving without saying your goodbyes, didya?” Spoke the raven-haired young woman presently clinging to her back like a leech to the skin. It had to be very uncomfortable, wrapping her arms around Asher while nestling her head between the rucksack and guitar case, but she managed it. Somehow.
“Julia?” Asher blurted out as she felt the impact, making some small effort to keep herself upright. “No, no, of course I didn’t. I was going to crash into your house before taking off for real.”
The thought struck her that preparing something to that effect had, in fact, slipped her mind. Being so terribly nervous and absorbed in thought had always caused her to become absent-minded. Right now all those worries seemed so silly, though. Everything was going to be fine, wasn’t it?
“Marcus! Fier! You’re here too?” The redhead said as she looked up at the two boys that had likewise sprung from the trees the moment she let down her guard. The one on the left was broad-shouldered and handsome, with a mess of black hair pointing skyward, while the one on the right was a tall brunet with an undercut and a witty look about him.
“Well duh. It’s not like we planned on missing the first journey of our very own knight of Phos you know?” Fier replied with a chuckle.
“Listen Ash, regardless of whatever anyone else says, you’re one of us. So go show them what we’re made of, alright?” Marcus told her.
“I will. I promise.” Asher nodded, before taking a step towards them - still with Julia in tow - and pulling them into a hug. These were her friends, after all. The people she had grown up with, counted on. The people she had confided in and loved. These were her friends, and she’d miss them terribly.
But this story is not about such people.
They never are.
07:30 |
The wind was an old friend. Many liked to say, on stormy nights or when the northern wind fell upon the dale, that it was howling. They likened it to a beast, an enemy. But Asher had never seen it that way. The wind did not howl, it sang to her, it sang to her songs of friendship and love and loss. How long had it been here, watching over her, over whoever was here before her? Connecting star-crossed lovers, muffling the tears of those who suffered? The wind was an old friend, one she was embraced by during her pegasus rides over the distant mountains, one she was caressed by during her walks through the lonely old mesa and beyond. An old friend that now raced her one last time in farewell, for she would not be back in a while. She would remember it, of course. She would remember it fondly.
But it would forget her. The mountains had no voice; the wind had no memory.
She wasn’t sure how many hours it had been now, the clock on her panel silent and unseen. Dawn should have fallen upon quaint Third by this time, she was confident of that. But as she flew across the rocky landscape of Phos, past the mining settlements of Fourth and Second and First and all the others, all she saw was night blanketing the sky, the only sunlight over the serene countryside being that which reflected off of the surface of seven moons looming across the sky. Stars twinkled above and overhead, teasing her across time and space.
“Young ghost, whence have you come? And where are you going, young ghost?”
Their childlike humming went as unheeded as the passing of time. The truth was, Asher at the moment had little attention to spare for anything that was not the rushing wind, the contrast of the celestial vault and the terrestrial blur, the roar of the engine that was but an echo of the roar inside her heart. At times like these she felt invincible, like a god dancing in the sky. Love. Hate. Order. Family. None of that could reach her up here, betwixt peak and void, cloud and star. What fear could grip one’s heart when there is nothing to fear? What stress, when there is nowhere to go and nothing to return to? What anxiety when there was no one else here to speak? No one but the wind, her brother, the one that stayed, singing of friendship and love and loss.
And then, like the night, it all ends. Inevitably.
Wrenched away from her reverie by a blazing orange glow on the horizon, the redhead slowed down her pace, the ground becoming more distinct in response. There in the wake of the setting sun was Sequence, seat of the baron that reigned over Phos and its star. More importantly, it was the location of Malus Harbor, where chariots bound for other worlds docked to await cargo and passengers. While still a far cry from the great citadels of the Phantom Blade, Sequence was closer than anything else on Phos. She had been there once or twice, on the odd family holiday when she was much younger, though to its credit the city didn’t seem to have changed much in the meantime. Tall towers replaced the squat locales of the countryside. Holographic displays took the place of neon signs. Stone was more polished, and brighter, and ornamental rather than utilitarian.
As she began her slow descent towards the long shadows cast by the setting sun, her eyes shielded from the light that filtered between the buildings by the tinted acrylic of her helmet, Asher saw more clearly the pseudodome that was Malus Harbor rising out of the ground like the face of a sleeping giant. A great edification made of marble and iron and glass, worthy of any of the Lucent Arm’s great citadels… except, the iron looked just a little rusted, the marble a little cracked. Still, it was not without dignity. There was a quiet grandeur about it; a knight in shining armor this was not, but a knight of a thousand battles nonetheless.
You’re getting into the mindset already.
Before long, she was in Sequence’s airspace, slowing down to follow city regulations instead of soaring through the sky at the speed of light like an angel. It would be terribly embarrassing, after all, to get in trouble over traffic matters, now of all times. Fortunately it wasn’t long until she found a convenient place to leave her pegasus, and from there she began heading towards the harbor on foot. That part was unfortunate. It was unfortunate because here, so far from the mines and so close to the stars, there were people of more worldly persuasions. Learned people. People, perhaps, with some notions as to the history of their great order. And so the sight of a young woman with a long red mane and eyes of a steely gray inevitably drew the stares of the curious and the erudite. A part of her could not blame them, though she dreaded it nonetheless; would she not, if the roles were inverted, stare in shock or awe or wonder, or perhaps fear, at the living memory of the Guardian, a legend of old?
“The blood of the Guardian is like the blood of the Saints.” Her father had once told her, long ago, when she made an innocent question she no longer could recall. “It resists dilution. It overpowers. It seethes…”
It bothered her greatly. How she wished she could have at least inherited her mother’s eyes. Those beautiful, kind, loving verdant eyes instead of this blindly crossed, overcast glare. That perhaps would keep the stares away. But it didn’t happen, and all she could do was hurry along, walking at a far brisker pace than one would normally see and perhaps drawing even more stares as a result, though it needed not bother her if she would end up leaving them behind anyway. All she had to do was keep her focus on the path ahead. Directly on the path, preferably, rather than ahead. That way she wouldn’t risk crossing glances with a curious onlooker and wouldn’t have to risk making awkward conversation and wouldn’t-
“Asher, where are you going?”
The voice immediately caused the redhead to freeze in her tracks. She looked up, then over her shoulder, then a smile she didn’t know she still had appeared as she ran back.
“Mom! Adel!” She cried out in joy as she pulled her mother and her younger brother into a tight hug. “You came to see me off?”
“Wouldn’t miss it for the world.” Her mother, Fennel, spoke as she looked at her with those lovely eyes that always calmed her down. “How are you feeling?” She asked as the three parted, though Adel was perhaps a little more reluctant.
“Well, you know…” Asher replied with a vague gesture that did comparatively very little to mask her anxiety. The brief silence that followed prompted her to continue. “It’s the Year of Our Lord 3031 and I’m going to have to wear a skirt so, I could be better.” She chuckled. She then turned to look at her younger brother, Adel, who seemed even more like a fish out of the water than she did, if such a thing were even possible. He too had the ‘blood of the Guardian’, his hair was shorter and somewhat more unruly, but still very much the same color, and his eyes were the same as hers.
More notably, he was three years younger and four inches taller. “Hey, look at you! You’ve grown so much since the last time I got to see you in the flesh.” She said cheerfully. He smiled, a little, nodded with a manner that made it seem as if he wondered whether he should be proud or apologetic. Knowing all too well how he felt, she shouldered the burden of conversation and continued. “I know you’ve been doing a great job without me around, but you make sure to study hard alright? You could become a mender like mom and help save lives, or a rich prospector… or really anything you want!”
“...Then why can’t you, sis?” Adel replied softly, his expression one of concern more than anything else. Despite his little brother’s innocence, or perhaps because of it, the question cut deep.
But she couldn’t let him see that could she?
“What do you mean?” Asher finally replied as if she hadn’t missed several beats already. “I get to go and become a knight and have a lot of adventures. It’s gonna be a blast.” She smiled at Adel. He smiled back. It was difficult to imagine which was more forced.
“Asher, if you don’t-” Her mother began after a few moments of silence. Before she could even half-finish her sentence, Asher threw her arms around her once more.
“I’m fine.” She said. “I can take it. I promise.”
It was as much an attempt to convince herself as it was an attempt to convince Fennel. By some miracle, it seemed to help put the both of them a little more at ease.
“I’ll study really hard and I’ll be even taller next time I see you, okay?” Adel mumbled as he joined in.
“I know you will.”
The three remained like that for a few minutes this time, cherishing one another’s touch, knowing it would be some time before the opportunity would arise once more. The chilly night breeze of the hour that followed the sunset made it all the more comfortable to remain huddled together like that, but in fact, that had very little to do with it. Asher, Fennel and Adel shared in that embrace until their worries were forgotten, just a little bit. Their family was missing two, but at least they had each other. For now.
“Isn’t it going to cause trouble that you left the clinic, mom?” Asher inquired, curious, but not quite ready to let go yet.
“Well, I don’t think so dear. My assistant is a klutz, but I’m sure even he can hold the fort for a day. I left him some help and instructions in case something does happen, too. He’ll be fine.” Fennel replied without much concern. For as much of a vocation as she might have had, she was a mother first and mender second.
“That’s good.” The redhead nodded. “Say, could you make sure the pegasus gets back to Marcus? I told him he could have it when I’m not around.”
“I’ll have someone bring it back. I’m sure someone around here offers that service.” Her mother said.
After a few moments longer, Asher took a deep breath and then separated herself from her mother’s and her younger brother’s embrace, turning to look at the harbor. She almost didn’t want to go. Would it be so bad if she just turned back, asked to go back with mom and Adel, forgot about this whole thing? Would it really be so bad?
But of course, that would be tantamount to an admission that everything she had said earlier was a lie, and some small part of her, or perhaps not so small, truly did want to believe that she could do this. That she could take it. The seething ‘blood of the Guardian’, perhaps, or her mother’s determination. Or something else.
“Well, got to go.” She said at last. “Best not to keep them waiting.”
“You’re shaking, dear.” Fennel pointed out. Asher hadn’t realized until then, but it was true, her legs were feeling a little quiverish. She let out a nervous laugh upon realizing.
“Um, shaking with excitement! Can’t wait to get started! Bye mom, bye Adel, I’ll write back as often as I can, I promise!” She said hastily, and then began walking, hoping to trick her legs into forgetting about their sudden lack of strength. When she looked back, she was already some distance away from the harbor’s entrance, where Fennel and Adel were looking at her and waving their very last goodbyes before turning and heading home, back to the life they left on pause, back to Third.
Back to the life she had chosen to leave behind.
The following half hour didn’t hold much of note. Asher hated bureaucracy, it made her feel as though months of her life might vanish over one little mistake, and the anxiety that it brought irked her because it made her feel weak, but nothing too bad happened this time. It helped that the academy more or less took care of booking the seats and paying the expenses to get her to Arcadia in time, so all she had to do was go through the motions and wait patiently for the chariot to arrive. And wait patiently she did, eyes pointing up at the sky beyond the clear glass ceiling of the waiting room. If there was anything she was grateful for, it was that at least she could stargaze a little while she was here.
As the clock struck eight - in the part of Phos where she currently was, that is - her chariot pulled into one of the docking bays. It was a revolving hexagon, like the cylinder of a six-shooter if it had learned to fly and increase its size by a thousandfold. As it came to fully rest in the docking bay and a gangplank lowered to allow exit and entry, everything became a blur of movement. Presenting credentials, verifying payments, confirming destinations and aisles and seats. Dreadfully tiring but also mercifully brief. Once all of her luggage was sorted and her access cleared, it was a simple matter of finding her seat.
Her seat just so happened to be next to a familiar face, a black-haired man, with a pair of keen all-seeing amber eyes behind small round spectacles. His face was very nearly buried in a portable terminal held before him, but try as she might, she couldn’t get a good look at what was on it.
“Master Rhodan, it’s good to see you.” Asher greeted him politely. He did not look up at her, but his head did make some vague gesture of acknowledgment.
“That would be my brother Rheus, in fact.” The bespectacled man replied in a brisk tone. “He would be more than a little thrilled to remind anyone and everyone around him, too, the pompous prick.” He stated, as if it weren’t an Arche he was talking about. The redhead stood there for a moment, in stunned shock, but also in admiration. She knew more than a couple of people she would’ve loved to call pricks to their faces.
“...I see.” She muttered as she sat down next to him. She tried to catch a glimpse of whatever memorandum or news article he might be looking at, but he seemed to notice and closed the terminal. “So how did your business with the mining company go?”
“Very well, very well indeed. The headmaster will be most pleased to know that we have secured a cheap source of adamant steel for manufacturing purposes. And we happened upon quite the promising young knight candidate while at it, too.” He stated as though it were just a matter of fact, but it was still enough of a compliment to cause her to look away in embarrassment. Despite his apparent inattentiveness, it was clear he picked up on this immediately. “Come now, there’s no need to be shy. We are friends, are we not? You may call me Rhadamant, if you like.”
“I mean, are we?” Asher queried, raising an eyebrow at the man. “I’m very grateful for your help in getting invited to the academy, but beyond our previous meeting I don’t know you that well. Or at all.” She asserted.
“True. Many would consider I’ve done you an incredible favor but even that may not be considered enough material for a friendship. It is of no consequence though. You’ll be seeing a lot of me where we’re going. Is this your first time in a voidbound vessel?” The bespectacled man spoke. The sudden question at the end of his spiel caught her off guard, but she nodded.
“Yes, why?”
“Better brace yourself.”
And it was true. The takeoff wasn’t too bad. The chariot moved faster than she had expected, but speed had never been a problem for her; it was mildly disorienting to see the face of an old aristocratic woman in front of her instead of the path ahead, but nothing too bad. The problem was when they began rising, past the peaks, past the clouds, higher and higher. Turbulence in planetary flight was nothing compared to what she experienced the first time she pierced through the atmosphere of Phos, her home, and passed into the void. The sudden lack of weight only made matters worse, but as the cylinder began gyrating, everything began to stabilize.
Asher looked all around. Despite everything, nobody around seemed terribly fazed, except one or two people who had all the trappings of being first-timers like herself.
Well, one down. Just five more times to go…
February 10th
12:00 |
She wasn’t going to get used to this anytime soon.
One second, she was about to start falling asleep, the thrum of the engine and the quiet darkness of the void lulling her and forcing her eyes shut. The next, it was that dreadful turbulence again, except entry was a lot worse than exit. And still nobody around her seemed too terribly bothered by it.
Is everyone in the Hearth Spiral used to this garbage other than me?
The resentful thought continued to resonate in her head as the chariot moved from the void into the atmosphere, descending across the crystalline blue skies of Mandus and piercing through the cover of the clouds. As usual, planetary flight took up a minimal portion of the time necessary to travel between worlds, and so before long she could feel the weight and hear the familiar mechanical groan as the chariot slowed down and settled into one of the docking bays at Kalven Harbor. And then, it was the blur again. Verifying identities, confirming arrivals, waiting for her luggage to be returned only to be informed that the academy had already made arrangements to have everything delivered to her dormitory.
So here she was, in Kalven Harbor, in a red uniform and a gray skirt that made her feel more than a little uncomfortable, with nothing to keep her hands busy and relatively little idea of what to do or where to go. She was sure that the acceptance letter included some manner of instructions to follow upon arrival to Citadel Arcadia, but if those indeed existed she had forgotten them by now. She’d lost sight of Rhadamant in the commotion, too.
At least she wasn’t alone out here. There were a lot of other red uniforms around, undoubtedly new arrivals like herself. Some had arrived alongside her, some had arrived in separate chariots, some even seemed like they had been here for a while, just sightseeing for a bit before heading on to the academy proper.
And there was, in fact, a lot to sightsee, here in Arcadia. A shining ringed city segmented by rising walls and crystalline canals, it might have been a frontier citadel, but it had very little to envy from the ivory towers of the upper arms and it showed. Even from where Asher stood, one could see, through the clear glass walls of the star harbor, the smooth gray high-rises that gave the Stacks its name, and beyond them the Bard’s Wound and the Crystal Chapel. Surely there was plenty to see in the other direction too, if one approached the edge of the third wall. Unfortunate that the redhead was too unnerved to be bothered with any of this, instead heading in the same general direction as the rest of the red tide of student uniforms, doing her best not to look too out of place.
Taking a few deep breaths, Asher calmed herself down and settled into a comfortable place as she walked. The harbor’s exit had already come into view when-
“‘Scuse me? You’re the one who wasn’t looking where he was going and I’m supposed to apologize to you? Fat chance!”
What’s going on over there? Asher thought as she approached the commotion. A small crowd had gathered around three people, two pompous-looking boys and a black-haired girl that was at present the very image of ferocity.
“Who do you think you’re calling peasant, prick? You wanna have a go? I’ll give both of you a good taste of my shoe if you don’t back the heck off!” The girl continued, settling into a fighting stance that resembled more that of a street brawler than that of a knight. Despite being a good few inches shorter than the two boys, her presence was clearly the stronger one.
“What’s going on here? Why are you fighting?” Asher spoke up as she approached. Despite not wanting to draw any attention to herself, she felt it was her duty to try and defuse the situation. These people could end up hurting each other, getting into trouble with the academy’s or the citadel’s authorities, or any number of things, and she preferred not to be a simple bystander and let it happen if she could help it.
As it turned out, she didn’t need to do much more.
“Bah, I don’t have time for this. The academy awaits.” One of the boys said before turning around and moving along, the other boy soon following suit. The black-haired girl shook her head.
“Rich kids. All bark and no bite. And here I was hoping for a good scrap to warm up before class.” She remarked.
“I get it if they were being rude to you, but don’t you think you blew it out of proportion a little?” The redhead asked. Now that she got a closer look at the other girl, she noticed that she had yellow highlights in her hair and quite a few piercings on her ears. Certainly a far cry from the sort of people she thought would be attending the academy, though the surprise was not unwelcome.
The girl, too, turned to look at Asher, quickly looking her up and down as if sizing her up. “Listen here, there’s only two ways the little people get to stay on top instead of getting swept by the current. First, you wait and hope for your friends in high places to throw you a bone. Second, you act dangerously unstable and make sure they don’t want to bother you again. And guess what, baby? I ain’t got any friends.” She remarked.
The delivery was enough to get a chuckle out of Asher. “Well, if you’re looking, I could use one.”
The other girl examined her fingernails with an air of disinterest. “I don’t know, what’s in it for me?”
Asher blinked, a little blindsided by the question. “Um, you know, a friend?”
“Alright alright alright. Geez. You drive a hard bargain lady, but fine, I’m in.” She extended a hand in offering, but when Asher moved to take it, it slipped right out of her grasp, like a wet fish. “Name’s Mercury, don’t waste it. You wouldn’t happen to be in, uhhh…” She trailed off and looked at a message written in her left hand. It wasn’t there, so she had to look at the right. “You wouldn’t happen to be in Team Admonition, would you?”
The redhead shook her head. “No, sorry. My acceptance letter said Commandment.”
“Shit, that’s a damn shame. Well, I’ll see you around Red. Gotta go find my teammates. I sure hope it’s not those pricks from before…” The black-haired girl waved goodbye and then turned around and ran out of the harbor. Asher wanted to tell her to stick around a little longer, that she could help her look, but it was much too late - she was gone in practically an instant.
She sighed.
Well, no point in staying here either way. The academy awaits.