The next morning dawned pale and slow, with the sun barely breaking through a thick curtain of clouds. It wasn't raining, but the sky carried that strange, heavy silence that came before a storm.
Elara barely noticed.
Her mind was still in the woods—back in that clearing where the shimmer had pierced her chest and changed something deep inside her.
She couldn't explain it. Not fully. But she felt it.
In her blood. In her breath. In the space between each heartbeat.
Something had awakened.
And if she was going to survive whatever this path was, she needed to understand what had been sleeping inside her all this time.
So she went to the library.
The door creaked softly as she entered, and dust floated in golden shafts of light pouring in through the tall windows. The air smelled of old paper and ink, leather and time.
The place had always comforted her as a child. A world within a world. Now, it felt like a maze filled with hidden doors one of which might finally tell her the truth.
She walked past the shelves slowly, trailing her fingers along the spines until she reached the section her father had always avoided.
History of the Solari Line.
Books about the noble families. The old blood. Those born with gifts that weren't supposed to exist anymore.
Her family was among them, once. But they had buried that legacy long ago—burned the old tomes, locked the rest away, and never spoke of it again.
But Elara knew better now.
The shimmer had proved it.
She climbed the old ladder and reached for the thickest book on the top shelf. "Of Flame and Silver: The Lost Bloodlines."The cover was cracked, the pages yellowed at the edges. It smelled like something sacred.
She carried it to the reading desk and opened it carefully.
The first pages were filled with names she didn't recognize—ancient nobles, long-dead queens, bloodlines that faded after the war.
Then she saw it.
A sigil. An open hand, cradling a crescent moon.
Her house.
House Aerlyn.
Elara stared at the symbol, her pulse quickening.
Beneath it, a single line written in an elegant, slanted script:
"To bear the shimmer is to bear the price. For power does not come to the willing it comes to the wounded."
Her breath caught.
She read on.
"The Gift of the Solari is rare, and once bloomed only in the line of House Aerlyn passed down through the daughters, hidden in the marrow of their bones. They were known not for destruction, but for knowing. For seeing things before they came. For guiding kings. For waking stars from slumber."
Elara's hand trembled as she turned the page.
There were drawings, strange symbols, faded maps, and a diagram of a woman standing beneath a full moon, light pouring from her palms.
Another line followed beneath it.
"When a Solari girl comes of age, the shimmer finds her. It speaks only once, and what it awakens cannot be undone."
Elara pushed the book back slowly, the words swimming in her mind.
It had spoken to her.
And it hadn't just given her power.
It had given her sight.
Not in the way of seers or oracles, no. It was more subtle than that.
It was in the way she noticed the way Kaelin's hands trembled just slightly when she thought no one was looking.
It was in the way the manor walls whispered at night, not with sound, but with memory.
It was in the way she knew, without question, that someone had lied to her ten years ago.
That the betrayal she remembered so clearly was only part of the story.
Someone had hidden the rest.
And now, she had the means to uncover it.
That evening, Elara left the book tucked behind a row of gardening records no one had touched in years. She wasn't ready for questions. Not yet.
As she exited the library, a voice stopped her.
"Studying again?" Kaelin leaned against the doorframe, arms crossed, her head tilted in mock amusement.
Elara didn't flinch. "Just passing the time."
Kaelin stepped forward. Her boots made soft sounds on the stone floor. "I remember when we used to hide in here during storm nights. You'd make me read aloud until I lost my voice."
"I remember," Elara said quietly.
Kaelin's eyes searched hers. "We were close, once."
Elara didn't answer.
Because what was the point of saying 'once' when she now knew how fragile that closeness had been?
Kaelin continued, softer now. "If I hurt you, back then… I didn't know. I was just trying to survive."
Elara's breath caught. Not at the words.
At the way Kaelin's aura shifted.
A flicker of dark around the edges.
Not quite shadow. Not quite light.
The shimmer pulsed faintly in Elara's chest, warning her.
Something was wrong.
"Why did you come back?" Elara asked carefully.
Kaelin blinked, caught off guard. "What?"
"You say you missed us. That you wanted to return. But I don't believe that's the real reason."
Kaelin opened her mouth, then closed it.
For the first time, she looked unsure.
"I needed answers," she finally said. "There are things happening strange things. Whispers in the capital. People with old bloodlines being watched. Some… disappearing."
Elara felt a chill crawl up her spine.
Kaelin stepped closer, lowering her voice. "Something's coming, Elara. I don't know what. But it's tied to families like ours. To places like this."
Elara studied her face, trying to read past the mask. And for the briefest moment, she believed her.
But she didn't trust her.
Not yet.
That night, Elara returned to the clearing.
The shimmer didn't come.
But the wind carried voices, not words, but feelings. Echoes.
And in the center of the stone circle, she saw something new.
A marking.
Faint, carved into the earth beneath the moss.
It hadn't been there before.
She knelt and brushed the dirt away, revealing a symbol an open eye, half-closed by a crescent moon.
It was hers.
But it also wasn't.
Someone had left it here.
Someone who knew what she was.
Elara rose slowly, her heart pounding.
This wasn't just magic.
It was a message.
She wasn't the only one with the Gift.
And someone had found her first.