"Dude, you're not going to believe this."
Lorien Vale looked up from the Materia Mechanica textbook he was trying to understand to see Mira Thorn grinning at him, her black eyes glinting with mischief. She plopped down across from him, silky black hair caressing her sunkissed shoulders. She wore a rainbow tank top and black cargo pants, with a bigger pouch attached to her waist as a belt.
Classes at Blackmere Academy didn't start for another week, and the few dozen students who were back looked tan and healthy — except Lorien, who’d spent his summer cataloguing his grandfather’s mechanical butterfly collection while his siblings went shooting, kayaking, and climbing trees. He didn’t mind much. He’d never been athletic, and sunlight made him sneeze.
Trying to ward off whatever trouble Mira was about to get him into, Lorien turned his textbook around to face her. She'd spent her summer as an apprentice mechanic on her uncle's airship. She was a total gearhead. "We're supposed to make aurichalcum, this semester", he said. "I'm pretty sure that stuff turns your skin into metal."
"That's why you use gloves, dummy," she said, impatiently dismissing his concern. She shoved his book back toward him and pulled out a book of her own. She slapped it down in the middle of his textbook. "Look what I found. It's a romance novel, written by Professor C!"
The book was small, paperback-sized, but slimmer, with a thin, leather cover and silver-lined edges. "Lady of the Lake," he read aloud. He flipped open to the first page, read the first line, and slammed it shut again. "Whispers and weatherlight", he quoted. He could feel himself blushing, but he matched Mira's grin. "This is gold," he whispered, looking around.
He needn't have. The library was empty -- even the librarian had stepped out. Lorien had wanted to get a head start on some of the classes he knew he'd struggle in. He wasn't sure why Mira had come with him. She was pretty and popular and although they'd been best friends since the first day of freshman year, he continually expected her to move on to more interesting company. She definitely wasn't anxious about her grades. She'd spent the last hour trolling through the stacks and calling out the more ridiculous book titles.
Mira's dark eyes danced. "You have to read it!" Her tone was light, but she had an undercurrent of intensity flowing from her.
Lorien was definitely curious. Professor Caldus was a middle-aged, balding little guy who always seemed to be wearing the same gray, three-piece tweed suit. He wore little round spectacles and a little fedora that matched his suit, and had never told a joke, or laughed at one. The idea of him writing a novel that included the word "weatherlight" was bizarre. But he didn't really want to be watched while he read.
Mira, who could be sensitive to Lorien's sensitivities, stood up and started trolling the stacks again. "Aetheric Condensers and You: A Memoir," she called out, as Lorien opened the book again.
The castle was built on whispers and weatherlight — its towers leaning like old thoughts toward the silver mist that hung over the water. Dawn never quite reached the Blackmere Lake; instead, it lingered behind clouds, turning the surface into a mirror that remembered faces long vanished.
From the forest, a young scholar came riding —
Lorien slammed the book shut again and closed his eyes. The writing was so old-fashioned and cringe.
"The Four Humors and Steam Physiology," Mira called out.
Lorien caressed the soft leather of the book. It glimmered, like tiny bits of mica had ingrained itself into the cover. As he ran his fingers over the embossed title, he felt like a cold finger caressed the back of his neck. He jumped and turned in his seat, expecting to find Mira behind him. But he could hear the soft thud of her footsteps as she moved around the stacks.
The school was in a drafty old mansion, he told himself. Not the first draft that had ever freaked him out. He took a deep breath and opened the book again.
From the forest, a young scholar came riding — not in armor, but in travel-stained robes and a mind full of questions. His name was Alaric Vale, a second-year apprentice of dream cartology, sent from the college’s upper halls to chart the ley-lines that hummed beneath the grounds. But what truly led him here was not his assignment. It was the song.
It began at twilight each evening — a voice rising from the lake, low as a hum, high as the breath of stars. Some said it was the enchantress who lived beneath the water, a guardian from before the age of the towers. Others said it was only the wind, slipping through reeds like a secret that could never quite be caught.
Alaric did not believe in ghosts, though he believed in loneliness.
Lorien stopped again, but didn't tear his gaze from the page. He felt -- weird, like -- he didn't know -- like the cold caress on the back of his neck was now floating through his thoughts.
He had walked through echoing corridors where portraits whispered his name and candle flames turned to watch him.
So he followed the song.
Through the mist and the murmuring pines, until the moon climbed pale and round above the towers. The trees parted like curtains, and there — between the reeds — he saw her.
She was not quite of flesh. Her hair drifted as if underwater, though she stood upon the shore. Her eyes were pale as starlight on glass. When she turned to him, the song ceased, but its echo seemed to fill the air between them, as though the world itself were holding its breath.
“You should not be here,” she said, her voice like the last line of a forgotten spell.
“I heard your song,” Alaric replied. “And followed.”
“Then you’ve crossed more than distance.”
The mist thickened. The castle bells began to toll — distant, solemn, calling the students to curfew. But Alaric did not turn back. For in that single glance, he felt he had stepped out of time, into some deeper place where magic still spoke the old language of the heart.
And the Lady, whoever she was, watched him with eyes that knew both promise and ruin.
Lorien sat for a moment, absorbed in the story. He could almost hear the song, he knew exactly the silvery echo of her voice sounded, he could see the sorrow in her eyes. He could feel the vibration of her sad song shimmering under his skin.
"Right?" Mira asked, quietly. She was leaning against a bookcase, watching him.
Lorien felt like she'd been watching him for a while. "Do you think it's real?" he asked.
Mira shook her head, her expression solemn. "Either that, or Professor Caldus missed his calling. He should be writing novels, not alchemic equations."
Mira was never serious. That would have been spooky enough, but Lorien was pretty sure he could still hear the song faint and high, threading through the hum of the academy’s old pipes.”
"Come on," Mira said, grabbing Professor C's book and stuffing it into one of her voluminous pant pockets. She noticed Lorien's gaze watched the book until it disappeared. "Let's go downstairs and make sure the Lake isn't actually haunted."
Lorien's startled look made her giggle. She slammed his textbook shut, too, the action causing a look of reproof from the librarian, who'd finally returned to her desk. "Sorry, Ms. Wynn," Mira called out in an unapologetic sing-song.
Ms. Wynn was short and wide with a baby face and a curly Afro streaked with gray. She liked to wear long skirts and button-ed up blouses with puffy sleeves, like a Victorian lady, complete with an unnaturally quiet chatelaine. She glanced around the empty room, and shrugged. "I suppose the books can forgive you," she said in her quiet, deliberate voice, before scrunching her cute little face into a mock-glare. "This time."
Mira, startled by the unexpected playfulness, gave another full-voiced giggle, before cutting it off apologetically. Ms. Wynn just shrugged again, then turned to bend over a huge tome she had open on her desk, smiling.
Mira circled the table so that she could tug the still-seated Lorien toward the door. He allowed himself to be pulled out of his chair, but he made a protesting motion toward his books.
"Leave them," she said, gesturing at the empty tables. "They'll be here when you get back."
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