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The world came back to me slowly, in fragments. The first thing I noticed was the weight of my body—heavy, leaden, the very essence of my being poured out and left hollow. My limbs protested even the smallest of movements, and when I dared to open my eyes, the dim, dusty light of the room only made the dizziness worse.

A low, rhythmic sound reached my ears—a gentle tapping against the blanket covering me. My vision wavered as I turned my head, the motion threatening to undo me entirely. Yet, it was not the ache in my body that arrested my attention, but the black-feathered creature perched atop the blanket covering me. It cocked its head at me, its eyes, like polished obsidian, gleamed with a keen intelligence that felt too knowing for a mere bird.

The sight of it stirred a strange mix of recognition and nausea. My stomach churned, and for a moment, I thought I might disgrace myself entirely. The raven hopped closer, its talons snagging slightly on the coarse fabric, its head bobbing inquisitively. I recoiled, its scrutiny frightening.

"By the gods," I muttered, my voice weak and rasping. "Shoo, you wretched thing."

I swatted at it feebly, and the bird flapped up into the air before resettling on the blanket, unperturbed. It fixed me with a look that seemed almost reproachful. Then, to my utter disbelief, it spoke.

"Well, aren't you a sight," it said, its tone dripping with sarcasm.

I let out a scream so piercing it appeared to rattle the room's wooden walls. In my panic, I scrambled out of bed, only to stumble backward and hit the nearest wall with a jarring thud.

The room around me came into sharper focus, though my head still swam. It was plain, almost stark in its simplicity. Wooden walls, worn smooth by age, enclosed the small space, and a single narrow shelf sat against one corner, layered in years of untouched dust. The only light came from a narrow window, its panes smudged and grimy.

This was not the mage towers, not my chamber, not anywhere familiar.

My heart raced as I stared at the raven, its feathers puffed in apparent annoyance at my reaction. That bird, the bird who's visits I had so long been accustomed to every dawn, spoke.

The sound of hurried footsteps on a creaking staircase broke through my daze. From the corner of the room, a narrow flight of steps descended, and up them came Cyrus, sword drawn and face taut with urgency.

"Where is it?" he demanded, his voice sharp. "The shadow mantle—did it follow you?"

I tried to shake my head, but the effort was too much. The room tilted dangerously, and my knees buckled. Cyrus was at my side in an instant, his sword clattering to the floor as he caught me.

"Careful," he said, his tone softer now. His arm slipped around me, steadying me as I struggled to regain my footing. The warmth of his touch, steady and certain, was a small comfort against the chaos roiling in my mind.

He carried me down a narrow flight of stairs, the world swaying around me as though I floated in a fevered dream. The chamber below was modest and unadorned, its walls of rough-hewn wood, the air thick with the mingling scents of herbs and old dust. At the center of the room stood a simple wooden table, its surface marred by the scars of time and use. The scent of something warm and herbal wafted up from a bowl set upon it, but my attention was drawn to the two figures seated nearby.

Martha, ever sharp-eyed and imperious, regarded me with a mix of concern and scrutiny. Beside her was a woman I did not know—fair and tall, with streaks of silver in her dark hair

"You're awake," Martha said, her tone brisk but betraying a faint note of relief. My gaze darted to the raven, now perched upon the table, its beady eyes fixed on me. With a trembling hand, I pointed.

"It spoke," I whispered, my voice shaking with disbelief.

"And what of it?" Martha said curtly, though her voice held a rare note of what might have been amusement. "He always could."

I stared at her, incredulous. My thoughts were a maelstrom of questions, but the weight of my exhaustion rendered them incoherent.

"Calm yourself," the unfamiliar woman said, her voice smooth and commanding. "You have endured much, and answers will come in time." She gestured for Cyrus to help me seated, and he rested a hand on my shoulder.

Martha cleared her throat, her demeanor shifting into one of formality. "Rowena," she began, I flinched at the mention of my formal name, her voice carrying the gravity of a pronouncement, "allow me to introduce you to the Headmistress of the Academy of the Dark Sorcerer. She has come here at my request, for reasons that concern your father—and your future."

The room stilled at her words.

"The Academy..." I managed, my voice a threadbare whisper. "The sorcerers—"

"Were hunted and killed," Martha interjected, "Yes, that is what you were taught. Convenient lies for a kingdom built on fragile truths."

Her words struck me like a crack of thunder, reverberating in my chest. My pulse quickened, a tangled mix of disbelief and something darker—something dangerously close to hope.

I wanted to refute her, to name the histories etched into the archives, the legends passed down like sacred scripture. The sorcerers, Hamelin's greatest threat, had been destroyed to ensure peace. The treaty, the bloodlines, the magic split into sanctioned clans... truly how could it all be a lie.

The Headmistress leaned forward, her presence a weight unto itself. "Lies endure for the same reason shadows cling to the walls: they thrive where truth cannot."

Her words pressed against the edges of my thoughts, unraveling threads I wasn't ready to lose. My father's sternness in my upbringing, the shadows in Martha's eyes when she thought I wasn't watching—it all seemed to fall into a pattern I couldn't yet see.

"No," I said, shaking my head. "If they lived—if they retreated—how could the kingdom not know? The Southlands..." My voice faltered as a memory surfaced, unbidden.

The Southlands were cursed ground, or so the stories went. The soil there turned to ash underfoot, and the wind carried whispers that drove men mad. No banners flew there, no roads dared cross its borders. The kings of Hamelin had decreed it forbidden land, unfit for civilization after The Siege.

Unfit for civilization—or sanctuary for those who had none?

I gripped the edge of the chair, the wood biting into my palms as the pieces slotted together in my mind. "The curses," I murmured, more to myself than to the room. "The rumors—they weren't to warn people away. They were to keep the sorcerers safe."

The Headmistress inclined her head slightly, a faint smile playing at her lips. "Your mind serves you well, Rowena."

I stared at her, a storm of emotions rising within me. "But why—why would they retreat? Why would they hide when they were the most powerful among us?"

Martha's voice was low and deliberate as she answered. "Because power alone is not enough when the world is against you. And Hamelin turned against them with a ferocity that only fear could provoke."

Her words carried a weight that felt too large for the room. The air seemed thinner now, harder to draw into my lungs.

"Then why have I been summoned?" The question tumbled from my lips before I could stop it. "If the sorcerers live, if they've hidden themselves, what does that have to do with me?"

The Headmistress met my gaze, her eyes sharp and unyielding. "Because you are one of them, Rowena. More than you know."

The room spun again, the ground beneath me unsteady. My voice was a rasp, barely audible. "No. My father—he was a mage. My mother..."

"Did you ever truly know your mother?" the Headmistress asked, her tone quiet but piercing.

The question lodged itself in my chest, a barbed thing that refused to dislodge. My memories of her were fleeting, blurred by time and loss. She had been kind, patient, but distant in ways I hadn't understood as a child. My father had filled the gaps with stories of her strength, her wisdom. But those stories were as carefully chosen as the books Martha allowed me to read, their edges neatly trimmed to leave no room for doubt.

"I knew enough," I said, though my voice wavered.

The Headmistress tilted her head slightly, a gesture that seemed almost pitying. "Then tell me this: did you ever wonder why your father never spoke of who she was?"

The words sent a chill down my spine. I had wondered, of course, but I had never dared to question it aloud. All he told was that she was a healer, a healer as who I was meant to be.

"She was my student," the Headmistress said finally, her voice breaking the silence like a stone dropped into still water. "One of my brightest, before she left to raise you. And she was more than what you've been told."

The room seemed to shrink around me. My hands trembled as I clutched at the chair, my breaths shallow and uneven. The weight of the revelation threatened to crush me. Every instinct screamed to deny it, yet the pieces of the puzzle began to fall into place.

"You're lying," I said, though the words felt hollow even as I spoke them. The single candle on the shelf flickered, its flame bending toward the Headmistress like a supplicant.

"Am I?" The Headmistress's gaze did not waver.

My pulse thundered as fragments of history returned to me, fragments I had pieced together through countless hours in the grand library, reading the chronicles of Hamelin's bloody past. The Siege. The war that had shaped our kingdom, the tales whispered in the cold stone halls of the mage quarters. I had read about the sorcerers' unbridled power, their dominion over life and death, the chaos they wrought in their defiance of order.

Yet those same texts, penned by mages, spoke with venomous bias. Sorcerers were painted as tyrants, destroyers, their magic unholy and wild. No wonder their descendants had been hunted, I thought bitterly, if this was the narrative taught for centuries.

My gaze shifted to the headmistress. "The Siege ended over a century ago," I said, my voice trembling, though with disbelief or anger, I could not tell. "The sorcerer clans were defeated—annihilated. Their magic harvested and broken by the Mage's Guild."

She watched me with a patient intensity, as though waiting for me to arrive at the conclusion myself.

A memory surfaced, sharp and vivid. The Shadow Mantle in the forest, its dark form shifting as it pursued me, relentless and silent. And that chilling moment when it hesitated, as though recognizing me.

My heart pounded against my ribs as my gaze darted to Martha. She was silent, her hands folded neatly in her lap, her sharp eyes fixed on me with the same unreadable expression she wore when lecturing about spell circles. A thought crawled into my mind, unwelcome and insistent: how long had she known?

"I don't believe you," I said again, but the conviction was gone. My voice sounded weak, even to my own ears.

The Headmistress didn't answer immediately. Instead, she turned to Martha, a wordless exchange passing between them, thick with meaning I couldn't unravel. Finally, Martha spoke, her tone clipped and precise.

"I told you, child, that there are many truths you are too blind to see. Do you think I kept you under my roof, tolerated your insolence, and shielded you from death out of pity?"

I stiffened at her words, heat rising to my face. "You didn't shield me. You nearly let me die."

"Nearly," she said sharply, her lips curving into a faint, humorless smile. "Yet here you sit, alive and with powers awakened. Do not mistake discipline for cruelty."

Her words stung, a mix of reprimand and vindication I wasn't ready to accept. Before I could respond, the Headmistress raised a hand, her pale fingers catching the flickering light.

"Enough," she said softly, though her voice carried an authority that silenced even Martha. She turned her piercing gaze back to me. "Rowena, you are confused, angry—this is natural. But you must understand: you were born of two worlds, a union that should not have been. Your mother carried the blood of sorcerers, and your father..."

Her voice trailed off, leaving the unspoken words hanging in the air like a blade poised to fall.

"My father was a warrior," I said, my voice firm despite the chaos in my chest. "A hero of the king's army."

"Yes," the Headmistress said, her tone laden with meaning. "But do you think that was all he was? A simple soldier who fell in love with a sorceress?"

I froze, the pieces shifting again in my mind, forming a shape I didn't want to see. My father's warnings, his insistence on secrecy, his relentless training—it wasn't just to prepare me for a mage's life. It was to protect me from something far greater.

The silence stretched, broken only by the faint rustle of the raven's wings as it shifted on the wooden stool. Its beady eyes gleamed in the dim light, watching me with an unsettling intelligence.

"What do you mean?" I whispered, my voice barely audible.

The Headmistress rose from her seat, her movements slow and deliberate. "I mean that you are more than a mage, Aster. You carry within you the legacy of the Southlands—a power that cannot be ignored. And now, you must decide what to do with it."

Her words were heavy, laden with a finality that made my chest tighten. My mind raced, grappling with the truths unfolding before me. I thought of my father, his sacrifices, his love for me. I thought of my mother, a shadowy figure whose life and death had always been shrouded in mystery.

"Why now?" I asked, my voice trembling. "Why tell me this now?"

"Because the shadowmantles have come for you," Martha said, her voice cold and unyielding. "They smelled the magic on you, as I always knew they would. Their purpose is to protect sorcerers and return them to the Southlands. If they have found you, the Academy will not wait any longer."

"The Academy..." I repeated, the word tasting foreign on my tongue. "You want me to join them? To leave everything behind?"

"It is not what we want," the Headmistress said. "It is what you must do, if you wish to survive. The Academy is not for the faint of heart, but it is where your destiny leads."

The room seemed to close in around me, the walls pressing against my thoughts. My chest ached with the weight of their words, their expectations. Could I leave behind the life I had known, the dreams I had clung to so desperately?

I glanced at Cyrus, who had remained silent throughout the exchange. His expression was unreadable, but there was something in his eyes—something that spoke of understanding, even regret.

"You're one of them," I said, the realization hitting me like a blow. "You're a sorcerer too."

He nodded once, his jaw tight. "I am. A bastard prince, born of secrets and shadows, like you."

His words stirred something in me, a flicker of kinship amidst the chaos. But it wasn't enough to quell the storm raging in my heart.

I looked back at the Headmistress, my voice trembling as I spoke. "And if I refuse?"

Her expression hardened, the faint smile vanishing. "Then you will remain here, weak and unprotected, until the shadowmantles come again. And they will not leave without you a second time. Make your choice."

A choice. The word echoed in my mind, weighted by the promise and peril that accompanied it. I turned my gaze to Martha, the woman whose cruelty I had grown to despise, yet who now seemed like an unrelenting tether to my past. She met my eyes with a look that was almost unreadable, her lips pressed into a thin line.

The room swayed slightly, the revelation pounding through me. Me. A descendant of the sorcerers. One of the very people our kingdom had spent generations erasing.

I sank onto the edge of the seat, my hands trembling. The weight of it all pressed on me—the life I had lived, the truth I had never known.

"The chronicles said sorcerers were dangerous," I said quietly, almost to myself. "That their magic was unstable, untrustworthy. That they sought to dominate, and the mages had no choice but to rise against them."

The headmistress tilted her head. "And do you believe everything the victors of war write about the vanquished?"

I had no answer. The history of Hamelin, as I had been taught, was suddenly suspect, every tale and triumph a potential lie.

"Martha," I said slowly, my voice strained. "Was this your plan all along? To break me until I had no choice but to become what you wanted?"

Her eyes narrowed, but there was no malice in her tone when she replied. "My plan, child, was to keep you alive. Your father entrusted me with that, though I doubt you've the faintest understanding of what it cost."

My jaw tightened at her words, anger and uncertainty warring within me. I thought of my father—the memory of his stern kindness, his belief in me—and of the life I had tried so desperately to carve out for myself.

But more than that, I thought of the magic. The fleeting, unbound rush I had felt when it surged through me, raw and untamed. It had been wild, overwhelming, and yet it was mine. A freedom I had never known, a glimpse of a future where I was not bound by the confines of mediocrity or the expectations of others.

I could not deny how it called to me, like a song half-remembered but deeply familiar. That power, dangerous and unpredictable as it was, had felt like the truest part of me.

Yet, fear lingered in the corners of my thoughts. The Academy of the Dark Sorcerer was no sanctuary—it was an enigma, shrouded in legends of rebellion and hidden truths. What would it demand of me? What would it reveal?

I glanced at Cyrus, his posture steady and unwavering, though there was a flicker of something in his eyes—a silent understanding, perhaps. He nodded faintly, as if urging me to find my answer.

The Headmistress spoke again, her tone softer but no less commanding. "You are at a crossroads, Aster. The path you choose will shape more than your fate; it will shape the legacy of your bloodline. You are more than you know, but it is for you to decide whether to embrace that truth."

Martha's gaze bore into me, "You may hate me, Rowena, but remember this: I kept you alive for a reason. Your father entrusted you to me, and I have done what I must to ensure your survival. Do not waste his sacrifice."

Her words cut deep, stirring a mix of anger and guilt within me. My father's face flashed in my mind, his voice urging me to be strong, to be ready for whatever lay ahead.

Memories of my life in the mage quarters flashed before me—the countless hours spent yearning for more, for something beyond the mundane. And then, the revelation of my parents, the fragments of a history I had never been told.

How could I walk away from the chance to uncover the truth of who I was? To wield the magic that had been denied me for so long? To find the mother whose name was but a whisper in my memories?

I closed my eyes and took a long, trembling breath. The thought of leaving behind what little I had left tugged at me, but I knew the answer was already etched into my heart.

"I will join you," I said finally, my voice steady despite the turmoil in my chest. "But I have conditions."

The Headmistress arched an eyebrow, a faint hint of amusement returning to her face. "Oh?"

"Juniper and Elka," I said firmly. "They are to be reinstated at the mage quarters. And I want a correspondence with Vae."

Martha's lips pressed into a thin line. "The first, I can arrange. The latter... is unwise."

My chest tightened, the thought of leaving Vae behind like a dagger in my side. But I knew I couldn't turn back now.

"Fine," I said, my voice barely more than a whisper. "But you promise me they'll be safe."

Martha inclined her head, a gesture that felt more like a concession than agreement.

The Headmistress smiled, the expression both warm and foreboding. "Then it is settled."

As I took my first sip of the soup, the taste earthy and grounding, a single thought echoed in my mind: What have I just agreed to?

The raven hopped onto the table top. "Welcome to the Academy, Rowena Aster Craft"

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