Eury wiped the sides of her lips with a paper napkin. Already, her cup of sorbet was smoothed dry. "So, you just barged into his office and demanded for him to stop pushing for the bill," she summarized the long story Arya had begun telling ever since they found this bench. Eury gave a manic chuckle. "Wow. If they say love makes someone stupid, I'm believing it. What are you thinking, Ari?"

Arya ran her fingers against the condensation building up in the side of her own cup. She had requested this dessert when Eury appeared at her front door and demanded to have a whole afternoon out.

It was Juisevon today, so the parks were filled to the brim with humans walking their fluffy pets in leashes and watching their children chuck balls, mechanical boomerangs, or serrated frisbee discs in the air. If there were two fae women eating a delectable treat on one of the numerous metal benches scattered around the park, no one's going to care.

"I just thought I could get through him if I talk to him in person," Arya scooped another spoonful from the melting lump of sorbet inside her cup and forced her numb mouth to swallow it. The sweet traces of the cream left the lining of her throat was a welcome distraction from her shame. "I have never been more wrong. Not only did he think of me as a self-righteous leech who only cared about my own sake, he thought of me as a self-righteous leech for thinking he was doing all this because of his love for me."

Eury snorted. "Yeah, girl," she said. "What kind of horsecrap is that?"

Arya shook her head. "Maybe it was my own fear talking," she said. "But I just can't stand by and watch Norren run himself to the ground."

Eury kissed her teeth. "You're in a tight spot, indeed," she said. "It's not like you're selfish because you don't want the rest of the fae to continue to suffer. You're selfish because you care about him."

Arya had never had anyone summarize her entire situation like that. Hearing Eury say it made it seem so silly and simple, but whenever Arya was alone, it was all she could think about. Norren was a precious soul, a good one who deserved to be protected. There's not a lot of humans like him, or even fae.

He might have flaws, like being so headstrong and passionate about his ideals, but it's not like Arya could blame him either. He had the influence, the power. She could bet he felt guilty about seeing all the wrong in the society he was presiding over and not being able to do anything about it. And so he did. To feel better about himself, he's not going to let it go, even if Arya begged him.

Humans were strange creatures like that. Sometimes, they could be so hideous to make Arya's blood boil and her fists curl with hate. Other times, they could be so pure and bright in pursuing what they think they wanted out of their lives. Passion and greed. Corruption and principles. Two sides of the same coin but never had their difference been presented into the light like this.

The bottom line was that humans fight for what they believe in, whether good or bad, whether it hurt millions or saved them. Where did that leave Arya, Eury, and the rest of the fae? Unlike humans, fae disliked chaos and confrontation. Unlike humans, they were quick to settle with what they're given. Fae developed the skill to stop dreaming and live with the life they were given, whether or not it was to their benefit. And they developed that skill well.

"Remember that dream about Norren I told you about?" Arya faced Eury fully, folding her leg against the bench, scooting back to extend the space between her and her best friend. "I have a confession to make. It's not the only strange dream I've been having. There's more."

From there, it poured out. Starting from the first instance until the most recent one she got a few days ago. A bulk of it was of the girl flying between the house of the senile woman towards the city. There was something about a tall tower and a boy. She was certain the girl was talking to a boy her age. The one who looked deviously like Norren.

Then, she got to the part where she first saw the boy's face and realized he was part of the royal family from one of the dynasties in the Old Kingdom. Since then, she had tried looking for records bearing the dynasties' portraits but found none. After the fall of the monarchic system, the common people looted the palace in Rosewall, destroyed the legacy left by the last royal line, and most of the archives were never recovered.

So, there wasn't really any way for Arya to research and find out who that prince was unless the dreams revealed it to her.

When Arya finished, Eury wrinkled her nose. "You sure have an imaginative mind," she said.

"That's exactly the problem," Arya massaged her temples with her wrists. "I know it's not my imagination. There's got to be something else going on here."

"Could be the old fae tales about past lives and such," Eury regarded the leaves swaying from their branches. Her dark hair didn't flutter or move even as a soft breeze kissed Arya's skin.

"Past lives?" Arya inclined her head to one side.

Eury bobbed her head. "It's an old fae belief dating back to the primordial ones," she said. "They believe that fae souls, when they pass on, do not really leave this world. They're just around, in the air, in the sky, or whatever. And if they're lucky, then their souls could live again, usually in a different body, in a different time."

Arya knitted her eyebrows. "Wouldn't that be messy?" she asked. "Would that also make everyone just a reincarnation of every fae that lived? Do humans reincarnate as well?"

Eury shrugged. "I won't put my eggs in that basket, if I were you," she said. "Like I said, it's an old belief. Doesn't mean it's true today or had ever been."

"As for the dreams..." Eury sighed. "I don't really know how to help you there, girl. But I'll wish you luck. Let's hope you can get your crap together, sooner or later. I need my best friend back."

At that, Arya laughed. It wasn't that bad to be out with Eury on a weekend, eating sorbet at a random park bench. It was refreshing, to say the least. "Now, come on," Eury stood up and offered a hand towards Arya. "Let's go watch a play or something."

Arya filed all her worries at the back of her head and took Eury's hand.

When Arya got home later in the day, her limbs were so stiff and her shoulders so tight. She couldn't believe she spent the whole day out. It sapped her dry. Ignoring Cornelia's prodding and incessant questions about how her day went, she stumbled into her room and flopped into her bed.

It wasn't even five minutes when she started dreaming.

The girl was back in Arya's consciousness, skipping along in her merry days ahead. Well...not really skipping. More like, walking so gracefully she resembled the princess she was now. It didn't take a genius to infer that the ball Arya saw the girl attend was the same one where she got engaged. Now, the girl never left the palace, was always surrounded by human guards, and met with the prince (who still looked like Norren, by the way) every night.

But today, there was a different character. The girl had wandered the streets of the town adjacent to the palace and met another fae. It was someone the girl knew, judging from the frantic movements of happiness. They embraced. Of course, they missed each other. Having been separated for most of their childhood and teenage years, they reserve the right to act like that.

When the girl and her friend broke away from each other, Arya saw what the friend looked like. Straight dark hair framed her small face, too messy and uncombed for it to be compared to a lark's nest. Scratchy tunic and trousers hugged her curvy frame. A huge smile painted her face, reminding Arya of where she had seen this face and this person before.

She found herself reaching out to touch the girls. Maybe they'd be able to tell her what all of this was about. Before she did, the scene glitched and folded in on itself. When it flickered to life, the girl was on the floor, face contorted into a sob. On her arms was blood. Tons of blood. It was everywhere. On her face, her clothes, her skin.

It was still warm. Still sticky.

Arya made the mistake of looking down. She saw the carnage. The dark hair sprawled against the gray cobblestones. The arrow sprouting from the chest. The lifeless eyes staring up at the sky.

Dead.

Murdered.

Arya realized it was the girl screaming the word. Her friend, the one she hadn't seen for the longest time, was murdered. Shot through the heart. Dead before she even hit the ground. But who killed her? What could have happened for it to be this way?

Arya forced herself to look at the corpse's face, to remember every gruesome detail of her face, her splayed limbs, her chest that hasn't stopped bleeding still. Her eyes flew open. Just like that, the dream was gone, with most of the memory with it.

She sat up, hands scratching against her eyes. Past the drawn curtains over the only window to her room, the faint light of dawn crept through. Her limbs remained heavy. It was like she hadn't rested at all. She let her head rest on her hands, blowing a breath to calm her pounding heart.

This dream was darker than most. After the bliss came the storm. Arya cursed and squeezed her eyes shut. Come on. Remember. Who was it? The girl had a friend. Ivory Lightborn. A fae born out of light. Ivory. White.

Red. Red as wine. Blood.

Arya gasped. Her eyes flew open. That's right. Ivory was shot. Murdered. And the girl saw it. Cradled her friend until her friend's dying breath. What did the friend look like? Come on...

Black. Her hair was black. She had a contagious smile. The girl loved her dearly and Arya felt like she loved the girl's friend too.

Black hair. A contagious smile. A carefree laugh. Small face. Pale skin. Black hair.

Dear gods.

Her earlier conversations played in her head. Past lives. Reincarnations. Old fae beliefs. Do these exist in the first place? Was Arya the reincarnation of the girl in her dreams? Arya's breath shook when she drew a deep one. Dear gods. Let her hope it wasn't so, that all of this was just a cruel trick her mind and the universe was playing on her.

Because if it's true, if she was really stuck in this vicious cycle of dead fae souls dying and living again, then the only friend she knew in this world, the girl with the black hair and carefree smile she thought no one could erase, would die.

If all of this was as twisted as Arya feared it would be, then, Europa Marlow was going to be killed.