Chapter 5

She doesn't look at him. Instead, her eyes flit to the jagged, pointy, midnight-black rocks of the small cavern she was sitting in.

"Interesting setting," he says, trying to make light conversation with his prisoner. She continues to ignore him, keeping her hands laid on her propped up knees as she leans against the uncomfortable wall on her right.

The male in the hooded cloak sighs sadly, keeping his gaze on her from the same position as her, except against the wall directly in front of her. "This wasn't how this was supposed to go."

She clenches her jaw; a sign that she was listening to him, which was a start.

"You probably hate me—"

"Probably?" she questions, her tone dangerously low, voice as sharp as a dagger.

"You must really hate me," he corrects, "and nothing I can do will fix that—"

"Even if you tried, I wouldn't believe you," she says in the same tone, interrupting him again.

"—but please know that I am truly sorry."

The queen lets out a sarcastic laugh. "You really do sound like you're sorry; a shame that it's not true."

"It is true," he defends, not sure if he should be happy or scared that she was talking to him after a week of silence. "If I could, I would keep my promise."

She turns her head to look at her fingers, keeping him out of her sight. "But your promise to the Renegades is greater, right? Them over us."

If he didn't know her so well, the Renegade would've thought that she really didn't feel anything but negativity for him, but she did. She feels her heart shatter into millions of sharp shards that were cutting at her insides. And it's a worse feeling to know that she still loves him, no matter how hard she tries not to. But she is good at keeping her emotions in check.

"Eva!" someone shouts, the name echoing off of the cavern rock walls. Suddenly, Eva sees the familiar white walls of her room at Castle Orphanage and feels someone shaking her. "Finally!" the same voice that called out to her says in exasperation.

It takes Eva a moment to realize that she was dreaming before, and another moment to realize that it was Josie that woke her up in the middle of the night.

"What?" Eva groans, feeling a huge headache coming on.

"You tell me," Josie says, her tone worried. "You were crying in your sleep."

Eva tries to rub the sleep from her eyes. "I was . . . what? Can you even cry in your sleep?"

"I don't know, but you seem to make a habit out of it," Josie whisper screams, trying not to wake up their other roommates. "Was it another one of your weird dreams?"

Weird was one way to describe it. "Yeah."

"You should really get that checked—"

"I'm fine," Eva interrupts. "They're just dreams, they're harmless."

"And yet, people with PTSD have nightmares."

Eva rolls her eyes, sitting up in her bed. "How many times do I have to tell you, I do not have PTSD. It happened such a long time ago that I barely even remember it." Liar, liar, pants on fire.

"Well maybe your subconscious still remembers it or something," Josie counters.

"I wasn't even having nightmares," Eva says, "it was just a really weird dream."

"A weird dream that made you cry?" Josie questions.

Eva sighs, and closes her eyes for a couple seconds. "I'm going to go use the bathroom, and when I come back, you better be in your bed, worrying about your crazy pigs-flying-in-fire dreams, and I'll worry about my dreams."

Josie wants to push the subject further, but Eva is already making her way out of her bed and towards the door. Reluctantly, she goes back to her bed, hoping she won't have another dream about pigs while Eva makes her trip to the bathroom.

After walking down the hall, turning left, walking down that hall, then turning right, walking down to the end of that hall, turning another right, walking down that hall, turning a left, then walking down that hall, she reaches the bathroom. Of course, she could have went to the bathroom directly in front of her room, but she needs the walk to think about the events of her dream.

She has dreams like those every night. It's what her journal is filled of; it seemed like it was a whole other world she was visiting every night, the world of Queen Red and her life, everything that happened to her except until that moment in the cave that she had just dreamt about.

She washes her hands and her face and stares into her dark green eyes for a couple moments, just to relax a little before drying off her hands and walking out of the bathroom, a little distracted. Too distracted to notice someone was walking in front of her, and she accidentally bumps into them.

"Oh, I'm sorr-" she starts to apologize before noticing who it was she bumped into . . . again. "Stefan?"

"Um . . . hi," he says, scratching the back of his head lazily like he had just woken up. "Eva, right?"

Eva nods. "What are you doing here?"

"Oh, I was just using the restroom," he answers, then raises an eyebrow. "What are you doing here, aren't the girls' dormitories far away?"

"Yeah. . . ." Eva replies quietly. "I was just taking a little walk, couldn't sleep."

Stefan nods slowly, but it doesn't look like he really believes her. "I liked what you read in class, today—or was it yesterday?"

Eva lets a single chuckle; she usually gets confused of how to refer to certain times while it was still really early morning. "Um, thanks. Wait, how did you know they were my dreams?"

He shrugs. "You had it written on the front of your notebook."

This time, it's Eva's turn to raise an eyebrow as she thought about the big Somnis she'd written on the cover in cursive when she was younger. "You know Latin?"

"I know a few words," Stefan explains.

"Even though Latin is a dead language?"

He smiles. "Maybe I'm a dead person."

"How lovely," Eva says back with her own smile. "Did you actually like what I read in class?"

Stefan nods. "I wasn't lying about your dreams being interesting, though you must have a lot of them for you to have a journal dedicated to them."

"Maybe," Eva tells him. "Or maybe they're all super boring and I have nothing in my free time to do besides write down my really boring dreams."

He laughs a little at that and widens his smile, making Eva's heart rate increase a little. "Trust me, with me around, you won't be such a 'boring' person."

"You seem to be a little cocky there, Stefan," Eva says, not sure what else she should say without sounding like a complete dork—boring dork. "I don't really like cocky, arrogant, and annoying people."

"And yet, you hang out with those friends of yours." His smile and expression makes him seem like he's joking, but his tone sounded fairly serious. "Besides, maybe I don't want you to like me."

"Friend," Eva corrects. "She's my only friend, and I got used to her. And you wouldn't be standing here with me right now if you didn't want me to at least like you as a friend."

"Ah, so I can be your second friend?" he asks, his teasing tone back.

"Not if you're going to be cocky and arrogant."

Stefan chuckles before he walks passed her. But he doesn't leave her without saying, "I have a feeling we're going to be friends very soon, Eva."

*~*~*~*

Written: 10/1/17
Words: 1,287

Chapter 7

"The queen lets out a sarcastic laugh. 'You really do sound like you're sorry; a shame that it's not true.'

"'It is true,' he defends, not sure if he shou-"

"Writing down your dream from last night?" Eva hears a voice calling from the dorm room door, interrupting her in the middle of what the voice was accusing her of in her dream journal.

She looks at the door, not surprised to see Stefan there, leaning against the door frame, a small smile on his lips. "Maybe, maybe not."

He walks in, and sits down on her bed on the opposite side of her, and she lets the journal lean against her propped-up knees.

"Are all of the dreams written in there about the Red Queen?" he asks, nodding towards her lap.

"Maybe," Eva says, "maybe not."

He smirks. "Will you ever give me a straightforward answer, Miss Totally not talking about you?"

Eva feels slight blush form on her cheeks, and she's glad all her roommates are out of the room at the current moment. "Maybe, maybe not."

"Can I read your journal?" he asks, raising an eyebrow.

"Absolutely not," Eva answers quickly with a shake of her head. "No one reads these, I don't even reread them after I write them down."

"Interesting," he says, his green eyes seeming to be calculating. "If I can guess something you've written in there, can I read a dream?"

"What do you mean?" she asks.

"I mean," he says, lying down on her bed with his legs hanging off the mattress. "If I can guess one of the dreams you might've had besides the one you read in class, can I read something in that journal."

Eva feels uncomfortable with Stefan trying to guess. There's no way he'd be able to know what any of her dreams are about, but she has a strange feeling about him. Something that tells her she shouldn't trust him with anything, even something as ridiculous as him failing at guessing what her nightly visions were all about.

"Why do you want to know and read so badly?" she decides to ask him.

He shrugs. "You seem really interesting, Eva."

"That's not a good reason."

He hesitates for a moment before saying his next words. "Because I know that somewhere in that journal, there's something written about Mysticalia, about its Red princess or queen, about its witches and elves, about its academy, and about its rebels."

Eva's mouth gapes open, unable to form syllables, no matter how hard she tries. "I—bu—wh—bu—wh—"

Stefan's small laughter stops her attempts at trying to speak, and he sat back up on the bed, his arms hanging over his propped-up knees as he faces her. "How do I know all about that?"

She nods, closing her mouth.

"You're going to think I'm crazy, especially since you've only known me since yesterday," he admits, staring straight into her green eyes. "And that this is all moving a bit too fast, but Mysticalia isn't a place your subconscious made up, Eva. It's a real place, one that I've come to take you to."

Eva's stunned for a second, thoughts and questions vanishing from her mind before they were completed as new ones began to form. But in the end, she just laughs and laughs.

"M—mysticalia . . . a r—real place," she manages to get in between laughs, wiping away the tears forming in her eyes. "That's a good one."

Stefan nods and smiles, like he expected this kind of reaction from her, and stands up from her bed. "I'll see you later, Eva."

She waves him off as he left the dorm room, still laughing a little bit.

Mysticalia is a real place, she replays in her mind, her laugh starting to cease. I've come to take you to it.

Her laugh faded into a nervous chuckle. How did he know? . . . He read my journal, that has to be it, she conceded. Right?

*~*~*~*

Written: 10/23/17
Words: 658

Chapter 8

"So what'd you and Stefan talk about?" Josie asks, the second Eva leaves the dorms to go to the cafeteria for lunch, nearly giving the latter a heart attack in the process.

"You need to stop scaring me," Eva replies, a hand over her rapidly-beating heart. "And how'd you know Stefan and I talked?"

Josie shrugs. "I saw him leaving here a few minutes ago, and you're the only one in here so . . . what'd you two talk about?" she finishes with a teasing smirk.

"Nothing," Eva tells her, not feeling the need to explain that the guy she is being shipped with by her roommates was asking about her dreams and practically saying he'll wisp her away to some magical fantasy land like a prince.

"So you two just stared at each other for a minute and fifty-eight seconds?"

Eva shakes her head while continuing down the hallway to get to the cafeteria. "Why am I not surprised you counted the seconds?"

Josie shrugs and follows. "'Cause you know me so well. You still haven't told me what you two were doing in there, by the way."

Eva sighs, knowing Josie would only continue to pester her until the latter finds out. "He wanted to tell me that the scene I read for Language Arts was good."

"Wait, I thought you didn't write it," Josie says, confused.

"Yeah . . . um, I sorta just read something out of my journal."

"You left your L.A. journal in our locker, though."

"I didn't read out of my L.A. journal . . ." Eva admits, and she gets it after a few seconds pass by.

"YOU READ OUT OF YOUR PRIVATE JOURNAL?!" she exclaims, excitement evident in her very loud tone.

"Sheesh, how come you never told me you were a banshee?" Eva complains, a slight ringing sound in her ears fading away after a few moments. "And yeah, I did."

"I can't believe it! You have to let me read what you read, it's only fair," she begs.

"You think I care about fairness?" Eva asks with a raised eyebrow as she opened the doors to the cafeteria.

Josie scowls at her, walking into the cafeteria. "I will eventually read something out of that journal."

"Sure you will."

Josie skips her way to her friends at their table while waiting for the announcement that the food is ready while Eva lags behind at the door.

"You could just tell her your dreams are filled with a magical fantasy land," she hears someone whisper into her ear from behind her.

Eva's heart rate picks up in surprise, already knowing it's Stefan before she turns around to see him hardly an inch away from her.

"Ri~i~i~i~ight," Eva replies, dragging the word out, "and that this supposed 'magical fantasy land' isn't real."

He smiles and cocks his head to the side. "I knew you wouldn't have believed me."

"Because I'm stubborn," she voices his thoughts.

Stefan takes a step back and ruffles Eva's curly mess of red-orange hair. "That you are, little Eva."

"I'm not little," she states, standing on her tippie-toes to try to look a little taller compared to his towering figure.

"No, I suppose you're not," he whispers softly. "What's it going to take for you to believe me?"

Eva shrugs, and looks into his peculiar eyes. "Proof."

The grin Stefan makes is so wide and happy, it makes Eva nervous.

He can't possibly actually prove magic is real, she thinks, and Stefan's grin turns into a smirk.

"Well if it was that simple," he says, and Eva starts getting really worried now.

Stefan points at Josie's table through the door, where Josie was already talking and laughing with her other friends and eating her lunch.

"What 'magic' are you going to do?" Eva asks him, putting air quotes around the word "magic."

Stefan places the index finger on from his other hand on Eva's lips as he whispers, "Shh . . . I need to concentrate."

He then proceeded to use the same hand to get out a small pouch from his back-jeans' pocket and opens it to reveal a purple dust-like substance. Eva, frozen from the tingling feeling Stefan's touch left on her, barely managed to get out her question.

"Wh-what is that?"

Stefan smiles at her and he takes a pinch out of the small, brown pouch. "It's solid mist—"

"Isn't solid mist just water?"

"No—well yeah, but no," Stefan answers, confusing Eva further. "Anyways, this is what's going to give me the capabilities to blow your mind."

Eva raises an eyebrow as Stefan sprinkles it over his head. She shakes her head. He's crazy.

Stefan closes his eyes and mutters something underneath his breath before opening his eyes and slightly raising his arm towards the cafeteria. Eva notices how his eyes seemed glazed over, like he was in a trance.

Stefan stops muttering, and only continues keeping his arm raised towards the door and in a trance.

Eva shook her head again after a few moments, not believing that something would actually have happened. Stefan seems to have stepped out of his trance when his eyes widen and he lets out a gasp of breath, nearly collapsing over himself.

He groans. "I forgot how tiring that can be."

Eva is confused, and doesn't try to hide it. Stefan didn't do anything but look like an idiot.

He laughs, and straightens his posture. "You probably shouldn't have been keeping your attention on me, Eva." He motions towards the cafeteria.

Through the open doors, Eva saw how everything was completely still in the room. No one was moving, no one was emitting a single sound, no one was even breathing.

Eva stood there, her eyes wide, her mouth gaping open, not breathing, unsure of what to say or do.

Stefan stifles a chuckle at her response.

"Wha- but - h-how?" Eva manages to sputter out, blinking rapidly in case her eyes were trying to play tricks on her.

With a wide smirk and a cocky posture, Stefan simply says, "Magic."

Eva didn't know if it was initial reaction, or just shock, but she smacked Stefan—hard—on the shoulder. "That's not possible! Magic isn't . . . it can't be . . . What drugs did you put me on?"

Stefan grips his shoulder, and looks like he was in pain, but he still laughed. "The drug of reality."

Eva resists the urge to smack him again, and instead leans against the wall, slowing sliding to the floor with her hands rubbing her temples.

What on Earth is going on?

Stefan softens up a little bit, and sits next to her. "This probably makes no sense at all."

"Probably?" Eva retorts, sparing a glance towards him. Her mind was racing with so many thoughts and questions, not a single one stuck long enough to formulate an actual, coherent thought.

"This makes absolutely zero sense. And I literally just came into your life yesterday. And this is all moving too fast. And you don't want to believe that there really is something meaningful out there. And you think this is just another one of your dreams."

Eva shakes her head, taking slow, deep breaths. "And?"

"And all I can say is it's going to take time for you to process this all."

Eva turns her head to the side to look directly into Stefan's pure green eyes. "A whole lot of freaking time. This cannot be legitimately happening."

He smiles warmly at her, and Eva shakes her head before burying into her knees.

"Are you going to . . . ," Eva started to ask, but paused, unsure of how to phrase her question. "Umm . . . y'know . . . unfreeze them?" She still couldn't believe the words coming out of her mouth aren't part of some strange, realistic dream.

Stefan's smile slowly fades, and something comes across his eyes that Eva could not interpret.

"Eva, can you respond honestly to my next question?" Stefan asks, seriousity combed into his voice

Eva didn't say anything, but when she looked up to look Stefan in the eye, he knew he had his answer.

"What do you really have here?"

Eva didn't process the question, her brain still whirred with the possibility of magic.

"I . . . don't know."

"Do you like it here? This place?"

"I don't know."

"Would you rather be in Mystica?"

Eva lets out a hysterical laugh. "You quite literally just showed me magic is real. You really want to ask me to believe in Mystica, too?"

Stefan just smiles. "Where do you think magic came from?"

* * * *

Eva couldn't concentrate that evening. She was still processing everything that Stefan had told and showed her.

Magic is real.

Mystica is real.

My dreams . . .

Eva had tried every trick she could think of from waking up from a dream, but none worked. She was still waiting for Stefan and Josie and everyone else in that cafeteria to just barge into her empty dorm and yell "April Fools!" even though it was nearing the end of October.

She lied down on her bed, running through every detail that had happened. Wanting to find something false to prove Stefan wasn't really telling the truth. But most of her wanted to find nothing to prove him wrong, and to believe that maybe, just maybe, magic is actually real.

She groans, and shakes her head.

What do you really have here?

Do you like it here? This place?

Would you rather be in Mystica?

She told Stefan she didn't know the answer to any of those. When in truth, her answers were the ones he wanted to hear.

Even if Mystica was a real place, which she isn't even sure if magic is real, would the realm look like it does in her dreams?

Is Mystica is real, does that mean that the Red Queen is real? Princess Violet? Prince Salvatore?

Are her dreams real? Did they actually happen?

Eva's eyes widen in realization and she bolts upright in her bed, glad that no one else was around to see her frantic state.

If Stefan wants to take her to Mystica . . . does that mean she's one of them?

A witch?

An elf?

A naturial?

"You're not a naturial," she hears a voice come from the doorway.

Eva scoffs, surprised for a second that Stefan knew what she was thinking, but then remembered the whole 'magic is real' thing, and turns her attention to man blocking the light from the hallway entering her dorm room. "So am I a witch or an elf, then?"

He just shrugs. "Come to Mystica and find out."

Eva rolls her eyes, but couldn't hold back a small smile. "I still think you're crazy."

Stefan smiles, and uncrosses his legs as he takes a step inside her room. "I know."

Eva's smile grew a little, then a question came across her mind, nagging at her to ask. "How did you know where to find me? And how do you know if I'm actually a witch or elf or whatever?"

"Magic," he answers.

Eva raises an eyebrow, but doesn't object to his answer - after all, apparently that's a valid answer. "Is it important that I go to Mystica?"

Stefan takes another step further into her room, and Eva slightly stiffens. "It would be a loss not to have you there."

"It would be a loss to have me there."

He takes another step closer. "Honestly, you seem like a good person, Eva. Besides, it would be fun to see you fail at practicing magic."

"One, I'm not that good. Two, what makes you think I'll fail?"

Stefan chuckles. "Prove me wrong and come to Mystica."

"Do you really want me to go to Mystica?" Eva asks, a little playfully, but she still couldn't quite believe everything Stefan was telling her.

"Even if you don't want to come with me," Stefan says, taking another step closer to her, "I'm going to bring you, anyways. It's your choice whether or not you'll come willingly."

Eva scoffs, eighty-percent of her sure that Stefan was joking. The other twenty-percent a little unraveled.

Don't trust him, a voice inside her head told her. He's tricking you, be careful.

Stefan takes another step towards her, and now he's barely a foot away from her bed. He holds out his hand, and says, "Come with me. I promise, I won't hurt you, and I'm not lying."

That's not true, don't listen to him.

"Please, Eva," Stefan pleads, his hand growing tired, but a sparkle in his pure green eyes shining through the dark evening.

Eva stared into his eyes, trying to figure out if he really is telling the truth, or if she's going insane. She takes in a deep breath as she reached her final conclusion, and thought, Probably both, as she took his hand. "Okay."

Stefan's shoulders relaxed a little bit, and his smile grew wide, making Eva's heart flutter. "Okay."

Eva stood up from her bed, still holding Stefan's hand. She blushed when she realized how close they were now. He took out the brown puch from his pocket using his other hand, and single-handedly opened it.

"Close your eyes," he said, his voice soft, as he let go of her hand to take a small pinchful of the purple solid mist.

Eva raised an eyebrow. "Close my eyes?"

Stefan let out a short chuckle. "I know it sounds strange, but you're going to be in total shutdown mode if you have your eyes open while we teleport."

"Teleport?" Eva questioned, disbelief weaving inside her voice.

"Exactly," he responds, and takes her hand again once he puts the pouch back inside his pocket. "Now please, close your eyes."

Eva did as she was told, trying not to focus too much on the fact that they were holding hands.

She could hear as Stefan through his hand up, releasing the purple dust-like substance to rain on them, and he connected his now-free hand with her other hand. Eva tried really hard not to blush in the awkward silence before Stefan started to mutter a few words in a language she couldn't recognize.

Latin, she remembered, her memory of Stefan telling her he knew a few words in Latin resurfacing.

Before long, Eva felt a strange wind start to wrap around them, making her unruly red hair fly across her forehead. The wind grew stronger and stronger, and Eva kept shutting her eyes tighter and tighter.

Stefan could probably tell that she was nervous and unraveled, and tightened his grip on her hands. "Trust me," he whispered close to her ear so she could hear him over the roaring wind.

After what felt like eternity - when it was really only a couple seconds - the wind began to die down, and everything started to calm.

Eva risked opening her eyes, slowly, and gasped at the scenery around her. It wasn't the bland walls of her dormitory, but rather, beautiful vegetation and trees of all colors surrounding the well-sized clearing she was in. The grass was too green to look real, and the cobblestone-like material that created a path that led out of the large circular area seemed to almost sparkle in silver moonlight.

"I told you you can trust me," Stefan said, a proud smile on his lips.

"But . . ." Eva wasn't sure what she wanted to say, still distracted by the beauty around her.

"Welcome to Mystica." 

*~*~*~*

Written: 2/3/18
Words: 2,557

~Nuela