Magnus's Point of View
It's been twelve days since she left.
Not that I'm counting.
(Except—I am. Every damn day. Every hour. Every heartbeat that echoes too loudly in her absence.)
At first, I told myself she was just being dramatic. That she'd show up with windblown hair, some cryptic celestial proverb, and that familiar look in her eyes like she knew things no one should. Maybe she'd knock on the tower door and smirk, *"Miss me?"* like it was a game.
But the days passed.
And the joke got old.
The hideout feels colder now.
The pillows are still scattered, the books still untouched—but her scent is gone, and so is the warmth she brought just by being there. Horace, the cat, comes around less too, like even he knows something's wrong.
I searched the nearby woods first. Then the cliffs. Then the ruins.
Everywhere we'd been together.
I even checked the weeping tree.
Nothing.
Her trail just… vanished.
And the worst part?
No one else seems to notice.
Father pretends he doesn't see me pacing the halls at midnight. The guards give me sympathetic glances, like I've been stood up by a lover instead of abandoned by someone I should've protected.
I keep replaying our last conversation.
The way she touched my face, then walked away like I didn't matter—like I was just another page in a book she had to close.
But I know better.
I saw the look in her eyes before she turned.
She didn't want to leave me.
Something's wrong.
Terribly wrong.
And as the sky over Yeneva grows darker each night, and the stars vanish one by one behind swirling clouds...
I wonder where is she...
And I hate hate that I let her go.
Day's passed, I didn't sleep much anymore.
Not because I couldn't.
Because I didn't want to.
Every time I closed my eyes, I saw her.
Not just Ophelia.
But… someone else.
Someone I don't know.
A woman in light—eyes like constellations, voice like wind through glass. Sometimes she wore robes made of starlight, sometimes armor that glowed with silver runes. Sometimes… she bled.
And I was always running toward her.
Always too late then i dreamed again.
Last night, the dream was sharper.
Too real.
I stood beneath a shattered sky. The stars were falling—no, burning—turning to ash before they touched the earth. A broken temple stood at the cliff's edge, crumbling into black dust.
She stood at the altar, wrapped in light and sorrow.
I reached for her.
But something else was there first.
A voice—low, ancient, made of whispers and smoke—wrapped around me like a chain.
"Do you wish to see her again?"
I couldn't speak.
I just nodded.
And then—I made a deal.
No words, no contracts. Just a feeling —a vow that pulsed in my chest like fire and ice. A promise made not with lips, but with soul.
I'd give anything.
Even myself.
Even my light.
And then I woke up.
Soaked in sweat. Heart hammering. The edges of the dream clung to me like fog I couldn't shake.
But it wasn't just a dream, was it?
It felt… familiar.
Like an old scar I'd forgotten how I got.
And the worst part?
When I looked in the mirror, for a split second—just one—I didn't recognize my own eyes.
They were mine. But not.
Older.
Sadder.
Like someone who'd lost everything.
I sat alone in the hideout later that evening, staring at the pendant Ophelia left behind—buried in a corner of one of the cushions. I hadn't noticed it before. It shimmered faintly, like a heartbeat in crystal. The moment I touched it, I felt that ache again.
Not just grief.
Guilt.
For what, I didn't know.
Or maybe I did.
Maybe some part of me remembers making that deal.
Maybe some part of me remembers… her.
And if the woman in my dream was Ophelia—if she was the one I'd given everything to see again—
Then gods help me.
Because I think I already did it once.
And the darkness is coming to collect.
I didn't know what was real anymore.
I hadn't eaten. I hadn't slept. The castle halls felt twisted—familiar yet foreign, like walking through a dream that refused to end. Faces blurred. Names slipped from my tongue. Everything was noise.
Everything hurt.
And the worst part?
I didn't know why.
These dreams—these haunting, aching visions—were getting worse. They weren't just dreams now. They clung to me even when I was awake. I'd catch glimpses in mirrors that flickered like broken glass. Whispers in empty rooms. The smell of smoke and starlight where there should've been dust.
And the voice.
Always that voice:
"Do you wish to see her again?"
I didn't remember saying yes.
But my chest ached like I already had.
---
The next day I found myself standing in the war room, surrounded by maps I couldn't read and papers I didn't remember writing. My father had tried to speak to me earlier, but I barely heard him. The words echoed like distant thunder.
"You're not well, Magnus."
"You need rest."
"This is not like you."
I didn't understand my dreams and the emotions I'm feeling
Because how do you explain this... hollowness?
This sense that your soul has cracks—hairline fractures that weren't there yesterday?
That you're bleeding memories from a life you don't even remember living?
That every time the rain falls, you swear it's falling through you?
---
I couldn't breathe.
My hands trembled as I gripped the edge of the table, gasping, heart pounding like a war drum inside my ribs.
"I'm not crazy," I whispered aloud, trying to convince myself. "I'mnot."
But my reflection in the window—my wide, lost eyes—wasn't so sure.
That's when I remembered the pendant.
Her pendant.
I didn't know why I suddenly thought of it. Maybe it called to me. Maybe my soul remembered before my mind could.
I ran—half-tripping over my own feet—to the hideout, shoving open the old door like a man chasing light through fog.
There it was.
Still where I left it.
Nestled in the folds of her favorite pillow.
I sank to my knees.
And as my fingers curled around it, the world… stilled.
A warmth spread through my palm, slow and pulsing, like a heartbeat. The madness in my head—those spiraling thoughts, the fragmented dreams, the terror of not knowing who I was—quieted.
The whispers stopped.
The cold retreated.
And for the first time in days…
I breathed.
Tears welled in my eyes—real, silent tears I didn't bother to wipe away.
I didn't understand this connection.
I didn't know why this small crystal carried her presence like a tether to the stars.
All I knew was that when I held it...
I didn't feel lost anymore.
Just lonely.
And in love with a ghost I wasn't ready to let go.
"Where are you Ophelia" I muttered softly as i held her pendant tightly "Please come back"