Chapter 4 Things That Didn't Happen

Chapter Four: Things That Didn't Happen

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‎The next morning, the sky was soft and gray.

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‎Rain tapped lightly on the windows of Saint Morwen's Academy, making the glass hum like a distant lullaby. The halls smelled of damp stone and tea leaves. Classes resumed, laughter returned, and the chaos of the festival became just another story to tell.

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‎Seraphina clung to that normalcy like a lifeline.

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‎She didn't mention the whisper in the chapel.

‎She didn't tell Nora about the candle burning blue.

‎She didn't show anyone the strange message that had faded from her palm overnight.

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‎None of it happened.

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‎That's what she told herself.

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‎Just a dream. Just the candlelight playing tricks. Just the echo of music warping her thoughts.

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‎Everyone had strange thoughts during festivals, didn't they?

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‎She smiled a little too brightly during breakfast. She kept her head down in metaphysics. She even volunteered to clean the library stairwell - the one with all the dust and cobwebs and no visitors.

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‎She wanted silence.

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‎And yet...

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‎The silence felt wrong now.

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‎---

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‎While sorting old scrolls near the back corner of the library, she found a torn page tucked between volumes. It wasn't dusty. It hadn't aged. The ink was fresh the edges almost warm.

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‎One word.

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‎"Liora."

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‎She stared at it, heart stuttering. Her fingers trembled as she folded the paper and shoved it deep into her satchel. She didn't read it again.

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‎She wouldn't.

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‎That afternoon, Nora caught up with her near the garden wall.

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‎"Fina, you've been acting... off."

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‎Seraphina forced a laugh. "I'm always off."

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‎"No, I mean... quiet. Distracted. You missed tea. And you didn't even flinch when Sister Elwen dropped her teacup this morning you always flinch at loud sounds."

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‎Seraphina blinked. "She dropped a cup?"

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‎"Yes! Right during chapel readings. It shattered. Like, exploded. You didn't even look up."

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‎"Oh. I... I must've been focused."

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‎Nora stared at her. "You haven't been focused on anything since last week."

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‎There was no accusation in her voice. Just worry.

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‎The kind of worry Seraphina didn't know what to do with. The kind that made her chest ache a little.

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‎"I'm fine," she whispered, almost too softly to believe.

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‎She didn't sleep that night.

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‎Not because of dreams. But because she was afraid of not dreaming.

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‎So she sat at her window, staring out at the sea, watching lightning flicker across the distant horizon. The storm never reached the cliffs it just hovered out there like a sleeping creature, too far to hear, but close enough to feel.

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‎She sketched.

‎Not with intention but with urgency.

‎As if her fingers knew something her mind refused to admit.

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‎When she looked down, the page was covered in ink.

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‎A masked man beneath a bleeding moon.

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‎Again.

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‎---

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‎The next morning, her satchel felt heavier.

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‎As if someone had slipped something inside it overnight.

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‎She opened it slowly in the garden.

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‎The paper with Liora was still there but now there was another page behind it. Older. Yellowed. Smelling faintly of roses and ash.

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‎It was a map.

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‎Not of the school. Not of the cliffs.

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‎But of a forest. Labeled only as:

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‎The Vale of Veyrath.

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‎She didn't know how she knew it was real.

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‎But she did.

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‎She folded it shut. Tucked it beneath the journal. Stood up.

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‎And walked away.

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‎---

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‎That evening, as the sky turned a bruised gold, Seraphina returned to the chapel.

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‎She told herself it was for the quiet.

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‎For peace.

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‎Not because she wanted answers. Not because she hoped the candle would burn blue again.

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‎But when she stepped inside, the lanterns were dark. The air was still. The ruby-glass window had been replaced - fresh, whole, clean.

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‎Everything was ordinary again.

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‎Almost too ordinary.

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‎She sat in the last pew, her hands folded tightly in her lap.

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‎"Nothing happened," she whispered to the stillness.

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‎The silence didn't disagree.

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‎But far above her, near the rafters, a single spider moved across the beam.

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‎Its shadow formed a strange, swirling symbol as the last light of day caught it.

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‎Seraphina didn't see it.

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‎Not yet.

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‎---

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