Mr. Collins' voice continued to drone across the lecture hall, as steady as rain, interrupted only by the squeak of a marker on the whiteboard and the occasional cough. I should have been writing, but instead I was nodding, appearing to focus on the druids.
Instead, my attention moved to the window. The window was fogged, obscuring the world with gentle gray smears.
Daydreaming. Again.
I know the look Cassie gives me when I zone out—eyebrows arched, lips pressed, like she's trying to decide if I'm hopeless or just stubborn. She wasn't here today to elbow me back to reality. And maybe that was for the best, because no amount of sharp nudges could stop where my mind went.
I met Cassie in my sophomore year of college. Our first conversation wasn't even supposed to be one. I was just standing in line at the campus coffee shop, half-asleep, clutching my wallet like it might run away.
She glanced at me once and said, totally serious, "Don't get the latte. You're going to spill it in about… six minutes."
I blinked at her, wondering who would even say something like that.
But she was right. Six minutes later, I tripped over my backpack strap and wore the latte all the way back to the library. Cassie arrived out of nowhere, offering me a handful of napkins as if she were waiting for the show. "Told you," she replied, her grin making me laugh despite the fact that caffeine was dripping down my shirt.
Most people felt she was unusual for making prophecies about events that had not yet occurred. But I've got it. Perhaps it's because I'm Wiccan and have always lived in a world where the unseen is important. She referred to herself as a Seer, which could have been a joke or a serious statement. Regardless, I liked her right away.
Back to the library. Back to the forbidden scrolls.
The memory surged so powerfully that Mr. Collins' speech faded into static, and the classroom dissipated until I was back in the dim corridor, rain drumming lightly on the ceiling and the smell of dust stinging my throat.
I had not been looking for anything scary or mysterious. Honestly, I was simply wandering. Killing time. The older section of the library was practically demanding to be explored—crooked shelving, lights that buzzed like furious bees, and enough dust to make you question whether anyone had been there since the 1920s.
That's when I noticed it. Not it, exactly, but a sliver of wood paneling that didn't fit perfectly on the back of a shelf. At first, I thought, "Great, secret snack stash!" Because if I were a stressed-out graduate student, this is where I'd stash a bag of chips.
Curiosity won. I pressed on it, and the panel creaked. My stomach did a strange flip, as it does when you realize you're entering a "probably not allowed" area.
Behind it was a tiny hole filled with dust dense enough to choke on. A scroll was slipped inside, as if it were supposed to be buried forever. Real parchment, tightly rolled and sealed with silver wax.
The moment I touched the scroll, the air transformed. The overhead lamps flickered, and the shadows extended and withdrew as if breathing. A faint hum filled the room, not loud but deep enough to be felt in the hollows of my ribs, like the breath of something ancient waking up.
As I pulled it out, my fingertips left streaks, and the scent of ancient paper lingered on my skin. The shelf creaked beneath my weight, as if it disapproved of what I was doing.
For a few moments, I stared at it, half expecting it would collapse into confetti if I exhaled too hard.
My intellect whispered the obvious thing: close the panel. Walk away. Pretend you've never seen it.
The seal included a symbol I'd only seen once before: an ouroboros wrapped around a crescent moon, its eye a flaming star. The memories nagged at me, but the specifics faded away like wet sand. My fingertips tingled as I brushed the wax. The enchantment was old, coated with wards that tried to push me away, murmuring "not for you." Curiosity, however, is a hazardous blade. Whoever had buried it did not expect someone like me to come snooping.
I breathed a sigh of relief as the wax finally cracked under my thumb.
Cold air poured out, carrying a slight hint of ozone and something sweeter, like scorched honey. For a brief moment, I swear I heard my name, too faint to be certain and too close to dismiss.
Inside was a prophecy.
The words shimmered, not written in ink, but with a faint light flowing through them. The glyphs moved across the parchment like fireflies caught in moonlight, moving even as my eyes fought to fix them. I felt it more than I read it, with each line gliding under my skin, winding itself into my bones, and singing right into my marrow.
It mentioned the Evermore Keeper.
Blood shall bind where gods have severed,
Threads long torn shall weave together.
One cast down shall call the rest,
The keeper wakes, the chosen test.
From shadow's womb, a daughter rises,
Death obeys no crown's disguises.
Tide shall roar and storm shall break,
Wrath of war the world shall quake.
Moonlight guides through crossroads burning,
Seed and root in ash returning.
Seer shall speak what none can see,
Truth unveiled: what's meant to be.
When crowns to embers, thrones undone,
The daughters merge—they weave as one.
No god shall rule, no chain remain,
For Fate reborn shall break the chain.
The scroll pulsed in my hands as if it had its own heartbeat, so I held it tighter to avoid dropping it, my breath short and my chest tense. The words engulfed me, heavy and stifling, like a memory I had forgotten but could no longer shake.
Until that final sentence, I had always considered the Evermore Keeper to be a single entity—one fated life, one destiny. That is what the mythology says. What we were all taught. But the prophecy foretold of daughters. Threads woven together. A keeper is born of many, not one.
The air in the library pressed heavily against me, and the silence was so thick that I could hear my pulse hammering in my ears. I could feel it in the hollow space between my eyes and in the depths of my bones: The Evermore Keeper was more than just a myth.
The prophecy extended farther. It described a prison where a keeper was kept away in an obsidian temple of stillness, even from her own memories. The keeper was guarded by an Ares warrior, formed of war, carved of starlight and steel, and bound by a promise to ensure she never escaped.
However, fate is not without irony.
He had been watching her for ages, and something impossible occurred during that time.
The guardian had fallen in love.
Not the transitory kind spoken about in Shakespeare plays, but the kind that can alter the stars. He perceived her as a soul: lonely, brilliant, and longing for freedom. And she, in turn, saw the person beyond the mask of duty.
Their love became a hidden hymn. And when the moment came, he did something unfathomable.
He let her go.
Some claim she deceived him. Others claim he failed. However, the prophecy confirmed that he chose her over Olympus.
This protector assisted her in vanishing into the mundane realm, where the gods refused to pursue. Because of his treason, his name was wiped, and his memory was dispersed like ash throughout the stars.
But the keeper remembers.
And now, as the Umbra Ascension stirs again, the prophecy predicts her return—not as a prisoner, but as a reckoning.
That occurred nearly a century ago.
Since then, the gods have searched in secret, frightened of those who could destroy them. The prophecy predicted the keeper's return when the Games resumed—when the sun rises on the summer solstice, the first name will be taken.
And now I believe the signals are aligning.
The nightmares. The whispering. The invitation.
The Masquerade Ball is more than just a tradition. It is a threshold. A veil. A choice.
And I have been invited.
The invitation sits in my satchel, dark as midnight and sealed with the same ouroboros insignia. There's no return address. There's no explanation. Just my name, scrawled in silver pen that sparkled like starlight.
I have not told anyone. Not even Shelby. How could I? She'd know from the look on my face. She'd advise me to give it to the headmistress, burn it, or run. But I can't. When I touch it, something in my veins hums, as if in familiarity. Like inevitability.
The prophecy stated that the keeper would return when the cycle began again.
I blink, and the library fades. The prophecy's words fade into the background of my recollection, leaving just the rain-tapped glass and Mr. Collins' voice.
Someone shifts next to me, and the real world becomes sharper all at once.
I don't realize the hand is reaching until it pokes my back.