Working in a dead-end, post office job in the heart of a primarily-Human city, Arya Salcrest cannot let her secret out else she loses her rights and her safety. Norren Sterling, a member of the Council whom she met after a failed museum trip, is det...
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Arya should be focusing on the date but all she could think of were the pebble, the lark, and the mystery behind Norren Sterling. Had she somehow developed psychic abilities manifesting in dreams that she somehow foresaw Norren giving her a mechanized lark with a pebble?
She glanced at Norren who walked behind her with his cane tapping the cobblestones with every step. Unlike all the other times she had seen him, he insisted on using it now. As much as she was curious, she pretended it didn't bother her, especially the sharp clicks and the faint scratches its butt made against the pavement. Moreover, if Norren was as rich as he flaunts to be, why hasn't he called a carriage or something?
The afternoon was a bit cold, with the winter creeping closer. Orange and brown leaves rained from the spots of trees, the gnarly branches being exposed once again. Somehow, Noren's ash brown hair fit the somber mood.
Arya drew her coat tighter. Her soles clacked against the stones in synchrony with Norren's. Around them, the flat complexes rose from the ground in walls made of bricks and wood. Old and new, modern and a bit behind from the times. Everything was present in this part of Aldermere. But, something was still the same—the sky still couldn't be seen.
She didn't like to think about it too much but she preferred the pureness of nature rather than the convoluted mess of pipes, steam, and gears making up the New Civils. Perhaps it was just her dreams influencing her or her fae ancestry coming to life at the oddest of times. Whatever it was, Arya couldn't deny it. Not anymore.
What's left of her upbeat vibe this afternoon flitted out of her head. She sneaked a glance at Norren again. He seemed unaware of her conflicting thoughts, the guilt pounding in her system, and the dreams lodging themselves at the back of her head. The thought of her ancestry brought a fresh wave of those back, even after she tamped them deep, deep down before she headed out of the flat earlier.
It's not like the dreams come often. Sometimes, Arya reverted back to her nonsense dreams of elephants with chicken wings or cats puking rainbows. She would wake up not remembering a thing, just the fact that she had a strange dream.
But at odd moments, she would dream about a girl with wings of a fae. That girl would meet a boy then she would be captured by humans, sent to live and work in a mine. The latest dream Arya had was of the girl finally snapping and escaping the mines to live a life on the run and of poverty. Then, there was something about living in a forest and stumbling over the house of a senile old woman?
Just this morning, on the day she and Norren arranged to meet once again, she was seeing the old woman being taken care of by the girl. Then, the girl would always spread her wings and fly off into the setting sun, always off to somewhere. Arya had not an inkling about where the girl was going and the dreams didn't give a hint about that.
In fact, there's so many things the dreams weren't telling Arya. The foremost would be the sole reason she was seeing and remembering them in the first place. Another would be the patched up and splotched order of things the dreams were presented.
