The museum was nearly empty, just the way Iva liked it — echoing and quiet, as if the past were holding its breath.
She wandered alone through the East Wing of the Royal Archives, trailed by her thoughts and the faint scent of aging parchment and floor polish. Her footsteps clicked against the marble tiles, an oddly satisfying rhythm in a place that didn’t usually welcome people like her — broke scholarship kids with big brains and bigger baggage.
The exhibit ahead was the reason she’d come today.
“The Flamebearer Dynasty: Ashvardan and the Lost Kingdom.”
Iva stopped in front of the towering oil painting at the center. A man, clad in layered crimson robes, with sharp, intense features and the kind of eyes that seemed to look straight through you.
She scoffed, tilting her head.
“Your PR team really went all in, huh?”
King Ashvardan. A brutal conqueror, if old history books were to be believed. Revered for unity, feared for bloodshed, never married, no known heir. A man whose kingdom vanished in smoke after his mysterious death.
Still, Iva had always been weirdly obsessed with him.
Not because she liked him — gods no — but because something about his story didn’t add up. Too many gaps. Too many “unknowns.” It reminded her of her own life — full of unfinished sentences and unsent apologies.
She pulled her phone out of her bag.
Battery: 32%. Enough.
Scrolling through her notes app, she glanced back at the plaque beneath the painting. Dates. Symbols. The signature carved into the sword he held. She’d been trying to decode it for weeks now, convinced it was more than ornamental.
She reached forward.
Just to touch it. Just to feel something real.
The moment her fingers brushed the edge of the display case, the ground trembled.
Soft at first. Then violent.
Her heart leapt. Earthquake? Construction?
A sudden, thunderous crack echoed beneath her, and the marble floor splintered like glass. She gasped, stumbling, trying to backpedal — but gravity had other plans.
The floor gave way, dragging her down into a dark, blinding spiral.
No scream escaped her lips. No sound reached her ears.
Only silence. And falling. And light.
When she landed, it wasn’t marble she felt — it was grass.
Soft, damp, and real.
The wind slapped her face with scents she didn’t recognize — earthy and wild, not even close to city air. The sky above her was wrong too. No buildings. No planes. Just endless blue and three crescent moons.
“What the actual—?”
Iva sat up, groaning. Dirt clung to her jeans. Her phone, miraculously still in her hand, now read No Signal. Of course.
She stood, brushing herself off, trying not to freak out. Maybe this was a set. A high-tech prank. Maybe she hit her head. Maybe she was dead.
Then she heard it — a voice shouting in a language she didn’t understand.
She turned.
A patrol of men on horseback approached at full speed, swords glinting, armor clinking like old coins. One of them raised a hand, signaling the others to slow. Their eyes were locked on her — with suspicion, awe, and something else.
She couldn’t breathe.
They circled her, and one dismounted.
Tall. Cloaked in deep red. A sword at his hip.
The same face from the painting.
Ashvardan.
Not oil and canvas. Flesh and blood.
Iva’s mind raced. No way. No way.
She blinked, once. Twice.
He stepped forward slowly, scanning her strange clothes, the glowing rectangle in her hand. His voice, when he spoke, was calm — like coals that hadn’t yet turned to fire.
"You fell from the sky," he said.
"And you carry light in your hand."
Iva opened her mouth. Nothing came out.
She was shaking. And yet… something inside her buzzed with a wild, impossible excitement.
She knew him.
Not just from books.
From fate.
Write a comment ...