It was just another Tuesday morning.
The crisp autumn wind shook the shutters and blew on white satin curtains causing them to dance open and let the glow of a sun not yet risen into Failynn’s bedroom. The warm golden light brushed the skin of her face, gently waking her enough to feel the dread of her impending alarm. She knew it was coming and the anticipation kept her from falling back into a state of slumber. If only she could rise with the sun, taking her time to enjoy the brisk morning air and gentle song of the birds.
Even with the expectation of it, the shrill beep of the clock beside her bed still made her jump. Groaning in frustration she slammed her hand over the snooze button with one hand and used the other to drag her comforter over her head, covering her in darkness. She dozed for a few minutes longer, dreaming of the possibilities her day could hold, before that shrill beeping jolted her out of the peaceful state once again.
Failynn grumbled a few obscenities under her breath and sat up, turning off her alarm in the process. She rubbed her eyes and looked around her room, now in its own blanket of golden sunbeams that poured in through the window. Her eyes dragged over a mess of clothes tumbling out of her closet, school books still open on her oak wood desk. Her phone, charging on top of her chemistry book, was vibrating and lighting up with notifications from the night before.
Faylinn took a deep breath, the crisp air holding scents of fresh-cut grass and sunflowers gave her the energy she needed to leave the comfort and warmth of her bed.
Her brain was barely awake enough to think let alone answer text messages so she shuffled her way into the bathroom. Taking a look at herself in the mirror she was not surprised by the gruntled mess that stared back at her. She had fallen asleep with her dishwater blonde hair tied up in a messy bun and makeup still on her face — studying her new look in the mirror Faylinn figured she resembled both a raccoon and unkept lion.
A quick hot shower remedied that.
“Great.” She grumbled upon realizing they had run out of toothpaste… so she opted for mouthwash, figuring something was probably better than nothing. After running a comb through her hair — already drying in soft curls — she finally felt decent enough to throw on a pair of black athletic leggings, an oversized scratchy knit sweater she had found at a thrift store the other week, and make her way downstairs.
Halfway down she realized all at once that not only could she not see… but she forgot all her school work and her phone on her desk — “shit.” She stumbled back into her bedroom, practically throwing the contents of her desk into a simple black backpack. Selecting her favorite pair of thin round gold frames she took another glance around her room and winced at how unkempt she had let it become. The sun was now dancing above the mountains outside and fully revealing all the garbage, paperwork, and dirty clothes she hadn’t bothered to pick up over the last few days.
Tonight. Faylinn promised. “Ah double shit.”
The clock on her phone flashed: 8:20 am. Late for school.
Senior year usually meant more study halls, sleeping in, and missing the first period but Failynn didn’t have that luxury. She had always been behind in schooling—diagnosed with dyslexia at a very young age her sister saw fit to hold her back and have her retake second grade. Twice. Already almost 2 years older than half her class she refused to let herself fail.
“Are you on your way?” Ava’s quiet whisper was hard to hear as it was, Faye’s cheap gas station headphones didn’t make it any easier. Her legs kept her moving at a brisk pace; dried leaves crunched loudly under her feet scaring nearby squirrels and chipmunks just trying to find food for the winter.
“I’m turning onto state street now.” Her eyes fell upon the old brick walls of their high school. For the town they lived in being so small, the state gave them a significant amount of funding for their schools; it being the only one within a 50-mile radius it had to be the best it could be.
Which wasn’t very great.
Ivy vines climbed up the sides of the three-story building big enough to compete with Buckingham palace. Even the front courtyard was hardly cared for, uncut grass and giant weeping willows growing with a mind of their own, if it weren’t for the lights on inside and a parking lot full of cars one might assume it was just another abandoned building. Even the outdoor basketball court was overgrown with weeds and wildflowers.
Ava gave no response, all that was heard was a solid high pitched beep letting Failynn know Ava’s teacher must have caught her on her phone. She could picture Ava looking up through wisps of her autumn red hair at the older man— blinking her big brown doe eyes apologetically as she came up with some dumb excuse on why she forgot about the no phones rule again. No doubt he’d sigh and give it back, later regretting how easily he gave into his most troublesome student.
Just a typical Tuesday morning.
The next few hours Failynn went through class after class, retaining what little information she could. Her mind went numb the moment her ass landed on the hard plastic chairs— already caught in the vicious cycle of public school. Go to class, take notes, wait for the bell, go to class, take notes, wait for the bell — and on and on it seemed to go.
It wasn’t until the period before lunch —history class— that she was able to pull herself out of this mindless state. Her best friend had yet to show himself today and Ava made herself comfortable in his empty seat to the right of Failynn.
Almost without taking a breath Ava quickly burst into the lasting gossip, knowing all the ins and outs of every popular group in school, only when the teacher gave her a sharp warning did she finally stop. Failynn gave a small humorous, yet relieved, smile to her friend and turned her attention to the droning of the little old lady standing at the front of the classroom. They were learning about the Great War against magic that happened a little over a century ago.
A topic not easily forgotten especially as it’s passed down from generation to generation. Failynn was probably the only one to learn about it through school and not a relative —seeing as how none of her relatives outside her sister were living.
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“I’m very well aware most of you already know about this war,” her voice was shaky with age. It wasn’t lost on the class how old their history teacher really was, she reminded them often how much she loved teaching and would until she either died or couldn’t speak any longer, “but for the sake of your upcoming exam and for those that are unfamiliar,” she gave a pointed look resembling pity to Failynn causing her cheeks to flush with embarrassment, sinking down in her seat at the glances of her classmates, “we’re going to review it again.”
Wrinkled hands lifted the white piece of chalk up to the green wall, she was one of the only teachers the school allowed to keep the old chalkboard, most others moving on with the advancing technology.
Something about it was refreshing to Failynn, to see the handwriting of her teacher neatly etched in white as she wrote the date ‘1917’.
Before the war, there was no separation between the world with magic, and ours without; creatures and fae ventured between lands as easily as you take the bus to and from school in the morning. Humans, however, could not venture over to their realm, to do so meant never returning or dying in the process. The fae had given our world so much in terms of trading, items that brought great advances to healing, gems, and jewels worth millions, even food more filling and sustaining than anything we were able to grow. But the cost of such items was great — many people gave their lives to serving in the mansions owned by fae in this world so their families could be well cared for. Others asked for blood, land, livestock, even children.
Rumbles of disapproval came from the students, even Ava whispered, “how horrible.” Failynn herself felt somewhat conflicted. As much as she wanted to agree on how horrible such a thing was… something small kept her from speaking. A small low voice in her head seemed to say, ‘That’s not the whole truth.’
“Yes, it was a horrible trade.” She continued.
After so many years some people got together and began to voice their opinions against having magic in their world. What benefit was it truly to have them if it meant losing loved ones? Many of the fae were furious at such an outburst, killing those that spoke against them and leaving their bodies as an example in the streets.
Again, a voice deep in Failynns brain seemed to grumble, ‘lies.’
“This infuriated more humans, one in particular — make note of this…” Malcolm Winters— she scratched the words quickly onto the chalkboard, the sound of both pen against paper echoed in response.
Malcolm pulled together the leaders of the country, hundreds of people willing to fight for the cause; they marched against all those who carried magic in their blood. Burning down the mansions of high fae, leaving their bodies in the streets to set a different example. Enraged, the fae and creatures of magic fought back in order to keep their place in this world. The fight lasted for 3 years and many brave lives were lost.
Then on August 14th, 1920 camps of human armies woke up to find all their enemies had completely disappeared —and with them their brave leader Malcolm Winters.” She etched the date on the board underneath the name.
Since then we have not seen or heard of a magic being; search parties went out looking for Malcolm with no success, those who had fought to keep magic in this world were executed as traitors and the world went on to be what we now know it as.
Putting the chalk down she clapped her hands together and removed the white dust from them, “Now. A quiz on this and what we’ve been studying the past few weeks will be given Friday. Be sure to study. Take the remainder of class to begin reading your assigned pages for tonight…” Failynn’s mind wandered and her teacher's voice faded into the rumbling voice in her mind.
‘A lie twisted into truth for the comfort of human hearts.’ It growled, leaving her with the ghost of an emotion— frustration at the ignorance of her own race. Failynn didn’t understand how she could feel such a thing when this was history written over a hundred years ago.
Her eyes darted around the room, perhaps she wasn’t alone in this… but even Ava had her eyes fixed on the thick blue book lying open on her desk. Drawings of people with giant wings dying brutally at the hands of humans, detailed sketches of those wings, and the power they held. It was supposed to be terrifying, infuriating that a realm with so much magic would take life from one without— but she couldn’t bring herself to think beyond those words echoing in her head.
A lie twisted into truth for the comfort of human hearts.
Despite staring down at the book filled with supposed fact upon fact, she was too lost in thought to read a single word— only the ringing sound of the bell released her to move on with her day, leaving the strange voice in her head, and all her teacher said at the doorway.
Lunch came around and Colton finally waltzed into the cafeteria like he owned the place. Being one of the most popular guys in the school he practically did; waving to both faculty and teens it seemed everyone wanted to be noticed by this star student. Those he acknowledged with a wink of one of his ocean blue eyes, or a nod and toss of his shaggy brown hair seemed to swoon and sigh. The sight of it made Ava and Faylinn share a laugh between one another; teasing about how big his ego was going to be by the time he sat down.
Sure enough, his eyes seemed to be glowing with pride from all the attention he received. He didn’t get those kinds of responses from either girl at the table though he never did care. Colton loved to joke and comment that he enjoyed hanging out with them because they saw him as ‘just another guy'. Faylinn however, knew that it went a lot deeper than that. They knew him and loved him when he was the scrawny kid with a big personality; especially Faylinn who he swore he would trust with his life.
A big commitment for an 8-year-old, but they’d been inseparable ever since, even when he made it to the football team; even when he had a line of girls at his door, he always made space for his two favorites.
Faylinn wouldn’t consider herself popular by any standards, she just knew the right people— alone she didn’t stand out in a crowd, Colton, and Ava making up for her lack of a boisterous personality with their own.
“Let’s go to my place after school,” He suggested with a wave to a passing senior girl. She had responded with a childish giggle and scurried over to a group of gossiping girls— the sight made Faylinn roll her eyes. Colton, smirking at her reaction, continued, “We can hang out and have pizza for dinner. Ava you in?”
With a mouthful of cafeteria food she nodded excitedly, her blonde bob bouncing in time. Colton’s attention turned to Faylinn who had her own humorous smirk on her face at the cocky egotistic football star she called her best friend… though as they had gotten older she found herself sometimes wishing he might give her one of those flirtatious winks he tossed to seemingly any girl with two legs, except for her. “Faye?” He drawled and batted those big golden-brown eyes at her.
Pretending to muse over the invitation for a moment she rested her knuckles against her chin and tapped her lips a few times, “I suppose I can move my schedule around.” Colton kicked her legs from under the table and rolled his own eyes, a smile gracing his lips.
“You’re an ass.” He teased, a playful glint in his eyes. Failynn only laughed and nodded her head in passive agreement. The rest of lunch was filled with laughter and small conversation, but something in the back of Failynn’s subconscious reminded her of the strange feeling she had in history… and for some reason, she had an unsettling sense that this moment— with the three of them together laughing and joking— would be one of the last normal moments they’d have for a long while.