Magic had always enamored me when I was growing up. I can recall countless nights where my mother or father created small illusions of lights and dancing figurines over my head to lull me to sleep. As I got older, I became fascinated with greater spells, and my obsession grew to favor more intense spells.

The circumstances of where I grew up also contributed to my interest.

When humans were first barred from the magical world and cast into Pangea, the place I and its inhabitants call Earth, few escaped the banishment. Craftiness saved some, but they couldn’t hide forever. The safer bet was to offer service to The Nest. The specifics of each deal varied person to person, but the most common arrangement was to monitor their peers to make sure humans did not rediscover magic.

It did not take long for such deals to be offered to whole families, and within a year, they proved to be more effective than the individual. Before long, families were the sole bulwark keeping magic away from humanity.

The Nest placed these families all over Pangea. Most found a home in Europe, with over two dozen in England. The only country with similar numbers was China, but its nobles were redistributed to surrounding countries around the twelfth century. Only eight remained once the shift finished.

The second-most populated country became Japan, with nineteen families placed around its provinces.

I belonged to one such family, and my ancestors made their home around the outskirts of Moscow; close enough to intervene should anything happen, but far enough away for prying eyes to be of little concern.

Despite what many would have expected, I did not mind the isolation. In fact, I preferred it. I disliked interacting with outsiders, regardless if they were serfs or nobles. When we had magic and they did not, what did they matter?

As a noble family, there was a social expectation for us to interact with the other nobles, and the serfs we ruled over needed to be reminded of their place every so often. The ridiculous mannerisms I had to adapt when interacting with them did not help, and that was before considering the attire they expected me to wear. The frilly, flamboyant dresses they stuffed me into choked me at every turn, and nothing I did could give me a reprieve. I made it no secret how I felt about the dress code and made it everyone else’s problem, no matter how many times they forced me into them.

I enjoyed interacting with the serfs more, though not by much. The etiquette was not the same, as interactions were less structured, but the procedure forced me to act superior around them. I did this by keeping my distance and avoiding eye contact with them.

Despite all the rules, it was more relaxed than the expectations I had to adhere to with nobles. I didn’t have to lower my head to anyone older than me, and I could be free with my speech without the risk of being deemed a savage.

Best of all, I did not have to wear the god-awful clothes.

It did not matter who I interacted with; I could not use magic under any circumstance. Even playing pretend magic was off limits, and my parents warned me of what would happen if I broke the rules long before I cast my first spell. Punishment loomed around every corner like a boogie man.

Such a restriction made no sense to me. I understood why we didn’t do it on a large scale, but we had the means to wipe or modify the memory of anyone who saw us performing it. I saw no harm in starting a fire to keep ourselves warm or creating a light to see what we were doing.

It was after my grandmother told me about the first time I used magic that I understood my family’s hesitancy, despite the tool they had at their disposal.

I was young when it happened—just old enough to walk and understand how to hold a basic conversation. My parents were hosting a ball for other nobles, acting as a neutral ground for two families with bad blood. Of course, I was required to attend and wear the hideous dresses forced upon me.

I felt claustrophobic inside the hideous abomination, and when the summer heat started cooking me alive, I was nothing short of crabby. My irritation continued to grow as people whose names I struggled to remember pestered me, asking me questions I didn’t care to answer and making absurd jokes they wanted me to laugh at. It did not take long for everything to boil over, and I snapped, releasing a glacier’s worth of ice that nearly crushed my home.

This tale has been unlawfully obtained from Royal Road. If you discover it on Amazon, kindly report it.

The reason I have no memory of such an event is because I passed out before the glacier reached its peak and had to be carried away.

Most were in shock from what I had done, unable to say or do anything before we detained them. The outspoken and outgoing individuals, individuals who happened to be more religious than their counterparts, called me a witch and my family vile for harboring me. Some even accused my mother of being no different.

Because it was an isolated event, it was no challenge to wipe everyone’s memories and replace them with false ones. Those in attendance never behaved the same towards my family afterwards. They were distant and disinterested in anything my family was doing. Sometimes they would forget to consider us at all, which my parents had no issue with.

What made the situation difficult were the serfs. None were in attendance at the party, but my ice was visible for miles around. It took weeks for my family to convince the public that what they saw was a cloud pushed to the ground by a freak weather event.

There were always those who believed it was a sign of something ominous, an omen to steer clear of our territory. No matter how many minds we changed, either through conversation or magical means, there were always more.

My punishment for my outburst was strict surveillance and confinement to my home, unable to take so much as a step outside without supervision. This rule remained in place for years, lasting until I turned ten before my parents relented on the one condition, a condition that would shape my future more than any other event in my life.

—

“Guinevere, what do you think you’re still doing in bed?” a voice I knew nothing but hatred for demanded.

Seconds later, my sheets flew off the bed, exposing my body to the elements. Under normal circumstances, the magic insulation of the manor would have shielded me from the bitter Russian winter, but when a window was thrown open, such protection disappeared.

“Up, up, up! The day is young, and so are you!” the voice sang, grabbing my arm and pulling me to my feet.

“I’m up! I’m up!” I protested, trying and failing to escape the grasp of my aggressor.

The devil of a woman charged with waking me up was my personal maid, Dragoslava. She was a hard woman, born and raised in Siberia before being brought to Moscow long before I was born. I never figured out why my parents hired her and brought her into the magic world, but they told me she took to the new environment like a fish to water.

Dragoslava was not the type of woman who smiled, which did nothing to help my opinion of her. Instead, she wore an eternal frown, making me question whether or not she could feel joy.

As unfriendly as I found my maid, even I could see how much effort she put into her job. Dragoslava was the first to wake up and the last to bed. The standard she held herself to was above and beyond what anyone expected of her. Such a work ethic earned her the ire of our other maids, as she single-handedly raised the quality of work expected of them.

Her industrious behavior drew ire of my own as I shivered from the frigid air she let in.

Before I could try to hide from the wind to wake up on my own, I felt her hands slide into my sleeves and come into direct contact with my skin, shocking me awake.

“I’m up! I’m up!” I repeated, pulling away from the horrid woman.

“If you were up, I wouldn’t be here now, would I?” she shot back, using an icy tone I could not argue against.

Silence befell the two of us as Dragoslava went about undressing and redressing me in the attire my parents deemed necessary to meet my tutor in. While it was not as bad as what I got stuffed into during parties, it limited my flexibility. The most I could manage would be a light jog.

I had to hold back a groan as I realized how suffocated I would feel in the dress she stuffed me into, knowing how Dragoslava would respond to my complaint. If she could do as much work as she did in her work uniform, then I could survive a few hours in a dress.

The clothes my mother picked out for me the day before were white, tainted with a hint of yellow. Yellow flowers decorated the dress while keeping the upper portion plain. She tied a golden sash around my stomach to separate the two, which Dragoslava turned into a bow behind my back.

The only redeemable part of the outfit was the shoes. Because the length of the dress hid them from view in all but a few scenarios, they were functional rather than flashy. On the outside, it was polished wood with a cloth lining to limit chafing. In reality, the material was spongy and gave a little on the inside when I walked.

It took her less than five minutes to get me ready—hair, makeup, clothes, and all. Giving me a twirl to ensure everything matched her standards, she nodded and pushed me toward the door.

“Your tutor is waiting for you in the study. Don’t keep her waiting,” Dragoslava informed, turning her attention to her next job and treating me as nothing more than an afterthought.

“What about breakfast?” I asked.

“You’ll get your breakfast when you're called for it. Now get going. She’s in the study. Don’t keep her waiting,” my maid repeated without an ounce of care in her voice.

Knowing better than to argue against her, I opened my door to make my way to the instructed destination, grumbling once I was out of earshot.