In a room whose only entrance lay hidden within my own mind, an impossible feeling came over me.

I was being watched.

Three walls of gold, silver, and bronze threads woven into an infinitely repeating pattern gleamed around me the same as every time I had entered The Well.

“You can’t be here.” I called, receiving nothing but the continued feeling of the watcher’s presence as an answer.

Then, as it always did, light came. At first only appearing as a faint outline, it brightened into an open door of iridescent light.

Just like I had every time before and would a near infinite amount of times after, I stepped through it.

“Again.” Precept Anite demanded and extended her hand to me.

“I can’t, I’m too tired.” I muttered, unable to meet my teacher’s copper colored eyes. Nothing about her was soft, not her eyes or her voice.

“Maiden Mags,” Precept Anite insisted. She grasped my hand in her rough palms. “You can and you will,” She squeezed my fingers in her hands. “Focus your aura and your feelings. Try again.”

She hadn’t meant to, but she hurt my fingers when she squeezed and tears welled up in my eyes. I couldn’t see them but I could feel the other girls in my coven staring at me. They already didn’t like me, that had been obvious since our first day together. I hoped my decision to wear my hair down that morning would keep them from learning that I cried at the drop of a pin.

“Maiden Mags.” Precept Anite gave my hand another painful squeeze.

“Okay.” I muttered, swallowing the lump in my throat. To pass, I had to charm her into smiling, but I couldn’t think of a single happy memory or feeling to push into her. I pulled my aura anyways, the faster I failed, the faster I could go to the back of the line and cry in private. Holding my power in my hand, all I could think about was going home.

All I wanted to do was go home. I would bake some of those little cakes that mother loved so much. I’d even fill them with blueberry jam, her favorite, and sprinkle sugar on top. I’d make them extra special, full of love, and beg her to never make me go to school again.

I couldn’t hold my aura any longer. I let it go and turned to go to the back of the line.

Precept Anite didn’t let go of my hand. “Well done, Maiden Mags. You pass.”

“How?” I asked, confused.

“You pass. Move on.” She repeated.

I didn’t understand. Was she taking pity on me? Rather than risk provoking her anger, I did as I was told. When I passed her, I snuck a glance at my teacher from under the cover of my hair.

A single tear rolled down Precept Anite’s stern face.

I had not made her laugh.

I hadn’t even made her smile.

I had made her cry.

Then, I fell.

In the same instant, I sat up with a gasp.

All I could do for the first few moments was shiver violently and listen to the sound of my teeth chatter. I opened my eyes. I was in a bathtub and had been long enough for my skin to thin and shrivel. Tiny waves rippled out across the surface of the cold water from my shivering. Once I saw the two towels neatly folded on the counter to my right, I couldn’t get to them fast enough. Hands shaking, I hurriedly wrapped one around my soaked hair and pinned the other under my arms. My reflection in the mirror, besides the chattering teeth, looked the same as it had the day before. Brown hair, brown eyes, and dull features that weren’t remotely memorable. Relieved I still looked nothing like myself, my glamor had improved dramatically once there had been a reason to use it, I sat down on the floor and pulled my knees to my chest so I could get warm.

When I was fairly certain I would not slip into hypothermia and my shivering had subsided into an occasional spasm, I noticed it again.

I was being watched.

“What is your name?” A hypnotic baritone spoke from above me.

Its very resonance compelling me to obey, I did, powerless to resist. “Mags.”

Perched atop the mirror light, the skeleton of a small kitten stared down at me with the two yellow flits of light floating in the sockets of its skull where eyes should have been. Though there were none of the necessary muscles and tendons to allow it to make expressions, the yellow flits were focused on me with unwavering attention.

It swished its segmented tail, sending a series of cracks that sounded like someone popping all of their knuckles at once “What is your name?”

“Mags,” I shook my head.” No, not her, I wasn’t Mags anymore. I had never been Mags. Her, Precept Anite, even the little cakes she had wanted to bake had all been a memory. “Dani?”

“What is your name?” The skeleton asked a third time, rising to all fours atop its perch.

I might make myself look like Dani and I might tell people I was Dani, but I wasn’t her either. She was a lie.

The tale has been illicitly lifted; should you spot it on Amazon, report the violation.

If I wasn’t Mags and I wasn’t Dani, but I was able to live through Mags’s memories and I had the power to make myself look like Dani, then. . .?

“Autumn Aubrey.” I said, mostly sure it was right.

“Who is Autumn Aubrey?” It continued, its voice so deep I could feel it in my chest.

“I am a Maiden of Zenithcidel. Daughter of Idensyn Aubrey. Thief and possessor of The Well. Debtor to The Circle of the Nine Mothers.” I sighed, the familiarity of the words bringing me back to myself in full.

Maybe that was why it had been difficult to leave Mags behind, I felt a similar sadness to what she had felt.

“What were you doing?” The Skeleton asked, nimbly dropping down from the light fixture and landing on the counter without ever dropping its haunting gaze. If not for its claws clattering against the hard surface its descent would have been utterly silent.

This would be the last question. There were only ever three and they were always the same.

I began. “I was. . .”

Outside the bathroom, I heard the worn door to my old room creak open.

I shot to my feet. Had I not turned the deadbolt? I always double checked before I went to The Well.

I pointed at the skeleton. “Stay.”

“What were you doing?” It repeated.

“Not right now!” I whispered harshly.

“What were you doing?” It asked a third time, unaffected by the intruder.

“You made me do this.” I growled, grabbing the tiny skeleton in one hand and dropping it into the tank of the toilet in one quick motion. The porcelain lid clinked shut and I flushed it for good measure. Oh fuck, oh fuck, oh fuck. Had something from Chaos crawled into this reality and caught my scent, or would it be someone from the Spire, come for The Well. Did The Mothers finally track me down and were going to drag me back to Zenithcidel? In my panic, I reached within myself with my mind and focused my aura against the oppressive restrictions that kept it bound. I closed the bathroom door behind me, woefully unprepared to defend myself.

“Housekeeping?” A woman’s voice tentatively called through the crack in my door.

I hadn’t considered the only possible threat worse than the horrors my mind had immediately suspected.

My landlord.

Before I could answer, the door swung open and a girl, not a woman, stepped in with both her arms full of neatly folded sheets.

“No, that’s alright, I don’t need it.” I stammered, trying and utterly failing at sounding normal.

Raven black hair pulled up in a messy bun, wearing jeans and a flannel shirt, she looked like my landlord, Ms. Lao, only about thirty years younger. The girl smirked. “Are you even old enough to get tattoos?”

“What's that?” I asked, confused.

“On your stomach,” She nodded towards me.”The tattoo.”

I looked down. “Oh, this!”

I didn’t understand what she meant. I’d never heard the word tattoo before, but when I pointed at the seal over my stomach, she nodded.

“Yeah, that.” She said, raising an eyebrow.

Circling my navel was a tight pattern of nine interlocking circles. Each a different color and thickness. It was a binding laid on me by the hands of the nine Mother’s after I had wronged them. How could she see it?

I looked down. How could I see it?

When I had rushed out of the bathroom, I had left my towel behind me.

The door was the only thing close enough that I could cover myself with. I jumped behind it and took the opportunity to push it a little further closed.

“Thanks.” I said, finding myself much closer to the girl.

“You’re blushing, that's so cute,” She chuckled. “I’m Anna, by the way. My mom owns this place.”

“I’m.” Autumn. I nearly slipped. “Dani. Your mom is my landlord.”

“Right,” Anna said, dragging the word out. She took her eyes off me and glanced into the room. “I’ll just come back later.”

From behind the bathroom door, through the porcelain of the tank and the water that filled it, I heard the skeleton’s muffled voice repeat its third question.

“Nice to meet you Autumn.” I said, shutting the door, locking the locks, double checking the locks, and finally sagging my bare back against it.

“Fuck that’s cold!” I blurted, streaking into the bathroom and opening the toilet tank.

The Skeleton kitten shot out of it just as soon as its boney body could slip through it. Its claws sank into my shoulder before it bounded off me and reclaimed its perch atop the light fixture.

“Hey, that hurt.” I groaned and pressed my hand to the punctures.

“What were you doing?” It questioned as if the entire last ten minutes had not happened.

“For fucks sake,” I snapped. “Viewing a memory from The Well, because I was such a bad little girl, I found a way to steal an ethereal structure that contained the collected knowledge and memories of every sorceress of Zenithcidel! Do we have to go through this every time?”

The Skeleton was silent for a moment, giving me nothing but empty air and the stare of its haunting eye lights. Then, it lifted the bone of its paw and began grooming it. Which would have been perfectly acceptable if it had fur to lick or a tongue to lick with.

“Sam!” I yelled.

“I am bound to ask you those three questions.”

“Of course it is. Thank you for your unshakable devotion.” I sighed.

The skeleton of a kitten had arrived not long after I had settled into the boarding house that currently served as my hideaway. It had not been a friendly meeting or a friendly couple of weeks, but he was my familiar and his name was Sam.

“You are welcome,” Sam spoke, my sarcasm lost on him. “You were within yourself for much longer than I am accustomed to. I find that strange.” He continued, swapping paws.

“I don’t know. I don’t know how any of it works.” I spat, the last of my anger running out with the words.

“ You should not be hiding away from the very people that could help you understand.” He stated without any hint of emotion.

“I am very aware of your opinions on my choices, cat.”

I left the bathroom and threw myself down on the mound of blankets I used as a bed. The actual bed was propped up against the windows on the back wall of the room. It would offer me no protection from the people and things that were after me, but when I did manage to get some sleep, I slept a little deeper because of it.

My stomach groaned.

I had been gouged by my familiar and was bleeding onto my blankets, had nearly been discovered for being a sorceress hiding amongst mortals, almost gave said mortal my true name, said mortal was the daughter of the woman whose room I was renting and hadn’t paid in the month I’d been there and on top of it all, I had exposed myself to her.

Of course I was hungry and a quick glance at the clock ticking away on the wall told me It was far too early for me to plunder the kitchen for scraps.

“Mother’s help me.” I sighed and dropped my head onto the bed.