A faint creak.
Seraphina's blood ran cold.
Footsteps echoed softly just outside the library doors. Heavy, deliberate. A guard? A servant?
No one was allowed in the family's restricted library without written permission—especially not her. She backed away from the book, instinct screaming at her to hide, to run—but there was no time.
The doorknob turned.
Her heart pounded.
Then—a voice, clear and cold, whispered directly into her ear:
"Chant the seal. Speak the cycle."
Her breath caught. She didn't know how, didn't understand what force was speaking—but her lips moved anyway, as if guided.
"Chrona… Vireth… Se'lume."
The golden light under her ribbon flared bright.
And the world… slowed.
The door creaked open in agonizing motion—frame by frame.
Dust floated lazily in the air. The candle's flame flickered like a slow dance
Her feet hit the floor like thunder in a dream.
Everything moved like molasses—slow, heavy, surreal. She could see the guard's boots mid-step, barely crossing the threshold, his hand still frozen on the doorknob.
It worked.
She didn't know how, or why, but the magic obeyed her.
Her mind screamed for her to move. She crossed the room in a blur, grabbed the edge of the tall window, and slipped out into the garden. Her body fought her—every step like pushing through water—but she forced herself to keep going.
A few branches tore her sleeves. Her lungs burned. But she made it.
Back to her wing.
Back into bed.
And just as her fingers brushed the sheets
"Unseal."
Time rushed back in.
The world snapped to full speed like a slingshot. Her body collapsed against the mattress as the golden glow faded beneath her wrist. She lay there trembling, eyes wide, heart racing.
Footsteps rushed down the hall, confused and hurried.
But no one opened her door.
No one found her in the library.
She had escaped.
Barely.
The next morning, Seraphina woke up with a sharp headache, like someone had driven a nail into her temple. Her body ached slightly, her fingers trembling as she sat up in bed.
Clearly, the power took its toll—though it didn't feel fatal.
"Is this… the price?" she whispered to herself, eyes drifting down to her wrist. No glow. No warmth. Just skin and the faint memory of golden light.
She clutched her head, sighing.
Maybe it was just because she wasn't used to it yet.
Still, she couldn't deny it. That moment—the world slowing, the breath of silence, the whisper in her ear—it was real. And that meant her time magic was real too.
From that day on, Seraphina began to test it.
Quietly. Cautiously. In secret.
She whispered the chant when no one was around. She watched how the dust in the air froze, how her own heartbeat slowed in her chest, how the ticking clock on her wall dragged its second hand like a lazy sun.
And each time she used it, the spell became easier. The dizziness faded quicker. The toll grew lighter.
She was learning.
Bit by bit.
She was mastering something no one in history had ever wielded—something that was supposed to be myth.
"They tried to kill me five times," she murmured one night, fingers glowing faintly gold. "This time… I'm rewriting everything."
Months passed.
By now, the headaches were gone. The strain had faded. Her control had sharpened like the blade of a well-kept dagger.
She could freeze time for nearly a full minute.
It didn't sound like much, not to an outsider. But in battle, in escape, in assassination—or survival—a minute was everything.
She learned how to move while time stood still. How to touch objects and leave traces. How to maneuver without disrupting the still world too violently. There were rules—strange, quiet rules—but she understood them now.
And most importantly:
"No one knows," she said softly one evening, staring at her reflection in the mirror. "No one even suspects."
She smiled—not out of joy, but quiet satisfaction. The kind of smile born from control. From power.
She wasn't the desperate girl begging the crown prince for mercy anymore.
She was becoming something else.
Something dangerous.