POV: Elara Virelle (1st person)
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I don't remember when it started.
The moon had always followed me like a loyal ghost — quiet, patient, watching. Some nights, it felt closer than the sky itself, as though it were breathing just above my window, waiting for me to notice.
But last night... last night, it spoke.
I was dreaming, I think. Or maybe I wasn't. In the dream, I stood barefoot on cracked marble, a silver mist curling around my ankles. The floor beneath me shimmered like starlight frozen into stone. Ruins towered in the distance — not dead, but sleeping, breathing with secrets of a forgotten age.
A man stood at the edge of the platform, his back to me. Pale. Still. Cloaked in something that looked like woven moonlight.
He turned.
And when our eyes met, I forgot that I was asleep.
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"Wake up, Elara!"
I jolted upright, heart punching my ribs. My grandmother's voice cracked through the wooden walls like thunder on still water. "You'll be late for class!"
I blinked at the gray light pouring through the thin curtains. For a moment, I could still see him — silver eyes like winter stars, lips parting to whisper my name. My real name. Not "Ellie" like the girls at the café called me. Not "that weird moon girl" like the boys on campus sneered behind my back.
No, this man knew my name like it was a prayer.
"Elara," he'd said.
And then he vanished.
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[Scene: The Library of Old Cinders – Afternoon]
The library smelled of ash and books older than the town itself. I was supposed to be cataloguing ancient astronomy texts for extra credit, but instead, I traced my finger along the edges of a leather-bound atlas with the words "Lunaris Maps: Restricted" burned into the spine.
No bar code. No index label. No record.
I opened it anyway.
The pages whispered — like wind through a cracked door — and my fingertips stung. A silvery glow pulsed beneath a map that depicted... the moon. Not just its phases. Not craters. But cities. Pathways. Names. Words I couldn't pronounce but somehow understood.
"Kael," I murmured, tracing the name scrawled in old ink across a crescent-shaped ruin.
The lights above flickered. For a breathless second, I thought I saw a figure behind the shelves. Cloaked. Watching.
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[Flashback: Nightfall – Elara's Bedroom]
That night, I left the window open.
The air was cold — too cold for spring — but the moonlight felt warm. I lay in bed with my fingers laced over my chest, staring at the silver eye above me. Hoping. Fearing. Waiting.
The dreams returned.
Only this time, I felt the dream.
I stood in the ruins again, barefoot, wearing a robe of deep indigo stitched with stars that moved like breath. The man — Kael — stepped forward. This time, he touched my hand.
"You opened the map," he said, voice a melody of light and memory. "You saw the gates."
I couldn't speak. His touch was cold and warm at once, like moonlight on water.
"Do you know what that means?" he asked.
"No," I breathed. "I don't even know if this is real."
He smiled. It was the kind of smile that hides centuries of pain. "It's always been real, Elara. You just stopped remembering."
"Who are you?"
He lifted his hand to my cheek, and the moment his skin brushed mine, a flood of visions tore through me — a city of glass and shadow, a war fought in silence, and a crown buried beneath the moon.
"I am Kael Arven Lunaris," he said. "And you were once the light that kept me alive."
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[Back in Reality – Elara's Perspective]
I woke up sobbing. Not from sadness. From... remembrance.
Everything felt wrong. The bed. The walls. The gravity.
My hands shook as I touched the moon pendant around my neck — a gift from my grandmother when I was a child. She used to say it would protect me when "they came calling."
I used to think she was crazy.
Now, I wasn't so sure.
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[Ending Scene: The Letter]
That morning, I found a folded note wedged inside the Lunaris Map.
> You are not dreaming, Elara. The Lunar Gate opens with every breath you remember. Come find me — before the moon forgets you too.
— K.
My heart raced. A choice stood before me like a silent door.
Forget it all. Or step through.
I stood at the window once more. The moon stared back, full and watchful.
And I whispered:
"I'm coming."