As if the dreams were mocking her, that night, they were joyful.

Arya had to watch the girl dance around the house she shared with the senile woman. The girl had a silly smile plastered on her face even as she was sweeping the floor, washing clothes, or even feeding the immobile owner of the house. What happened? What had the dreams not shown to Arya? Had she missed something?

The last thing she was aware of was the girl receiving the pebble from a mystery sender. Whoever that was used larks and knew about their incredible homing and tracking skills. Did the girl meet the mystery sender, perhaps? Had they found each other?

Also, why was the girl going through the senile woman's old clothes and trying them on in front of a splotchy mirror?

Arya was in no mood to follow through all this nonsense. She would rather get her restful sleep and forget most of the bad things in her life for at least eight hours. It wasn't like she had a choice, though. The dream raged on, shifting to the girl finally deciding on a glittering gray dress. Then, the girl waved her hands over it. Light flashed and wrapped around her lithe body. With Arya watching and unable to cover her eyes, it slapped her dream eyeballs. It didn't hurt like it normally would, though.

When the light faded, the girl now stood in front of the mirror, clad in one of the grandest gowns Arya has ever seen. Awe colored her insides. Was that...magic? Had she just seen magic at play, even if most of it was just light? Amazing.

Then, the scene shifted to a depiction of a festival. Arya weaved through hazy blobs of people running around either in celebration or in a grouch because they have to work during some sort of a holiday. What's going on?

A carriage streamed past the commotion, catching Arya's attention. Peeking through the small window at the back of the carriage were traces of the feather wings she had come to associate with the girl. So, Arya did the most sensible thing in this dream world. She ran after the carriage.

They arrived in front of an elaborate castle which could only exist in the time of the Old Kingdom. Walls as tall as the heavens flanked bridges and moats leading to a mansion hewn out of stone. Towering spires bore flags of the empire's characteristic color. However, against the sun, Arya couldn't make out the crest inscribed on them. Bummer. She could have found clues on whose reign this whole thing was taking place.

But seeing the carriage pull up to a set of stairs and the girl stride upwards, Arya concluded this was a special event determined by royalty and, for some reason, the girl had access to it. What happened to the days in the mines and the bland afternoons of sweeping floors? Was this girl a secret fae princess after all?

Her question was answered when her attention fell over the flock of stately-dressed ladies gathered in irregular circles and cliques on the wide landing. The expansive wooden doors remained closed, barring the rest of them from seeing what's behind those ornate surfaces.

Arya tailed the girl who strode across the landing with a confidence Arya could only dream to have. Shoulders back, chest puffed out, back straight. And most importantly, wings out. Eyes followed the girl—as well as Arya—and whispers rose to a peak. Feathered fans unfurled, mouths leaned into waiting ears, heels clacked against stone, and skirts rustled. The crowd felt like someone had set fire to their shoes.

The urge to start fiddling with the hem of her skirt had never been this strong. Then again, she wasn't even sure if she had a skirt on in this dream. Maybe she was just an ethereal figure, blending with the wind or something. There's no reason to be self-conscious. These people weren't whispering about her. They were talking about the girl.

This has to be those ceremonies conducted by the Old Kingdom royals when the heir to the throne came of age. Women (or men) from around the empire would be invited to this once-in-a-lifetime ball and the heir was supposed to pick a consort from the vast pool of faces. Arya learned from the history books that sometimes, these series of balls could take years and years, until the heir has chosen their consort.

What did that have to say about the girl, despite being fae, getting invited to this public function? Should Arya get scared for this girl now?

The girl stopped a few steps from the door. Arya had to scramble back to avoid bumping into anyone even though she knew how pointless that was. This was a dream, not a freaking theater play. Arya wasn't really here.

Then, the agitation in the crowd heightened. This time, the girl wasn't their attention. That's when the door began swinging open. Arya imagined the sound to go with it, sort of like heavy creaking combined with the ominous whoosh of the wind made by the swinging motion.

Slowly, the gap between the doors widened. A figure emerged from the gap, the light from the outside falling down on him like a predetermined theater beam. The girl's spine straightened further, her wings perking at the sight of the person walking out of the doors. Whoever that was, the girl knew him. And she knew him well.

Arya gritted what teeth she had in her dream. She stepped aside, her gaze traveling from the girl's shoulders and towards the man striding out of the foyer. Her heart stopped, falling down to her feet and shattering into a thousand, bloody shards. She was looking at wavy brown hair the color of freshly-burnt ash, the brilliant blue eyes with a sparkle of a thousand stars in them, and the dark skin complemented by the bright, golden embellishments of his scarlet dress uniform. She was looking at his gentle smile and at how familiar it was, how similar it was to the real thing she had known. She didn't need him to speak because she knew what his voice would sound like.

That's because Arya Salcrest was looking at the one and only Norren Sterling.

"So, now, even my dreams are of him," Arya stabbed the piece of meat but didn't pop it into her mouth. Instead, she glanced at Eury. "Am I going crazy? I can't be going crazy."

Eury rolled her eyes and smacked her red-tinted lips. Arya couldn't tell if it was from the sauce the meat was doused with or from the latest brand of cosmetics that got introduced a few months ago. "If you dumped him without even waiting to hear his side, then yes. You are crazy," she replied, sawing the next bite off the remaining slab on her plate. "What are you thinking, Ari?"

Yeah, what was she thinking? "Did I tell you how he kissed me that evening?" Arya blew a breath. It sounded so wistful and pathetic in her ears. "It was...well, better than I expected. But I thought about what you said."

Eury slammed her cutlery on the table, making the other items on the surface clatter. "Don't do that to me now," she leaned forward and curled her fists in the air. "Did you tell him that night?"

Arya blinked. "Y-yeah," she said. "I told him after we kissed. Why?"

"Dear Palendral gods," Eury massaged her temples with a groan. "And you broke up with him after telling him? You're just that clueless, are you?"

Arya knitted her eyebrows. "I'm not clueless," she said. "I did the right thing."

"What you did might be right but it's also cruel," Eury jerked her chin at Arya. "You couldn't have chosen a better timing?"

Arya clicked her tongue. She had forgotten all about her food nor had she felt the need to sustain her appetite further. "That was the only timing," she sighed. "Eury, I realized I liked him way more than a friend that night. I couldn't keep lying and hiding things from him but I couldn't tell him without losing him either."

Eury opened her mouth but Arya lurched forward before she lost her reasoning. "He told me he was a member of the council. He was the Norren Sterling of the Civils," she said. "If I let it linger longer, if I didn't end things the way I did, then sooner or later, it's going to affect him. It's going to destroy everything he built until there is nothing left."

"This world isn't forgiving to our kind, Eury," Arya leveled her gaze towards her friend. "And even with his influence, he wouldn't be able to make a dent in it. Having me by his side would only cast him in a bad light. Associating with me or any of the fae will make his life a living hell."

Arya pursed her lips and, for once, felt like she meant what she's going to say next. "I don't want to do it to him," she averted her eyes to the off-white tablecloth. It was far more interesting, anyway. "I don't want to hurt him more than I had to."

For the first time since Arya met Eury, the woman was quiet. Was that a case well-defended? "It's a little too late for that, don't you think?" she said after a few minutes of chewing and sipping from her glass.

Arya raised her head from the table to meet Eury's eyes. "What do you mean?"

"I never pegged you as the non-reader type when it came to prints," Eury nodded to a rack of gray-green paper bearing blotchy letters of today's headlines. "You're not keeping up with the news?"

Arya frowned. "Obviously," she said. Was it such a bad thing? "I don't want the doom and gloom."

Eury finished her meal with a fierce shove of the meat into her mouth. She chewed for a good few seconds. "If he's the Norre Sterling in the prints, then you're already too late in trying to protect him. He's already in too deep," she said. "A few weeks ago, he raised the motion to grant fae equal rights as the rest of the citizens of the New Civils."

Arya's heart quivered. "Equal rights? Do we already have that as citizens of the New Civils?"

Her best friend shook her head. "Right now, we may be citizens but we have lesser privileges and opportunities as a lesser class," she said. "Institutions can deny us things that they normally wouldn't to humans. We can't get into some places without being prodded like crazy. There are places we can't go into because it's exclusive for humans. We don't have access to some things, like information, stating our opinions, or even being a witness in judicial proceedings."

Eury raised an eyebrow towards Arya. "Does that scream 'equal' to you?"

Arya had no choice but to shake her head. She hadn't thought much about it, mostly because it didn't concern her. She hasn't even wished to go into the humans-only establishments. She didn't want to invite danger. She survived this long with those principles.

"And if this motion gets approved?" Arya forced herself to ask. Eury wasn't the bullheaded woman she had come to know her friend as. It looked like Eury cared about the things that matter. That's what made her better than Arya, in more ways than one.

"Then, we will get to be just like regular humans," Eury drained her glass dry. "We can own permanent property, go to court, get access to high-paying jobs and not get stuck with the period-based contract that we do. We'd get more opportunities to flourish, the same way humans do."

Arya wrinkled her nose. "Isn't that a good thing?"

"For the fae, yes," Eury said. She had never seen her friend get this passionate about something. Mostly, it was just Eury playing around and not taking anything seriously. "But for the humans, it could introduce new competition and lesser chances for them. They're afraid. They don't want the fae taking over the society they built. It's all messed up."

Eury stood up and placed their pay for the meal on the table. She threw in a few coins for a tip. "More than half of the council is against it," she said as they ducked out of the restaurant. "Sterling's got a whole mountain to climb before him."

Arya picked at the chaps on her lips. Maybe she should try out those lip cosmetics as Cornelia kept bothering her about. It might help with her recurring problem of skinning her lips until they bleed. "Why was he doing that?" she wondered aloud as they started walking back to the Postal Quarters. "Isn't getting opposition enough to make you evaluate if you're still doing the best thing?"

Eury just snorted and said, "Say that to Norren about you breaking up with him and come back to me when you're sure it's still true."

Arya glanced at her friend, pondering about what was said and what was implied. When she couldn't muster the motivation to puzzle over it, she just threw her figurative hands up in the air and focused on her job, one that was responsible for paying the bills.

Still, she couldn't throw the ominous feeling at the back of her head. It told her to hide, to make sure the people around her were safe and not doing anything to make them stick out. And Norren...

She shook her head as she gripped the letter canister. Stop thinking about him and let him go his own way. If he preferred to chase butterflies without looking where he was going to fall, it's his problem. Not Arya's.

Or so she would have liked to force herself to believe.