11 years ago...

The Prince of Azuris was lost in a stack of etharis files dating back to the Gods, while laughter and music hummed along the walls of the Estate, fluttering down the swirling hallways into the Grand Archives where he sat.

He flicked through each leaflet with waning enthusiasm. Any distraction from the ball upstairs, even one so urgent, was welcome. But beneath his vision, the words seemed to melt off the page, the dark ink blending together and morphing into strange shapes.

Sorein sighed roughly, rubbing his eyes with the heel of his hand as he tossed the file away with the others.

Perhaps he was wrong.

Not everything was more entertaining than boastful royals and bland bread.

He'd never considered the whole world might be dull.

He once wondered if he simply wasn't trying hard enough, imagining what he might find engaging.

But Sorein came up short every time.

Of his many disinterests, he found people intruding on his personal space the most annoying, something he prayed to Aida would not disrupt him tonight.

Just then, the Lord of Medeis burst in with the gravest look on his face. The sun-tanned man looked flushed as worry tugged at his brows and tightened his jaw.

Sorein almost felt sorry for the Lord, leveling him with the least irritated stare he could manage.

"Have you seen the Princess?"

Sorein lifted a brow. "Which one?"

Most of the globe's royalty was in the Estate celebrating the Spring Equinox. There was likely more than one princess at the ball.

"Princess Dalaminai," he said, the tone implying the Prince should've known.

Sorein couldn't even recall what the Princess looked like, let alone whether he'd seen her. For urgency's sake, he shook his head and shrugged.

"I haven't seen anyone in hours."

The Therian Lord took off without another word, leaving the room silent once again.

Sadly, the silence was short-lived as a small figure dashed in through the very same doorway.

Sorein barely caught sight of her before the door slammed shut and she was deep within the aisles of books and files. A tail-length braid fluttered after her, long and wild, the color of hot coals tossed in the water.

The amber hair ebbed behind her just long enough for him to rise and follow.

"Hey, you're not supposed to be here!" he called after her.

Sorein heard the girl whimper before he caught sight of her, cornered against two bookshelves. Big, bright lime-colored eyes stared up at him, flooded with tears.

He stared at her, taking in her white Temple clothes and the freckles peppering her blotchy, red cheeks. The girl stood nearly half his height, though he was taller than most. But he knew better than to call her young. Perhaps she was close to his age.

He noticed the crescent ears, arching back like small moons. Therian then. Though strange, as the top didn't quite tip back down.

Sorein had never seen a Therian with ears resembling Fae heritage, even if they'd only been measuring time for four-hundred and fifty years.

She swallowed the sob in her throat and straightened herself. But her legs trembled, small clenched fists vibrating.

Sorein squatted down to her height and looked her straight in the eye, cooling the edges of his voice. "The Grand Archives aren't a fairground."

A tear streaked down her face and she seemed to be holding her breath.

"Cae Tusa?" he murmured, the Therian tongues rolling off his own with ease.

Her eyes widened, a pointed stare aimed at his ears. As if the sight of his Fae lineage made her want to cry more.

Sorein asked again, even softer this time. "Who are you?"

"Ti Cae, Iliya," she whispered back, barely vocalizing the words.

"Nice to meet you, Iliya," he said in the common tongue. "Ti Cae, Sorein."

A ghost of a smile traced Iliya's lips. "I'll bet you don't know any more words."

"I'll have you know, I'm fluent in Therisi." He smirked.

Iliya giggled and scrubbed the tears from her eyes, nervously peeking over Sorein's shoulder.

"Do you tire of those stuffy royals too? Or are you hiding for another reason?" he asked.

Hesitating, she seemed to consider his inquiry for a moment, then she stepped around him and began running her hand over the spines of untouched biographies.

"Hiding then?"

She nodded as she traced a line through the dusty tomes with her finger, tracking all the way to a copy that appeared to catch her eye.

The Therian recoiled, looking up at Sorein then back at the spine's engraving.

"What?" he asked, glancing at the old book of bloodlines. A Fae copy, he noted. "Do these scare you?"

Sorein flicked the small points of his own ears.

She blinked, brows furrowing.

Iliya murmured a word he had never heard in Therisi before. To herself more than him. Then she lifted her gaze to meet his.

"You don't know who I am, do you?"

"Should I?"

"I don't know Prince, should you?"

Sorein laughed. "So you know who I am then."

Iliya nodded, her smile growing until a pounding on the door stifled it. Her body stiffened, seemingly paralyzed at the sound of a man yelling.

"We know you're in there, Princess!"

Sorein slowly reached out to block her from sight, but Iliya had already broken into a run. She tore down a row of bookshelves that opened up to a looming pillar of obsidian. It stretched from beneath the floor and continued through the ceiling. A steel railing wrapped around the outside, keeping away straying hands.

The obsidian Aphyre, marbled black and wrapped in ancient, archaic sigils from the planet's crust, pierced upward to a glimmering point that peaked in the Throne room above.

As a boy, he was told the Gods sealed the three planes together with their final breath, casting spells that bound The Void, The Living, and The Afterlife through the Aphyre. Some even believed the Aphyre extended out of The Void itself.

The door swung open behind them and two Lords charged into the Grand Archive with rotten, bunched-up faces.

"Where is she?" One of them snapped, still several shelves away.

He didn't know.

A scream had Sorein whirling to face the Aphyre. He caught only a glimpse of the Princess as she fell through the sealing barrier into the dome of steel below.

Sorein gasped, stunned by the failed magic as the yelling Lords shoved past him.

Centuries old and forged from the strongest spells.

Broken.

He didn't know why the world began ringing or when the ground began to quake. He only had seconds to throw out his hands and summon a shield before a cloud of darkness enveloped them.