CHAPTER ONE : THE GIRL WHO DREAMED OF WINGS
1308 Words
The first time Elena Vale dreamed of the sky burning, she was seven years old.
The second time, she was twelve.
The third time, she was twenty-four.
By then, she had stopped telling anyone.
In the dream, the world was always ending.
Not slowly.
Not with the gradual destruction people imagined when they spoke of war or famine or the end of the world.
It ended all at once.
The moon hung enormous in a blackened sky, fractured down the middle as golden light poured through the cracks. Mountains floated upside down in the distance. Rivers rose from the earth and twisted through the air like silver serpents. And beneath her feet was a vast circle of ancient symbols glowing beneath a layer of ash.
There were voices too.
Thousands of them.
Whispering.
Calling.
Begging.
But Elena could never understand what they were saying.
Until tonight.
“Wake up.”
Her eyes snapped open.
Elena shot upright in bed, gasping for air.
Her room was dark.
For several seconds, she didn’t move.
Her heart hammered against her ribs as she stared into the darkness, trying to convince herself that she was awake.
The dream was still clinging to her.
The burning sky.
The golden light.
The voices.
And the wings.
She had seen them again.
Six enormous wings spread across the sky, brighter than the sun itself.
Except this time, she had seen the person standing beneath them.
A woman.
A woman with long silver-white hair and eyes that glowed like molten gold.
A woman who looked exactly like Elena.
Elena swallowed.
“No.”
She pushed the blanket away.
It was just a dream.
It had always been just a dream.
She reached for her phone on the bedside table.
3:17 A.M.
“Of course.”
She rubbed her face.
She hated 3:17.
She had been waking at exactly 3:17 for almost two weeks.
Always from the same dream.
Always sweating.
Always with that strange feeling that someone—or something—was watching her.
Elena reached for the glass of water beside her bed.
The moment her fingers touched it, the glass cracked.
She froze.
A thin line appeared across the surface.
Then another.
Then another.
The glass shattered in her hand.
Elena screamed.
She dropped it.
Pieces scattered across the floor.
Her palm was bleeding.
She stared at the blood.
Then something strange happened.
The wound began to close.
Not slowly.
Not naturally.
The skin pulled itself together beneath her eyes.
The blood disappeared.
The cut vanished.
Elena stared at her palm.
Her breathing stopped.
“No.”
She turned her hand over.
Nothing.
Not even a scar.
Her bedroom door creaked.
Elena spun around.
“Mom?”
Silence.
She climbed out of bed.
“Mom?”
Still nothing.
She stepped toward the door.
The hallway outside was dark.
Then she heard it.
A whisper.
So faint she almost convinced herself she had imagined it.
“Aurelia.”
Elena stopped.
Her skin prickled.
“What?”
The whisper came again.
“Aurelia.”
She stepped backward.
“Who are you?”
The lights in the hallway flickered.
Once.
Twice.
Then every bulb in the house exploded.
Elena screamed.
Darkness swallowed everything.
For a moment, there was absolute silence.
Then something moved downstairs.
A heavy scrape.
Like claws dragging across the wooden floor.
Elena’s heart began pounding.
She reached for her phone.
No signal.
She tried the emergency light.
Nothing.
“Mom?”
No answer.
She grabbed the small lamp from her bedside table and held it like a weapon.
The sound came again.
Scrape.
Scrape.
Scrape.
Something was coming upstairs.
Elena backed toward the wall.
Her instincts screamed at her to run.
But there was nowhere to go.
The footsteps stopped outside her bedroom.
Silence.
The doorknob slowly turned.
Elena held her breath.
The door opened.
A man stood in the doorway.
At least, she thought it was a man.
He was tall.
Too tall.
His skin was unnaturally pale, and his eyes were completely black.
No whites.
No pupils.
Just darkness.
Elena couldn’t move.
The man smiled.
“You finally woke.”
Her fingers tightened around the lamp.
“Who are you?”
He tilted his head.
“You don’t remember me?”
“No.”
His smile widened.
“Of course you don’t.”
He stepped inside.
Elena felt something inside her chest suddenly burn.
She grabbed at her shirt.
A strange sensation spread across her skin.
Heat.
Light.
Power.
The man stopped.
His expression changed.
For the first time, he looked afraid.
“No.”
Elena stared at him.
“What?”
He took a step backward.
“No, no, no.”
The strange heat inside Elena’s chest intensified.
A golden light began shining through her skin.
The man stared at her as though he were looking at something impossible.
“You’re not supposed to awaken yet.”
Elena shook her head.
“I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
The light grew brighter.
The floor beneath her feet began to tremble.
“What did you call me?” she whispered.
The man didn’t answer.
Instead, he whispered something in a language Elena had never heard.
And yet she understood every word.
“The Celestial One has returned.”
Elena’s eyes widened.
“What does that mean?”
The man lunged.
Everything happened at once.
A thunderous sound shook the house.
The windows shattered.
The walls cracked.
And a burst of golden light exploded from Elena’s body.
The man was thrown backward as though an invisible force had struck him.
He crashed through the hallway wall.
Elena stared at her hands.
They were glowing.
Not brightly.
Not like a flashlight.
Like sunlight had somehow been trapped beneath her skin.
Golden symbols began appearing across her arms.
One after another.
Ancient.
Beautiful.
Terrifying.
She didn’t know what they meant.
But somewhere deep inside her mind, something did.
A memory surfaced.
A voice.
A woman’s voice.
Soft.
Familiar.
“When the world forgets you, remember who you are.”
Elena staggered backward.
Another voice followed.
“Your name is not Elena.”
Her knees weakened.
“No.”
“Your name is Aurelia.”
Elena shook her head violently.
“No!”
The room flashed white.
And suddenly she was somewhere else.
She stood beneath a sky filled with stars.
Not Earth’s sky.
These stars were enormous.
Close enough to touch.
A magnificent city floated above an endless sea of clouds, its towers made from gold and crystal. Rivers of light flowed through the sky. Thousands of winged figures moved between enormous gates.
And standing before her was the woman from her dream.
Silver hair.
Golden eyes.
Six wings.
She reached toward Elena.
“My daughter.”
Elena couldn’t breathe.
“Who are you?”
The woman’s expression broke with sadness.
“You.”
The world shattered.
Elena fell back into her bedroom.
She screamed.
The golden light vanished.
Everything went dark.
And then she heard a voice behind her.
Not the man’s.
Something older.
Something vast.
Something that seemed to come from everywhere at once.
“Aurelia has awakened.”
Elena slowly turned.
The creature she had thrown through the wall was gone.
But carved into the floor where he had stood was a symbol.
A circle surrounded by six wings.
Elena stared at it.
She didn’t understand what was happening.
She didn’t understand who Aurelia was.
She didn’t understand why a stranger had come looking for her.
But she understood one thing.
Her life had just changed forever.
And somewhere beyond the walls of her home, something ancient had felt her awakening.
Something that had been waiting for her for centuries.
Something that was coming.
For her.
Elena Vale had spent twenty-four years believing she was human.
Tonight, the heavens had begun to remember her.
And hell had heard her name.
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