CHAPTER 6 - PAGES OF A FORGOTTEN KINGDOM
1055 Words
Rosavino’s public library had once been a monastery. Now, it was a cathedral of silence and secrets, with tall archways and sun-dusted windows that filtered the light like blessings. The smell of old vellum and beeswax polish lingered in the air, mixing with whispers of history.
Ayra walked with purpose, ignoring the creak of the floor beneath her boots. She made straight for the regional history shelves, her fingers already brushing spines in search of anything—anything—that might validate what she had seen, felt, dreamed.
She settled at a long oak table near the cloister courtyard, stacking volumes until the surface nearly groaned beneath the weight of forgotten knowledge.
Hours passed like clouds on wind.
Latin charters. Lombard land lists. Florentine trade ledgers. Her vision swam across lines of faded ink and crumbling margins. Her fingertips grew gray from dust. She flipped through centuries in silence.
Nothing. No kingdom of Elvencia. No Seraphina. No Caelum.
Yet scattered through the texts were fragments—shards of something broken but not erased.
A worn 14th-century map labeled a valley “Elenzio,” nestled precisely where her dreams had shown rivers and forests. A crusade roster mentioned a now-lost banner: Silvanian Hawk, bearing a crest like the one etched into the sword’s hilt. A curious poem in early Tuscan spoke of a “silver-eyed maiden who fled fire with her shadowed knight.”
Coincidences? Perhaps. But to Ayra, they rang like echoes in her bones.
As afternoon light slanted golden through the clerestory, the head librarian, Signora Dell’Aquila, wheeled out a cart of unsorted donations. She gave Ayra a nod and smile. “Fresh from the archives,” she said.
Among the books was a cracked leather portfolio, tied shut with a faded green ribbon.
Ayra hesitated—then asked to examine it.
Inside were parchment fragments: illuminated letters, partial maps, fragile sketches pressed like pressed petals between brittle covers. The portfolio smelled of smoke and cedar.
One page caught her breath. A single line, in archaic Italian script, danced like a ghost off the page:
“E così cadde Elvencia, le ali del falco spezzate sotto cieli cremisi…”
And so Elvencia fell, the hawk’s wings broken beneath crimson skies…
The date: 1105 A.D.
She felt the air thin. Her pulse quickened.
Page by page, her hands trembled.
And then—there it was. A faded drawing in ink and gold leaf.
A young woman in a torn gown, clinging to a crescent moon pendant. Beside her stood a knight—tall, somber, armored in flowing lines—with a sword unmistakably like the one Ayra had unearthed. The cross-guard, the symbol, the bearing—everything matched.
Beneath it, a barely legible caption:
“Seraphina e il suo ombra silenzioso—Caelum.”
Seraphina and her silent shadow—Caelum.
Ayra’s vision blurred. Her lungs refused breath. She closed her eyes, whispering aloud, “This is real…”
“Whoa.”
A voice broke through her daze.
She turned.
It was Luca Benedetti. Childhood friend. Neighbor. University folklore student. He stood there with an armful of poetry anthologies, one eyebrow raised. His lopsided grin was still the same, but there was a new gravity in his gaze.
“You look like you’ve seen a ghost,” he said.
“I might have.” She gestured to the portfolio, still open like a wound.
Luca leaned over, curiosity flaring. He studied the script, then ran a finger carefully along the ink. “This is early medieval—pre-Hohenstaufen era. Rare. You found this here?”
“Donation cart.”
He whistled low. “Most of this would’ve ended up forgotten in a basement box.”
She pointed to the caption. “Look at the names.”
“Caelum,” Luca read. “Latin. It means sky.”
Ayra nodded. “And Seraphina. They match the names from my dreams. From… from what I saw.”
She swallowed hard. “Luca, if you found something impossible—something that didn’t fit any logic—but it felt alive, would you believe it?”
He looked at her then, really looked, the grin fading. “I’d listen.”
Relief washed over her.
She told him everything.
The sword. The visions. The burning castle. The name Caelum whispered in her sleep. The way the pendant from her dreams matched the one in the illustration.
Luca didn’t interrupt. He didn’t scoff. When she finished, he leaned back, thoughtful.
“I’m writing my thesis on migratory legends,” he said. “Stories that travel through time by word of mouth—hidden in lullabies, regional songs, local ghost tales. If Elvencia existed, and was erased, it could’ve survived in whispers. Your dreams…” He tapped the parchment gently. “They might not be just dreams.”
“Or,” Ayra added, voice trembling, “they’re memories. Reincarnation.”
He didn’t laugh.
“Some stories,” he said, “are older than reason. And some souls, I think, remember more than others.”
They packed the fragile pages carefully, photographing each one for Luca’s university archive. As they stood from the table, Ayra felt as though she were standing between two worlds—one of light filtering through library glass, the other of burning skies and vanishing kingdoms.
Outside, dusk had wrapped Rosavino in soft lavender. The bell tower rang six times, slow and resonant.
Ayra looked at the sky—flushed pink, then deepening toward blood orange—and whispered, “It looks like the night Elvencia burned.”
Luca turned his gaze skyward. “You still feel it?”
She nodded, almost afraid. “Every time I close my eyes.”
They didn’t speak as they walked down the cobbled path past the garden. Somewhere, a violin played from an open window. The breeze carried rosemary and dust, like a forgotten prayer.
By the time they reached her house, the sky had deepened to indigo.
Ayra paused at the gate. “Thank you, Luca. For… not thinking I’m crazy.”
He offered a small smile. “You might be. But maybe history is too.”
And for the first time since the sword, since the dream, since the name Seraphina first left her lips—Ayra didn’t feel alone.
Something ancient had stirred.
And it would not sleep again.
- Writer
