The Luna Academy

Memories

An unfamiliar place develops around me out of the darkness. It’s bright—too bright—and with every step, flowers burst into bloom at my feet, as if the ground itself is alive. A dizzy, shimmering euphoria fills me until it’s almost unbearable, and the sudden realization sets in.

“Am I dead?” The words slip out, even though no one is there to hear them.

“Ali…” A low rasp of a man’s voice drifts through the brightness.

I turn around to face where it’s coming from when I notice him.

“Dad?” I choke out, tears spilling down my face and blurring my vision.

I run toward him, but my body passes straight through. Gasping, I turn back and watch as he kneels, his arms wrapping around someone small. The air shimmers faintly, colors fading like an old photograph. When I move around to the front, I recognize the figure in his arms is a three-year-old me.

“Ali, it’s okay. I’m right here. Daddy’s got ya,” he soothes my younger self.

“I don’t want you to leave,” the little me sobs, wiping her runny nose.

I don’t remember this.

“I know,” Dad murmurs, smoothing my child-self’s hair, “but I have to go to keep you safe. Your mama will take good care of you.”

“Well, that’s a damn lie,” I snap, pissed, but my words go unheard by the specters in front of me.

“But why do you have to leave? I’ll be good if you take me with you,” The child me whines, clutching onto his pants, wrinkling it with her desperate fists.

“You won’t be safe with me. I love you. I know this is hard for you to understand, but this will let you live a normal childhood,” Dad’s voice breaks, but he stays firm.

The white surrounding us fades to black. Vertigo floods through me, making me queasy. I nearly vomit until another scene unfolds around me.

“Melinda, it was your duty to take care of her. How could you do this?” Dad demands, his voice trembling between fury and panic.

Mom’s sprawled out, nearly dead drunk on the couch, a bottle dangling from her perfectly manicured hand while the TV hisses static.

“Melinda! Pay attention. There isn’t much time. You have to listen,” he pleads desperately, but she doesn’t move. “Give this to Alyssa when she’s sixteen. It will help control her abilities.”

Dad holds out a folded note with a bracelet on top of it, barely illuminated by the tableside lamp shining in the room.

“Leave me be, you asshole! You’re gone. What do I care? You’re not real!” Mom shouts.

“Mom?” A seven-year-old me wipes her eyes as she walks towards the living room, where they are speaking.

The sound of something clattering on the floor draws my attention away from little me and back to Mom and Dad when I notice he’s disappeared along with the scene.

“Alyssa!” Dad wails, his voice echoing from nowhere.

I turn to face his screams when I’m transported to somewhere unfamiliar. The place reminds me of where Oliver took me that night in the woods, except it’s bigger and people are packed in like sardines.

Dad’s arms are tied in front of him as two men force him to his knees before another. He meets the man standing in front of him with a cold, hardline smile, leaving no trace of fear or emotion in his eyes.

“Where is the girl?” a man towering over Dad demands.

“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” Dad answers evenly, making my heart pang.

Did he forget about me?

“Liar!” the man roars.

The crowd takes up the word, chanting “Liar” in a steady, dreadful rhythm.

“Tell us where she is!” the man orders.

“Never!” Dad forces himself upright, facing him head-on. “And you won’t ever find her.”

“Only if you’re still alive,” the man snarls through clenched teeth.

He places a hand on Dad’s shoulder. Dad tries to shake him off but fails. With his other hand, the man holding Dad steady reaches behind his back, then brings it forward, revealing a large silver blade that someone must have placed there moments before.

As if he can see me, Dad’s gaze cuts directly to mine. “Goodbye.”

The blade sinks into his chest, slowly draining the life out of him. The current me runs to him, but instead of pushing the man aside, I run through him and see the same view from another angle. Even as Dad’s body hunches over, the man twists the knife further into his chest until the tip of the blade emerges from his back.

“Now… With your life is leaving your body,” the man mocks in his ear, “there’s no one to hide her any longer.”

The little light left within Dad flickers off like a candle being blown out by the wind.

Snapping awake in a cold sweat, I claw at my chest as if the blade had pierced me instead.

“Was that a dream?” I whisper to the empty room.

Sweat drips from my forehead, heavier than anything training could wring from me as my heart tries to beat its way out of my ribs. Unable to take it any longer, I fling back the covers, half ready to storm into Viola’s room and demand answers. The only problem is, I don’t know which one is hers, and I’m not brave enough to pound on every door until I find out.

Undeterred—or maybe desperate to be out of this hell-filled sauna I call my room, I step into the hall and freeze. Across from me, red curls bounce slightly as their owner shifts. Viola lifts her head from what looks like a nap. When her gaze meets mine, a slow smile curves her lips.

“Took you long enough,” Viola quips, yawning while stretching her arms before folding them neatly over her chest.

“Were you…waiting for me?” I manage to ask, my throat suddenly dry as sand.

“Maybe,” she coos, studying me with the unnerving, feline calm of hers. “You scream in your sleep, you know. The whole hallway could hear you.”

I swallow hard, trying to steady my shaking hands as my father’s last word—goodbye—echoes in my ears

“Sorry,” I utter, my head hanging low

Viola tilts her head and asks, “Nightmare?”

“I don’t know what it was.” The words scrape out like gravel. “It felt real. Like I was there… watching him die.”

Her expression softens, though only slightly.

“Dreams tied to bloodlines usually are,” Viola reveals.

I look up sharply.

“What’s that supposed to mean?” I press.

Viola pushes herself off the ground, using the wall for support as the dim corridor lighting catches her red curls.

“Nothing for now. But if you’re seeing what I think you’re seeing, it’s not just a dream. They’re memories: buried, borrowed, or forced.”

My stomach twists.

“How could I remember something I wasn’t a part of?”

“Maybe they weren’t your memories. The thing I lent you was an amulet. It’s supposed to show you something that needs to be seen,” Viola explains.

I press a hand to my chest again, the phantom wound burning beneath my skin. Viola’s gaze flickers to the movement, her eyes narrowing with suspicion.

“What did you see?” Viola questions.

“I… don’t know…” I trail off, unsure how to answer or if I even want to.

Viola grabs my wrist, her bracelets clinking with every movement, and shoves me inside my still-open door then shuts it behind her. I stand there staring at her as she takes in my room before grabbing the amulet I tossed onto the desk.

“Why did you give me that?” I demand.

“I had to,” Viola answers.

“What do you mean?”

“This…” She shakes the amulet in her hand. “…has been passed down through my family for generations, keeping our bond to the immortal witch, or as I like to call him, Grandpappy Lewis. In one of my dreams, I was told to give it to you.”