Goodbyes

I awoke from my restless slumber, the bright sunlight greeting me with its blinding light. The light felt so intense that it forced me to once again close my eyes, hoping to block it out. While it did block out a majority of the brightness, a little bit of light was still sneaking its way in, replacing the usual darkness with a yellow colour. Seeing as this solution hadn’t quite worked, I chose to avert my head from the window. The act of turning woke me up more than I had hoped and I once again opened my eyes, but far more slowly this time.

As my feet left the warm sheets and touched the ground, it had seemed that the ground had also been warmed up from the piercing warmth offered by the sun. However, it would seem the ground had been heated to an almost unbearable extent. My feet were unable to stay on the ground for a long period of time due to the heat. The current circumstances almost made my eyes roll out of my head. I decided there was no point in trying to think of a normal solution and instead decided I’ll just cool the room with ice magic. I raised my hand out in front of me, and an azure mist started emitting from my hand, cooling down the floor and the room as a whole. Finally, without any other issues, I was able to get up from my bed and exit the room.

I washed my body with the freezing water we had for this purpose, however the coolness of the water had started to make me shiver. I wish I knew fire magic, then I’d be able to stop this issue as well. All I could do though was curse my terrible fate and instead tried heating myself with the towel, although it worked far slower then I’d have liked. While waiting to dry off, I noticed my reflection in the mirror. I was much taller than I had been in the past, and my hair had grown long enough to reach my waist now. After taking centuries to dry, I headed back to my room to get dressed.

When I started to get dressed in my lackluster clothing, I remembered that today Fae and I were going to be carrying out the promise we had made. Remembering this, I took off the clothes I had been putting on a moment ago and instead put on a nicer brown dress. This one was bigger than the one I had for when I was just a kid, but it also didn't look as nice as the other dress. Now I can finally make my way into the main room.

“Ugh. Where did all this stupid ash come from? It’s such a pain to clean up.” My mother complained, sweeping the ash on the floor into a nice pile in order for her to scoop it up in one try.

“I wonder what Fae burned this time.” I mumbled in a low tone voice making it inaudible to my mother. As I looked around the room I noticed Fae was nowhere to be seen. Maybe she was still sleeping, I thought to myself. Something interesting had caught my gaze as I looked around however. There was a letter and a ring on the table.

“Mom, what’s this?” I asked my mother about the strange occurrence on the dining table.

“No idea. It’s addressed to you so I didn’t bother looking at it.” She replied with a slightly annoyed tone due to her inability to pick up the ash all at once as it kept falling.

I stepped over to the letter and the ring slowly, letting out a big yawn on my way over. I picked up the letter. It seemed it was made of a high quality paper, a type which was not easy to get and would fetch quite a large price. As I went to open it, the ridges of the paper brushed against my fingers. It had a certain bulk to it unlike common paper, was slightly coarse, and was the most miniscule tinge of yellow. The texture was enough to cause me goosebumps. As I pulled out the paper, I recognized the hand writing to be Fae’s.

“Dear Celestia,

You have done well as my student. I found myself enjoying our time together more than I had ever imagined. Remember when I burned down the kitchen at my old place? You screamed so much. Talk about a memorable lesson, huh? I’ll never forget that place. Or you, of course. But it is for these reasons that saying goodbye will be so much harder. The king has requested me for something. I know we promised to go look for the meadow today, but I’ll be gone for quite some time as this is urgent. This ring beside the letter is for you. It’s proof that you’ve graduated from being my student. The ring allows you to amplify your power when using magic by a little bit. I promise that I’ll take you to that meadow one day. Don’t break the promise either, okay?

Love,

Fae”

I gently placed the letter back on the table and picked up the ring in order to further examine it. The green jewel shone beautifully, reflecting light in a stunning manner. When looking deeper into it, it looked as though water had been swirling around inside the jewel, but it was just an illusion created by the reflecting light and the patterning inside. The ring part itself was pretty heavy and shone like gold. On second thought, maybe it is real gold? How Fae would have gotten real gold is another story though. As I traced my index finger around the inside of the ring, I felt some odd ridges. There was an engraving. I tried to make it out but to no avail. Maybe it was another language? I doubt it though. Fae didn’t have an accent, and never said she could speak anything else. I put the ring onto my right index finger and it slid on with no struggle at all. It was as if it was designed to fit my finger.

“Mother.” I started, getting her attention. “I’m going to go on a journey and learn more about magic. One day, I’ll be able to heal the people who lost the function of their limbs. When that day comes, I’ll be coming back to heal father.” I continued making sure to display the inner depth of my resolve to her.

“Your father and I knew one day you would go out on a journey.” She began slightly sighing during her words. “It’s not like I can say no, right? You’re old enough to make your own decisions now. We even prepared a present for this day.” She walked over to a drawer and pulled out a black sundress. She held it up by the shoulders and it unfurled to its full size.

I gently took it from her hands with a smile across my face. I quickly ran to my room to put it on. The softness of the material wrapped my body as if it was a blanket rather than clothing. I quickly ran back into the main room now. Both my father and mother were there, waiting to see my reaction.

“How do I look?” I asked.

“Lovely.” They both responded with a warmth in their voice far greater than anything the sun was giving off earlier.

As I walked over to the door, my father handed me something wrapped in cloth. I took it into my hands looking at it with my eyebrows raised.

“It’s food and some money. More specifically, food for 3 days, but it’s nothing fancy. Just some bread. The money isn’t much either, but it should help for starting your journey.” He explained, noticing my visible confusion.

With a wide smile, I thanked him and quickly put on my shoes. I embraced my parents for a few minutes, all of us sharing warmth with one another one last time. Finally, I turned away and walked out of the home. I looked back once more to wave at them. They responded with a wave of their own. Before I could turn my head away, I caught just the slightest sight of my parent’s faces going red. Before I could hear their sobbing, I had already walked away from earshot.

I went towards the village square, making it there in thirty seconds at a somewhat brisk pace. It would seem having longer legs than before made it far quicker to get here than when I was younger. I let out a small laugh thinking about that time, but quickly stifled it in order to avoid getting a lot of concerned looks.

“There you are!” I exclaimed pointing towards three men loading cargo into their open carriage.

“Us?” one of the men asked, confused about who I was talking to.

“Yes! Would it be fine if you give me a ride over to the next village?”

“Well I guess that’s fine, but you need to be ready to leave now.”

“That’s perfect. I’m ready to go.” I hopped onto the back of the cart. We began to take off, initially at a slow pace, and then quickening as we reached outside the village. I hope I’ll be able to find out how to properly heal others and make sure the people of my village are able to get the help they deserve. Maybe I’ll even meet Fae while travelling around.