Prologue[]
A once heartbroken wizard cradled a small, brown-haired girl, barely over the age of one, walking through Lamplight Town, with two newly crowned grandparents walking besides the man and the toddler. The girl felt overjoyed that day, but a little bit worried. Up until this point, she had only ever really known the adoption center and the caretakers inside.
Growing up, however, she would naturally forget this experience.
A few things stuck with her, though.
That tall blonde-haired man is her grandfather.
The red-haired woman walking next to him is her grandmother.
And the blonde haired man holding her? Well, he’s her father. His name was Lucas.
And he’s just a statue now.
Sobbing, she clung onto the crystal statue that was her father, soon falling into the embrace of her best friend, still incapable of being comforted.
With one hand, Aurora fiddled with a small, translucent, light purple crystal. “Phorite,” the island's scientists called it. The crystal that wreaked havoc on the island almost three years ago. The crystal that had torn lives apart. The crystal that took her father.
Almost three years and she had made no progress in getting him back. Just failure after failure after failure.
Aurora clenched the powerless Phorite crystal in a knuckle-whitening grip.
But she wouldn't give up.
She couldn't.
The Crystal Warden[]
An orphaned Astral Trainee leaned against the cool glass windows of the Academy’s Great Hall, eyes unfocused as she absentmindedly clenched and unclenched her fist around her Phorite crystal, palm indented by the sharp edges. Most of her friends were gathered around the room, chatting quietly, but she couldn’t hear what they were discussing, too deep into her own head to filter out the loud buzzing that came with her grief and never left since... it happened.
Hope glanced at the silent Astral Trainee from across the room, then looked back at Nathan. "Yeah, you're probably right...but we can't just do nothing."
Nathan shrugged. "I think she just wants to be left alone."
"And what if doing nothing does more harm in the end? And honestly, I doubt 'leaving her alone' for her birthday will make her feel any better."
"...fair enough. So we're back to square one again."
"Did we ever even leave it?"
Raiden flipped through a book, legs crossed as she sat on the window seat and effectively ignored everyone's idle chatter. Glace was holding one of her tarantula's, petting it.
Jax had tuned out his siblings' conversation, instead shooting a concerned stare across the room at Aurora.
Hope took notice, shifting her gaze from her worried brother to her red-haired sibling, who shrugged unhelpfully.
Birthdays...
Aurora continued staring out the window, catching on to the word. Three birthdays without her dad there to celebrate it with her–without him, was there any point to it?
Unless... I can get him back before mines? Maybe he could celebrate it with me this year?
She felt eyes on her, and turned around to see Jax sitting next to his older siblings, staring at her in concern. All she could offer was weak smile.
Jax glanced at his siblings, then stood up and walked over to the Astral wizard. He gazed at his friend. Her hair was tied back in its usual messy ponytail, but it had finally given up the last bits of blonde dye, reverting back to its natural brown. The once barely darkened circles around her eyes were now significantly darker. Jax sat down beside her, little droplets of the water constituting his right leg splashing onto the floor. "Hey...you uh..." Jax trailed off, realizing the pointlessness of the question. Of course she wasn't doing okay. Why even bother asking. "...hey," he said, attempting to correct himself.
"Hey." Aurora replied absently. Jax continued standing awkwardly next to her, and she sighed internally.
"I'm trying to... find something new to try." She didn't elaborate, Jax already aware of what she was talking about.
To be honest, Jax kind of wished he didn't know. He wanted to tell her that she's done all she could. That she couldn't keep pushing herself to do this.
But that little spark of hope...
"...like what?"
A good friend would tell the other about their concerns, right?
So why couldn't he?
"Hey look, I don't want to interupt you two being mushy or anything—"
A startled "eep!" escaped Jax while a huff escaped Aurora as, quite of nowhere, a spider lowered down on a silk between them, indicated a certain horned fey was standing behind them with her arachnids. It seemed rather disinterested in the two, of course, dropping onto the floor and scurrying over to the table to start building a web.
"—but are you two going to get to the part where you just talk about what's bothering you? We're all pretty aware at this point and scuffing your feet about the issue is starting to turn into a PDA-fest," Glace informed them quite bluntly, ignoring her pet and flicking her tail.
"I-ah-um..." Jax stammered.
There was nothing "mushy" about that. Aurora thought, only barely avoiding shooting the fey a pointed glare. Instead she sighed, discreetly pinching Jax's wrist to get him to stop stuttering–although the loud yelp wasn't much better.
"We're best friends, Glace." The Astral Wizard sighed. "And I already know that nothing's bothering Jax, because we tell each other everything. As best friends."
Jax just gave Glace an awkward smile. I'm a terrible best friend.
The fey sighed, but shrugged as if to say she tried and simply walked back to the window seat plopping down irritability.
Jax's shoulders sagged a little as Glace walked away. Whether or not this was out of relief or of dismay was unbeknownst to him.
But Aurora was right. They were best friends. They should be able to tell each other everything.
...right?
Jax took in a deep breath. "So...Aurora?" Jax started.