Page 72 of Academy of the Wicked: Year Three

But a different question escapes first, driven by curiosity that transcends immediate concern.

"In your world, do you have shifters and such?"

She pauses, considering with the particular focus of someone translating between languages that don't quite align.

"It's different here."The 'here' carries weight, suggesting not just physical location but fundamental reality."Power lies in the essential of magic and elemental grace."

Her hand moves through the air, trailing light that forms shapes—a bird becoming flame becoming water becoming earth, the cycle continuing without clear beginning or end.

"Can one shift? With magic, yes, but it's not a physical change."

The distinction feels important. Not transformation of flesh but of essence.

Not becoming something else but revealing what was always within.

"Interesting," I whisper, but the word stretches like taffy, distorted by exhaustion creeping even into this dream-space.

My eyes grow heavy—absurd given that I'm already asleep, but the sensation persists. The weight of too much happening too fast, understanding arriving in doses too large to properly digest.

"I'm sleepy," I admit, the words small and honest.

Iris's smile turns maternal, though she can't be much older than—well, than whatever age I actually am beneath this child-form.

"Which means it's time for you to continue your journey, youngling."

The term makes me pout harder, indignation cutting through exhaustion.

"You make it sound like you're old, but you're like me."

Her giggle is music made of wind chimes and crystal, delicate and multifaceted.

"The me on the surface is as beautifully youthful and naive as you and your team who are dipping into the edge of this grand world of centuries-old power."

Surface. Another layer of meaning—she exists differently here than in waking world.Youth there, age here, or perhaps neither and both.

"But the essence of my Seer abilities is passed down by heritage. So you're a youngling in my eyes, though you are destined for greatness."

Heritage.

Inherited power, like my fire crown, like Gabriel's authority, like the curse Elena placed that transformed two into one.

We're all carrying legacies we didn't choose, powers we didn't earn but must bear regardless.

My eyelids are so heavy now, each blink lasting longer than the last.

But there's something I need to say, need to ask, before this dream releases me.

"I wanna help my brother." The words emerge slurred with approaching unconsciousness. "I want us to discover what happened to lead us into becoming one and not staying as two separate people."

The admission carries more vulnerability than I usually allow. Gabriel isn't just my burden or my curse—he's my brother, trapped as surely as I am in this shared existence neither of us chose.

Iris nods slowly, her expression shifting to something deeper. Older. The beauty remains but transforms, like seeing the ocean's surface suddenly reveal its depths.

"You know the answer to that, though."

Do I? The memories are there but fragmented—Elena's jealousy, the spell that should have killed us, the merging that created impossibility. But knowing what happened isn't the same as understanding why, or more importantly, how to undo it.

She pauses, and I watch something change in her eyes.