Epacia Academy: Year One (Epacia Academy #1)

Chapter 1

        The only thing I remember about my mother are the stories of strange human-like creatures living in a place us humans could never dream about. She spoke of these creatures as if she knew them, as if they were friends and family. Before she died, her last words to me were about these creatures. Not of love, of anything else in the world she could have said to me, it was about the Fae. Fae that i'm not even sure are real at this point. I'm not even sure why my mother was so obsessed with them, especially in her final days as her deliria progressively became worse. Ever since then, my brother and I have been searching caves and forests, not completely sure what we're looking for. Our mother's dying wish was to search for them, "Find them," her voice echoes in my ears, tears welling up in my eyes, "You need to protect yourselves, find the Fae. They will keep you safe, forever."

        My mother had always been eccentric, creative if that's how you'd wanna explain it. Many of her stories consisted of a castle, deep in the faerie realm. She described this castle and the many types of Fae that lived in these forests in great detail, reminiscing as if she had really known these creatures. She talked about the rulers of this realm with joy and happiness. I had always assumed it was because her father, my grandfather, had told her stories about these things. Could there possibly be a deeper meaning? I don't even want to think about what all this could mean. I sighed, rubbing my hands over my face, stepping over murky puddles and sharp,jagged rocks embedded in the path between every step.

        My mother lived in this small country town in northern ireland for most of her life, a population of only a bit over a thousand. My brother and I travelled here after my mothers death to stay with our Uncle. He doesn't exactly know of our whereabouts most of the time, but i'm sure he knows about mother's last words to me. If he had the same "stories" told to him as a child, he would know what my mother had said to me. We came here to search, as our mother told us to. We've been searching for months now to no avail. We've travelled deep into the forest at this point. There's really not many more places we could search, unless we stray further from the town. Any further could be very unlikely that we would find anything.

        Pushing more vines out of the way, I step deeper into the cave, my brother trailing behind me. I hop over the puddles of murky water, eyes trailing around the walls. After camping and walking through the dense, old forest for the last few weeks, we finally found a cave that, although dark and slightly terrifying, looked the tiniest bit promising.

        The cave around us was beautiful, there were jewels of various colors shining around us, jewels that I had never in my life seen before, glowing eerily in the darkness.The only sounds in the cave were the trickling of the water and our quiet footsteps.I watch as Jack runs his hands over the jewels as if he's entranced by their colors. The small waterfalls of water that were rushing out of the walls glowed as if they, too, were made of the colors themselves.

        I venture deeper into the cave, running my fingers across the walls, the glinting of jewels encrusted into the rocks of the wall. Glancing around, I see the vines swinging down around the walls, water droplets glistening as the light from our flashlights shine on them. It really was a beautiful cave. Beautiful things are sometimes deceiving, especially in these kinds of caves, where ethereal creatures could lurk around every corner. The fear started trickling through my veins, my heart started to pump faster as if it knew something was wrong. I shake my head, clearing my head and soon enough both Jack and I were going deeper and deeper into the cave. "I don't know if we'll be able to find our way back, it's been more than a few hours of exploring by now, it feels like we've been here forever." I mumbled, almost incoherently.

        Jack just shrugs and steps ahead of me, seemingly noticing something else in the cave. I look down and see a small purple glow being emitted from a corner of the cave. Slowly, one by one, the gems in the cave glow brighter, changing colours, shades of purple racing through the cave, pulsing, as if we were inside a heart. The walls glittering all shades of magenta and indigo, I look around, entranced by the dazzling colors dancing around in front of my eyes. My body relaxes, fear leaving my body. This was definitely not normal, my body relaxes yet my brain was racing, thoughts flying through my head like a hurricane. Jack puts his hand on my shoulder, "This doesn't seem normal..." he trails off.