The village never gave her a name. Not a real one.
They called her stray, witch's brat, curse-child.
She didn't correct them. She didn't have anything else to go by.
Cold wind slipped through the cracks in the wooden hut she slept in, brushing against her skin like cruel fingers. The old woman who grudgingly took her in only did so for the coin left behind with her—a coin long spent. Now she was more a burden than a child. A pair of hands for chores. A thing to be ignored.
But the girl remembered warmth once.
She couldn't remember faces clearly, but there were flashes in her mind—soft silks, a kind voice humming, a boy laughing and holding her hand. That was before the night everything disappeared. Before the carriage that took her away in the dark, before she was dumped in the village like a mistake no one wanted to claim.
She was only three then.
Now, at ten, she had grown used to silence. The children mocked her for her strange purple eyes, calling her demon-born. She had learned not to flinch. Not to answer. The bruises faded. The words stayed.
Some nights, she dreamed of lightning—of a tall castle wrapped in stormclouds, of voices calling her name. But no one ever said what the name was. She would wake up breathless, fingers clenched in the torn blanket, her heart full of a longing she couldn't name.
No one in the village knew where she'd come from. Or perhaps they did, but feared the truth too much to speak it aloud. Some said she was cursed. Others said she brought death. A few whispered that she had once been noble — a royal child cast out in secrecy.
She didn't care anymore.
She only wanted to leave.
It happened one winter, when the snow was thick and the world felt quiet. She was gathering wood outside the village when she saw it — a black-winged creature perched silently on a snow-covered stone. It looked like a shadow brought to life, and yet its eyes held warmth. Intelligence.
And it spoke.
"You are not meant to die in this place," it said, voice deep and echoing in her mind. "There is a tower beyond the dark woods, hidden from the world. Go there."
The girl stared, unsure if it was madness or a miracle. But the creature tilted its head, like it was waiting for her decision.
"I have nothing," she whispered.
"You have more than you know," it replied.
And then it vanished.
That night, with frost biting at her skin and her heart pounding, the girl stole away from the only home she'd known. She did not leave a note. No one would miss her. No one had ever really seen her.
She walked into the woods with no name, no voice, and no past that belonged to her.
But ahead — far ahead — waited the Mage Tower.
And there, she would finally become someone.