1. Sample of Introduction
Or is it.
Looking over the three grave markers, I let my most early memory wash
over me. My only memory from before feels more like a dream than anything. I
had to have been a very small child, maybe three or four, and I was lying in a tiny
bed shaped as a dollhouse, staring at my bare ceiling. Pretending that there were
glued-on glow-in-the-dark-stars on it, I pondered my existence. Was I real? Was
the world real? Or was I simply a character in a story being read to another child,
being put down to bed in another world?
A young blonde woman came in to turn out the light.
"Mom?"
The woman rolled her eyes and turned towards the plastic bed, "Yes?"
Pushing myself up, I was ready to explain my hypothesis. "Are we real?
Or are we just someone's story?" I pictured a storybook with a painting of our
earth on one page, and a painting of me in my dollhouse on the next. A young
boy was turning the pages for his smiling father, the two of them engrossed in my
tale.
"No,” she muttered, “You're real."
With a quick flick, my mother turned out the lights and turned away.
Disappointed, and doubtful due to lack of evidence, I lay back down and
closed my eyes.
I do still hope every once in a while, that maybe my life truly is a story, and
that it is simply in the middle of being told. After all, most stories that I have read
where people start out as little girls seem to end with them living happily ever
after.
I ran my fingers over the inscription of the center grave marker, and closed

2. my eyes. I fell onto my back, letting the grasses envelop me. This was the perfect
place to bury their bodies. The mountain overlooked a nation that could have
been. I turned onto my side and buried my face in the grass, somehow breathing
in life itself, when just a few feet below lay death.
“Has anyone ever told you that you’re a pessimist?”
I sat up, spinning on my knees towards the voice, and shot my hand out,
urging my silver to restrain whomever had snuck up on me. I gasped as my silver
did not change from the form that it held, as a chain around my waist.
A young, rather ordinary looking man was leaning against a smooth, rather
ordinary boulder. He looked rather sad, and quite out of place. All the ordinary
people had been seemingly extinct for a few years now.
“Elie,” said he, “that won’t be of any help to you right now,” nodding
towards my chain.
I sat poised, scanning the area, measuring my options for attack. Then I
realized that I not only did I have nothing left to fight for, I had a weapon that was
currently a useless chain of metal. I fell back onto my rear and held my knees
close to me. Chin buried, I stared at the ordinary. My chest hurt and my eyes
were steamy.
“What could you possibly want from me?” I choked. “Who are you?”
The ordinary man straightened himself up and walked to me. I clenched
my eyes shut. It was my turn. It was finally going to be over. He touched my face,
and my body froze. I realized he was just wiping off some blood. He kneeled and
put his face close to mine and concentrated on pulling muddy leaves and small
sticks out of my hair. I furrowed my eyebrows.
“Who- who are you? What are you doing…” I tried to focus on his face
through my ever blurring eyes, but eventually let the tears make tracks on my
face through the red and brown grime. I sobbed into my knees and the ordinary
grabbed me and held me tight to himself.

3. “Cry as long as you want. The wish went wrong again. But we have one
more.” He felt so familiar. “You don’t remember me, but we used to be allies. You
were my faction leader in another version of this reality, but I can grant you
another wish.”
I sobbed and shook my head, gasping for air. My head spun and I pushed
the ordinary away from me and leaned away from Nyle’s grave, retching up
stomach acid. The ordinary reached for me as I was coughing and I shoved him
away, crawling backwards on my elbows.
“Who the fuck are you?!” The ordinary opened his mouth to speak but I
had had enough. “Do you think this is some kind of fucking joke?! Yeah, the
ordinaries were wiped out, but that doesn’t mean that you can come mock me
when the leaders of the shifters have been TORN APART!”
The ordinary’s eyes were still locked onto mine, unflinching. The sad look
on his face had not budged.
He spoke, with confident, steady voice. “We have had this conversation a
number of times already, Elie. Do you want me to restore your memory?”
Tears still flowing freely I nodded and fell back onto my back. Whatever
was going on, I didn’t care. I hiccupped and felt a hand on my forehead. Whoever
he was, he seemed to know me from before. Very few knew that I had amnesia,
and they were all long dead.
The ordinary kneeled next to me and brushed away my tears. With one
hand resting on my arm, and his other hand still laying softly on my forehead, He
whispered into my ear.
“Remember, I’m James.”
And it all came back.
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
A young woman stumbled and stared around her, her eyes as bright and
as green as the lush wood that seemed to envelop every sound, every moment,

4. every breath. Her eyes were searching for something, anything familiar. She
grabbed at her chest, and gasped, though there was no visible wound. She did
not know anything, save for panic. Pushing through the branches, the trees
started to make room for her passage, spacing further and further apart, showing
the way out, hopefully showing a way towards safety. A small, lonely beach
materialized, and she kept running until she came upon a short wall on its
furthest side. Stumbling the last few precious steps, the young woman leaned
against the concrete barrier and laughed. Her hands slipped on the cracked
barrier; it could not be told at this point whether she was laughing, or sobbing.
The young woman pushed her dark locks away from her pale face and slid down
the wall until she was on the sand, slowly breathing in the unfamiliar salty air. A
burning pain in her chest bled into numbness and the world around her lost its
sound. She slowly opened her eyes to find the sunset, and with that bit of comfort,
allowed the world to go black.
“God damn!” I awoke half slouched over, having fallen asleep leaning
against the ancient little moss-covered wall. I stretched out onto my stomach,
completely sore from having slept in such an uncomfortable position. Propping
myself up on my elbows, I looked out towards ocean. The tide was slow and soft,
repeatedly meeting and parting with the shore. In and out, the waves would come,
each time leaving the wet sand fresh and clean of the little footprints of the
seagulls, that would quickly land and run about each time the water receded. I
smiled, loving this playful little world. Rolling onto my back, I closed my eyes and
absorbed the heat of the sun. The seagulls were still squawking, playing their
game of tag with the ocean, and the forest in the distance was letting the wind
pass through it with as many sighs as it had leaves.
The forest… I furrowed my brow, trying to remember. I had been there. I
remembered that. I had been running, panicked, but from what I had no idea. I
closed my eyes again. I failed to see how it mattered. This beach was certainly
peaceful enough, and there didn’t seem to be anything dangerous about it.

5. My eyes flew open. The sun was gone, and red and blue lights flashed in
the distance. My heart began to tighten and I struggled to get up, slipping in the
sand and realizing with a pang that I could barely stand, much less run. A strong
hand grabbed my wrist and pulled me, and a soft voice said, “This way!”
confused, I tried to follow their lead but could no longer gather the energy
necessary to run. In one motion the man swept me up in his arms mid-sprint
towards the ocean and whispered into my ear, “Remember, I’m James.”
I beamed up at my friend. He was laughing and wading into the water.
“So I think I may have let the amnesia for my next wish take effect a little
early.”
He snorted, “You think?”
I rolled my eyes, “Shit happens. I definitely did a great job on this last wish
though!”
Beaming and laughing, the two of us were submerged under water.
James immediately walked up marble steps out of the water.
We were coming out of a circular fountain pool that had white marble
steps leading down to the center on all sides, with wish granters walking in and
out of its waters. I squinted my eyes at the sun, feeling warmth with the
knowledge that I was back home, in our own world. “How am I supposed to
explain this one to Nyle?” I wondered. James scoffed. “That’s on you boss,” He
jerked his head towards a stern building made of red brick. “But your first stop is
the infirmary.