Magic has a sound.
I didn't notice it at first.
It was soft—like breath moving through leaves, like a song you only hear when you stop trying to listen. The magical world hummed constantly, as if it was alive and aware of its own existence.
I stayed longer than I should have.
Days passed. Maybe weeks. Time never behaved properly in this universe. The sky changed colors depending on emotion, and the stars drifted closer when you felt lonely.
Eryx walked beside me through markets made of light and stone. People bowed when they saw him, but he never noticed. He only noticed me.
"You look like you're waiting to disappear," he said one evening as we sat near the upward river.
I laughed, because if I didn't, I might've told him the truth.
"I'm just… not used to staying," I said.
He picked up a glowing pebble and rolled it between his fingers. "Then stay until you are."
That was the dangerous thing about him. He spoke like forever was simple.
I helped him every way I could. We searched old towers for forgotten spells. We spoke to spirits who remembered when magic was endless. I taught him how to believe the future could still be rewritten.
And slowly—so slowly—I started believing it too.
At night, the world glowed brighter. Lanterns floated into the sky, carrying wishes written in gold ink. Eryx taught me how to write one.
Let this world live, I wrote.
He didn't read it.
Instead, he wrote his own and tied it carefully to a lantern. When it lifted, he smiled—not at the sky, but at me.
"What did you wish for?" I asked.
He hesitated.
"That you'd stop looking like you're halfway gone."
Something inside me cracked.
I wanted to tell him everything. About the other worlds. About how staying would tear something out of me. About how love here would hurt more than leaving.
But magic has a way of making you selfish.
So I stayed.
The longer I stayed, the more the world healed. Rivers flowed stronger. The sky lost its fractures. People laughed more freely. Eryx's curse weakened, like it was afraid of hope.
One night, he took my hand without asking.
I didn't pull away.
His touch was warm, steady—real in a way nothing ever was.
"Don't leave," he said quietly.
I looked at the sky. It was the softest blue I'd ever seen.
"I can't promise that," I replied.
He smiled anyway. "Then promise you'll come back."
I nodded.
I always nodded.
But deep down, I felt it—the pull between worlds tightening. Magic doesn't like being cheated. And the more I belonged here, the more the universe prepared to take its price.
That night, for the first time, the doorway appeared without me calling it.
And I realized something terrifying:
This world was starting to feel like home.
And homes are the hardest things to leave.