I stared at my now cold hands. I started imagining scenarios where I was bombarded by interviewers and my face would be broadcasted across the walls of estates across the empire. People would make paintings of me, either emphasizing my milky white irises or painting over them in black. I’d be taken on expeditions and conquests in order to heal soldiers and villagers. 

‘Madeleine, Madeleine, Madeleine!’ The people would chant, probably. My palms were getting clammy from just thinking about it.

Vincent snapped me back to reality. “Okay, so what do we do about this now?” he said.

“Mom and Dad might be coming home soon,” Axel reminded the two of us. “We should maybe go back into the house.”

“There’s dirt all over my legs,” I said. “I just took a bath this morning. I can’t do that again.”

“Oh, I was practicing a water spell today,” Vincent said excitedly. “I wanna test it out.”

Please don’t drench my whole body, I would’ve said. Vincent’s pride would’ve been hurt, though, so I didn’t.

He closed his eyes and balled his fists. A sphere of water was forming above my legs. The area around us seemed to be getting slightly colder as the sphere was forming.

“Vin, we don’t have time,” I exasperated, watching the sphere expanding ever so slowly. 

“Okay! Fine!” He released his fists, and the water fell to my legs and surrounded them. I flinched from the ticklish sensation.

Vincent lifted his right hand and straightened it out. Then he started moving it from left to right and back, as if wiping off a shelf. The water on my legs was doing the same motions. I really wanted to itch them. 

Vincent continued to scrub the air but more vigorously as time passed. Finally, he balled his fists again and lifted them up, causing the water to be lifted as well. My legs were completely dry, but they were also cold. I covered them up with my skirt.

“What are you going to do with the water?” Axel asked him as Vincent stared at the now dirt-contaminated sphere of water. 

“Um.” He looked around for a place to throw the water, then decided to throw it directly at the statue.

“What!?” I exclaimed as I got up. “Vincent!” 

“Sorry! I have bad aim!” He sputtered. “It’s fine, the statue needed a little cleaning, anyway.”

“With dirt?” I asked, but was cut off by Axel’s voice. 

“Okay, we should get going now.” Axel started walking out of the garden and we followed.

As we walked back into the mansion, I told Vincent, “Wow, so you actually aren’t bad at magic. Our family isn’t doomed, after all.”

“Oh no, I’m still bad,” Vincent said. “But that doesn’t matter anymore because now we have a divine magic user in our family.”

“Wait, we’re going to actually tell people?” A part of me wanted to forget that I had ever manifested.

“People are going to find out, anyway,” he explained.

“I guess that’s true. But still! Because of my white eyes I’ll probably become an idol to the Lights. And they might ask me how I got divine powers. And they might start thinking they could manifest stronger powers as well.”

“Now that I think about it, they might start having expectations for us, too,” Axel said, looking at Vincent. “If a Light could manifest divine powers, then the people will think that we’re basically gods or something.”

“Or they might start stupid rumors,” Vincent mumbled. “Okay, I see your point. But it’s really hard to hide divine powers.”

“Why?” I wondered.

“Even if you don’t want to activate them, whenever you or someone else is in pain, your subconscious will try to activate them by itself. It might also activate if you’re really, really mad at someone. I think you can learn to control it, but from what I read it can take years if you practice daily.”

“Years?” I was shocked. I didn’t even have the patience to practice daily for anything else in my life. This could’ve taken decades at the pace I went for things! 

“Is the last person who manifested alive?” Axel asked Vincent. “They could teach her, maybe.”

“He manifested when he was in his thirties and already had magical abilities,” Vincent replied. “I don’t think he’d be much help.”

“In his thirties?” I exclaimed. I was shocked by basically everything coming out of Vincent’s mouth. “Vin, I’m ten. Ten! Am I the normal one at this age? Or is he?” 

“Oh yeah, you are ten.” Vincent said the words as if it was a brand new revelation, then he looked down at me. “If you don’t stop looking so devastated, you’re going to look like you’re in your thirties, too.”

All the questions in my head distracted me from the fact that we had reached the stairs back into the mansion. By the time we had gotten back, our parents had already arrived from their errand and greeted us. 

“Maddie, why do you look so pale?” Dad asked, worried. 

When Vincent noticed that I wasn’t going to reply, he quickly said, “A-ah, it’s because we were playing… games, and Maddie’s really bad at games, you know that right?”

“Games? Why?” Mom questioned. “I didn’t know Maddie liked games.”

“We’ve introduced her to some,” Axel swiftly jumped in. “She was in a bad mood today, so I taught her how to play Traffic. Oh, without magic.

“I see. Well, you should go get some rest, Madeleine,” Mom told me. I was already going to do it, anyway. I went to sink down into one of the sofas and curled up into a ball. 

Axel asked if I needed help before he and Vincent went to finish up homework. I then remembered I had school for the rest of the week.

I’ll just force myself through…