Fleeting on Dragonfly Wings

Delta Ace

It was one year later, the year I turned eighteen that really changed me. I was graduating, finally getting to leave the hellhole of a boarding school. After messing up Titus, he and his friends left me alone. I slept with a few others, losing track of those I had and hadn't been with. The ultimate sense of control was too great to pass up each and every night. True, I did spend some times without someone but I hated those nights. I was labelled dangerous, never getting the roommate I was supposed to. 

I wasn't ready to graduate. I had no inkling of what to do. Sister Claire wrote me, telling me to go where Queen Titania wants me. I ignored her message, pushing myself through the last of my classes. 

Then a letter arrived.

It was addressed to me from Alvara Academy, in Citadel, a city a good distance from here. I tore it open. The heading on the cream colored paper had Delta Ace scrawled across in fancy silver print. A crest stood in the center, the pictures too small fro me to understand. 

Dear Caius- We are excited to inform you that you've been accepted into Delta Ace, a guild prized on equality for all. Because of your unique set of skills and assets, we believe you are best for the next generation of our guild. Please arrive promptly in Citadel on xx.xx.xxxx, and move to the holding quarters of Alvara Academy. From there, you will be guided to Delta Ace. If you prove yourself in your initiation battle, we will gladly add you to our ranks. Please don't back away, this is the offer of a lifetime. -Zephyr

I stared at the letter, appalled. I was accepted into the prestigious Delta Ace, the one all my classmates gossiped about trying to get into. No one from a measly boarding school such as ours was bound to be accepted, in competition from the many planets and schools about. I couldn't accept the fact that they wanted me, of all fae. 

Along the bottom, I noticed something that shined. I had to hold the letter in a particular light just to see, scrawled in fancy lettering along the bottom, You are a vital asset to our future.

Was I really an asset? Who needed me, in a world where I had nothing and no one? I rushed downstairs to find Miss Flittish. She was the teacher I relied on, the one who taught me magic.

"Miss," I popped into her classroom.

She looked up from the papers she was grading. She moved down her reading glasses, the one she hated people seeing her wear. 

"Yes, Caius?" she asked.

I shut the door, holding the letter out to her. "I was accepted into Delta Ace."

"Delta Ace?" she quickly removed herself from her chair, her heels clicking across the floor as she rushed over. "Are you being serious?"

"No one could fake a letter like that," I held myself against the door.

"Caius!" she smiled. "I am so proud of you! You've worked so hard to get here."

"I didn't even know I wanted to be here."

"You need to be here," she squinted at the message along the bottom, finally resorting to putting her glasses back on. "It's said that this Zephyr fellow is one of the Cniva Observer Fae, with the power to see the future as it is. If he says you're needed for their future, you are absolutely needed."

"So I should go?"

"Of course you should go!" she hugged me before promptly stepping back, embarrassed. "You'll never get an offer compared to this one. You're needed, Caius. Finally, a place where you are necessary, not just lolling about, looking for a purpose. Is there nothing more comforting?"

"You're right," I brushed my hair back, thinking. I never had a purpose. My father would never allow me to amount to anything.

"You don't need to write back, just show up. You've got six days, you'd better get packing."