CHAPTER THREE
A Letter, The Secret, and The Curse
__________________________
Two Years Ago...
The letter didn't arrive with any grand fanfare. No owls. No wand waving. No crest-emblazoned courier.
It came the way most things did in their small North Yorkshire flat—wedged between a gas bill and a takeaway flyer, in a stack of post left half-soaked on the welcome mat.
Lyra Sorin nee Hartwell, Erin's mother and pediatric nurse working at the local hospital In Whitby, New Yorkshire, scooped it up—barefoot and bleary-eyed from the night shift. It wasn't until she reached the kitchen counter that her gaze lingered on a pristine envelope.
At the front of the envelope was a large dry seal of some sort of school logo with wisteria vine curling around a mountain, petals caught mid-fall, almost covering the full width of the envelope. Around the bottom half of the dry-sealed logo, it stated Shinjuu Academy.
Lyra turned the envelope over in her hands. It felt thick, heavier than ordinary mail, the paper cool and textured. She was startled. At the back of the letter, her daughter's name was printed in ink—neat, calligraphic, precise.
MISS ELEANORE H. SORIN
17 Hawthorn Crescent
Whitby, North Yorkshire
YO21 1JW
United Kingdom
Lyra Hartwell—nurse, widow, pragmatist—narrowed her eyes.
"Sweetie," she called, cautiously, like someone testing the air before stepping into fog. "There's... something here for you."
Erin padded in, still in her pajamas, glasses slipping slightly down her nose.
She blinked at the envelope. "It's not yet my tenth birthday, is it?"
Her mother’s lips curled into amusement and handed the envelope to her Erin. Her daughter was an odd mix of ageless grace and gentle childish whims. It seemed that magic was the theme for the day. She watched as Erin surveyed the envelope critically, turning it once, twice, and another for good measure, Lyra snickered in fondness, “No owl deliveries dear. Just old fashion Mr. Mailman delivery. Have you been reading that story to your brother again?”
“Just checking, mom. You’ll never know. What if this is the start of magic?” Erin gently quipped. She squinted. She could have sworn she saw a shimmer where her name was printed. A trick of the light, she thought after a second look when it didn't. In a tone filled with mock disappointment, a voice that didn’t match her -ten year old body, she huffed, “Well, just regular mail. Darn it.”
Inside were a stack of documents, with the regular kind of A4-sized paper, and a cream-colored letter on textured paper, pressed with a wax seal in silver. The same emblem showed a wisteria vine encircling a mountain, delicate and timeless.
Erin read it once. Then twice. The third time, her hands began to tremble, “Mom, it's not magic but it sure feels like it.”
___________________________
_____________________________
Erin's fingers tightened around the edges. "It's... a school. In Japan."
Lyra took the letter gently, eyes scanning with the same clinical precision she used at work. A full scholarship. International gifted program.. Shinjuu Academy. Her brow furrowed deeper with each line. "I don't remember submitting an application. This—this can't be real."
"It feels real," Erin murmured. The paper felt real. Heavy and cool. It didn't crinkle like normal paper. It whispered.
Lyra didn't respond. She stood in silence for a long moment before finally setting the letter down. There was even a family relocation clause, including entry options for siblings. A transitional sixth-grade program for cultural acclimation, regardless of prior academic completion. All these sounds too good to be true for a scholarship grant for High School. It was in Japan, another country.
None of it made sense.
Which is why Lyra—eternal skeptic and pragmatic mother—had done what any sane woman would do.
She checked for scams. She checked out the school online. She cross-referenced names, maps, and hidden wiki pages.
And then, when the logic ran out, she thought about his box.
"Go wake your brother. It's time for breakfast." She gestured to Erin towards upstairs, "Then, help me set the table, sweetie."
Erin was curious but held it in. Mother just came back from work. Erin nodded and hurriedly went upstairs, filled with expectation and new dreams. Later, she can ask her mother what to do about the letter.
Lyra then disappeared into the hallway.
The box had been tucked behind a wall panel in the coat closet. Untouched since the funeral, right after COVID year. Erin had seen it once—brown leather, tarnished latch, initials barely legible.
A.S.
Lyra placed it on the table. Her hands hovered over the lid like she was unlocking something ancient. She opened it slowly.
Inside: a few yellowed documents. A photo. And a single folded slip of paper. She picked it up, and held it to the light. It was the same texture. The same smell. Her heart started to pound.
One number. Written in her husband's handwriting. International prefix. No name.
A memory surfaced—faint, like an echo. Her husband, standing by the window at dusk. A quiet conversation. "If a letter ever comes for Erin or Kael," he had said, "don't ignore it. Even if it sounds impossible."
She hadn't understood then. She wasn't sure she did now. She took a shuddering breath to ground her, as she dialed the number anyway.
The line rang only once.
Then a voice. Warm and old. Familiar in a way that made her knees weak, "Lyra."
Her breath caught. "Who is this?"
"You already know."
She did. It was someone her husband had known. Trusted. Someone who shouldn't be alive, not if the stories were true.
"Is the school real? Is it safe?"
A pause. Then: "Yes. Shinjuu is safe."
"I don't understand. Why in Japan?"
"Your husband had enemies. And, something brought their interest to Europe. You must leave the continent." He said solemnly. "The school... is a haven of sorts, but it is not without danger. Your husband meant this as a last resort."
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"What do you mean, a haven? And danger? What is this about? And what about you? " Her mind was working a mile a minute. Her voice cracked. "What happened to—"
"Child of my heart, I will tell you when it is safe." The voice broke her rambling with a tone of patience and age-old wisdom. "It is imperative to keep the children safe. You may have noticed the signs, dear child. There is more to the Sorin name."
Silence. Then: "You can refuse. But the invitation won't come again."
"I don't understand." Her mind grasped at what would make sense. She whispered, "He was always the mysterious kind."
She remembered how nature became more vibrant when their family went on camping trips. The birds were more playful, more friendly as they sang in the mornings. The rivers were always crystal-like as if to showcase themselves. The weather is always at perfect temperature, cool and refreshing, with plenty of clouds providing shade every now and then. The trees felt more alive, a feeling of content as the wind gently ruffled the leaves. She remembered how every excursion they had seemed perfect like in fairy tales, and then she would tease him, how he must have been Snow White's son or the son of an elven lord left behind in their world. And he would laugh it off.
Then her mind seized at the thought of her children being harmed, "What would happen to Eleonore, she’s barely ten? Dear God, Kael is just seven! What is this about Vaelen Sorin? He died in a freak car accident years ago. I buried his body, for God’s sake! And now, you are telling me he was murdered all this time!?"
"Breathe, child. I understand this must cause you a great amount of distress. I give you my word, just as the word of my line swore to the name of Vaelen Sorin, I will tell you what you need to know." The voice said gently, "But time is of the essence, and we must make haste. When it is safe, I will find you. Your children... for all intents and purposes, remain dormant. Be at ease, but remain vigilant. Do not leave traces. "
The call ended.
Lyra stared at the receiver for a long time. She closed her eyes, and took a deep shuddering breath. A glint in her eyes showed determination, her jaw clenching at the thought of looming danger and heavy decisions. Then she looked down at the slip of paper in her hand.
She struck a match.
It curled instantly into a green flame.
She didn't even flinch.
She watched as the green flame slowly consumed what her husband had written. Her mind was running a mile a minute, of scenarios that could be and should not be. But even as the flames burned the last of the parchment, its ember flickering into smoke, her resolve burned much brighter—a mother’s will to keep her children safe.
Even if it meant uprooting everything she ever knew. Even when the world seemed not to make much sense at the moment.
She will protect her children.
___________________________
In the kitchen, Erin waited with her untouched tea. Kael sat cross-legged on the floor, humming to himself and trying to turn a spoon into a spaceship.
Lyra returned, the faintest scent of cedar smoke trailing behind her. She placed the letter back in Erin's hands.
"We're going," she said, her voice soft, steady. "All of us."
Erin's eyes widened. "Really?"
Kael perked in curiosity, "To where, mom?"
"To Japan, dearest." Lyra smiled, but it didn't reach her eyes. "Your father would've wanted it."
And then, they were all caught up in their preparation for moving to a new country. After a flurry of calls and swift packing and arrangements barely a month later, their family of three found themselves in the International Airport bound for Japan in early August.
The airport smelled like steel, citrus cleaner, and too many goodbyes.
Erin sat by the terminal window, her knees drawn up in the seat, cheek resting against the cool pane of glass. Outside, the tarmac shimmered under the August sun—giant metal planes gliding in silence like behemoths on silver rivers.
Inside, the world was all soft murmurs and flickering departure boards. Kael pressed his nose to the glass beside her, his voice a constant hum of excitement.
"That one's ours, right? The white one with the red tail?" Kael pointed at the slowly rolling aircraft. His eyes were alight with wonder and excitement.
Erin nodded absently. "Probably."
She didn't tell him she'd already checked the screen five times. Didn't say she'd memorized the gate number. Or that she could feel the weight of the ticket like a stone in her chest pocket. She just watched. And waited.
Their mother, Lyra, stood nearby at the window, arms folded, her usual nurse's calm coiled tighter than usual. Her eyes kept drifting—not to the runway, but to the sliver of sky above it. Searching for something only she could see.
Erin turned away from the window.
The acceptance letter was folded neatly in her backpack, alongside her travel documents, a bento box for the flight, and three books she wasn't sure she'd read.
She still didn't quite believe any of it.
Not the letter. Not the relocation guide. Not the fact that an elite academy in Japan—a country she'd only ever seen in movies and anime—had sent her a scholarship.
But what she did believe, more than anything, was that something inside her whispering that this was their only door out. From whatever inexplicable certainty that made her uneasy, staying further in Hawthorne made her feel unsafe.
She'd thought about that moment—again and again—the day the letter arrived. The weight of it. The strange, familiar paper. The scent of cedar.
And her mother's face after the call.
Not frightened. Not confused.
Resigned. Like someone who had been waiting for this without realizing it.
"Flight JL042, boarding in ten minutes." The flight intercom was announced.
Lyra's head turned slightly. "Come on, both of you. Shoes on. Bags zipped."
Erin reached down to grab Kael's backpack, slipping the straps over his tiny arms. He grinned up at her as if this were all a grand adventure. In some ways, it was. But it didn't stop the nerves crawling up her spine.
The flight to Tokyo felt like a dream she wasn't fully inside of. Erin watched clouds slip by like mountains, Kael dozing off on her shoulder. and their mother on the aisle seat, reading through the orientation packet again and again, lips moving without sound.
She thought about school. About being too smart. Too quiet. Too strange. Their family name—Sorin—was an oddity no matter where they lived. And their looks didn't help. Pure black hair. Eyes too vivid—not just dark, but sharply tinted like old amethysts drowned in ink. People stared. Then whispered. Then mocked.
And it got worse when her brother started going to Brookfield Primary School with her. She was the youngest in her year. A nine-year-old girl, too smart for her own good, with a bunch of sixth graders. She learned then, how children can be so cruel.
Erin's memories of school blurred with stinging whispers and ugly laughter, of messed up lockers and occasional pushing around. They called her "witch" or "shadow freak." They called Kael a demon baby. The glasses helped dull the intensity, but only just.
At home, her family was her sanctuary, her father’s echoes in the house a quiet source of comfort and safety, even when all she could recall was a handful of memories. It all ended with his passing. Erin couldn’t show weakness, she must stay strong for her mother and brother.
She kept their grief a closely guarded secret. No one will know how she was by the stairs, as mother mourned their father’s death in choked sobs and unending tears in the kitchen at night when she thought no one was watching; how Kael’s asked questions when he didn’t understand why father couldn’t wake up anymore only to end up with muffled cries and vague understanding of the finality of death. She didn’t point out how her mother’s knuckles would clench like screws bolted shut on the fairy tale book father used to read to them for bedtime stories, as she tried to keep their bedtime ritual.
Oh how she tried very hard to keep everything back to normal, consoling them in that tight, but not unkind, voice. Young as she was, she can see her mother, and wonders how her mother could be fragile and strong at the same time. She could feel that gaping hole of loss and something she couldn’t name that was at the brink of consuming her mother—only to be held at bay by that thin film of warm velvet.
That was how her mother felt to her, fragile and delicate glass in the middle of a dark vortex, wrapped in warm velvet and steel. Her brother, a little ball of sunshine, warm and cool at the same time, radiating faintly with a sense of regal dignity.
She couldn’t name them, and she had no one to ask. She could not ask, it felt sacred to her, something that should be kept hidden.
And, no one will ever know. Not of their grief, and not how they felt in her
She used to wonder if she was cursed. Not when she was four where her father comforted her saying that she was still young and that he will tell her when she’s a little bit older.
She remembered whispering to her father that day. She told her father then to keep away from water in a solemn voice. How she told him there were black threads trying to stick on him and they felt cold and wet.
Her father told her when he came home that night.
She was young then, and didn’t go to school yet. Her spidey-sense wasn’t always there, only on odd times. She didn’t know any better, and she was taught how lying was bad. So she whispered to her father how this one wasn’t telling the truth, or that one was not being bad because he was lying.
Then she went to school, and found herself a friend named Rose. Everything was great. Until she told the secret that should not be said. It was fun at first, having a friend. Until a secret broke her family because Rose’s mother was lying. She didn’t know what adoption was, all she knew was when Rose’s mother said she gave birth to Rose in a hospital, she blurted out to her friend that it was a lie.
Her first friendship died that week. She never saw nor heard of Rose ever again. She didn't really understand what happened, only that Rose was gone. The whispers began that day.
Then she got very sick. She dreamed of skies breaking, and shadows screeching. Then she saw a disjointed dream of Rose, hiding under her bed. Voices of screaming and things breaking heard in the house. Rose’s father found out the truth of his real child buried in a distant cemetery; she died in her sleep and Rose’s father screamed at his wife in rage and grief; and Rose’s mother was otherwise occupied with another man.
When she woke up, her father was lying quietly in a gleaming casket. She remembers screaming very loudly how the casket felt empty even as it held her father’s remains, and there was a gaping hole and spindly arms grabbing at her father’s cold empty body. Only to find out, days later when her mother told her, she didn’t really scream; only whimpered in a hoarse still-ill voice, and fainted.
She swore then to never tell another soul.
“It was a secret after all.” Her mind supplied blankly as she was lying on the hospital bed, her gaze staring blankly at the faint outline of the ceiling. She brokenly whispered to the dark, “I’m sorry, Daddy. I shouldn’t have told anyone, and now I am cursed.”
Their family of three left, and settled at 17 Hawthorn Crescent, her father’s house. Everything was alright, dull, her spidey-sense fading to almost nothing. It was right, it was normal. She tried so hard to forget, better to keep the secret untouched. But it was so hard to pretend that she didn’t feel or those other things, even as she forced herself to ignore it. Other people didn’t see those things.
For a while it worked. There were no more shadows. No more whisps or spindly arms trying to get someone dead.
Then she wondered if she could make her spidey-sense disappear. Oh how she tried and tried. But always failed in the end.
When she finally managed to shrink her spidey-sense into a nugget, it finally sunk in that she had too many visits to the clinic. The results of her failures.
The doctors said, so she had to be medicated.
The ophthalmologist commented. She started wearing glasses.
The Psychologist determined, “
Tests after tests, and she found herself the youngest in her grade.
She kept her mind focused on her school work. She didn’t mind the whispers or taunts, it is as it should be.
For her, everything was fine as long as her spidey-sense stayed quiet.
And It did stay quiet, for short lengths of time.
Until she pushed it so deep in her mind, squeezed it to a dot. Then it became too quiet. It jarred her, She had it for so long, keeping her spidey-sense quiet, made her feel more different, not her.
She remembered feeling afraid.
It made her recall the night she got ill. How she subconsciously desperately wished there was no secret. She was only ever sick once, then never again.
When she timidly poked a hole, just a tiny little bit in her nugget—it could never remain as a tiny dot—it blasted her with heavy unease of something about to happen. Of something dangerous coming their way. Telling her of leaving. Until she slammed the nugget to the deepest corner in her mind, wrapping it tightly, metaphorically sealing the small hole.
She could not risk another curse. She fretted about how to tell her mother. She could blame the school. But what about Kael? He was unhappy at school right? She didn’t know. She could never pay full attention to Kael when she was busy with keeping her spidey-sense quiet.
Then the letter came. A full scholarship to an elite international school in Kyoto, Japan. And somehow, her mother found a position at the same school—campus nurse.
"Three of us," her mother had said when they finally got their flight tickets, "against the world."
Now... she wondered if maybe she wasn't cursed after all. Just different. Japan was a new country for her. A new place full of promise and hope, and dreams and new life to her young mind.
Somewhere over Siberia, Eleonore Sorin finally fell asleep as she dreamed of a grand castle beyond the mist and forests, and black and crimson wisps trailing in a darkened forest.
