The orphanage smells like rain and soap.
When the storm passes, I always sit by the window, counting the drops that slide down the cracked glass. The other kids rush outside to play in the puddles, but I stay where it's warm. Sister Maren says I think too much for my age. She's probably right.
I'm six, maybe seven—old enough to remember the sound of thunder, too young to remember the faces of my parents. People tell me they died in a carriage accident. I've heard the story enough times to recite it, but it doesn't feel real. Accidents are loud, sudden things; the kind that leave a sound behind. For me, there's just silence.
When I ask about them, the caretakers give me polite smiles. "They loved you very much, Ethan." Then they move on to safer topics, like dinner or chores. I stopped asking after a while. Silence tells me more than words.
Nights are the hardest. The dormitory creaks when the wind moves, and the candles sputter out one by one until only moonlight remains. Sometimes I pretend the shadows stretching across the ceiling are roads—places I'll travel when I'm old enough. I trace them with my eyes until sleep takes me.
---
I grow taller, thinner. My hair darkens, my voice deepens. The city outside changes faster than I do.
The orphanage stands on a hill overlooking the lower district of Westmere, where the roofs are patched with tin and the chimneys always smoke. From my window, I can see the river cutting through the heart of it, reflecting the lanterns at night like a trail of small suns.
I imagine my parents once walked those streets. Maybe they bought bread from the same market stalls I sneak past now. Maybe they stood on the bridge and watched the same moon drift over the water. The thought comforts me, though I know it's just a story I tell myself.
At twelve, I start helping in the workshops. Mostly sweeping floors, sometimes fetching nails for the older apprentices. They treat me like a stray cat that refuses to leave, and in a way, they're not wrong.
When I'm not working, I read whatever scraps I can find. Old guild pamphlets, discarded lesson sheets, half-torn newspapers—anything with words. The teachers say knowledge is expensive; I say it's the only thing that's ever been free to me.
---
One evening, Sister Maren catches me awake long past curfew, reading by candlelight. She sighs, takes the book, then hesitates.
"Do you even understand half of that?"
I shrug. "Enough."
Her eyes soften. "You could make something of yourself, Ethan. Maybe even study, if you keep this up."
Study. The word lodges itself in my head. I roll it around like a coin, feeling its weight. Study means leaving. Study means becoming someone new.
That night I dream of open gates and roads stretching forever.
---
The following years move like pages turning too quickly.
Fourteen. The workshops close after a fire. I work odd jobs—delivering letters, cleaning stables, carrying crates.
Sixteen. The orphanage finds me a sponsor, an old bookseller named Herr Varren who smells of ink and dust. He lets me read after hours as long as I keep the shelves neat.
Seventeen. I save every coin I can, stashing them in a box beneath my bed. Westmere College's entrance exam costs more than I can afford, but I study anyway. Some nights I fall asleep over the counter, the letters in my notes swimming like fish.
Eighteen. I pass. Barely, but enough.
The day I leave the orphanage, the younger kids gather at the gate to wave goodbye. Sister Maren hugs me tight, whispering, "Don't let the world harden you."
I promise I won't. I'm not sure I believe it.
---
College isn't like the stories.
It's louder, colder, full of names and faces that blur together. Noble sons with fine boots and fine friends, merchants' daughters who speak like every sentence is a performance.
Then there's me—Ethan Black, the boy from nowhere. The one who still counts the raindrops when the hall roof leaks.
But I learn quickly. Not just from books, but from silence, from how people move and talk when they think you don't matter. I learn that kindness often hides calculation, that laughter doesn't always mean joy, and that sometimes being invisible is safer than being seen.
---
Still, not everyone treats me like a ghost.
There's Professor Helvar, who teaches history and says I remind him of himself at my age—quiet, curious, always late. He lends me books that aren't on the syllabus and tells me to "read until your questions outnumber the answers."
And there's Lily.
She sits two rows ahead in class, hair the color of copper in sunlight, eyes too gentle for this world. We talk sometimes—about lectures, about the weather, about nothing important. But those moments linger. When she smiles, it feels like sunlight sneaking through a dusty window.
I never tell her that. I just smile back and hope it's enough.
---
By nineteen, I've learned to survive on little sleep and less certainty. The city grows harsher; crime creeps closer to the college walls, and the air smells of tension. Rumors of disappearances, of strange lights beyond the hills. I ignore them. Ordinary people have enough monsters to worry about.
One night, walking back from the library, I stop on the bridge overlooking the river. The moonlight dances on the water like it used to when I watched from the orphanage window.
I realize I'm alone, truly alone—not in a sad way, just factual, like an equation I finally solved. Everyone else seems to have something waiting for them: family, inheritance, expectation. I have the road.
Maybe that's enough.
---
I start keeping a journal that winter. Not for anyone else—just to make sense of the noise in my head.
Some entries are questions.
Why do people fear being forgotten more than dying?
Others are small observations.
The sky looks different after snow. Quieter.
Sometimes I write letters to my parents, even though I don't know their names. I sign them all the same way: I'm still trying.
---
The final months before graduation blur into routine. Study, work, sleep, repeat. Herr Varren writes me from the city, his letters full of gossip and ink smudges. "The shop's falling apart without you," he jokes. I smile when I read them.
I visit the orphanage once more before exams. The halls feel smaller, the walls thinner. The younger children are mostly new faces, but one boy—small, brown-haired, maybe eight—follows me around all afternoon. He asks if I'm famous. I laugh and tell him not yet.
When I leave, he runs after me, pressing a small, chipped wooden coin into my hand. "For luck," he says.
I still keep it in my pocket.
---
The night before graduation, Westmere sleeps under clear skies. I stand at my window, the certificate draft folded on my desk, and listen to the city breathe.
No storms tonight. Just the hum of distant carriages and the faint chime of bells from the cathedral tower.
I think about everything—the orphanage, the bridge, Lily's smile, the promise to Sister Maren. The world feels wide again, like the roads in my childhood dreams.
Tomorrow will be different. It has to be.
I blow out the candle and let darkness take the room.