The Drive from the café to Lyra's apartment was made in a heavy, charged silence. Selene's mind raced, replaying the look in Lyra's eyes; that flash of pure, unguarded alarm when she had mentioned the dreams. It was all the confirmation she needed. Lyra was not just keeping a secret; she was guarding a truth so profound it had shaken her composure to its core.
Once inside the familiar space, the atmosphere felt different. The cozy apartment, with its shelves of books and soft lighting, now seemed to hum with a hidden energy. The air itself felt thick with anticipation.
"Sit," Lyra said, her voice softer than usual. She gestured to the couch, but she remained standing, pacing a short path in front of the bookshelves as if gathering her courage.
Selene sat, her hands clasped tightly in her lap. She watched Lyra, her heart a frantic drum against her ribs. The wait was agonizing.
Finally, Lyra stopped. She walked to a small, elegant cabinet Selene had always assumed held fine china or glassware. Instead, Lyra retrieved a small key from her pocket, unlocked it, and carefully lifted out the object. It rested on a velvet cloth, its internal luminescence casting shifting blue and silver patterns on the fabric.
She placed it on the coffee table between them. It seemed to pulse with a quiet energy.
"It is the same," Selene whispered, her voice full of awe.
"It is," Lyra confirmed, her tone grave. She hesitated, her eyes fixed on the artifact. "And that is the part I cannot fully explain. Not yet."
"Why?" Selene asked, the single word laden with all her confusion and need. "Why keep it hidden? Why keep this a secret?"
Lyra finally sat, not next to her, but in the armchair opposite, putting the artifact between them like a talisman. Or a warning.
"Because it is not just an object, Selene," Lyra began, her voice low and measured. "It was not found in a market or dug from a dig site. It is... a relic. But not from a civilization you would find in any of your history books."
Selene's breath caught. "What do you mean?"
"It is ancient in a way that defies your carbon dating," Lyra continued, her gaze fixed on the shimmering stone. "It predates every known culture on this planet. It is not of this world."
A cold thrill shot down Selene's spine. Not of this world. The words should have sounded insane. But looking at the artifact, feeling the strange pull it exerted, they felt like the only possible truth.
"Then what is it?" Selene pressed, her voice trembling.
Lyra finally looked up, her dark eyes meeting Selene's. The vulnerability in them was terrifying. "It is a key. A key to understanding what I am. And why I have been here for so long."
The air left Selene's lungs. "A key to what?"
Lyra's throat worked as she swallowed. "A key to a longevity you would call immortality." She gestured to the artifact, which seemed to glow a fraction brighter as Selene stared at it. "It reacts to life, to specific energies. And Selene... it reacted to you. It hasn't done that for anyone else in a very, very long time. It... it means you're connected to this somehow. To me. I wish I could tell you how or why, but I can't. Not yet. That is part of the truth I am still uncovering myself."
The word immortality hung in the silent room, immense and impossible. But it was the other confession—that she was somehow connected to it that truly stole Selene's breath. The artifact's light seemed to pulse in time with her own heartbeat, a silent, terrifying confirmation.
Selene could only stare, her mind refusing to process the concepts. "What are you talking about?" she breathed.
Lyra reached out and turned the artifact over. On its underside was a complex, geometric symbol. It was too perfect, too intricate, its lines flowing in a way that seemed to dance just at the edge of Selene's vision. It was utterly alien.
"This was given to an ancestor," Lyra whispered, her fingers hovering just above the engraving. "It has been passed down through a line you cannot trace in any historical record. My bloodline is human, Selene, but it is... altered. Infused with something else. This artifact is a focus. It is the reason I look the way I do, why I have endured. It sustains a form that is still human, but not entirely. Not anymore."
The confession was a seismic shock, a tremor that originated from some deep, sub-oceanic trench within Selene's soul. The world didn't just tilt; it swayed, a ship caught in a sudden, colossal swell. The woman sitting before her, the librarian with a fondness for stray cats and old books, was telling her she was... something else. Something that had not merely defied time, but had drifted through its currents for ages.
The strange dreams, the profound sense of recognition it all crashed together not like breaking glass, but like a wave against a cliff, the spray carrying forgotten memories. The feeling that Lyra was from another time now felt less like history and more like the abyssal plain: ancient, pressure-filled, and utterly dark. A fleeting image from a dream surged to the surface: the scent of salt and cold mist, the crushing silence of a deep, lightless place, and a haunting, beautiful song that seemed to vibrate through the water itself, a melody that promised forgotten shores and drowned worlds. She could almost feel the phantom chill of deep water on her skin. She shook it away, her focus snapping back to Lyra's waiting, fearful eyes, which now seemed to hold the stormy grey of a winter sea.
"What does this mean for us?" Selene's voice was a thin, reedy thing. "If you are not entirely human, and this... this thing connects us... what does that make me? What am I to you?"
Lyra looked at her, and her eyes were filled with a deep, aching sorrow. "It makes you someone who has stumbled into a truth very few ever learn. I do not know why you can see these things in your dreams, why the artifact reacted to you. But I am afraid. If we continue down this path, your life will change in ways I cannot protect you from. Knowing this... it puts you in danger."
The weight of it all threatened to crush Selene. Altered bloodlines. A life sustained by a relic. A connection she couldn't understand. Otherworldly dangers. It was a fantasy, a myth. But it was also Lyra's truth. And she believed it completely.
Fear coiled in her stomach, cold and sharp. The rational part of her, the archaeologist trained in evidence and logic, screamed at her to run. This was madness.
But as she looked at Lyra, saw the raw fear and hope warring in her eyes, a different instinct took over. This was the mystery she had been desperately trying to solve. This was the pull she had felt from the very beginning. She was not just in deep; she was at the heart of it. The artifact's gentle glow was a beacon, and it was calling to her.
She could not walk away. Not from this. Not from her.
Her life had irrevocably changed in the span of a few minutes. But as the initial shock began to recede, it was replaced by a fierce, determined curiosity. She leaned forward, her gaze never leaving Lyra's.
"Then you had better start explaining everything."