I’m going mad.

  Even after several years, that was still the only thing Kalvin was sure of.

  He was now five years old and had made little progress on any other front, whether it was trying to contact somebody or exploring Zentharra.

  Because, as he did learn from Agnes’s rambling, they were in Zentharra. On the very outskirts, specifically. That was also how he confirmed that it was indeed not the same time period when Kalvin had gone to that forsaken island. It was forty years prior.

  He had little opportunity to learn anything else. Agnes was living off of her late husband’s modest inheritance and practically raised him while Ellie was away at work or the bar of the night. She’d come home drunk and yell at Kalvin if he was anywhere but in the tiny closet that had become his bedroom. She installed a lock a few months ago on the outside, and would often forget to unlock the door until Agnes came to pick him up. She rarely spoke to Kalvin unless it involved screaming at him for asking for food after being locked away for hours.

  His interactions with other children were limited to brief awkward greetings when Agnes ran into an old friend with a kid of their own. And when he did have time to himself at night, neither woman had a computer he could discreetly use let alone books. Agnes bought him some for children that she would read aloud, and Kalvin wondered if someday his ears would start bleeding from how much he had to hear about what sounds different animals made.

  The presence of a spirit persisted. It would come in and out at odd hours of the night and Kalvin would get that creepy sensation of being watched. He had grown used to it as a medium, but it seemed that being in a child’s body made him more susceptible to anxiety.

  He had asked Ellie about his father once, to which she went even more dealthy pale before locking him in that room for several days.

  Sometimes he’d lay there on his tiny bed in his tiny closet for days until he had to bang onto the walls to be let out. Sometimes he heard Ellie bring home a man from the bar she always found a way to start drunk arguments with. Sometimes he had nightmares that wouldn’t end once he awoke.

  Kalvin hated every second of it- hated being cut off from the outside world, hated being stuck in a toddler's body, hated being treated like one. He was glad that he wasn't a baby anymore, but this felt almost just as humilating. When he found a way to return to his timeline, he would start a nonprofit dedicated to stop people from infantilizing kids so much.

  Because he was going to go back, he decided. It would probably take years until he could really research into what had happened, but it was worth it. He couldn't imagine how his parents felt, let alone how confused Yvaine must be.

  And, admittedly, he didn't want to stick around for the wars that would be raged years from now.

  The days he spent with Agnes weren't too bad, and she sometimes took him out into the city (although they hadn’t returned to Temple street yet), but Ellie he couldn’t stand.

  He was still reluctant to accept that he was living forty years in the past, although it did explain things. The old-fashioned architecture, the lack of technology, the overall sense of calm in the air. This was before Mael’s time.

  And speaking of Mael...he hadn't heard a single thing about him in all these years. It was as though he vanished from existence entirely, even though Kalvin knew he had either not been born yet or was still just a child. He supposed that was the one redeeming thing about being forced into a different timeline. That and all the money he could make from his knowledge of future stock prices.

  At first, the knowledge that he had been reincarnated into the past tormented him. He could barely sleep at night or focus on trying to act like a regular four year old. Then he made his peace with the idea, or at least learned to live with it, but it still made no sense. If people could really be reincarnated decades into the past, that would cause all sorts of paradoxes.

  The more he tried to find reason in it, the less sleep he got.

  Agnes noticed and suggested to Ellie that he be taken to a mental health professional. She said they didn’t have the money for that kind of thing.

  It was for the better. Kalvin couldn’t afford to slip up and be locked in some asylum. For now, he had to stay low.

  And today was going to be his hardest trial yet.

  Kalvin looked up at the doors labeled “Sunshine Primary School.” For a name like that, it wasn’t very sunny.

  The small building was a dull grey color matching the gates encircling it- a far contrast to the school Kalvin had gone to which was in the heart of the city and had cartoon characters painted all over the exterior. This preschool was just a five-minute walk from his apartment, and unlike his own, it didn’t seem to be a magic one.

  Children as early as five years old very rarely displayed any signs of magical ability, but the early schooling would help establish the fundamentals in their head. That, combined with sustained practice at home, leads to most doing simple spells by eleven or twelve. And two or three years later, you’d learn if you got accepted into one of the few magic academies in the world.

  That was around the time when Kalvin first tapped into his own mana core. But now…would he be able to do so way earlier?

  Sometimes late at night, when he couldn’t sleep, he’d lay there while trying to feel his mana core. The lack thereof concerned him slightly. It wasn’t common, but some people naturally had a very small repository, not to mention a lack of one entirely. It was very possible he wouldn’t be able to do magic in this body, or at least nothing more than the basics. But he had to wait to be sure.

  The idea frightened Kalvin. He figured it was because no would take him seriously if he couldn’t offer at least some kind of proof of his reincarnation.

  “It’s alright to be nervous,” Agnes said beside him. “Everyone is on their first day, but then ends up making lots of friends.”

  Kalvin looked up at her. He didn’t consider himself to be socially awkward, but he also never had to talk to toddlers while pretending he was one of them.

  “Just be yourself.”

  He gave her an ambivalent look as a young woman holding a bunch of paper in her hand opened the doors before them.

  “Hello! You must be Ellie,” she exclaimed.

  “Agnes Jean, actually. Ellie should’ve signed off on me picking him up and dropping him off?”

  The woman looked at her papers. “Oh, yes! My mistake.” Kneeling until she was eye to eye with Kalvin, she added, “And what’s your name?”

  He almost blurted Kalvin before remembering to say, “Samuel.”

  Ellie decided on the name when they got home from the healer’s office four years ago. She turned to a pile of fliers on the table and wrote down the first name she saw in a laundry advert.

  This narrative has been purloined without the author's approval. Report any appearances on Amazon.

  The woman smiled. “Nice to meet you, Samuel! I’m Emily. I’ll be your teacher for this year.”

  Kalvin nodded and allowed her to usher him inside as he waved goodbye to Agnes. Now all he had to do was act as normal as possible for the next five hours.

  It was more apparent how stuffy and old the building was on the inside. Emily led him into a small classroom where fifteen or so other children were already waiting, gesturing for him to take a seat with them on the carpet.

  “I think we’re all mostly here now,” she said, stepping to the front of the room. “I’m Emily Hsu, but you can all call me Miss Emily.”

  Kalvin briefly looked at the kids around him. Nothing seemed out of the ordinary except for the fact that this class seemed more diverse than his had been at this age.

  “Today we’re all just going to get to know one another. How about we go around and have everyone say your name as well as a fun fact and what you want to be when you grow up?”

  Cheers echoed against the walls as Kalvin resisted plugging his ears from the particularly loud ginger kid beside him.

  Emily walked over to the opposite end of the carpet. “Right, let’s start from here.”

  “I’m Danny,” the first kid said. “A fun fact about me is that I like tractors. When I grow up, I want to be a doctor.”

  “I’m Stella. My favorite animals are seals! Someday I want to be a lawyer.”

  “Nigel. My fun fact is that I have no fun fact. I want to be an inventor.”

  Kalvin tuned out the rest of them as he glanced over his shoulder to further study the classroom. It was rather nice looking, albeit in an overtly childish way. There was a rainbow bookshelf by the wall with labels like science, history, math, and reading. No mention of magic anywhere. His gaze suddenly caught onto a boy at the very back of the carpet with gleaming blue eyes and fluffy auburn hair- staring right at him.

  His breath hitched as he met the boy’s eyes. Despite being bright, they seemed almost endlessly empty. And despite the rising of Kalvin’s heartbeat, he couldn’t help but stare back into their depths.

  “Samuel?”

  Kalvin looked back at the teacher, realizing his name had been called twice now. “Um, I’m Samuel. A fun fact…I have a high death perception.”

  “A what?” Someone said.

  Emily smiled tightly. “Oh wow, and what is it you want to be?”

  Kalvin had no idea why everyone was reacting strangely, so he decided to say the same thing he said at his own first day of school. “When I grow up, I want to be a sorcerer.”

  The class went silent.

  “My mommy said sorcerers are people who think they’re better than everybody else,” Stella blurted.

  Another child said, “Mine told me magic was made up by the government to control us.”

  “I didn’t know we were allowed to say sorcerer!” Nigel cried. “I want to change my answer!”

  The ginger kid beside Kalvin sniggered. “What are you, four years old?”

  The entire class erupted into laughter. Kalvin merely sat there as he wondered what the hell was wrong with toddlers and their sense of humor.

  “Now, now,” Emily said, bringing the laughter to a close. “It’s not nice to belittle others for their dreams.”

  He looked at the teacher blankly. Yes, it was true that most people would never learn a single spell in their life, but the way she said dream made it sound like Kalvin said he’d wanted to be the prime minister instead.

  “What does belittle mean?”

  “To make fun of someone. You wouldn’t like that, would you, Lukas? Why don’t you tell us your dreams and we’ll all listen with respect.”

  “I’m Lukas,” the ginger kid said. “I can already read two languages. And someday, I’m going to be the prime minister!”

  Not a single person laughed at that. Emily looked at him in awe.

  You’ve got to be kidding me.

  Nigel bobbed up and down in excitement. “That’s so cool, I can barely understand one!”

  The rest of the kids in his class gave more ordinary answers before Natasha paired them all up to get to know one another better. Kalvin noticed she’d skipped over the auburn-haired kid in the back as he went to sit down next to Danny.

  “Hi!” The blonde boy greeted.

  “Hi.”

  They both awkwardly looked at the board for the list of conversation starters.

  “What’s your first memory?” Danny asked.

  “Um….I don’t remember. How about you?”

  “My mom making dinner while I was playing with my brother. What’s your full name?”

  “Samuel Martin,” Kalvin said carefully. “What’s yours?”

  “Daniel Orlov.”

  “Orlov? Are you Ostrovian?”

  His eyes brightened. “My parents are from there! Are yours too?”

  “No, I just read about the country.”

  “You can read already? Like Lukas?”

  Damn it.

  “Um, only a little.”

  “That’s so cool! By the way, I think it’s awesome you want to be a sorcerer,” he said. “I told my parents I also wanted to be one and they said to forget about it.”

  “If that’s really your dream, you shouldn’t give up.”

  “Thanks, but my parents would kill me.” He smiled sadly. “They already know what college I’m going to go to- Drayton University.”

  “That’s one of the best colleges in Dorlinard. It’s as hard to get into as the worst magic schools.”

  “Yeah, but I have to get into a good college to get into a good law school.”

  Kalvin was taken aback. “Why law school?”

  “My parents say it’s a stable job and they make good money.”

  “You shouldn’t do something just because your parents told you to do it. You should be a sorcerer if that’s what you want. If you go to a good preparatory school and study hard, I’m sure you’ll get into a magic academy.”

  Danny shook his head. “Those are way too far away and expensive.”

  Before Kalvin could reply, Emily ordered them to pair up with their next assigned partner. He said goodbye to Danny and went to sit across from a girl named Farida.

  As he made his way over to her, he caught another glimpse of auburn hair at the back of the carpet- the same boy from before still sitting by himself as he stated blankly out a window.

  Maybe he’s in time out or something?

  After talking to Farida, his final partner for the day was Nigel. He could barely get a word in between the boy’s entire monologue about what kind of sorcerer he’d be. But at least someone seemed to take magic seriously.

  “The obvious choice would be an elemental sorcerer,” he was saying. “My dad showed me a video of Morinich making fireballs with his hands and it was the coolest thing I’ve ever seen!”

  The name blind sighted Kalvin at first until he remembered Morinich was a famous fire mage in his parent’s time. Which he supposed was now his time. He knew the names of almost all all significant figures in necromancy, but almost every other school of magic was far more advanced than his and therefore had more accomplished sorcerers to their name.

  Nigel looked up in thought. “Water mages can do some crazy things too. But I think I’d want to be a wright sorcerer since my ultimate goal is being an inventor.”

  “Why an inventor?” Kalvin asked. He figured it was best to allow the kids to take control of the conversation while he remained as quiet as possible.

  “Because someday I want to make flying cars!”

  He rummaged through his head for the name of the wright sorcerer who did invent flying cars; Sebastian Gallant. But that wouldn’t be until well after the first war, the one against the Red Circle.

  Kalvin watched Nigel as he continued rambling.

  He hadn’t remembered that name in ages- Mael had kind of overshadowed all the other evil sorcerers of his era. But now that Kalvin thought of it…it was still a few years until the coven would make an attack on his own academy. If he went to the government with the name of their leader, Lilian, he could prevent it. He could save lives.

  Of course, he’d have to explain how he knew the attack would happen in the first place, then probably sit through a bunch of laboratory tests conducted by researchers who were more concerned in using him to enrich themselves than anything else. And that was the best case scenario.

  But it was probably worth it. He just needed to get more information on what was going on first.

  “Don’t you agree?!”

  He blinked himself back into reality. “Uh, totally.”

  “At least someone understands,” Nigel sighed.

  Kalvin stole another glance at the kid in the back, still all by himself. “Hey, do you know what’s up with him?”

  Nigel followed his line of sight. “With who?”

  “The auburn-haired boy.”

  “What auburn-haired boy?”

  “The one who's alone.” Kalvin pointed. “There.”

  Nigel frowned and looked back at him. “Are you trying to play a joke on me?”

  “What? Of course not.”

  “You’re making fun of me, aren't you?” Nigel yelled, attracting a few stares. “Just like everyone else!”

  “I’m not making fun-“

  “How’s everything going here?” Emily asked, suddenly appearing from behind him. While everyone was paired up, she was walking around and checking in on their conversations.

  Nigel crossed his arms. “Samuel’s making fun of me.”

  “I’m not.”

  Emily kneeled beside them. “Why do you think that, Nigel?”

  “He kept talking about some boy!”

  She turned to Kalvin. “What boy?”

  Kalvin looked over his shoulder to point out the auburn-haired kid, but he was gone. “He was just there."

  “There’s no boy, Samuel. Everyone’s partnered up.” She gave him a concerned look. “Are you feeling ok? Do you want me to call your mom?”

  “No, it’s fine. I’m just tired.”

  She nodded reluctantly before standing and addressing the rest of the class. “Alright, talking time is over. We’re now going to start our units for this school year. Please sit in a circle around the board.”

  As she approached the front of the room and everyone went to reseat themselves, Nigel gave Kalvin a look that was scary even for a five year old. Or perhaps it was scary because he was a five year old.

  He took one last look towards the now empty spot at the back of the carpet before sitting with the rest of the class.