Nicole Reeyn

Many of the stories Nicole envisions begin with a phrase as old as stories themselves: "Long, long ago..."

Perhaps, for some authors, "long ago" is less the threshold of a tale than a refuge from all further questioning. For once a story is consigned to unreachable distance, all the people and events bound up within it may as well have faded into obscurity, leaving no path by which the present might truly follow them back.

And yet, in Nicole's thoughts, those stories of "long ago" endure still.

Long ago, the lights of many nations filigreed the earth in gleaming gold. Long ago, the daughters of heaven wandered in carefree grace betwixt divine courts and mortal cities. Long ago, the sovereign of ages past, who had descended into deepest darkness, had not yet brought disaster back to his homeland. Long ago, the three radiant moons that hung aloft in the night heavens were still three...

The years brook no pause, the wheel spinning onward all the same. Within a cycle emptied of hope, the spark of paradise perished alongside the lives annihilated. Servitors once loyal to their ruler turned traitor for the sake of the lives that had been fashioned. The black dragonlord returned from beyond the stars. The moonlit chariot of the heavens shattered like crystal...

The story had not reached its end. Rather, it was those who had once read it, and those who had once listened to its telling, who had long since taken their leave. The angel who once longed to write laughter into the world lost all that had once made laughter possible. In the end, she even lost the voice with which she laughed, and could speak no more.

Thus, it seemed that the story Nicole kept within her would never properly find its beginning. She could only go on cradling her many "long agos," roaming the world and watching as all things passed, changed, and were remade by time.

That remained so until the day she met a tiny mage in an enormous hat, its extravagant brim tipped up with such pride it seemed almost ready to brush the sky. Compared with the hat she wears now, however, it was still a fair few sizes smaller.

The little witch tucked herself down at Nicole's side and listened intently as one story after another unfolded, not stirring until she had finished her drink and emptied her bag of biscuits.

"So you really are an angel? And all those stories were real, too?"

"Then yay, that works! I'm a mage, and you're an angel, so we match perfectly."

The merry little mage stretched out a hand to the angel who had come so far, all the way from those distant "long agos," and warmly invited her along.

"Want to join my Hexenzirkel? I only just came up with the name, but it has a real ring to it, don't you think?"

"It's going to be the funnest, awesomest, best club in all of Teyvat — I promise!"

"..."

No answer came from the angel. None could. But the little mage did not wait for one. She caught the angel's hand in both of her own and slipped the last piece of candy into her palm.

"There. Now our mages' pact is made."

Nicole had no thought of joining then, nor could she have guessed what this little gathering called the "Hexenzirkel" would one day grow into.

But at the very least...

It did sound like a place with happiness enough to spare.