It was a thing of legends what happened that day—they called it The Night of Six Suns.

The tale was told by all—bellowed in country pubs by men who'd drunk too much beer, murmured between marauder's in the moonlight and bards sang it in grand banquet halls.

And me? I didn't need it told.

I was there.

It was one of my usual nightly ventures where I stole away from the frivolity of boys my age and stepped out into the forest to study plants. A scientist, I called myself. Everyone else just called me "unnaturally curious" but what did they know of curiosity?

I was sketching a particularly peculiar fern when I saw the first tower of Bevelon—a strange thing of white and grey marble that no one could ever enter or destroy—begin to glow like the first glimmer of dawn. Little did I know that the same thing had just happened to five other towers around the land.

I blinked slightly. I'm hallucinating, I told myself. Derelict old towers didn't just start glowing in the dead of night. When the glow didn't fade after a few more blinks, I approached the situation from a different angle—science.

Perhaps it was a new species of algae—or fungus, I wondered. A glowing kind.

Excited by this new prospect, I decided to get a closer look.

Later, everyone called them walls, but I thought they looked like liquid light—the kind that the tower was emitting and that was growing stronger with every passing second. So much so that it was nearly blinding. This light shot from the tower like a blade of fire to another burning tower of starlight in the distance.

I staggered back in shock. This definitely wasn't fungus.

A low cry sounded from the bush near me and I spun, still in shock.

With the tower and the glowing beams of light, I had failed to notice the girl. She was lying on her side, covered in dirt and leaves—and was that blood?—and glowed dully with the same translucent light as the tower. She was looking right at me.

"Close the portal," she said. "Before it opens completely!"

"Opens completely?" For the first time in my life, I didn't understand anything.

"Before the light returns full circle," she gasped, and I drew closer to hear her. "Here." She handed me a dagger. "Use your blood on the tower. Draw a hexagon and say this..."

I ran.

The brightness of the tower was blinding, and I clumsily drew a hexagon out of my blood. The ground began to shake, and I knew that time was almost up. "Ego claudere vobis!" I shouted, stumbling a bit over the words.

And

everything

stopped.

Then, the glow began to fade like dusk to night until it was gone. 

A bird chirped in the distance. The girl laughed in relief.

A scientist, I called myself. I guess I'd have to change my title to hero. Just as soon as I figured out exactly what I was hero of.