Missing Time

30 days of Fantasy Prompt 18, Thalenra short story. A young student begins a journal

Jul 18, 2025

Written for Prompt 17 of the 30 Days of Fantasy challenge, hosted by Luna Asli Kolcu. Come through the door

(Entry 1) - I’ve been losing time recently. I’m not sure when it started. For a while I thought I was getting distracted, a bit too busy. It’s normal to lose track of time in class isn’t it? Or find you’ve been staring at the same page too long. But then Hedra said I was forgetting things, plans to meet, conversation we’d had. I thought she was making it up, trying to make me think something was off, like when she tried to convince me she’d infused my pen with a thaumic-link so we could talk in class.

But that doesn’t explain today, where we were walking to class, and the next thing I knew I’m in the centre courtyard, looking up at the campus clock. Hedra said I excused myself just as class was starting, and left, that I said I forgot something, but didn’t say what. Why was I in the courtyard? That’s a five minute walk from class, and we would have got to class a minute after I last remembered? Where was I for those eight minutes? I’ve tried to remember if anything happened just before the time loss, or just after, but there’s nothing I can remember. We’re meant to start Minescape sessions next Fiftday. The books say you can look at memories in those. Will that help me remember that time? And what if it happens again. I’m going to track any more I notice in here, and anything around them. Maybe it will help.

(Entry 2) - It happened again. Twice I think. Once, during lunch, where I blinked and everyone was gone. I was late for class again. Hedra said after, I left before her and asked where I went. I couldn’t tell her. She got annoyed at me, and went to the next class with Fenia. That hurt for sure, when she knows what Fenia did during warding last month, but there wasn’t anything I could say, not when everyone else I asked agreed with her. They said I got up from the table we were sitting at in the Courtyard, and said I’d see them in class.

The next time I think it was the same, but I’m not sure. I could be trying to find something that isn’t there. It was tonight, just before I was due to head home. I’d left the library and I was crossing the courtyard. I happened to look up at the clock, and when I blinked the hand had jumped a quarter hour, I’m sure of it. But could I really have been standing there for that long and no one notice me? And it was late, already dark, I could have misread the time easily.

If my mind isn’t playing tricks, then maybe it’s something to do with the courtyard? Doesn’t seem right though. Everyone goes through there all day long. If there was some left over Threadcraft or something it would have been noticed by now, right? Why would I be the one effected?

It’s Eightday tomorrow, so no classes. I’m going to hole up here and see if it happens again. Hedra’s still not talking to me so I should get left alone.

(Entry 3) - I don’t know what to do. It’s not the courtyard. I was sitting in my room, glancing up at the clock every so often to check I’d not lost time, and then I blinked and I was on the path outside the dorm. Something-

(Entry 4) - I’m on the path again. Further along. I was holding this journal this time. What is going on I need-

(Entry 5) - It happened again, twice, almost straight after each other. I’m in the cour-

(Entry 6) - I was in the courtyard and now I don’t know where I am except there are stairs up and down and I can hear ticking above and a voice and-

(Entry 7) - You need to stop fighting. The sooner you accept this, the soo-

(Entry 8) - I’m in the Recovery ward now. I’m so tired. The healer said they found me unconscious at the bottom of the clocktower stairs. I keep looking at my last entries and I don’t recognise them. It’s all hazy. But that last one, I don’t recognise the writing either. That’s one of the signs isn’t it? That a Weaver has severed your resistance. I have to tell someone.

Text within this block will maintain its original spacing when published

CCD Incident Evidence Log
Investigation: No specific case. To be Investigated  
Logging Agent: Practitioner Kirkall, Cell Ulmir
Evidence Type: Notebook. Contents identified as Journal entries, 6-9 Restavane
Evidence Logged: 22 Restavane, 1149 TCE
Evidence found at: Submitted by Healer Golton, Velcirra Academy. Reported it was found next to bed of discharged patient, Bekia Perell, current whereabouts unknown
CCD Reference ID: CCD-ACI-1149-CU-VA-I1
Notes on Evidence: Entries are not dated, but based on time indicators within text they cover four days. Indicators of Mentalia activity include recording missing time, forgotten conversation, and presence in restricted areas (Note-campus clocktower is off limits to students)
Based on Perell’s last entry (presumed writer) Mentalist influence is heavily suspected. There is only a slight difference between the handwriting of the seventh entry and the others, but difference consistent with forced control.
Clocktower was investigated fully in light of these entries, but no sign of recent occupation found.
Request submitted for investigation into activities of Perell, after leaving Recovery ward, to determine if still Order victim or, in light of disappearance to now be considered recruit.

Log Addendum: 2 Clarion 1150 TCE; Bekia Perell identified as present in the vicinity of several disappearances in the last eight months at Velcirra Academy. Advise full investigation to be launched around the vicinity of Velcirra Academy immediately

Thanks for Reading! It was another clock related prompt today, so doing the Order again seemed fitting. I tried to leave it up in the air as to what is happening, so I’ve got the option to come back to this period at some point.