"Cerve… huh?"
The voice drops from above them, lazy, confident.
The girls are seated at the centre table now, Cerve's children opposite them, the air tight and wrong. The sound should not exist.
Ulda moves first.
Criole ignites without ceremony. A knife hums into existence and kisses the man's throat the instant he manifests behind her.
"Your security," she says flatly, blade steady, "is lacking."
Thia scoffs.
"That," she says without looking up, "is my security."
She clears her throat."Stephan…"
A pause. Heavy. Expectant.
"A guard," she continues, eyes lifting just enough to acknowledge him, "losing his guard is not a good look."
Her gaze sharpens."Don't you think?"
Stephan gulps.
Then he dissolves.
Not retreats. Not fades. He breaks apart, scattering into nothing like smoke punched by wind.
The knife never leaves Ulda's hand.
Cold steel presses against her spine.
"You are good," Stephan's voice breathes from behind her, amused now. "I will admit that."
Ulda smiles.
Slow.
Measured.
"Good?" she asks.
The sound of Criole singing sharpens.
A line opens across Stephan's neck.
He freezes.
"The best," Ulda corrects calmly. "Excuse you."
His body drops from the ceiling.
Before it can collide with the table, a shadow snaps upward and drags it away mid-fall.
"That we are."
Yuri's hand settles on Thia's shoulder, grounding, steady, final.
Across the table, Lia rises.
"I would like to speak to our br… your father," she says, jaw tight, eyes burning with intent.
Ulda smiles.
"Huh. SEBBEHHHH!!!!!"
Kaelen has lost it.
The room Myles was supposed to be in is painted wrong. Blood everywhere. Too much. Fresh. Loud. The kind of silence that screams.
She knows he cannot hear her.She shouts anyway.
"He will be fine," she mutters, pacing, claws digging into her palms. "He has to be fine."
She exhales hard.
"But now," she growls, already moving, "I have to deal with this mess."
She vanishes down the corridor at a run.
In her room, Irva shakes.
She clings to her own arm, nails biting into skin as if anchoring herself to reality. Sweat slicks her scalp. Her skirt is soaked, ruined, shame clinging heavier than fabric.
She does not understand why her body refuses to listen.
Her breath stutters.
Then Myles.
The image crashes into her mind, uninvited, vivid.
Her eyes widen.
Her stomach rebels.
She barely reaches the bathroom before collapsing over the tub, vomiting until her throat burns and tears blur the world.
"What is this?" she gasps. "Why. Why. Why."
She turns the water on, one shower only, the sound deafening in the tiled chamber. She climbs into the massive tub and curls into herself beneath the spray, knees to chest, arms wrapped tight.
The water is cold. Freezing. It barely helps.
Her breathing slows. Barely.
She focuses.
"He is just a boy," she whispers."Just a boy.""Just a boy."
Again. And again. And again.
Minutes stretch. Endless. Hollow.
Finally, she pushes herself upright.
Then she collapses to her knees.
And she cries.
Not softly.Not neatly.
She cries like something has been torn out of her that she did not know she owned.
Running through the corridors, Kaelen suddenly notices something odd.
Funny, even.
She slows.
Then she smiles, a soft breath leaving her as relief finally catches up to her. Her hand presses against the wall, fingers sinking straight through solid stone as if it were water. She reaches inside and pulls out a tiny Myles, no bigger than her palm.
Daena is already moving, body tensing, ready to jump into action.
She is grabbed as well.
Clav turns to run.
They are grabbed too.
Kaelen exhales again, setting the three tiny figures carefully onto her bed."I suppose it's the thought that counts."
Myles is the first to find his voice.
"Lia!" he shouts up at her, panic sharp despite his size. "Is she okay?!"
Kaelen laughs, the sound light and genuine."What do you take your goddess for, huh?"
Myles visibly relaxes, shoulders dropping as the tension drains from him.
Daena speaks next."On my way here I—"
Kaelen stops her without looking.
"What you saw was nothing," she says calmly. "You are far too young to understand it."
Daena sighs, pulling a strange face in response.
Kaelen and Clav laugh.
Then Kaelen turns her attention to Clav, head tilting slightly."Now you," she says. "You're a new face."
Clav opens their mouth.
Kaelen raises a hand.
"Wait. Wait. Wait," she says, breaking into laughter. "Credit where it's due, I kept a straight face for impressively long, but I cannot take you seriously looking like that."
Daena smiles awkwardly.
With a small gesture, she returns herself, Myles, and Clav to their original size.
"Hm. Well… I suppose you could call me Myles' familiar," Clav begins, rubbing the back of their neck. "You know, like that tiny white-haired girl's—"
Kaelen shoots him a look sharp enough to cut.
He stops instantly.
Daena and Myles glance between the two of them, confused, as Clav obediently falls silent.
"Anyway," Daena says, breaking the moment, "where are we? And where are we going?"
Kaelen sighs.
"Why me?" she mutters, pressing her palm to her face.
She drops onto a seat and spends the next few minutes explaining everything to the trio.
"If I'm understanding this right," Myles begins, brow furrowing as he pieces it together, "in the end, we protect Lia and everyone back home?"
"Pretty much, yeah," Kaelen answers.
Myles nods once."Well, Clav and I still need a teacher."
"True," they agree without hesitation.
"Wait." Myles pauses, looking Clav up and down, studying them more carefully now. "I thought… doesn't matter either way." He dismisses the thought with a small shake of his head. "Where is Sebbeh?" he asks, already standing at the door.
Kaelen shrugs.
"We have a lot to talk about."
There is something in Myles' voice as he says it. Something low. Something sharp.
Kaelen watches him go.
"Aaaah," she murmurs to herself, amused, "have fun, kid."
She smirks.
On his way, it becomes painfully obvious to Myles that he is lost.
The corridors stretch and bend in unfamiliar ways, the architecture elegant but disorienting. The guards he passes do not stop him. Some glance his way, others do not seem to see him at all. Either way, none interfere.
That is one less thing to worry about.
"Oh, yeah," he mutters to himself. "The scary lady from earlier."
He remembers it suddenly. The matching tattoo on her shoulder.
Just like Sebbeh's.
He stops walking.
From the moment he woke up, she had been gone. And yet, even now, he could still feel her presence. Close. Quiet. Heavy. He does not question why.
He closes his eyes and focuses.
"There," he whispers.
Myles turns and walks towards the feeling, letting it guide him. He stops in front of a door, beautiful in a way he cannot place, made of something he has never touched before. It does not feel cold or warm. It feels… aware.
As he steps closer, the door opens on its own.
He takes that as an invitation.
Inside, after only a few steps, something catches his eye.
Clothes on the floor.
Soaked.
His eyes widen.
He takes a step back, confusion crashing over him all at once. His thoughts tangle, fear and uncertainty knotting in his chest.
Then he hears it.
Crying.
The memory hits him without warning.
So vivid it steals his breath.
He is younger. Standing somewhere else. Somewhere long gone. His little sister is there. He does not remember knowing he had one until this moment, yet the certainty of her existence fills him completely.
It was her first exam party. He cannot remember what the exam was for, only the way the room had been filled with people, the noise, the pressure. His uncle had frozen, not knowing what to do with a thirteen-year-old in that state.
So it had fallen to him.
Her clothes had been on the floor, just like now. Crying had come from behind a closed bathroom door.
He had sat outside it and told her a story.
It was not a true one. They both knew that. But it made her laugh, and that was all that mattered.
Tears slide down his cheeks as he drops to his knees in the present.
He wonders, suddenly, painfully, what became of her. Whether she lived out her life. Whether she is still alive.
That thought feels impossible.
Then another follows.
She might not be here, he thinks. That must be Sebbeh's daughter. Maybe she's going through the same thing.
He moves to the door and sits down beside it, just as he had that day.
Inside, Irva notices his presence.
She clamps a trembling hand over her mouth, muffling the sound, her body shaking uncontrollably.
Myles begins to sing.
Softly at first.
Hmm, hmm, hmm.I know you're ashamed.I know you're scared; your tears are all the proof I need.I am a stranger, but my heart aches for you, and it reaches out.I am not here to laugh as yours bleeds.There is someone I have loved and lost.Rejoice, and do not lose heart.You have led a brother.Your shame, your tears, and your voice.
His voice breaks before the last line is finished.
He does not stop the tears.
Strangely, impossibly, the sound of his voice calms Irva. Her breathing steadies. The shaking eases. For a moment, the thought of opening the door and hugging him even crosses her mind.
Instead, she turns off the shower.
She wraps a robe around herself and leans back against the door, wood cool against her spine.
"Thank you," she whispers.
Quietly.