I let out a frustrated scream. “Stop this! Whatever this is—I don’t know what happened here! What am I supposed to remember?”
The mouse froze. And when I looked up, I saw her.
A little girl.
She turned to me slowly, like she’d always known I was following.
She looked past me, and I followed her gaze.
Down the corridor stood a boy.
Still. Silent.
Black hair. Pale skin.
His eyes… green. Deep, shattered emerald.
Thorne?
He stared like he didn’t know how he’d gotten there either.
Then he turned and ran.
Without thinking, I chased him.
“Wait! Stop!”
We burst through a door and—
Suddenly, we were outside. In a village I didn’t recognise.
Sunlight filtered through bare trees. Smoke curled from chimneys. Laughter echoed faintly from somewhere out of sight—too far to reach. Too far to touch.
Up ahead, the boy had stopped.
He was sitting beside a girl with golden-blonde hair. She was crying—quiet, miserable sobs, her fists clenched in her lap. Her dress was torn. Her knees were scraped. I didn’t need to ask what had happened.
I heard voices before I saw the crowd.
Rough. Angry. Scared.
A group of villagers stood at the edge of the square, shouting cruel things I couldn’t quite make out—but I felt them like bruises.
Monster. Demon. Wrong.
The boy—Thorne—stood suddenly, positioning himself between the crowd and the little girl. He was younger here, smaller, but he didn’t hesitate. Not for a second.
His power shimmered through the air like heat on stone—unformed but raw, instinctive.
The jeers faltered.
And then the villagers saw something.
I didn’t know what—only that it wasn’t real.
They stumbled back, faces draining of colour. A few screamed. Some turned and ran.
Beside him, the girl sniffled. “You didn’t have to do that.”
