“I’m here,” I start, my voice breaking the silence. “I... I’m here to seek your guidance.” The words feel strange in my mouth, like I’m speaking into a void. “I need help. Please.”
The glade stays silent. The weight in the air doesn’t change. Alright, that wasn’t enough.
I take another step, my voice rising. “I don’t know what I’m supposed to do. I don’t understand any of this. I don’t—” I stop, my throat tightening as I try to gather myself.
I swallow hard, my gaze falling to the ground before I force it back up to the carvings. The lines in the stone look sharper now, and the weight in my chest grows heavier. “I don’t know what’s happening. I don’t know why—why any of this is happening to me. Someone took her from me. Someonetookher.” My fists clench around the fur as I take a shuddering breath.
“My mother—she was all I had. She was everything to me.” The words pour out before I can stop them. “She... she prepared me for everything, but not for this. Not for what it would feel like to lose her. Not for the emptiness she left me with.”
I blink back the tears that sting my eyes. “You let her die. You let her die without telling me why, without telling me what I’m supposed to do. And now, I’m here. Alone. And I don’t even know if I’m strong enough for this.” Anger and desperation take over as my tears finally break free to streak down my cheeks.
“Please,” I whisper. “Please, I’m begging you. Just let me know what happened to her. Tell me who did this to her. Tell me why. Tell me something. Anything.”
I squeeze my eyes shut, my voice breaking as I speak again. “I’ll do it. I’ll fulfill your prophecy. I’ll do whatever it takes. Just... just let me do this one thing for her. Please.”
I stand, my chest tight, my tears falling freely, staring at the ancient stone and its silence. I wait. But nothing comes.It’s not fair.
“Most souls do not know who they are.”
My eyes snap open. I turn around, my heart pounding. An elder vólkin female stands at the edge of the glade, her figure slender and quiet against the luminous orbs floating in the air.
My stomach drops. I’ve been caught.
The silver of her fur gleams, streaked with white, a clear sign of her age. Her eyes, white and without pupils, are unnerving yet strangely wise. Crystals adorn her forehead, white as well. She is unlike anything I’ve seen. She’s not like Mina, nothing like the vólkins I’ve met so far. There’s something about her, something... timeless.The other vólkin females didn’t have crystals.Though her crystals seem larger than Theron’s.
“I am Noël Ársa,” I manage to say, trying to steady my voice, though I feel small under her scrutiny.
“No,” she replies, her tone firm and calm, as though correcting a child. “These are just names. Two words. That is not who you are. That is what you are called.”
Her words confuse me, and I frown. “What do you mean?”
“When someone says their name, their status, their role, it means they do not know who they are,” she says, her presence growing more commanding. “My name is Aïna, but that is not who I am. Your name is Noël because your parents called you that. But it is not you.”
I blink, caught off guard by the statement. My mind scrambles to process what she’s saying. She lifts a paw and gestures to herself. “You could say I am a vólkin, that I have fur, fangs, claws. But that isn’t me. It is my body.”
She moves closer. I find myself frozen, unable to look away. “You do not say, ‘my fur is hungry,’ do you?” she continues. “You say, ‘I am hungry. I am sleepy.’ So, tell me, who is ‘I’?”
I can’t find an answer. My lips part, but nothing comes out. She watches me, and then, slowly, she lifts her arms. The floating orbs that light the glade gather near her paws, drawn to her like moths to a flame. They hover, pulsing as though listening to her.
“We are spiritual creatures,” she says. “And we must seek the answer to this question: Who are we really? We have physical bodies, but because we lack awareness of who we truly are, our minds remain trapped in the physical world. We let what is outside of us—circumstances, fears, others—control us.”
The orbs float from her paws to circle around my body. The glow feels warm, like sunlight kissing my skin, and something inside me burns. It’s not just warmth, it’s... A hum. A vibration.
“Most earthly souls are simply reacting to life, not living it at all,” Aïna says.
What is she saying? What does she mean?
Before I can find the words to respond, she takes another step forward, her gaze locked on mine. Her tone softer now, gentler, when she asks, “Do humans still wear braids?”
The question takes me by surprise, but I nod. “Yes. Most girls start wearing them at seven. It’s a tradition in Tárnov, the village I come from.”
Aïna’s white, pupilless eyes hold mine. “And do you know why?”
“Not really.”
She hums, motioning for me to turn.
I hesitate but comply, feeling her claws brush through my damp hair.
