The air in the alley smelled of burnt sugar and rust, like a penny left on a baker’s windowsill. Lyria skipped ahead, her boots kicking up puffs of iridescent dust that clung to Harlan’s coat like stubborn regrets.

  "You’re dragging me to a flea market," Harlan muttered, swatting at the dust. "While the city’s crawling with Hounds."

  "Not a flea market," Lyria corrected, twirling to face him. Her braids swung, each one tied with tiny bells that didn’t make sound. "A maybe market."

  Harlan opened his mouth—probably to argue—when the brick wall beside them rippled. A doorway appeared, its frame woven from frayed rope and crow feathers. A sign above it read:

  THE MARKET OF MIGHT-HAVE-BEENS

  (Tonight Only. Maybe.)

  Lyria grinned. "Told you."

  Harlan’s hand drifted to the vials at his belt. "This is some alchemist’s trick. Or a trap."

  "Both," Lyria said cheerfully, yanking him inside.

  The market unfolded like a pop-up storybook—stalls cobbled together from driftwood and old theater curtains, lit by lanterns that burned with no flame. Vendors hawked wares that almost existed: a jar of laughter from a wedding that never happened, a map to a city drowned in dreams, a cloak that smelled like rain if rain fell upside-down.

  Lyria bounded to the nearest stall, where a woman with ink-stained fingers laid out rows of tiny bottles. Each held a single thread—hair, silk, or something stranger—floating in liquid starlight.

  "Echoes," the vendor crooned. "Fragments of lives unlived."

  Harlan scoffed. "Charlatanry."

  Lyria held up a vial labeled Sorin, Age 70. Inside, a silver hair coiled like a question mark.

  Harlan’s breath hitched. "That’s impossible."

  The vendor smirked. "So’s he, and yet."

  Lyria shook the vial. The hair shimmered, and for a heartbeat, Harlan saw it—an old man with Sorin’s scars, sitting by a fire, alone. Then it vanished.

  Harlan’s voice cracked. "What is this place?"

  Lyria pocketed the vial. "Somewhere things go when the world forgets to look."

  A shadow loomed over them. Madame Orabi, her shawl stitched with constellations that moved, blocked their path. Her smile was a knife-slash. "Ah. The girl who remembers too much."

  Lyria didn’t blink. "And the man who pretends he doesn’t."

  Harlan stiffened.

  Madame Orabi fanned out a deck of cards—not paper, but thin slices of obsidian. "Let’s see what almost was."

  The genuine version of this novel can be found on another site. Support the author by reading it there.

  Madame Orabi’s obsidian cards clinked like broken glass as she spread them across her velvet-draped table. Harlan eyed them—each one etched with images that shifted when he blinked. A crown melting into a dagger. A child holding a mirror that reflected nothing.

  Lyria, however, leaned in eagerly. "Show me the paths," she demanded.

  Madame Orabi’s grin widened. She flipped a card.

  The Shattered Crown.

  A dozen fractured images flickered in the dark surface—Sorin kneeling, Sorin laughing, Sorin burning. One showed him older, face lined with grief, whispering to a woman with silver hair. Another depicted him as the Hollow King, his golden scars blackened and weeping.

  Harlan’s stomach twisted. "These aren’t prophecies. They’re possibilities."

  "Were possibilities," Madame Orabi corrected. "Until the world chose otherwise."

  Lyria touched the card, and for a heartbeat, Harlan saw her eyes flicker—not with recognition, but with something worse. Familiarity. Like she’d seen these paths before.

  The fortune-teller flipped another card.

  The Thief’s Lament.

  A figure—Kael, but older, face half-hidden behind the Exiled One’s mask—stood in a ruined hall, clutching a broken music box. The melody it emitted was visible in the card’s surface, notes curling like smoke.

  Lyria’s fingers twitched. "That one’s already happening."

  Madame Orabi chuckled. "Clever girl." She flipped a third card.

  The Alchemist’s Regret.

  Harlan froze. The card showed him, hunched over a worktable, hands stained with something darker than ink. A vial shattered at his feet, its contents swirling into the shape of a child’s face—Lyria’s.

  He snatched his hand back. "Enough."

  Lyria studied him, unreadable. "You’re scared of that one?"

  Harlan didn’t answer. He didn’t trust his voice not to shake.

  Madame Orabi gathered the cards. "Twelve paths. Twelve choices. But only one becomes real." She tapped Lyria’s forehead. "You already know which one you’re walking, don’t you?"

  Lyria’s smile didn’t reach her eyes. "Maybe."

  They wandered deeper into the market, past stalls selling bottled sighs and hourglasses filled with sand that fell up. Harlan’s skin prickled. Every instinct screamed to leave, but Lyria moved with purpose, her gaze locked on a stall at the very end.

  Its shelves were lined with tiny bells—each one etched with a name.

  The vendor, a wisp of a man with too many teeth, didn’t speak. He simply watched as Lyria reached for a bell no larger than a thumbnail. Its inscription read: Sorin, Age 12.

  Harlan grabbed her wrist. "We’re not stealing cursed objects today."

  Lyria wriggled free. "It’s not stealing if it’s already mine." Before Harlan could argue, she snatched the bell and rang it.

  The sound was wrong. Not a chime, but a reversal—a noise unraveling itself.

  Harlan’s ears popped. Somewhere, far away, Sorin’s scars pulsed, a golden flare that echoed across the market like a heartbeat.

  Lyria’s grin was triumphant. "See? He’s listening."

  The vendor’s smile vanished. He lunged for the bell, but Lyria was already darting away, weaving through the crowd with Harlan cursing behind her.

  Dawn approached. The market’s lanterns dimmed, their light retreating like tidewater. Stalls dissolved into mist; vendors folded into shadows.

  Harlan gripped Lyria’s shoulder. "We need to go. Now."

  She nodded, but her gaze snagged on a final stall—a skeletal figure offering a single coin on a velvet pillow.

  Lyria went still. "That’s not supposed to be here."

  The coin was pristine, stamped with a crown Harlan didn’t recognize. Below it, words in a dead language: "The Kingdom of Last Chances."

  The vendor held it out. "For the girl who remembers."

  Lyria didn’t move. Harlan, against his better judgment, took the coin.

  The second his fingers touched it, the market blurred. The ground lurched. For a heartbeat, Harlan saw—

  A silver-haired woman placing the same coin into a child’s hand. The Hollow King’s voice, whispering: "When the time comes, remind me."

  Then the vision snapped.

  The market was gone.

  They stood in an empty alley, dawn light bleeding through the cracks. Lyria stared at Harlan’s clenched fist.

  He opened his palm. The coin sat there, cold and impossible.

  Lyria’s voice was very small. "We should show Sorin."

  Harlan swallowed. "Yeah."

  Somewhere, a Hound howled.