I returned home after meeting with Mae, confident we were on to something. I continued my day as though nothing had changed, tending to my garden and unchanging moonflower seedling.

  When my father came around, I quickly did my best to shove my emotions back into the prison I had learned to build before, although it was a struggle. I kept our conversations brief, insisting that my time was best spent focusing on the possibility of fully mending Talen and getting him walking again. I didn’t hint at my knowledge of his potentially changed heart, or my discussion with him earlier that morning.

  I knew he surely didn't want Talen telling me the truth if he hadn’t wanted me in that council meeting. For my brother’s sake, I would lie to my father and learn to control my rage. He seemed to believe me, moving on and requesting that I restored the beauty of the wilting ceremonial garden before our Spring Festival.

  When I wasn’t being bothered, I pondered the meaning of the text my brother had given me to read. The words clung to my mind similarly to the hazy dream I couldn’t avoid, and I turned them over and over, hoping they would reveal something underneath. Maybe I was misunderstanding, but if this truly was attached to me, it felt like the divide had to be the answer. Talen had said that Finnean believed our answer was in the divide.

  After hours of digging, planting, weeding, and picking, the sun had begun to set, and the sky was glowing with a pink and gold hue. I gathered my tools, placed them in the small shed to the left of the house walls, and dragged myself back to my room. I’d missed dinner, not that I was hungry. The anger, fear, and determination that burned at the edge of my mind distracted my stomach from the pangs of emptiness.

  I showered off the dirt from the day and slipped into an oversized tunic and soft shorts for bed. I’d never been one for nightgowns or silk pajamas, as they clung to my curves in ways I didn’t necessarily appreciate. I had never been large, but I certainly wasn’t as thin and beautiful as Mae.

  Sitting at the writing desk in front of the large window of my room, where Luma lies in her usual spot, I pulled out my notebook. I began jotting notes from the day in the garden: notes on my current plants and their growth, the moonflower, and the different remedies I had mixed that day for future sessions with Talen. I wrote until the sun dipped low enough in the sky that light was scarce, and I had to light the oil lamp on the desk.

  My plan was simple. When the house was asleep, I would return to Talen’s room and retrieve the riddle from him. I couldn’t risk anyone overhearing our conversation.

  When the darkness finally crept in, I set aside my notebook and cracked open the door to my room, and, sticking out an ear, I listened for any noises that might indicate someone was still up and about in the house. When I heard nothing, I slipped out the door and down the stairs to Talen’s room.

  “Are you awake?” I asked, quietly shuffling through his door and closing it behind me gently.

  “Yes.” He replied. His back was turned to me, lying on his left side with his legs curled to his chest like a child. He looked… broken. I shoved the thought away.

  “Can I talk to you?” I sat down on the chair that had been perpetually left at his bedside.

  He didn’t reply, and although I should have taken it as a no, I carried on anyway.

  “The paper you gave me, with the riddle in it?”

  “Prophecy, supposedly.” He interrupted mockingly, not turning or moving a muscle. Something seemed different.

  “Yeah, whatever,” If he was going to be an ass, the least he could do was roll over and look at me. “Can I… can I have it again?”

  There was a moment of hesitation, and then he slowly pulled himself over onto his back with what looked like considerably less struggle than the last few days. Without sitting up, he reached a hand behind his head and under his pillow and pulled out the same leatherbound notebook from before. He opened the book, took out the torn paper, and handed it to me.

  “Through the divide, begins its flight”. I repeated, staring at the paper. “Must be why Finnean thought the divide was the answer. Where did this come from?”

  “Don’t know. I just know that Finnean thought it was important. He thought it was for me.” He seemed disgruntled by my questions, shrugging his shoulders but never meeting my gaze.

  “And you’ve never shown Dad, or Mom, or me? How do we find out?”

  “Nope. Don’t know.”

  He was quiet and not himself. I could tell he wasn’t interested in the company right now, so I folded the paper and reached for his hand.

  “I’m going to figure something out for you, Talen. We’ll get you walking and back to normal in no time. I’ll take care of it.”

  Talen looked at me, only for a moment, with a look I couldn’t quite make out. Anger, pain, disappointment, maybe? Then he pulled his hand away and rolled over, back to the position I found him in.

  Grasping my scrap of paper, I returned to my room for the night, tucking the paper into my notebook still lying on my desk. I spent the night replaying the riddle over and over in my head.

  A case of content theft: this narrative is not rightfully on Amazon; if you spot it, report the violation.

  Buried deep where the shadows sleep,

  The Heart stirs past the walls thorned keep.

  Not stone nor bone, but breathless light

  Through the Divide begins its flight.

  I wrote the words in my notebook, circling the word heart repeatedly. Talen’s heart? I didn’t know the connection, but it couldn’t be a coincidence. That man at the council meeting, whoever he was, had said Talen’s heart would be changed.

  Then, I looked to the end and circled one more portion: Through the divide.

  After an hour or so of circling and pacing my room, I finally decided that I would have to head toward it. Between those walls, held the only magic left on this land. If there was any chance of finding something to help Talen, it was going to be there. I would check around the walls first, searching for plants nearby that I might not have tried in Briarholt. If I couldn’t find anything on our side, I would have to find a way through the wastelands of darkness we’re warned not to go anywhere near.

  I’d never been there myself, but from what I understood of the stories of travelers and ranger crews, it was just under a full day’s travel to the walls’ outskirts. I would need to pack food, a carrying bag for anything I might need to bring, and my dagger—maybe two… or even three if I could find them. If I left now, I would make it to the wall’s border by early morning or afternoon.

  I shuddered at the thought. This was not a safe plan, but a necessary one. I would be quick and stay hidden. There were things within the walls we didn’t understand, dark magic and creatures, probably not unlike the one that attacked Talen. But I had to try.

  “A necessary plan, to save Talen’s heart.”

  I repeated the words at a whisper a few more times, allowing myself to accept the inevitable future. I changed into trail pants with a long-sleeved shirt made from thick black wool. I laced up strong black hiking boots, ones I would wear on hiking trips with Talen in the past, and reached under my bed for a small brown leather rucksack that I kept for traveling with my tools.

  Slinging the pack over my shoulder, I took the blade from the bottom drawer of my writing desk and pocketed it in its usual place, folding the note Talen had given me in with it. I paused momentarily, repeating my words and taking a few deep breaths, before peeking my head out of my bedroom door and listening closely again for sound. My hands trembled as I turned the handle, my heart pounding in my chest.

  I tiptoed down the stairs and into the kitchen, quickly and quietly stashing away a few slices of bread wrapped in paper and some dried venison that had been out in a brown bag. I grabbed an apple from the bowl on the counter and added it to the pile before sneaking down the hall and into my father’s study.

  The room was warm, and the fire my father had lit was still slowly dying down to embers, casting a subtle red glow around the room. A small pile of books was stacked atop his dark mahogany desk, an empty oil lamp and his reading glasses by their side.

  I crossed the room to his desk, my heavy boots leaving imprints in the soft brown rug beneath my feet, and sat in the large black armchair. The seat held a permanent dent from my father, almost warm still from his presence.

  As I rummaged through his desk drawers, I remembered being young on his lap, listening to him read his nightly stories to my brothers and me. Mom would frequently come in with warm tea or milk; occasionally, we were spoiled with treasures from beyond the divide, like hot chocolate.

  Comforts from the largest city across the walls, Valoria, once the capital of Terravellum, were few and far between. Only available when brave and strong rangers or soldiers survived the trek through or around the dangers of the divide, after they first braved the city itself. Tensions never calmed after the initial split -- and while the walls themselves protected us from war, hatred and resentment still boiled beneath the skin of those who came from long lineages. Valorians still believed themselves superior, and those of us from Briarholt still believed Valorians to be towering, egotistical mouth breathers.

  A small dagger with a wooden handle lay at the bottom of the desk, in a drawer filled with pens and bookmarks. Climbing the wooden handle were green-painted vines and bright red roses. The blade was pearlescent—almost white, with waves of pink and purple hues. It was my mother’s, most likely stored here for safekeeping.

  I snatched the knife, sticking it in the pocket of my left leg, opposite my own weapon. Closing the drawer quietly, I took a small step to the right and brushed against a small notebook. It fell with a slight thud, making me freeze in place, listening quietly. The ticking of the clock against the wall, the slight crackle from the last few burning embers in the fireplace, the sound of my heart beating, and short breaths. Nothing more.

  Picking up the notebook, I couldn’t help but notice the page it had fallen open to. The words “If the piece still calls, it must lie beyond the ashroot cliffs” are below a small sketch of what appeared to be a small crystal or sharp rock. There certainly wasn’t any ashroot near Briarholt, I thought to myself, so what could this be about?

  Just as I began separating the next page to investigate, I heard the sound of light footsteps across the hall above me. Someone was awake.

  I set the notebook back where it had been originally, closing the cover and rushing silently across the room again. I was out the door, through the lounge, and into the foyer just as the footsteps sounded like they might be rounding the hallway's corner. I hesitated a moment, as the full weight of what I was about to do settled in.

  There was no turning back; if I didn’t leave now, I would undoubtedly be caught and stopped from my plans. But stepping out this door meant I was on my way to danger, the place we had always been warned would certainly end in death for those not trained to survive – and I was in no way trained to survive.

  The footsteps rounded the corner, stopping in the lounge. If they came any closer, I risked being seen. I pressed my body close to the foyer's wall, hiding in a shadow beside a large coat hanger. A slight rustling sound, a few footsteps, a bit more rustling. I held my breath, listening, my eyes squeezed shut tightly. My heart pounded in my chest again, this time with fear like a child hiding from punishment. The footsteps picked up again, but they headed away from the lounge and back up the stairs to the second floor this time.

  I let out my breath, still holding my body against the wall while allowing my heart to slow down and the footsteps to stop completely. When I felt the slight shudder of a door closing upstairs, I stepped away from my hiding place and peered around the corner of the wall, hoping no one would be in the lounge.

  A sigh of relief swept across my lips when I saw no one there, but I tensed at the sight of a dark green pile of fabric that now sat on the edge of the small table in the center of the room. I tiptoed to it, lifting it to examine it in the dim light of a still-burning oil lamp in the corner of the room. It was a long, deep green cloak with a hood lined with brown fur for warmth.

  Someone had left it for me. I could stay and ponder who had left it in this spot. I could wonder if maybe someone had just heard a noise and come down to check on it, leaving their coat behind when they found no danger in the house. Or, I could take the possible offering and continue on my way.

  I moved quickly, leaving no time to wake anyone else. I snatched the cloak, throwing it over my body and connecting the small loops at the base of the hood with urgency, and slipped through the front door, closing it quietly behind me.