•Timberline Village•
[Ace's POV]
The wagon wheels crunched to a halt on the hard-packed earth at the village entrance. Timberline lay before us, a collection of weathered wooden structures nestled in a valley cleft, smoke curling lazily from a few chimneys. It was a place of simple survival, not beauty. My gaze immediately went to Ovelia.
She was staring at the village, but her eyes weren't seeing the present. They were fixed on some painful point in the past. All the softness had drained from her face, replaced by a rigid, pale stillness. Her lips were pressed into a bloodless line, and her hands were clasped so tightly in her lap her knuckles were white. The vibrant curiosity she'd shown on the plains was gone, swallowed by a heavy, silent dread. Seeing her like this—a ghost in her own life—sent a sharp pang through my chest.
I reached over and took one of her cold hands, enveloping it in both of mine. "I know this is difficult," I said, my voice low, meant only for her. My thumb stroked slow, reassuring circles over her knuckles. "But you are not facing them alone. Not this time."
She turned her head toward me. The fragile smile she offered was a ghost of its usual self, not touching the deep anxiety shadowing her red eyes. It was a smile of acknowledgment, not comfort.
"Ace, shall I park the wagon here, at the village edge?" Ray's voice was carefully neutral, but I heard the underlying tension. He had been silent since we turned onto the village road, his sharp eyes constantly scanning the tree line, the path, the few villagers who had stopped to stare—assessing every potential threat.
"Yes. Right here. We'll proceed on foot," I replied, keeping my tone light but decisive. I wanted to observe this place, to walk the ground she had walked, but I also wanted the option of a swift retreat if needed.
Ray nodded, his jaw a firm line. He climbed down from the driver's bench with his usual economy of motion, but his hand lingered near the pommel of his sword. Ann followed, her steps lighter, but her usual cheerful expression was subdued. She kept glancing at Ovelia, her brow furrowed with worry.
I turned back to Ovelia. She was staring at the rough planks of the wagon floor as if they held answers, her brow knitted. A fine tremor ran through the hand I held.
"Ovelia, your village has such a peaceful feel," Ann said, her voice deliberately bright, trying to pierce the gloom. But when Ovelia didn't respond, Ann's tone softened into genuine concern. "My lady… are you alright?"
Ovelia's head snapped up. "I'm fine," she said quickly, the words automatic and hollow. She forced another brittle smile for Ann, who returned it with one that didn't reach her worried eyes.
"Are the two of you planning to take root in that wagon?" Ray called up, raising an eyebrow. His tone was teasing, but his eyes, when they flicked to Ovelia, were serious and watchful.
I kept my grip on Ovelia's hand and stood, gently urging her up with me. "Let's go," I murmured, my voice a soft command. Her eyes met mine, and in their crimson depths, I saw a flicker of raw vulnerability, the little girl who had been hurt here. She gave a slight, almost imperceptible nod.
[Ovelia's POV]
My boots touched the familiar, hard-packed earth of the village path, and a wave of visceral memory washed over me. The scent—woodsmoke, damp soil, animal pens—was the scent of my childhood, but it carried no warmth, only a deep, cellular dread. The sight of the squat wooden houses with their shuttered windows, the well-worn path to the central well, the distant sound of a goat bleating—it was all a tableau from a life I had desperately tried to leave behind. My heart began a frantic, hammering rhythm against my ribs.
Villagers had stopped their tasks. They stood in doorways, leaned over fences, their eyes wide and fixed on our group. Whispers began, a sibilant hiss that seemed to come from the very air itself. "The sacrifice." "She's back." "Who are they?"
"Ace," I whispered, the name a plea. His grip on my hand tightened instantly, a solid, warm anchor in the rising tide of my panic. His presence was a shield, but it couldn't stop the cold sweat that prickled down my spine.
"Ovelia," Ann said, stepping close on my other side. Her voice was a gentle, steady murmur. "We are here. Right beside you. Whatever happens, we face it together." She gave my arm a reassuring squeeze.
Ray, who had taken a few steps ahead as if to scout, turned and looked back at me. His usual stoic expression softened just for a moment. He didn't smile, but he gave a single, firm, deliberate nod. "You are not alone," he stated, his deep voice cutting through the whispery static. "Remember that."
Their words were a lifeline, a tiny flame in the encroaching dark. But as we walked further into the village's heart, the stares grew bolder, the whispers coalesced into audible mutters. My chest felt tight, each breath a struggle. I clung to Ace's hand, my fingers laced with his so tightly I feared I might hurt him.
[Ace's POV]
The village was even more austere up close. The houses were built for utility, not comfort. Small, neatly tended plots held hardy vegetables, and a few scrawny chickens scratched in the dirt. It was a life of relentless toil and bare sustenance. The air, however, held a different tension—not just Ovelia's, but a collective wariness that thickened around us like fog.
As we neared a slightly larger, though no less worn, house at what seemed to be the village center, an older man with a stern, lined face stepped into our path. He held himself with an air of authority.
"Vice Mayor Arnold?" Ovelia gasped beside me, the surprise in her voice laced with fresh anxiety.
"Ovelia Ashford," the man said, his voice gravelly. His eyes narrowed, sweeping over our group with sharp suspicion. "What is the meaning of this? You are a designated sacrifice. Have you fled your duty? And who are these… merchants?" The word 'merchants' was heavy with doubt.
Ray opened his mouth, a retort doubtless on his lips, but I shot him a swift, silencing glare. Our disguises were flimsy, but to human senses, we smelled and looked human. That was our only advantage here.
[Ovelia's POV]
Panic, cold and sharp, lanced through me. What if they turn on us? What if they see through the disguise? But worse than the fear of the village was the looming, sickening dread of facing them again—the people who had called themselves my parents.
"Do not cower." Lady Firera's voice cut through the panic in my mind, not as a gentle whisper, but as a clear, imperious command. "You carry a divinity within you. Stand with the bearing it deserves. Your confidence is your shield."
"But you are sealed," I thought back desperately. You can only lend me strength for moments. Seconds.
"And in some seconds, a world can change. Be grateful for what you have, and use it wisely. Now, stand tall." she encouraged me, her mental voice instilling confidence.
I drew in a shuddering breath, trying to straighten my spine.
"I'll fetch your father, Ovelia," Vice Mayor Arnold said, his tone dismissive. "Mayor Lorence will decide what's to be done with you."
I felt Ace's hand squeeze mine once, hard. I looked up at him. He offered me a small, tight smile, a silent promise of I am here.
"We'll accompany you, Vice Mayor," Ace said aloud, his voice shifting into a tone of polite but unyielding authority. It was the voice of a merchant used to dealing with difficult clients, but I heard the steel beneath it. "We would like to meet the Mayor as well."
[Ace's POV]
We followed Arnold through the village. I noted the small, well-organized plots, the tidy pigpens. It was a community that survived through strict order and shared labor. Admirable in its way, and pitiable. My anger simmered beneath a cold layer of observation. This was the world they had used to break her.
We stopped before the largest house in the village, though it was still humble. Arnold knocked sharply on the door. "Mayor Lorence! Visitors to the village!"
I saw Ovelia's free hand fly to her chest, pressing against her heart as if to quiet its frantic beating. Her face was ashen.
"Ovelia, breathe," Ann murmured, stepping closer and placing a steadying hand on her shoulder. "We are right here with you."
"She's right," Ray said, his voice a low rumble. He stood slightly in front of us, a protective barrier. His eyes met mine, and I saw my own simmering fury reflected in them.
We all looked at Ovelia, offering what encouragement we could with our eyes. She managed a tremulous, grateful smile, drawing a shaky breath.
The door opened. An older woman stood there, wiping her hands on a faded apron. Her face was worn by weather and work, and her eyes held a habitual sharpness.
"Forgive the disturbance, Arnold, but Lorence is at the river, fishing. Who seeks him?" Her voice was polite but held no warmth.
I felt Ovelia stiffen beside me, a small, trapped sound catching in her throat. I tightened my grip on her hand, pouring every ounce of my presence into that contact. I am here.
"We have merchants," Arnold explained, jerking a thumb at us. "And, of course, Ovelia. I'll leave them in your care, Natasha." With that, he turned and strode away, his duty apparently discharged.
The woman's—Natasha's—eyes landed on Ovelia. The polite mask shattered. Her face hardened into lines of pure, venomous anger. A corresponding heat ignited in my own chest, and I felt Fenrir stir with a vicious growl in the depths of my mind.
"You," Natasha spat, the word dripping with contempt. "What are you doing here? You had a duty. A sacrifice. Did you crawl back from the beasts? And drag these… peddlers with you?" Her gaze swept over us with utter disdain. "You, merchants. If you've come to sell your trinkets, turn your wagon around. We have no use for your wares here."
The dismissal was absolute, the hatred in her tone so personal it was a physical force. A red haze of protective rage threatened to cloud my vision. I wanted to make her take back every cruel word, to make her feel a fraction of the fear she'd instilled in Ovelia.
"Ovelia's so-called mother is as charming as a nest of vipers," Ray muttered under his breath, leaning so only I could hear. "I'm fighting the urge to suggest she learns permanent silence." I shot him a warning look, though the same violent impulse throbbed in my own veins.
[Ovelia's POV]
I had braced for this. I had known it would come. But knowing did nothing to armor me against the venom in her eyes, the tone she had used to cut me down for years.
Then, another figure appeared in the doorway behind Natasha. Alessia. My so-called sister. Her eyes, so like her mother's, narrowed as they landed on me, and a slow, condescending smirk spread across her face. "Oh. Look who's come crawling back. My foolish little sister, bringing her merchant friends for a visit?" Her voice was sweetly poisonous.
The words were an echo, a perfect replica of what she had said to me on the day I left. "Thank you, you stupid little sister." The memory was a fresh wound.
I felt Ace's hand, Ann's presence, Ray's solid stance behind me. I clung to them. I drew a breath that felt like inhaling shards of glass.
"Alessia," I said, my voice trembling but audible. "So I was right. When I found out I wasn't your real sister, you didn't just change. You showed your true self. All those years of kindness… it was just an act." The pain of admitting it aloud was excruciating. "Why? Why pretend for so long?"
Alessia let out a short, cruel laugh. "Ha! I did what I had to, Ovelia. I've hated you since the day they dragged you here. I was nice to keep you docile. To make sure you didn't run away and ruin our perfect little plan." The confession was delivered with a casual cruelty that stole the air from my lungs. The foundation of my childhood—those rare moments of sisterly comfort—crumbled to dust, revealed as a carefully maintained lie.
"You know, Ovelia," Natasha cut in, her voice like ice. "If you came back to learn where we found you, I will tell you. But the price is this: you, and every one of your merchant friends, will get on your knees. You will kneel before me and beg for the truth."
"You will kneel to no one." Firera's voice was a whip-crack in my mind.
But my dream… my real parents hid me in the gnarled roots of a large tree. I already know. The thought was a weak protest. I didn't need their cruel confession.
"I-it's alright," I stammered, despair making my voice thin. "You don't have to tell me. And we will not kneel."
But then, the warmth of Ace's hand left mine. I looked at him, confused, as he slowly, deliberately, went down on one knee in the hard dirt of the path. A moment later, Ann followed, her head bowed. Then Ray, with a look of grim resolve, knelt as well.
A wave of crushing guilt washed over me. They were doing this for me. To unearth a truth I already possessed, to understand the scars on my soul. My knees felt weak. With a sob caught in my throat, I sank down beside them, the rough ground biting through my skirt.
[Ace's POV]
The four of us knelt. It was an act of submission that set every instinct in my body screaming, but it was a calculated one. I knew where I had hidden her. But I didn't know the story that came after. I needed to hear the words from their mouths. I needed to witness the shape of the cage they had built around her.
Ovelia knelt last, her movement one of utter defeat. Her voice, when she spoke, was a broken whisper. "Mother… where did you find me? Who… who were my real parents?"
The sight of her like that, brought so low by the very people who should have cherished her, was a physical agony in my chest.
Natasha looked down at our bowed heads, a flicker of grim satisfaction in her eyes. She sighed, a heavy, theatrical sound.
"First," she began, settling her weight as if preparing for a long tale. "I have no idea who your true parents were. Lorence and I found you as a babe, wrapped in clean blanket, placed in a basket and shoved into the hollow of a great tree by the river. The only thing with you was a slip of parchment with your name. Nothing more." She accepted a cup of water from Alessia, taking a long drink.
"When we saw you were a girl… we saw an opportunity. We could raise you, keep you hidden, and when the time came… you would take Alessia's place as the sacrifice. We thought we could be kind. We thought we could make you love us, so you wouldn't ever think to run." She took another sip, her gaze distant and hard. "But do you understand, Ovelia? When you discovered you were not our biological daughter, when you realized you were always meant to be the offering… it was a relief. The pretending was exhausting. We no longer had to fabricate affection for a stranger's child."
The words hung in the cold air, stark and brutal in their honesty. The four of us remained kneeling, the confession settling over us like a shroud. I could feel the eyes of the gathering villagers on our backs, a palpable pressure. I glanced at Ovelia. The sadness on her face was absolute, a raw, open wound. Her heart was breaking in the dirt of her hometown, and mine was breaking for her.
It is my fault. The thought was a blade twisted in my gut. I am the one who hid her near this wretched place. If I had chosen better, if I had taken her to a town with kindness, she would have been loved. She would have been safe. I delivered her to this. The guilt was a black, suffocating tide, and in that moment, kneeling in the dust, it was the only truth I knew.