We were still at the table. The coffee had long since cooled, but neither of us moved. The silence between us had grown comfortable. Outside, the wind rustled through cottonwoods, whispering secrets I wasn't ready to hear. Malvor drummed his fingers against his ceramic mug, then stopped. Started again. Stopped. I raised a brow.
"You're doing that thing," I said.
"What thing?" He blinked, feigning innocence.
"The thing where you're thinking too loud and trying to act casual about it."
He cleared his throat, looking everywhere but at me. "I was just... wondering." I waited. "Have you ever thought about… seeing Ahyona?" he asked, like the words might explode in his mouth. "For, you know. Healing. Emotional excavating. Spiritual spelunking. Possibly… couples counseling?"
"Couples counseling?" I echoed, arching an eyebrow.
"Well, technically that's Vitaria's area," he admitted, scratching the back of his neck. "But I feel like Ahyona would bring cedar smoke and fry bread, and honestly that might be more effective?"
I stared at him, somewhere between amused and disbelieving. He finally met my gaze, and whatever sarcasm had been lingering in his tone dissolved. "I just…" He exhaled. "I want you to really heal. Not just get by. Not just smile through the pain and say you're fine when you're bleeding on the inside."
My throat tightened.
"I've already had Ahyona's acolytes in my head," I said flatly. "For years. They were the ones who helped me 'deal' with trauma. Every time I broke, they made me feel better. Softer. Safer. Like I was fine."
Malvor nodded slowly.
"I know," he said gently. "But what they did wasn't healing." I tensed, but he didn't stop. "They manipulated your emotions. Put up barriers and called it peace. That was not healing, my love, that was corking a dam and pretending the flood wouldn't come."
He leaned in, voice quiet and steady. "I want to take the dam down. Slowly. Carefully. With you." My throat worked as I swallowed. "I want to feel what's real," he continued. "Even when it hurts. Especially when it hurts. And I want you to feel it too, not alone. Not shattered. Just... one piece at a time. With someone beside you."
His fingers brushed against mine on the table. "I'll sit outside if I have to. But if there's even a chance Ahyona can help, you deserve that chance."
I didn't pull away. I didn't say yes. But I didn't say no, either. When my thumb brushed against his, just once, I knew. That was a beginning. Outside, just beyond our silence, the prairie breathed. Somewhere far away, a sacred lodge stirred, its timbers groaning softly, its hearth embers glowing faintly. A place built not to hide pain... but to let it finally be seen.
Malvor didn't expect Ahyona to respond so fast. Usually, her realm required multiple petitions, at least one ceremonial song, and the occasional basket of sage bundles just to get penciled into her lunar calendar. But this time? Her reply came within the hour, sealed in beeswax stamped with a symbol of a thunderbird, scented like sweetgrass and tears. "Come this afternoon," it read. "I will be old enough to help you."
The air shimmered as we stepped through the portal, a doorway woven of bark and bone, feathers and smoke. A soft breeze carried the scent of juniper, burnt sugar, and heartbreak. We emerged into the courtyard of Ahyona's domain, not a palace but a clearing surrounded by towering redwoods. Instead of golden cobblestones, the ground was a carpet of moss glowing faintly underfoot. Fountains bubbled with what looked suspiciously like cedar-infused water, and delicate willow branches hung low, their leaves occasionally sighing when brushed. Malvor adjusted the tray in his hands, stacked with sweets from his realm: sugared violets that whispered secrets when chewed, caramel lace that shimmered with color, and his personal contribution: a candy apple that looked completely normal but screamed when bitten into. He felt it added character.
The lodge doors opened before we knocked. Inside, the light was dim, filtered through intricate beadwork and woven blankets that shifted colors with every step. The music in the background sounded like a lullaby sung through a river, deep, old, and unrelenting. Ahyona was already waiting. She reclined on her cedarwood bench, a deep earth-toned dress clinging to her like an emotion she hadn't shaken off yet. Her hair was braided in elegant plaits streaked with gray, and her face was soft, not from lack of power, but from knowing how much it cost to hold it. I blinked. This Ahyona wasn't a glitter-eyed girl or a sobbing teen queen. She was a woman who had seen decades of longing, heartbreak, and healing. Who survived it all with grace and crow's feet intact. "Well," Ahyona said, her voice like silk over cracked sandstone. "You brought sweets. That is already better than most."
Malvor gave her a half-bow, setting the tray down on the nearest carved stump. "Figured I'd soften you up before the trauma talk."
Ahyona arched a perfectly shaped brow. "You're lucky I'm currently feeling emotionally stable. Otherwise, I'd make the river flood."
She turned her gaze to me and stood, slowly, deliberately. She did something no one expected. She opened her arms. No drama. No performance. Just an invitation. "I'm not here to fix you," she said gently. "But if you want to start unpacking, I'll make sure the lodge doesn't wash away while you do."
I didn't move for a second. Quietly… I stepped forward. Not because I was ready. Because I finally had someone who would stand beside me while I fell apart. Ahyona didn't say a word as she led us down a path lit with flickering candlelight housed in hollowed gourds. The dirt beneath our feet shimmered like a reflection, like we were walking across memory itself.
At the end of the path, she stopped in front of two tall, arched doors made of oak and adorned with carvings of wolves and women and spirits intertwined. She brushed the handle with her fingers. "This is the Grove of Shattered Echoes," she said softly, looking at me. "Everything you've survived lives here. Every wound. Every silence. Every version of you the world refused to see."
Malvor reached for my hand. Ahyona held up a finger. "She walks alone."
I hesitated. The doors creaked open on their own. The grove stretched endlessly in all directions, the canopy high and arched like a cathedral of leaves. Pools of water dotted the ground, still as glass. Trees leaned close, branches heavy with moss and faintly glowing fungi. Totems carved from cedar and pine shifted in and out of focus. Some pulsed with emotion. Others stayed still like even they had learned to hold their breath. I took a breath and walked.
The grove began in silence. Not the kind that soothed, but the kind that pressed in. That judged. My footsteps were swallowed by the moss. My body felt too heavy for sound. The lighting flickered with a soft blue glow, but this first clearing felt darker than the rest. At first, I thought the pools were blank. But they weren't. They were empty. Each basin waited, titled and labeled, prepared, yet the waters?
Gray. A muted fog of memory. Untouched. Unrippling. Forgotten. I moved slowly, reading the plaques beneath each one. Some had dates. Some didn't.
Age 3 – Birthday? Winter – No Fire. Someone's Voice, Maybe. Age 6 – Hiding Under the Table.
Each title hinted at something, but the surface stayed unchanged. Like my mind had refused to keep anything too soft, too safe.
I reached out to one labeled: "Mother's Face." Nothing happened.
No swirl of magic. No sudden remembering. Just cold air brushing against my fingers, hovering over a truth I'd never had. I moved on. Further down, a small cluster of reflections emerged, fragments. Slivers of something broken. A chipped teacup in too-small hands. Cracks filled with gold that wasn't real, just painted on to look like care.
A window at night, the moon crooked in the sky, a blanket corner clutched too tightly. A hallway I didn't recognize, dark and narrow. I could hear my footsteps inside the frame. No one waited at the end.
Then I saw it: "Happy Lies"
At first glance, it was beautiful. Color bled across the water like a kaleidoscope, bright, cheerful, saturated. Children laughed in the corners. Parents, maybe, stood in the center, arms outstretched. But the closer I stepped? The blur emerged. No one had eyes. The smiles were too wide. The laughter had no sound. And beneath all that color, just barely visible, was a small, hollow-eyed girl curled in the corner, completely alone. The word family was etched into the stone in elegant script. When I touched it, the stone peeled back. Underneath, burned into the wood: You told yourself this story to survive.
The totem stood alone. A carved cedar figure beneath a flickering spotlight of moonlight. I didn't want to look too closely. But I did. The girl was tiny, no more than eight. Her wooden skin red-veined and trembling beneath carved ceremonial robes. Her shoulders hunched, her eyes downcast. Rusted chains looped around her neck and wrists. A price tag dangled from her collarbone, swaying slightly in a breeze that didn't exist. The number on the tag shifted.
40 silver. Then 25. Then a single copper coin.
I reached out not to comfort. Just to understand. My fingers brushed the bark. The totem bled. Thin red sap seeped from the wood, running down the girl's legs and pooling at her feet. The scent of iron filled the air like a memory I'd spent years trying to forget. I pulled back, heart stuttering. The girl didn't scream. That girl never had.
The next path was narrower intentionally. The trees leaned in like ribs in a cage. The air turned metallic, damp with something old, holy, and wrong. Here? The memories were no longer fragmented. They were ritual. Each effigy lined the path, a girl carved mid-motion, arms flung out, backs arched, mouths open in expressions that weren't quite ecstasy and weren't quite pain. Their skin bore etched runes, some glowing faintly, others crusted with resin like scabs. To my right stood another. Girls in temple robes, frozen mid-chant, hands clenched around nothing. Each title read like a sermon:
Preparation – Silence
Obedience – The First Cut
Purity – No Voice
The carvings were raw. Violent. Chiseled by hands that either trembled or should have. One figure knelt. A blade hovered just above her spine, suspended. Her hands reached for nothing. There was nothing to hold. Not comfort. Not mercy. Not even a name. I looked away. I found something so much worse.
Offering #43 Not a painting. Not a sculpture. A jar. Tall. Thin. Crystal-clear. Inside: thick, red liquid. Still. Unmoving. Eternal.
A gold label at the base read, in delicate script: She Didn't Scream Loud Enough.
Behind it: more jars. Dozens. Each one numbered. Each with its own brutal truth:
#27 – She Cried, But Not For Them
#61 – She Bled Beautifully
#88 – She Was Silent, So They Called It Consent
I stopped breathing. Just for a moment. Then stepped forward. My footfalls were absorbed by the earth. Not because the grove had changed. Because I had. I didn't touch the jars. I didn't need to. I already knew the taste.
Perfection Hurts Quietly It took up an entire tree. Carved from a trunk as wide as I was tall, polished so smooth it reflected me as I approached. Me. But not me. The woman carved there stood radiant. Chin tilted. Eyes shining. Smile soft. Untouchable. It was the version the world wanted. Except her mouth was frozen in a silent scream. Stretched too wide. Smoothed over too many times to ever be erased. Up close, the truth unraveled: Cracks.
Hairline fractures ran across her porcelain skin like spiderwebs. Each one glowed faintly, not with hope, but pain. Behind every scar that had been edited, erased, softened. She still burned. I stared for a long time. Then turned my back on it. I didn't touch it. Didn't cry. I just moved on. Because that was my sacred duty.
The next path was simply labeled The Johns. The path narrowed again. No paintings. No sculptures. Only pools and totems. Dozens. Hundreds. Each one rippling with illusion magic, settling into images of me. But not me. Versions of me. Smiling. Giggling. Moaning. Performing. Each one customized for the faceless figure standing beside her. Their features blurred. But their hands were always present. Stroking my cheek. Pulling my hair. Tilting my head just so. I walked among them like a ghost. Each reflection shimmered as I passed, reflecting a new version of myself, different laugh, different moan, different need to please. I tried not to flinch.
One reflection cracked. No warning. No sound. Just a thin, jagged line, splitting my reflection down the middle. The version inside that pool didn't smile. Didn't beg. Didn't perform. Just stared. Blank. Empty. I exhaled. I kept walking. Not because I was ready, but because turning back would mean choosing that life again.