Nights were when Seres' care showed clearest.
Long after the others had curled into their bedrolls, she would kneel beside me, her hands steady as she peeled back my bandages. The firelight caught the silver in her white hair, turning it molten as she worked in silence. She never spoke during these moments—just pressed her lips into a thin line when a wound wept fresh blood, or nodded slightly when the skin beneath began to knit together.
I once pretended to be asleep as she checked my ribs. Her fingers hovered over the bruises, feather-light, before she tugged the blanket higher over my shoulders. The gesture was so unexpectedly tender that I almost opened my eyes. But then she was gone, retreating to her own corner of the room like a shadow retreating from dawn.
The River's Revelation
It was on one of these quiet mornings that she led me to the river.
The path was uneven, my steps still unsteady, but Seres walked slow enough that I could follow without stumbling. When we reached the bank, she handed me the water skins, then pointed downstream where the current pooled into stillness. "Valla miran," she said—water goes—but her gaze lingered on me, expectant.
I didn't understand until I looked down.
The reflection staring back was a stranger.
Long, wheat-gold hair—lank and tangled now, but unmistakably bright even in the overcast light. Golden eyes, wide with shock, the color so vivid it seemed unnatural. A face too young, too unmarked by time or hardship, with sharp features that spoke of noble bloodlines rather than peasant survival.
This is me?
My hands clenched at my sides. The face in the water mirrored the movement, but the recognition I desperately searched for wasn't there. No flicker of memory, no whisper of yes, this is who you are. Just a hollow dissonance, like staring at a portrait of someone long dead.
Seres crouched beside me, her reflection a ghostly contrast—pale where I was gilded, winter where I was sun. She studied my expression, then hesitantly touched her own cheek, as if tracing the differences between us.
"Rin," she murmured. Beautiful.
I startled. The word was unmistakable, even in her language.
She quickly stood, brushing dirt from her knees, her usual stoicism back in place. But the compliment lingered, unsettling in its sincerity.
The Questions Unspoken
Kai was the one who explained it later, grinning as he sprawled in the grass beside me. "Seres says you shine like coin," he announced, plucking at my hair. "Gold hair, gold eyes—only nobles and spirits have that. Did you fall from the sky?"
I batted his hand away, but the question settled heavy in my chest.
Seres had been watching me differently since the river. Not with suspicion, but something more complicated—a quiet reassessment. That night, as she ground herbs into paste, she finally voiced it.
"Ardyn… veyen?" She gestured vaguely northward, where the war-torn kingdoms lay. Home?
I shook my head, frustration boiling over. "I don't remember," I snapped in my own tongue, then immediately regretted it when she flinched. But to my surprise, she didn't withdraw. Instead, she reached out and carefully tucked a strand of my hair behind my ear, her fingers lingering just a second too long.
"Rin," she repeated softly. Then, haltingly, "Not… danger?"
A plea, not a question.
I understood then. My face, my colors—they marked me as someone who shouldn't be here, in this ruin with orphans and outcasts. Someone who might bring soldiers down on them.
I caught her wrist before she could pull away. "Ardyn… Seres' veyen," I said clumsily. Ardyn is Seres' home.
Her breath hitched. For a heartbeat, something fragile flickered in her pale eyes. Then Nico barreled into the room demanding supper, and the moment shattered.
But later, when she thought I was asleep, I felt her fingers brush my hair again—light as snowfall, gone before I could be certain it happened at all.
The Children's Symphony
The argument began, as most did, with Kai.
He burst through the doorway with his tunic pockets stretched to bursting—not with mushrooms or edible roots as he'd been tasked to find, but with an assortment of smooth river stones that clacked together like teeth when he moved. "They're magic!" he declared, dumping his treasures onto the packed earth floor with a dramatic flourish. "See how they glow in moonlight? The river spirit blessed them!"
Nico, ever the skeptic, snorted and snatched the largest stone—a flat gray oval with a single streak of quartz running through it. "Prove it!" he challenged, grinning as he tossed the stone in the air and caught it. Before Kai could react, Nico wound up and hurled it into the dense thicket beyond the clearing.
Kai gasped as if personally wounded. "That was the best one!" His voice cracked with outrage. Purple hair flying, he launched himself at Nico, who yelped and tried to dodge, sending them both crashing into the carefully stacked firewood pile. Logs tumbled in every direction, one narrowly missing the cooking pot.
Ethan moved with the long-suffering patience of an older brother, intercepting Kai mid-lunge and hauling him up by his collar. "Enough," he growled, though there was no real heat in it.
Mia appeared at Nico's side, her small hands brushing bark fragments from his tunic. "You shouldn't encourage him," she scolded, though her dark eyes sparkled with amusement.
Luna, seated beside me on a worn bench, didn't look up from the small wooden fox she was whittling. The knife moved in smooth, practiced strokes. "Every day," she murmured in her quiet way. Whether she meant their fights or Kai's absurd claims, I wasn't sure.
Seres watched from the doorway, arms crossed over her patched tunic. She didn't stop them—just observed, her pale eyes tracking the chaos with an expression hovering between exasperation and something softer. This was their normal: a cacophony of squabbles and laughter, as familiar and constant as the creak of wind through the rafters.
The dynamic shifted abruptly the next morning when Kai came sprinting back from the river, breathless and wide-eyed. He nearly collided with Ethan, who was repairing a fishing net outside.
"It's dying!" Kai gasped, grabbing Ethan's wrist with surprising strength. His usual mischief had vanished, replaced by something raw and urgent.
Ethan opened his mouth—likely to scold—but the words died when he saw Kai's expression. Without a word, he let himself be dragged toward the water's edge.
By the time I reached them, the others had already gathered in a loose circle. A small red fox lay panting on the bank, its left hind leg twisted at an unnatural angle, fur matted with mud and blood. Its golden eyes were wide with pain, but it didn't snarl or snap as Ethan slowly knelt beside it.
They moved with startling efficiency, falling into roles without discussion:
Mia darted back to the house, returning moments later with strips of clean cloth and a clay jar of salve. Luna was already crushing herbs between two stones, her slender fingers working quickly to prepare a poultice. Nico cleared space near the smoldering fire, kicking aside debris with uncharacteristic seriousness.
Even Kai, usually so restless, stood unnaturally still as Ethan examined the fox. "Back leg's broken," Ethan muttered. "Maybe ribs too." His hands, usually so rough when chopping wood or sparring with Nico, moved with unexpected gentleness as he checked for other injuries.
Seres appeared silently at my shoulder, her presence like a cool shadow. She didn't intervene, just watched as the children worked.
"Hold him," Ethan ordered as Mia passed him the bandages. Kai and Nico moved in unison, Nico gently pinning the fox's shoulders while Kai stabilized its hindquarters. The creature whimpered but didn't struggle.
Mia smoothed salve onto the worst wounds while Luna applied her poultice to the broken leg. Ethan bound the limb with practiced motions, his brow furrowed in concentration. When his fingers fumbled the final knot, Seres stepped forward without a word and secured the bandage herself.
I stood apart, useless but mesmerized. There was no discussion, no assigned roles. They just knew—who would do what, who needed space, when to step back or step in. A family's rhythm, learned not by blood but by countless shared meals and winters and losses.
The Weight of Loss
The fox didn't make it through the night.
We found it at dawn, curled tightly as if sleeping, but its chest no longer rose and fell. Kai, who had insisted on keeping watch, sat stiffly beside the small body, his face streaked with dirt and dried tears.
Nico, usually so loud, said nothing as he dug a shallow grave beneath the hawthorn tree. Mia lined it with soft moss while Luna tucked a sprig of firra between the fox's paws—their herb for safe journeys. Ethan stood apart, his jaw clenched, but when Kai turned and buried his face in Ethan's shoulder, he didn't push him away. Just rested a heavy hand on Kai's head, his fingers tightening briefly in the purple hair.
Seres placed a piece of honeycomb in the grave—a rare luxury—before Nico filled it in. No one spoke. The silence was heavier than any words could have been.
That night, as I lay awake listening to the soft breaths of the others, it struck me with sudden, aching clarity:
I didn't want to leave.
The thought was equal parts comforting and terrifying. These people—this ragtag collection of orphans and strays—had carved a space for me without demand or expectation. I knew Mia would save the sweetest berries for me, that Nico would drag me into his games the moment I seemed withdrawn, that Seres' watchful gaze would always find me in a crowd.
Even my reflection, once so alien in the river's surface, felt less strange now. The gold of my hair was just another color among Kai's purple and Nico's orange, the nobility of my features softened by dirt and healing scratches.
But the war hadn't ended. The world beyond these walls hadn't stopped turning. Whatever past I'd lost still lurked in the shadows, waiting to reclaim me.
Seres stirred across the room, her pale hair glowing in the moonlight. She met my eyes, and for a moment, neither of us looked away.
My mind was telling me to leave but my heart was urging me to stay and so I did thinking just for a little more.
The next morning, I woke before dawn.
Pain still threaded through my ribs with every breath, but the sharp edge had dulled to something bearable. Careful not to disturb the others—Seres curled near the embers, the children tangled together like puppies in a heap of blankets—I slipped outside.
The ruins breathed in the pale light.
What had once been towering walls now slumped like broken teeth, their jagged edges softened by decades of moss and ivy. Great blocks of stone, each larger than a man, lay scattered as if some giant child had abandoned their game. Here and there, fragments of carving peeked through the green—a twisted knot of vines, the curve of what might have been a wing. Not a temple, I thought. Something older. Something meant to last.
The locals avoided this place—I'd gathered that much from the children's stories. Superstition clung to the broken arches like the morning mist. Bad luck, Kai had said, uncharacteristically solemn. The dead don't sleep right here.
Yet Seres had made it a home.
She'd claimed the sturdiest corner, reinforcing the gaps with scavenged timber and packed earth. The fire pit sat where an ancient hearth might have been, its stones blackened by years of use. Bundles of herbs hung from rusted iron brackets that had likely once held torches. Even the crumbling mosaics underfoot had been repurposed—Mia arranged her foraged treasures on them, the bright berries and feathers stark against the faded tiles.
I ran a hand along a nearby wall, my fingers catching on pockmarks that weren't from weather. Arrow strikes. Sword chips. This place had been a fortress once, then a battleground, now a grave for whatever kingdom had raised it. The war that had orphaned Seres and the children was just the latest in a line of violence stretching back centuries.
A rustle in the undergrowth. I turned to see Seres approaching, a basket hooked over one arm. She paused at the tree line where the ruins gave way to forest, plucking leaves from a low-growing plant with quick, practiced motions. Firra, the pain-relieving herb. She'd been gathering it daily for my wounds.
Our eyes met across the clearing. For a moment, the years fell away—I saw the fortress whole, banners snapping in the wind, heard the clash of steel where now only birds sang. Then the vision shattered, and there was just Seres, her white hair bright against the mossy stones, watching me with that unreadable gaze.
She tilted her head toward the trees. An invitation.
I followed.
The forest beyond the ruins was lush, the air thick with the scent of damp earth and pine. Seres moved silently, pausing here to dig up a root, there to strip bark from a particular tree. Every so often, she'd glance back to ensure I kept pace.