The monastery disappeared behind the mountains before midday.
For several hours, the wagon descended along a narrow road that curved between towering pines and steep cliffs. The air gradually grew warmer as they descended, and the mountain stream that had followed them from the monastery widened until it became a clear river running beside the road.
Ayan remained unusually quiet.
Brother Aldren's final words stayed with him.
Kindness had stopped being something Isolde remembered.
It had become who she was.
But another question remained.
Where had she gone?
Seventeen years was a long time.
Long enough for roads to change.
Long enough for villages to disappear.
Long enough for a young woman to become old.
And if Isolde truly forgot every morning...
How had she survived seventeen years alone?
Ayan looked down at Elira's old map.
The mark at the monastery had been the final destination.
There was nothing beyond it.
No second mark.
No clue.
Only empty parchment.
Maren noticed.
"You don't know where to go."
Ayan folded the map.
"No."
Doctor Rowan guided the horses around a sharp bend.
"Then perhaps we shouldn't go anywhere."
Ayan looked toward him.
The old physician smiled.
"Whenever I've lost something, I've found that running in random directions rarely helps."
"What do you suggest?"
"Ask."
It was such a simple answer that Ayan almost laughed.
Doctor Rowan continued.
"Isolde traveled on foot."
"She needed food."
"Shelter."
"Water."
"She would have met people."
"Seventeen years is a long time..."
He glanced toward Ayan.
"...but people remember unusual kindness."
Ayan understood.
They didn't need to follow Isolde's memories.
They could follow the memories she had left in others.
...
Their first stop was a small village at the bottom of the mountain.
Ayan asked the oldest innkeeper.
"Isolde?"
The man frowned.
"No."
A farmer shook his head.
A retired soldier didn't recognize the name.
Neither did the village priest.
For nearly an hour...
Nothing.
Then an elderly woman selling flowers near the road overheard them.
"Did you say Isolde?"
Ayan turned immediately.
"You know her?"
The woman narrowed her eyes.
"What does she look like?"
Ayan hesitated.
He realized...
He didn't know.
Elira had described her only vaguely.
Brother Aldren had spoken mostly of her behavior.
Ayan removed the charcoal drawing from his satchel.
The elderly woman stared at it.
Her eyes widened.
"Oh."
She whispered.
"The morning woman."
"The what?"
The flower seller smiled.
"That's what my mother called her."
"She came through here when I was young."
Ayan's heart quickened.
"When?"
"Must have been..."
The woman thought.
"...sixteen or seventeen years ago."
That matched.
"Do you remember what happened?"
"Oh, everyone did."
She laughed.
"She spent an entire day helping us rebuild a chicken coop."
Maren blinked.
"A chicken coop?"
"A storm had destroyed it."
The woman nodded.
"She didn't know us."
"We didn't know her."
"She just saw my mother trying to lift a beam..."
"...put down her bag..."
"...and started helping."
Ayan smiled.
Of course she had.
"Where did she go afterward?"
"South."
The flower seller pointed toward a narrow road.
"She left the next morning."
"Did she say why?"
The woman's expression became thoughtful.
"No."
"Actually..."
"She asked us."
"Asked what?"
"Which direction she'd arrived from."
Silence.
Ayan understood immediately.
She had forgotten.
Again.
The woman smiled sadly.
"My mother told her."
"Then the traveler opened a little notebook..."
"...crossed out the northern road..."
"...and chose south."
Maren's eyes widened.
"She was making sure she didn't walk backward."
The flower seller nodded.
"That's what Mother thought."
Ayan looked toward the southern road.
Isolde had created a method.
If memory could not guide her...
Writing would.
...
They thanked the woman and continued south.
The road crossed farmland and low wooded hills.
By evening, they reached another settlement.
Again...
Ayan asked.
Most people knew nothing.
But an elderly baker remembered.
"Isolde?"
He stared toward the ceiling.
"Wait."
"Was she the woman who couldn't remember eating breakfast?"
Ayan almost laughed.
"Probably."
The baker slapped the counter.
"I knew it!"
He pointed toward an old wooden table in the corner.
"She sat right there."
"Ordered breakfast."
"Ate everything."
"Then twenty minutes later..."
"...asked when breakfast would be served."
Doctor Rowan chuckled.
"What did you do?"
"I served her again."
Everyone laughed.
"She paid twice too."
The baker grinned.
"I tried returning the money."
"She refused."
"She said..."
His expression softened.
"'Then feed someone tomorrow who cannot pay.'"
The laughter disappeared.
Ayan looked toward the old man.
"Did you?"
The baker smiled.
"For seventeen years."
He pointed toward a small wooden sign beside the door.
Written upon it were simple words.
**If you are hungry and have nothing, ask.**
Maren stared.
"She started that?"
"One breakfast."
The baker replied.
"That's all it took."
Ayan felt something warm stir inside his chest.
Isolde had forgotten the meal.
She had forgotten the baker.
She had forgotten the promise.
Yet...
Seventeen years later...
People were still eating because of her.
...
The baker remembered that she had continued southwest.
The next morning, they followed.
Then another person remembered.
A shepherd.
"She bandaged my father's hand."
Another village.
Another memory.
"She taught my mother how to read."
Another town.
Another story.
"She stayed with a dying stranger so he wouldn't be alone."
Ayan slowly began marking the map.
One point.
Then another.
Then another.
A path emerged.
Not a straight line.
It wandered wildly.
Sometimes east.
Sometimes south.
Once almost completely west again.
But wherever Isolde had passed...
Something remained.
A habit.
A story.
A kindness someone else had continued.
On the fourth evening, Ayan spread the map across a table inside a roadside tavern.
Maren stared at the growing trail of marks.
"It looks..."
She paused.
Doctor Rowan finished the thought.
"Like roots."
Ayan looked down.
It did.
From the monastery, dozens of small marks spread across the land.
A tree of memories.
Except the woman who had created them remembered none of them.
The Bridge pulsed.
The silver notebook appeared.
Its pages opened slowly.
Silver ink formed across the page.
**When memory cannot leave a path...**
A second line appeared.
**Look for the lives that changed after someone passed through them.**
The ink continued.
**A person may forget every road they walked...**
**...yet the world remembers where their footsteps were kind.**
Ayan closed the notebook.
Then he noticed something.
Every recent story pointed in roughly the same direction.
Southwest.
Toward a region marked on the map by a vast forest.
Doctor Rowan leaned closer.
"The Greenwood."
"You know it?"
"Only by reputation."
The old physician's expression became serious.
"It's enormous."
"Several settlements exist inside."
Maren looked toward the map.
"Which one would Isolde choose?"
Ayan studied the marks.
He didn't know.
Then the tavern owner, who had been listening quietly while cleaning a nearby table, suddenly spoke.
"If you're searching for the woman from that drawing..."
Everyone turned.
The man pointed toward the charcoal sketch.
"...I saw her."
Ayan stood immediately.
"When?"
The tavern owner frowned while counting silently.
"Last spring."
The room became completely still.
Not seventeen years ago.
Not ten.
Not five.
Last spring.
Ayan's heart began beating faster.
"Are you certain?"
The man nodded.
"Older."
"More gray in her hair."
"But those eyes..."
He tapped the drawing.
"I remember them."
"Where was she going?"
The tavern owner pointed southwest.
"Greenwood."
"She asked about a village called Haven."
Doctor Rowan's expression changed.
"You know it?"
The old physician slowly nodded.
"It's deep inside the forest."
"Why would she go there?"
The tavern owner smiled faintly.
"She said someone was waiting for her."
Ayan felt the Bridge pulse harder than before.
"Who?"
The man shook his head.
"She didn't know."
Ayan froze.
The tavern owner continued.
"She showed me something written in her notebook."
"What?"
The man's expression became strangely solemn.
"Only one sentence."
He looked directly at Ayan.
**Go to Haven.**
**Someone there remembers who you were before you became Isolde.**
Silence filled the tavern.
Ayan looked toward the dark forest visible beyond the window.
For the first time since beginning this journey...
They weren't following Isolde's kindness anymore.
They were following her past.
And somewhere within Greenwood...
Someone was waiting who might finally know the truth behind the woman who woke each morning without herself.