Chương 5: Chapter 4: Awakened

Four years had passed since Valerius and the bulk of Veraxys forces had marched for the red shore, joined by a coalition of every neighboring nation. And the story Leta told her most mornings, while she worked a brush through Elma's golden hair, still ended exactly the same way: with nothing Elma could use. Leta stood behind her at the vanity, humming low under her breath the way she always did before she started, the brush moving in long, even strokes.

She'd told it so many times the words had worn smooth, like a stone handled until its edges disappeared.

"A hundred years ago," Leta began, dropping into the same practiced cadence she always used for this part, "the whole world dreamed the same dream. All at once. Lords, beggars, children too small to walk. Even the dying, they say, dreamed it clearest of all." Elma sat still under the brush, her eyes fixed on her own reflection, and let the recitation wash past her. This made the hundredth telling, by her count. Give or take a handful she'd lost track of somewhere around year three.

"A void," Leta said, the brush pausing half a stroke the way it always did at this part.

"Darker than any night you've ever seen. And in it, a shape with eyes like two green coals." He has many names, Leta liked to say—the Watcher, the Herald, the Green Shepherd, names that shifted from village to village like the story had passed through too many mouths to settle on one. Elma had already mapped every variant Leta had given her across four years of these mornings. None of them told her anything the others hadn't.

"He spoke," Leta went on, the brush resuming its rhythm.

"Always the same voice. The same words. But no one who heard it could understand a syllable. Just noise, my own mother used to call it. And when you woke, you couldn't remember the sound itself. Only the lingering certainty that it had been speaking to you." Elma didn't need to imagine the noise. She still heard the rough edge of it some mornings, in the stretch of quiet just after she opened her eyes, before the house had fully woken around her.

"Not long after the dreaming stopped," Leta continued, "the rifts opened. And then came the Tide." Her hand stilled on the brush—the one part of the telling she never delivered as smoothly as the rest.

"They say that before the Tide reaches a nation, people start dreaming of him. And wherever those dreams appear first, the Tide soon follows." She let it sit there a moment, the way she always did, then resumed brushing with a touch more vigor than before.

"But that's old, old history, my little doll. Nothing to fuss over before lunch. Your father will emerge victorious, the Four wills it that way." Elma met her reflection's green gaze and gave nothing away. She had run the data a hundred times now, and a hundred times it had refused to resolve into anything usable. No method of address. No pattern she could test, replicate, or provoke a response from.

Whatever he wanted—and she was now fairly certain he was the same presence that had pulled a deal out of her in the dark, the only conversation of her life she couldn't remember the terms of—the story gave her nothing to work with. No language. No leverage. Just static, twice over: once in the legend, once in her own memory of the void. From the hallway, Christa's soft voice floated in, laced with the subtle, compelling affection that Elma now recognized as command. Though it was strangely subtler today.

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"Elma, my love? Lunch is ready." Elma crossed the echoing expanse of the dining hall, her small shoes clicking with a precision that would have unsettled a more observant parent. She took her seat beside Christa, but the usual flurry of maternal fussing didn't come. Elma began methodically separating her roasted vegetables and sliced meat into distinct piles based on their caloric density. The estate kitchens heavily favored spices.

Elma couldn't comprehend the physical pleasure it brought them; she glanced at Christa's plate, fully aware that a single bite of that seasoned meat would cause her own throat to swell shut for days. She paused her sorting, noticing the prolonged stillness across the table. Christa was staring straight ahead, her silver fork hovering entirely motionless over her food.

"Mother?" Elma said. Christa didn't react. The silence stretched.

"Mother?" Christa blinked, her focus jarringly snapping back to the dining room.

"Hm?" she murmured, hastily lowering her fork and cutting into her food.

"Is everything fine with father?" Elma asked.

"It is," Christa said quickly, not looking up from her plate.

"I am just tired." They resumed eating in silence, the only sound the sharp clinking of silverware against porcelain. Then, Christa stopped chewing.

"Elma," she said, setting down her fork. There was an unusual tightness in her voice.

"Did you see something last night?" Elma frowned.

"Something?" For several seconds, Christa didn't answer. Her gaze drifted toward the far end of the hall where the shadows gathered beneath the curtains. When she finally spoke, her words came carefully, as though giving them form made them more real.

"Anyone near your room?" Elma shook her head.

"No." For a moment, Christa seemed relieved. Then doubt crept back across her face.

"A child, perhaps," she said carefully.

"A small boy."

"I haven't seen anyone." Christa stared at her for a moment, searching for any sign of uncertainty. Finding none, she forced a thin smile and looked back down at her plate.

"It's nothing," she murmured.

"A trick of the light. It must be." She lapsed back into silence, sinking into whatever internal vortex was slowly consuming her. Elma lowered her gaze to her cup, wondering how a mere "trick of the light" could leave Christa this shaken. The water inside lay perfectly still, a silver mirror reflecting the corniced ceiling above. Elma froze. Could it be her dead son? A young boy no one else had seen except Christa. Had her mother finally lost her mind? Christa had always been fragile enough for it.

Elma calmly took another bite of an oversized broccoli, masking her thoughts behind practiced indifference. It would be better to be careful around her now. Then a flicker. A small ripple in her water pulled her gaze back to her cup. The liquid in her cup began to rotate. Slowly at first, almost lazily, before gathering speed, drawing itself into a tight, perfect vortex that spiraled downward toward the bottom of the cup. Elma's eyes widened.

"Elma?" Christa said, her gaze lingering on the cup before lifting to Elma. The fog in her mother's eyes vanished, replaced by a sudden, frantic joy that was almost frightening. She lunged forward, grabbing Elma's shoulders.

"You did it," Christa breathed, a laugh bubbling up that sounded like a sob.

"You're a Flow Resonant. Just like me. You've awakened." Elma stared back at the water. The bitter cold that had lived in her chest for four years finally began to thaw. I'm a Resonant.

"I can teach you," Christa whispered, her fingers trembling as she slowly released Elma's shoulders.

"Wait for me in the garden, Elma. I… I must change into something more suitable. Don't try anything until I return." Christa turned and hurried out of the dining hall, her silken skirts rustling loudly as she vanished toward her dressing quarters. Elma remained in her high chair, staring down at her cup. The miniature whirlpool had already collapsed, leaving the surface of the liquid perfectly, deceptively still.

She closed her eyes, casting her awareness inward, searching the dark, quiet architecture of her mind where the Other used to dwell. Are you there? We have Resonance now. She waited. She listened closely for the familiar snarl, the mocking laughter, or even a faint, residual echo of its presence. Nothing. Elma opened her eyes, exhaling a slow, sharp breath. Doesn't matter. If the creature was truly gone, then this power belonged entirely to her.