The fire’s warmth seeped into him. Slowly, Collin’s eyes cleared enough to see Aries. He turned, searching the shadows of the room.
“Connor?” His voice cracked. “Where is Connor?”
The old man knelt before him, face steeped in sorrow. “Connor... he was not. They searched, but—” His voice broke. “I’m sorry, my child.”
“Mam? Where is my mam?”
The old man pulled him close. “She never gave you up. The regime... They... I’m sorry, lad.”
Aries folded into the embrace. “You still have us, Collin.”
Collin couldn’t speak. Couldn’t cry. The weight of it all pressed down on him—too large, too cruel, too much all at once.
But in the silence, something within him shifted. A thread of innocence snapped.
He saw his father in his mind—tall, laughing, brave. He remembered his mother’s final smile, her voice in the dark. Connor’s hand in his.
That was the day Collin said goodbye to the boy he had been.
And he would never be that boy again.
Sinking into Sunlight
Collin lay back in the narrow canoe, arms folded behind his head, the sun warm on his face and the gentle rock of the lake lulling him into stillness. The sky above was so bright it made him squint, even with his eyes nearly closed. Water lapped softly against the sides of the skiff, each quiet dip of the oars like a whisper just beyond reach. His breathing slowed. His thoughts floated. The pull of sleep was gentle and steady, like sinking into sunlight.
He was seventeen now—old enough to work, to carry a blade. Lately, people had started saying he looked just like his father. His grandfather said it most often, with pride and wonder in his voice. Collin didn’t remember much of Jiah, not really. But the eyes—deep and storm-blue—he remembered those. He caught glimpses of them sometimes in the lake’s reflection. Intense. Restless. Always thinking. Just like his father.
Splash!
Collin jumped, setting the narrow skiff rocking from side to side. Ice cold water ran down the ends of his dark sandy locks and over his face and neck. His heart pounded violently behind his ribs. The dream still tugged at him—something about a voice he thought he’d forgotten—but the image dissolved before he could see it clearly.
Aries sat at the front of the canoe with a mischievous smile. He held a dripping oar aloft, looking as though he was readyto send another spray of water over his dozing passenger. “Oops. Did I disrupt your beauty sleep?” He grinned, raising the dripping oar for another strike.
It was too hot. The kind of heat that turned thoughts to syrup and made even blinking feel like work. Collin’s head buzzed, thick and dull. His limbs felt boneless, useless, like he’d melted into the bottom of the canoe. He let one arm dangle over the side, fingers drifting in the icy water below. The shock of cold sent a brief jolt up his arm—but not enough to make him move. Even that felt far away. He couldn’t muster the energy to speak, let alone sit up. The heat had sunk into him, slow and heavy, and all he could do was float.
It was a windless summer morning in late July, the kind that felt suspended in time. The vast mountain lake lay perfectly still, its glass-like surface mirroring the unblemished expanse of the sky. Sunlight danced across the shimmering blue, blurring the boundary between water and air. Aside from the faint ripple of the lake and the distant song of unseen birds, the world held its breath in hushed tranquility.
Collin had grown up hearing how the North Town lake fed all of Crimisa. Now, drifting in its center, it felt like the lake held the last bit of peace left in the world. In long-lost legends, the valley was often referred to as the Moon Valley. From high atop the hilltop, as the moon rose each night, it looked as though the moon were rising from deep within the lake itself.
The massive lake sprawled at the valley’s heart, its dark waters threading into a web of slender streams and creeks that spilled life into the outlying villages. Dense forests pressed in along its edge, wild, ancient, and bountiful with game no matter the season. Atop a generous northern hill, a colony of lavish cottages caught the sun in glinting angles of glass, their balconies and gardens overlooking the lake like thrones. These homes belonged to village stewards, captains, merchants withdeep coffers, scholars with rare books—names whispered with deference through the land.
To the east, where the shore softened into humble mud and gravel, the North Town village circle huddled by the water’s edge. Its narrow stone streets pulsed with movement: merchants barking from cluttered carts, smoke curling from stuffie taverns, and the mingled scent of baked roots and charred meat drifting from family kitchens tucked above bustling storefronts. Just beyond this crowded center, a broad road unfurled like a ribbon, guiding travelers away from the dense valley and toward the vast, humming square of Chroma.
The canoe drifted lazily toward a white wooden buoy, its paint chipped and sun-bleached. Dozens like it bobbed across the lake, scattered like pale sentinels. Aries reached over the side, tugged the buoy up from the water, and examined the snarl of fishing lines dangling beneath. Each gleaming hook shimmered—stripped bare. He growled in frustration and flung the buoy back. “Every last one’s been picked clean!”
