"She needs balance," the woman continues, "in a world that was carved to help build instead of simply deplete."
The words settle over me like a blessing, like a prophecy, like a mother's hopes for a child she had to send into battle alone.
She pulls back just enough to smile at me—and despite the tears making her eyes glassy, the expression is radiant. Pride and love and bittersweet joy mixed together into something that makes my chest ache with longing.
"The final piece is ready to claim their Queen."
Queen.
The word triggers nothing specific, but something in me responds anyway—something buried beneath the void, beneath the amnesia, beneath the protective barriers my heart apparently erected to shield me from my own existence. Whatever that something is, itrecognizesthe title.
Recognizes it as mine.
"I don't understand," I admit, because it seems important to be honest about my confusion even if she's not expecting comprehension.
She doesn't seem disappointed. If anything, her smile grows warmer, more tender, the expression of a mother who knows her child will understand when the time is right.
She leans forward, pressing a kiss to the top of my forehead.
The contactburns—not painfully, but with power that sears itself into my essence. Something shifts where her lips touch, reality restructuring around the blessing she's bestowing.
"Father and I are so proud of you," she whispers against my brow. "Both of you."
Both of us?
The phrase catches on something sharp in my memory—twin consciousness, shared existence, a brother who... who what? The fragment slips away before I can grasp it, leaving only the ache of incompletion.
When she pulls back, my confusion must be written across my translucent features because her smile gains an edge of knowing humor.
"Tell your brother," she says, "his sacrifice in protecting your heart and the chalice will be worth it."
Brother. Chalice. Sacrifice.
The words are keys without locks, important without context.
Then she grins—an expression so playful, soyoung, that for a moment I see not just who she is but who she must have been before whatever aged her eyes with wisdom and loss.
"Return to your bonded ones, sweet Gwenievere."
Gwenievere.
The name crashes through me like a wave breaking on shore. Suddenly the void is full again—not with memories, not yet, but withself. I am Gwenievere. I am someone. I amme, whoever that is, whatever that means.
"I'll love you from the afterlife."
Afterlife.
"The afterlife?" I whisper, horror beginning to claw through the peace of this place. If she's in the afterlife, that means she's?—
My head pulses.
Not pain exactly, butpressure—something building behind my forehead, beneath my skull, gathering with the weight of storms about to break. I flinch, reaching up to touch the source of the sensation, and find nothing.
No—not nothing.
Something.
I can't see it, but I can feel it—a weight resting on my brow like a crown not visible to any eye. Heavy with power, warm with heritage,minein ways that transcend simple ownership.
