The day had barely begun when Kael's senses stirred him up from an uneasy sleep, the pendant beneath his pillow which felt like a small, heated stone, its pulse slow but insistent, he sat up, sweat clinging to his skin despite the morning chill that crept through the open window, he stared at the mirror on the far side of the room, and for a moment, just one breathless moment, it shone.
Not glass nor reflection.
But stone walls, torchlight and a girl walking ahead, barefoot, her shadow long and flickering.
Kael blinked, and it was gone.
He stood, pressing a hand to his forehead, these weren't just dreams anymore, something was shifting, or worse remembering.
---
Later that morning, Sai found Kael in the garden behind the mansion, staring into the fountain's rippling surface like it might offer answers. She approached quietly, holding two cups of warm tea.
"You look like someone who fought a war in his sleep," she asked, offering him a cup.
Kael took it without a word, his fingers brushing hers.
"Thanks," he muttered.
Sai sat beside him on the bench, watching him closely.
"Kael," she said gently, "I know something is wrong. You don't talk about it, but I can feel it. You're not sleeping, and you look at mirrors like your enemies are watching you through it."
He chuckled dryly. "Maybe they are."
She tilted her head. "Do you want to get away for a bit? There's a garden I go to when I need a breathe of fresh air and peace and It's quiet, you can say the place is sacred, almost."
Kael hesitated, but something about the word 'sacred' stirred the warmth of the pendant again, he nodded. "Let's go."
---
The Garden of Whispering Statues sat on the edge of the city, tucked behind tall hedges and ivy-covered stone walls. It wasn't on any tourist map, but Sai had known of it for years.
They walked through rows of statues, figures frozen in mid-motion, like dancers paused in time. Birds chirped overhead, and the breeze carried the scent of pine and something older, earthy, like dust from forgotten tombs.
Kael stopped before a statue of a cloaked woman. Her face hidden, but her hands extended as if offering something invisible.
"She looks familiar," he said.
Sai looked up at the stone figure. "She has always been here. People say she is the keeper of voices, for those lost to time."
Kael touched the base of the statue, the symbol was there again, etched faintly into the stone, the three-eyed crown.
His breath caught.
Sai stepped closer. "Kael… you've seen that before, haven't you?" are you okay?
Before he could answer, movement across the path stole his attention.
A girl.
Hooded.
Slim figure, walking briskly behind the trees, her stride familiar in a way that tore something open inside him.
"Sai?" he whispered.
Sai blinked beside him. "Yes?"
He looked back at her, then again at the figure moving away.
"No… not you. Her" he pointed to the slim girly figure.
He ran. Through the trees, ignoring the protests Sai called after him, the cloaked figure turned into an alley behind the garden wall, Kael pushed past the branches and froze.
There she was.
Unhooded now.
The same soft eyes. The same tilt of the head. The same Sai.
But different.
"Devis?" he breathed.
She looked at him sadly. "You remember."
Kael staggered back. "What is this? Who are you?"
"I was once someone who held your heart," she said. "But I am not the girl in that mansion."
He glanced back, as if expecting Sai to appear any second.
"I don't understand."
"You will. In time. But for now…" She held out a small object. A smooth black stone with that same seal, "You're being watched. By more than just memory."
Kael didn't take it.
"I saw you leave me when I needed you. At my worst."
Devis nodded slowly. "And yet you kept me alive in your pain."
Before he could reply, she stepped back into the shadows. And was gone.
Kael stood there, alone, the wind tugging at his shirt, the stone she had held now lying at his feet.
He picked it up.
It was warm.
---
Back at the mansion, Mr. Asoluka watched the garden security feed with narrowed eyes. He saw Kael running, Sai behind him.
He didn't like it. Not one bit.
Downstairs, the pendant under Kael's pillow pulsed again steady, then sharp.
And in a hidden chamber beneath the city, Madam Elsie stood over a table lined with scrolls and red wax seals.
"The two of them… they're awakening," she said.
The pale man beside her nodded. "And the girl?"
"Too late to split them now. But not too late to break one."