The only thing Teresa could think to do was drape a woolen blanket over Thana, the mysterious girl who now lay motionless on the stone floor. Her thoughts warred between concern for the stranger and the guilt she felt seeing her own son trembling violently nearby, his pale hands gripping the edge of a chair. A pang of regret struck her—why hadn't she dressed the young woman in her own garments, worn and moth-eaten though they were, rather than her sister's old nightgown that swallowed Thana's frame like a haunted relic?
The nightgown was large enough to make her look like a ghost from a child's nightmare—her shoulders hidden beneath layers of pale fabric, the hem dragging across the floor, her arms practically lost in the sleeves. Teresa had expected a sharp-tongued protest or an offended glare from the girl. But instead, Thana had done something completely unexpected.
She laughed.
Not bitterly or with mockery, but with startled amusement—half-choked, half-disbelieving.
"As if you've never seen skin before," Thana managed between soft chuckles, her eyes momentarily glinting with mischief before her expression sobered like a cloud rolling over the sun. The laughter drained from her as quickly as it had come, and a heavy sigh followed.
"What place is this?" she asked quietly, almost to herself. "Does anyone know how to get back to London?"
That word—London—hung in the air like smoke, unfamiliar and distant. Teresa and her son shared puzzled glances, neither speaking at first. Elias was the one to break the silence.
"London?" Teresa repeated, tilting her head. "Could that be a newly named kingdom? I've never heard of it."
Elias, seated across the room sharpening a small blade, raised a brow. "There haven't been any kingdom renamings in centuries. If there were, word would've spread to Aqora and the outer provinces by now. Word travels fast on this continent—sometimes faster than it should."
He put down the blade and leaned forward, eyes narrowing as he studied Thana. There was a sharpness in his gaze now, a practiced scrutiny honed by years of growing up near the palace.
"Are you perhaps from Cidias? It's the closest neighboring kingdom. You don't look like one of ours. And you couldn't have gotten far on your own... Not unless something happened." He paused, trying to read her body language. "Were you attacked? Did you hit your head?"
"The only thing I remember is being in that forest," Thana murmured bitterly, as though the words tasted foul. Her thoughts returned to the stream, to the man with eyes like dried ink and lips that delivered riddles with the weight of prophecy.
Elias leaned back, the stool creaking. "That forest is inside the palace walls," he said slowly. "Are you saying you woke up there?"
Thana blinked.
"Palace walls?" she repeated with a nervous laugh. "No, no way I'm in a palace."
But even as the words left her mouth, her expression shifted. She gripped the blanket tighter as a wave of memory crashed into her mind—sharp, cold, and merciless. The limbo. The echo of Otto's voice. The metallic scent of ink. Every word he had spoken now looped through her thoughts like a haunting lullaby.
She closed her eyes.
"You're already dead. There's no going back."
Thana opened her eyes and stared down at her own hands, now trembling, as if hoping she'd wake from a dream. She pinched the soft flesh of her arm hard enough to leave marks. Nothing changed. No illusion cracked. No familiar sound of her apartment, no hum of London's traffic, no warmth from her Aunt Lolita's old blanket.
This place wasn't a dream.
It was her prison.
"You've trapped me in here," she whispered hoarsely. Then louder, her voice raw and splintering, "Shut up, old man! You're a murderer! I swear, I'll tear you apart when we meet again!"
The shout rang through the room like a thunderclap. Teresa flinched. Elias shot to his feet, alarmed.
The silence afterward was sharp enough to cut.
Thana's chest rose and fell in heaving breaths, her eyes burning with fury. Elias reached for his weapon instinctively.
"She's gone mad," he said through clenched teeth. "We need to report this. Step away from her, Mother—before she lashes out."
But Teresa did not move. Her gaze was calm and focused, locked on Thana with something deeper than fear—curiosity, perhaps. Compassion, even.
"You're not from this world, are you?" Teresa asked softly.
Thana stilled.
The question hit her like a stone.
"If what that man said is true," she answered slowly, voice hollow, "then none of this is real. Not the walls, not this kingdom, not even you. You're just ink."
Elias scoffed. "You're delusional. You're in Aqora—the heart of the Pegia Continent. It's the year 1715. This isn't a figment of your imagination. We're not figments. You're not a ghost, and you're not dead."
Thana's eyes widened. "1715?" she echoed, stunned.
Elias turned to his mother, frustration deepening the lines on his face. "She's either lying or insane. Maybe a rogue mage. Maybe a spy from Creupias."
But Teresa remained unmoved. Her voice remained calm, her words deliberate.
"She's not lying. She's not a spy. And she's certainly not mad."
Thana's head snapped up.
"You believe me?"
"I knew the moment I saw you," Teresa said, nodding slowly. "You don't carry the spirit of someone from our world. Your energy... it's different. Faint, almost like a dream slipping away. And you said the name Otto."
Thana's heart skipped.
"You know him?"
Teresa hesitated, then nodded. "I met him in the marketplace a few days ago. An old man with strange eyes and a wooden cane. He told me to keep watch—that I would soon meet a girl not of this world, a girl lost between fate and ink."
Elias stood stunned.
"Mother... you never told me this."
"I didn't think I needed to," she replied softly. "Until now."
Thana rose to her feet, the blanket trailing behind her like a veil. Her expression was unreadable—equal parts awe and dread.
"So you met him. You've met the one who wrote this story."
Her voice trembled with realization and before she knew it, she blacks out.