The path beyond the broken slab wound through trees that looked wrong
Not dead
Not alive
Just stuck
Like they forgot how to grow or rot
Raiku didn't talk this time
Not even a joke
He kept glancing behind him
Expecting the forest to walk after them
Shigure didn't speak either
His hand never left the hilt of his blade
They stopped when the trees opened into a valley
Flat
Dry
Nothing should grow there
But a single house stood in the center
Made of white wood
Unmarked by weather or time
No windows
Just a single door
Raiku whispered
"Looks like the kind of place where nightmares go to sleep"
Shigure stepped forward
The air changed the moment he crossed the threshold of the valley
It wasn't colder
It was heavier
Like grief
But not his own
Raiku stayed close
This time not out of curiosity
But fear
The door opened on its own
They entered
Inside
Was nothing
Just a single bed
And a girl
Asleep
Her hair black
Skin pale
No breath
No heartbeat
But her eyes were open
Frozen in a stare that looked through them
Into something else
Raiku whispered
"She's not dead"
Shigure stepped closer
"No"
"She's dreaming"
He reached out
Her fingers twitched
And suddenly
The room changed
The walls fell away
And they were in a different place
A village on fire
A woman crying over a cradle
A child standing in the flames
Smiling
Then the scene shattered
And another took its place
A boy drowning in feathers
Screaming his mother's name
While wings crushed his ribs
Then another
Shigure being dragged through ice by chains of ash
His father's voice whispering truths that never were
Raiku screamed
The bed appeared again
The girl now standing
Eyes still wide
But now glowing
She spoke without lips moving
"I hold the dreams no one dares to carry
I keep the sorrow that would break the world if left outside"
Shigure stepped forward
"What are you"
"I am the dreamer of the forsaken
And the mother of forgotten pain"
Raiku backed away
His voice cracked
"She's not human
Not anymore"
The girl looked at him
"You laugh to keep the silence away
But even laughter dies here"
Then to Shigure
"You walk to escape
But you carry graves in your footprints"
He didn't deny it
She offered her hand
"Give me one memory
Just one
And I'll let you leave"
Raiku begged
"Don't do it
Don't give her anything"
But Shigure had already chosen
He placed a single memory into her palm
A smile
Small
From a girl who once sat beside him under the stars
Before everything burned
The girl closed her hand
The room vanished
They stood in the valley again
The house gone
The girl gone
But in the distance
A soft lullaby echoed
And it would never stop
Shigure walked
A little emptier
But a little lighter too
Raiku didn't ask what he gave up
He knew
Because Shigure's eyes
For the first time
Looked like they belonged to someone who couldn't remember why he was still fighting
But fought anyway