Lyra's POV
"You're insane." I press my bandaged hand against my chest, trying to steady my racing heart. "Two hundred years? Ancient souls? This is insane."
Kade stands perfectly still, watching me with those storm-gray eyes that seem to see right through me. "I know how it sounds."
"Do you?" My voice cracks. "Because it sounds like you've lost your mind. Or I have. Or maybe we both have."
"Lyra—"
"No." I back toward the door of my destroyed shop, glass crunching under my feet. "I don't know who Lyria was, but I'm not her. I'm just me. I'm nobody special. I'm just—"
"Running?" Kade's voice is gentle but firm. "You've been running from the truth since the moment you woke up three years ago. But the truth is catching up, whether you're ready or not."
The worst part is, he's right. Deep down, I've always known something was wrong. The nightmares, the curse mark, the way magic comes to me so easily when I should have had to train for years—none of it makes sense for a normal person.
But accepting that I might be someone else entirely? That's too much.
"I need air," I whisper, and bolt.
I run until my lungs burn and my legs ache. I don't know where I'm going until I end up at the town square, where workers are setting up for tomorrow's Memory Festival.
The festival. I'd completely forgotten about it.
Families come from all over to share their happiest memories in a beautiful communal viewing. It's supposed to be the highlight of the year—a celebration of everything that makes us human.
Right now, it feels like a cruel joke.
I sink onto a bench, burying my face in my hands. My curse mark throbs steadily, a constant reminder that I don't get to have a normal life. I don't get happy memories to share. I don't even get to know if I had a family once.
"There you are!"
I look up to find Seris marching toward me, hands on her hips. She looks furious and relieved at the same time.
"Do you have any idea how worried I was? You disappear for hours, won't answer when I knock on your door, and now I hear your shop was broken into?" She drops onto the bench beside me. "What is going on?"
I want to tell her everything. The message on my wall, Kade's impossible claim, the voice that called me Lyria. But the words stick in my throat.
"I don't know," I finally say. "Everything's falling apart, Seris. Everything."
She pulls me into a hug, and I let myself lean against her shoulder. Seris is the only constant in my life, the only person who knows how broken I really am.
"Whatever's happening, we'll figure it out together," she promises. "But first, you're going to help me finish setting up these crystals. The festival is tomorrow, and the committee will murder me if we're not ready."
Despite everything, I smile a little. "You're really making me work right now?"
"Work is good. Work keeps you from spiraling." She pulls back and gives me a serious look. "Plus, you need to stop hiding, Lyra. I know things are scary, but you can't let fear control your whole life."
"It's hard to live when you don't know who you are," I say quietly.
"Then maybe it's time to find out." Seris stands and offers me her hand. "Come on. Let's make something beautiful."
We spend the next few hours hanging crystals throughout the square. Each one will display a different family's cherished memory during the festival—weddings, births, quiet moments of love and laughter.
I try to focus on the work, on the simple act of creating something good. But my mind keeps drifting back to Kade's words.
She died in my arms two hundred years ago.
What if he's telling the truth? What if I really am someone else, living a second life without knowing it?
"Earth to Lyra." Seris waves a hand in front of my face. "You're doing it again. The spacing-out thing."
"Sorry."
"Is this about the commander?" She hands me another crystal to hang. "Because I saw the way he looked at you. Like you're the answer to a question he's been asking his whole life."
My cheeks heat. "That's ridiculous."
"Is it?" Seris grins, clearly enjoying my discomfort. "Come on, even you have to admit he's handsome. In a dark, brooding, probably-has-a-tragic-past kind of way."
"Seris!"
"What? I'm just saying, maybe it wouldn't be the worst thing if you let someone in. You've been alone for three years, Lyra. Don't you get tired of it?"
Yes. Every single day.
But before I can answer, the feeling hits me.
It's like someone reached into my chest and grabbed my heart. Not painfully, but intensely—an awareness so strong it steals my breath.
I gasp and nearly drop the crystal I'm holding.
"Lyra? What's wrong?"
I can't answer. Because suddenly, impossibly, I know something. Someone important just arrived. Someone who changes everything. Someone I've been waiting for without realizing it.
My curse mark flares with heat, and I look down to see the silver lines spreading even further, crawling up past my elbow toward my shoulder.
"No, no, no—" I clutch my arm, fear spiking through me. "Not again. Please not again."
"What's happening?" Seris grabs my shoulders. "Lyra, talk to me!"
But I can't talk. Because the pull in my chest is getting stronger, dragging me toward something—or someone—at the edge of the square.
My head turns against my will.
And I see him.
Kade stands at the entrance to the square, but he's not alone. There's a woman with him, beautiful and elegant with dark hair and eyes that gleam with intelligence. She's laughing at something he said, her hand resting casually on his arm.
Something hot and ugly twists in my chest. Something that feels dangerously like jealousy.
Why should I care if he's with someone else? I don't even know him. Except... except my body seems to think otherwise. My curse mark is burning brighter than ever, and my heart is racing like I'm about to face something terrible.
Kade's eyes scan the square, and then they land on me.
The woman notices where he's looking and turns to stare at me too. Her smile fades.
Even from this distance, I can see recognition flash across her face. But it's not the warm kind of recognition. It's cold. Calculating. Dangerous.
She leans in and whispers something to Kade. His jaw tightens, and he shakes his head, clearly arguing with her.
The woman's expression hardens. She says something else—something that makes Kade's whole body go rigid—and then she starts walking toward me.
My curse mark explodes with pain so intense I cry out and drop to my knees. Seris is shouting something, but I can't hear her over the roaring in my ears.
Images flash through my mind—not memories, but something else. Something darker.
Fire. Screaming. A grand hall collapsing around me. Kade's face, younger, covered in blood, reaching for me as the world burns.
And the woman. That same woman, wearing different clothes, a different time, watching us die with a smile on her face.
The vision vanishes as suddenly as it came.
I'm back in the square, gasping for air, with Seris and half the town staring at me in alarm. The woman has stopped walking, her eyes locked on mine with an intensity that makes my skin crawl.
Kade pushes past her and runs toward me, but the woman catches his arm.
"Don't," she says, loud enough for me to hear. "You'll only make it worse."
"Let go, Isla," Kade growls.
Isla. So that's her name.
She ignores him, her gaze still fixed on me. When she speaks, her voice carries across the square, clear and sharp as broken glass.
"Poor little Lyra. Do you have any idea what you've forgotten? What you threw away?" Her smile is all teeth. "He's been searching for you for seven years. Seven years of pain and hope and desperation. And you don't even remember his face."
"Isla, stop." Kade's voice is deadly quiet.
But she's not done. "Tell me, Lyra—when you look at him, do you feel anything at all? Or did you erase him so completely that even your soul has forgotten?"
My curse mark spreads in a burst of silver lines, racing across my shoulder and up my neck. The pain is unbearable.
And then, impossibly, my own voice—but not my voice, someone else's voice using my mouth—whispers three words that change everything:
"I remember everything."
I collapse.
The last thing I see before darkness takes me is Kade's face, twisted with hope and terror and something that looks heartbreakingly like love.