Elyas went still. His breath stumbled for a moment, the shift subtle enough that only he would notice.
This wasn't the answer he'd come for.
He had brought the girl here expecting to force the truth out of the tree. But a fragment of Elisie—inside the girl?
The thought hit harder than he was prepared for.
"I don't understand," Elyas said, the words slow and pulled tight. "How?"
"A fragment of Elisie's soul has latched onto the girl," the tree replied. "It now sleeps within her."
Rui froze. The meaning took a breath to sink in, and when it did, the memory followed—the cry, the split of light across the sky, and Elyas collapsing a heartbeat after Elisie vanished. He had felt the realm tilt off balance then, as if everything were falling with her.
Back then, he had accepted it as Elisie's ending. He hadn't seen any other possibility.
But now…
"Are you saying… she isn't gone?" Rui asked, the question taking shape slowly. "That she's… still alive?"
The tree didn't answer.
The silence stretched long enough that Rui glanced at Elyas, hoping for some hint of how to take this. But the King hadn't moved. His gaze had dropped to the roots at his feet, following the lines in the bark as if it could anchor his thoughts. He stayed like that for a while before lifting his head again.
"Is she alive?" Elyas asked, repeating the question that still hung unanswered in the air.
Still, the tree remained silent.
"Answer me," he said.
The words weren't loud, but they carried enough weight to send a chill down Rui's spine. The air tightened around them, pressure closing in as the anger Elyas had been holding down finally bled through. Rui knew Elyas almost never demanded answers. When he did, it meant his patience had reached its limits.
"Do not make me ask again," Elyas said, each word controlled and restrained.
A faint wind slipped through the branches as his magic bled into the chamber. On the far side, the rabbit jerked—ears flattening before it bolted behind a shelf. The fairy near the trunk shot upward in a thin streak of color, disappearing into the leaves.
For a moment, the chamber was quiet.
And then the tree finally answered.
"It was never death," it said. "Only her cycle that had stopped."
To Elyas, the words were plain. They held no comfort, and no grief—just a truth he could finally place somewhere.
Not death.
But not life either.
The strain in the air lightened. Not completely, but enough that the spirits could breathe again. The magic that had surged a moment ago had retreated, as though it had followed the change in him rather than his command.
The tree hadn't given him much, but it was enough.
"If it simply stopped," he said, "then the cycle itself is still there. If her soul was torn apart… can it be made whole again?"
Then, without pausing—
"Can she be brought back?"
"Yes…" the tree answered. "She can return to her cycle… only if her soul is whole again."
Elyas didn't look surprised this time, as if the answer had already formed in him long before the tree spoke. The moment the words settled, he stepped closer.
"Tell me how to find the fragments."
"What Elisie did was against the order of things," the tree said. "A soul is not meant to be divided. When life divides, the world moves to mend it. A scattered soul is no different. Its pieces turn toward one another and hide where they can survive, waiting to be whole again."
"So the other fragments could be anywhere," Elyas said. "Even carried by other humans—just like her?"
A faint tremor moved through the canopy.
"Perhaps," the tree replied. "The soul fragments were scattered across realms. Its pieces may be anywhere."
"Then tell me how to draw the fragment out of the girl," Elyas said. He began pacing around the tree, each step slow, his thoughts turning over one after another.
The tree took a moment before answering, its voice dimming with uncertainty.
"I do not know."
Elyas stopped in his tracks and looked at the tree again. When he spoke, his voice had gone cold.
"Would killing the girl free the fragment?"
Rui reacted before the tree did. A sharp breath broke from him, loud enough to echo through the chamber.
"Your Majesty!"
But Elyas didn't look at him. His attention stayed on the tree, gaze unmoving, as if Rui's protest were nothing more than a noise caught in passing.
It wasn't a threat. Not yet a decision either.
He was merely pushing the thought forward, watching what it may stir, waiting to see if the tree would intervene.
"Since you claimed she would be the cause of my fall," he continued, "then shouldn't I remove the cause? Isn't that the simplest way to pull the fragment out of her and save myself at the same time?"
"No, my child. You do not wish to kill her. You misunderstand the thread you stand on."
A sound came from deep in the trunk, almost like a heavy breath before it spoke again.
"She is the key to the future."
Elyas didn't move, though his gaze tightened.
Rui forced himself to breathe. "Key… to what future?" he asked quietly, though the question was meant for the tree, not Elyas.
The leaves rustled, softer than before, carrying something close to weariness.
"I do not hold all the truth you seek," the tree said. "I see the threads as they shift. They twist apart, knot again, change course without warning. The balance of the world leans in ways it should not. What I warned you of before has not changed."
Elyas's expression darkened. "How am I meant to save anything," he said, "when you tell me so little?"
"I cannot offer what I do not have. You know this, my child," the tree replied, its voice firm. "I see beginnings. I see imbalance. I do not see the end."
The branches settled, lights drifting and falling quiet.
"But this much holds," the tree said at last. "The human child who crossed realms carries a piece of what was lost… and she is the key to whatever future still remains."