Joya was seated close to the hearth of the fire; its warm radiation chased away the cold she had been feeling.
Her hands were folded into her lap, unsure of what to do with herself.
The old man, whose name she was yet to know, had brought her to his home.
He had led her in without many words.
Inside, the air smelled of dust, dried herbs, and something faintly sweet…old wood, warmed by years of sun.
She found the house she was in cozy; although many of the furniture pieces were worn out, it was neat, the least thing she had expected from an old man.
The house was quiet, too quiet, that even the faintest of sounds could be heard. Joy
She could even hear her own heartbeat!
"Do you leave here alone?"
She asked when she caught sight of him, seated by a table at the corner of the room. On the table was a lantern; the glow was enough to light up the book the old man was going through.
"Who would want to leave with an old man?"
He asked, turning to look at her.
Her eyes searched around; ahead she found a basin filled with fruits and vegetables of all kinds.
"If you have enough food, why do you beg?"
She asked nervously.
The old man smiled wearily.
"But I did not. You chose to give me that fruit; I did not ask you to."
Joya was marveled at his words. She wanted to say something but knew she would stutter, because truly the man was correct; she couldn't argue that.
Turning away, she gazed into the fire.
"What is your name, child?"
He asked, and Joya remained silent for a while.
"Naytira."
She answered, and the old man nodded, then snorted inwardly.
The floorboards creaked beneath his feet as he shuffled toward the hearth, setting his walking stick carefully against the wall before turning to a kettle already resting on the coals.
He lifted it with both hands, careful not to spill a drop, and poured water into a small pot.
Joya watched him without realizing she was doing so. There was comfort in the routine of it, in the predictability of his actions. It made the world feel subtle.
"You look cold," he said at last, not turning around. It wasn't a question.
She hesitated, then nodded. "A little."
He smiled faintly, lines deepening around his eyes. "Tea will help."
He reached for a tin on the shelf, its lid dented and worn. When he opened it, a gentle herbal scent filled the room: leaves and roots dried by hand and gathered with care.
He spooned some into the pot, then set it over the fire. The kettle began to hiss as the water heated.
While the water heated, he moved back toward the table, retrieved his walking stick, and eased himself into the opposite chair with a quiet sigh.
"You can stay the night," he said simply, eyes resting on her face. "The road is perilous."
Her throat tightened. She hadn't realized how much she needed to hear that until the words were spoken.
"Thank you," she said, with heartfelt gratitude.
The kettle whistled gently, and he rose again, slower this time. He poured the tea into two cups, the liquid steaming, pale, and inviting.
He handed one over to her with careful hands steady despite their age.
She wrapped her fingers around the cup, letting the warmth seep into her skin.
The steam brushed her face, and she closed her eyes for a moment, breathing in the therapeutic scent.
The old man continued to stare at her while lifting the cup to his lips.
The steam curled upward, brushing his face. The moment it touched his lips, his eyes slid shut.
And then it hit him.
A rush of memory surged through him like a broken dam: a palace courtyard washed in gold light, laughter carried on silk-draped air, and a woman's voice calling his name with quiet authority.
Yumi stood tall, her eyes sharp with purpose and soft only when she looked at the twins in her arms.
His breath caught.
His eyes flew open.
They bulged, wide and disbelieving, as though what he saw before him might vanish if he blinked. His hand trembled violently now, tea sloshing dangerously close to the rim of the cup.
"Joya!"
The name tore from him as if it had been trapped in his chest for decades.
Joya almost choked.
The tea burned her throat as she gasped, coughing sharply. Her eyes snapped up, locking onto the old man. In a single, instinctive movement, she was on her feet, heart pounding, fingers already clutching the small wooden box she had come with.
She began to back away.
"No…"
The old man lurched forward half a step, panic flaring across his face. His chest rose and fell too fast, his grip tightening on the walking stick as if it were the only thing keeping him upright.
"No, child. "Do not fear," he said quickly, voice shaking. "I will not harm you. I swear it."
"How do you know my name? Where you sent after me?"
Joya's brows knit together, her eyes sharp and wild now, stripped of the quiet gratitude she had shown moments before.
All her life she had run, from faces, from places; nowhere was safe…Nowhere!
"Who are you?" she demanded, retreating another step toward the door. "What do you want from me?"
The old man swallowed hard.
"My name…" He paused, as though tasting it for the first time in years. "My name is Kaal."
He leaned heavily on his walking stick and pushed himself to his feet.
The effort drew a low groan from him, but he didn't sit back down. Not now. Not when the past had finally stood up in front of him.
"I knew your mother," he said softly. "Yumi. I served her as a faithful disciple."
For a moment, Joya only stared.
Then she laughed.
It started as a short, breathless sound before spilling into something louder, more fractured. Hysterical laughter burst from her chest, echoing off the old walls. It stunned Kaal into silence.
"You speak words that make no sense," she said between laughs, eyes shining with something dangerously close to tears.
"Yumi? The queen of Canna?"
Her laughter cut off abruptly.
"My mother was Mira," she said, her voice suddenly flat. "She was no queen. She died at the hands of savages."
Kaal's face crumpled, and something inside of him did too. His heart bled inwardly, each beat a dull ache of regret and sorrow.
"All this time," he whispered, "I believed I had lost you."
He took a step toward her.
Joya immediately retreated, her back nearly brushing the door now. Her eyes flared with mixed emotions.
"You only know half the truth," Kaal said, lifting one trembling hand as he gestured.
"What truth?" she snapped. "What truth do you dare speak of?"
The wind outside howled suddenly, rattling the shutters of the windows.
The fire crackled low in the hearth, throwing long, restless shadows across the room. Kaal stood there, framed by flickering light, looking less like a harmless old man and more like a keeper of stories too heavy to die with him.
"The truth," he said slowly, carefully, "is that Mira was never meant to raise you."
"And the truth," he continued, eyes never leaving hers, "is that Yumi did not abandon you."
He tightened his grip on the walking stick, grounding himself.
"She hid you."
"I knew Mira," Kaal continued quietly. "I stood beside Yumi the day you both left in a carriage."
As he spoke, his strength seemed to drain away.
Without breaking his gaze from Joya, he stretched one trembling hand outward, fingers searching blindly until they found the edge of the chair. He lowered himself onto it with care.
"After you left," he continued, voice rough, "your mother went to war." She stood against the king of Decreash, Ragaleon himself. His throat tightened.
"She was killed on the battlefield. But know this, child… she was courageous. She died with honor."
Joya's shoulders sagged. She shook her head slowly, once, then again.
"I do not believe a word you say."
"Yes, you do," Kaal replied.
He was shivering now, though he sat close enough to the hearth; the fire should have warmed him. The tremor came from something deeper than cold.
"If the royal family of Decreash had ever crossed your path," he went on, "they would not have known it was you. They would have mistaken you for her."
He paused, watching her carefully.
"For your sister, Katie. You are the exact replica of her. The same eyes. The same brow. Time has changed you, but not enough to erase the truth."
Joya's eyes filled before she could stop them. Tears blurred her vision.
"Katie?" she whispered.
The name was not foreign to her.
She wasn't so mundane, so empty, as to forget the woman who had come to her in dreams.
In the cold streets of Hamstung, when hunger gnawed and hope felt thin as smoke, there had been a voice.
"…I am Katie."
The memory struck her like a sudden gust of wind.
"How is this even possible?" Her lips quivered as she shook her head from side to side.
Both hands flew to her hair, fingers clutching at it as if she could pull the answers free from her own skull. Her legs gave way, and she slid down the wall until she hit the floor, the impact dull and final. She sat there, knees bent, chest heaving.
"Why don't I remember?" she asked, her voice breaking. "Why do I have no memory of anything?"
She wasn't speaking to anyone in particular anymore—just to the air, to the fire, to the cruel silence of her own mind.
But Kaal answered.
"Because you were sick," he said gently. "Bedridden. Confined to a single room for years."
His eyes softened, filled with a sorrow so deep it seemed ancient.
"You paid the price for your sister to live," he said. "As it was written."
He bowed his head for a moment, then lifted it again.
"In the prophecy."
Joya's breathing slowed, though her tears did not.
"One shall live as royalty and face death," Kaal recited, each word heavy, deliberately. "And the other shall suffer, hollowed by misery."
His voice wavered.
Tears gathered in his eyes now, clinging to the deep wrinkles that time had carved into his face. They dimmed his gaze, but he could still see her clearly, this girl who had walked into his home carrying nothing but a box and a lifetime of pain.
"You must have suffered," he said softly.
The fire crackled behind him, sending sparks upward, as if even it could not stay silent in the face of such truth.
Joya searched through her memories, digging through them with desperation, grasping at shadows, at half-formed feelings, at anything that could anchor the words the old man had spoken. But there was nothing. No faces. No palace halls. No sister stands beside her in light or darkness.
Nothing.
…Except one thing.
"What is my name?"
Her voice came out small. Fragile. She blinked rapidly, forcing the tears back before they could spill again.
The question unlocked something buried deep, so deep she hadn't known it was there.
Before Mira had died in that forest, before the screams and the smoke and the terror, Joya remembered clinging to her hand.
They had been running, but all hope seemed to have been lost when they were ambushed and Mira was unable to walk because she had lost a leg to the beast that attacked her.
In that frantic moment, Joya had asked a question she hadn't known would be her last.
She had asked about her father.
Mira had never spoken of him. Not once.
"Jesophath, that is your father's name."
The memory came, sharp and sudden.
Joya's eyes lifted to the old man.
"You know my name," Kaal said gently, as though afraid even now of startling her. "It is the name I called you just now."
Joya swallowed hard. Her throat tightened, wobbling as she forced the words out.
"What is the name of my father?"
Her pulse roared in her ears. Saliva slid thickly down her throat as she waited, as though the answer itself might change the shape of her life.
Kaal straightened in his chair.
His voice was steady when he spoke, firm with certainty, with truth earned through years of silence.
"His name was Gothem," he said.
A pause.
Then, clearly, reverently …,
"Gothem Jesophath."
Joya closed her eyes as hot tears rolled down her cheeks.