Chapter 2 – Echoes of the River Village
The morning unfurled slowly, like a curtain of mist rising from the hills. By the time Ren descended the narrow staircase, the scent of stew and baked bread filled the air. Wooden beams groaned softly overhead, and through the small inn windows, sunlight spilled in long, honey-colored lines.
The woman from before—Elara, she had introduced herself—stood by the hearth, stirring a pot. Her auburn hair was tied with a piece of string, and her movements carried an ease born from familiarity with simple work. When she turned, her expression brightened.
"You're looking steadier," she said. "Sleep must've done you good."
Ren nodded, offering a polite smile. "Better than before. My head feels less… hollow."
Elara chuckled softly. "That's a start. Sit, before the stew gets cold."
He obeyed. The bench creaked under his weight as he settled by the table. The warmth of the hearth reached his fingers, grounding him in the present. Elara ladled thick, fragrant stew into a wooden bowl and set it before him.
He hesitated for a heartbeat before taking the spoon. The first taste was simple—potatoes, herbs, bits of fish—but something about it struck him deeply. The flavors were plain yet vivid, unfiltered by the noise of his old world. He didn't remember what his last meal in that other life had been, but he knew it hadn't tasted like this.
Elara watched him eat with a small, satisfied smile. "You must've come from far off," she said. "Your clothes were strange, and you had no travel pack."
Ren glanced down at the linen shirt and simple trousers she'd given him. "Farther than I can explain."
Her brow furrowed slightly. "You don't remember where you're from?"
He lowered his gaze. "Bits and pieces. Faces without names. Voices without words. It's… blurred."
A silence passed between them, not uncomfortable but heavy with unspoken things. Elara seemed to understand and didn't press further. Instead, she turned toward the open window, where the wind carried the sound of a distant river.
"That's the Eriven," she said. "Runs all the way from the Silver Peaks to the western sea. It's how most travelers find our little village—by accident."
Ren followed her gaze. Beyond the window, he could just make out the glimmer of water threading through the valley below. The river's song was faint but constant, like the steady pulse of something ancient and alive.
Later that morning, Ren stepped outside.
The village of Lirwen was built on a gentle slope, its houses clustered close together, their roofs thatched with straw that gleamed in the sun. Chickens pecked in the dust between stone pathways. Children chased each other with laughter that rang like bells. A blacksmith hammered in rhythmic bursts, each strike echoing against the hills.
Ren took it all in quietly. The sights, the sounds, even the smell of soil after rain—everything felt sharper, as though the world had been drawn with deliberate care.
He passed the edge of the square, where a small shrine stood beneath a willow. Offerings—flowers, ribbons, small coins—lay before the stone effigy of a woman with flowing hair. Her face was serene, eyes closed as if listening to some eternal current.
Elara had called her The Lady of the River, guardian spirit of the valley.
Ren lingered before the statue, an odd sensation stirring in his chest. Have I prayed before? The thought came unbidden. He couldn't recall. But something in the statue's gentle smile filled him with quiet familiarity, like a melody half-remembered.
He knelt briefly, unsure whether it was custom or instinct, and whispered, "If you watch over them, perhaps you'll watch over me too."
The breeze shifted. The willow leaves rustled, and for an instant, the air around him felt charged—alive.
Then, faintly, he heard it.
A whisper.
Not words, not quite. More like the echo of a thought brushing against his mind.
Ren straightened, heart quickening. He looked around, but the square was empty. The sound of the wind returned to normal.
Imagination, he told himself. Yet his hand had already reached for the Logbook at his side.
He carried it now, bound in cloth, always within reach. Pulling it out, he opened it to a blank page and wrote,
The air by the shrine shifted when I spoke. It felt like being noticed.
The ink shimmered faintly before drying—almost imperceptibly, but enough for him to notice.
He frowned. "That wasn't sunlight…"
He turned the page and saw faint lines that hadn't been there before—shadows of words, half-formed and blurred, bleeding through from nowhere.
—remember the river——the current carries all things—
The text vanished before he could finish reading it. The page was clean again.
Ren's breath hitched. Is the Logbook writing back?
He closed it quickly, clutching it against his chest. The leather felt warmer than before, pulsing faintly with his heartbeat.
By midday, he found himself drawn toward the river.
A narrow path wound down from the village, bordered by wildflowers and the soft hum of insects. The sun hung high, its light glittering off the water. The river's surface moved with quiet grace—swift where rocks broke the current, glass-smooth where it widened.
Ren knelt by the bank and dipped his fingers in. The water was cold, startlingly so, but not unpleasant. It seemed to wake every nerve in his skin.
He stared at his reflection. The face that looked back at him was young—perhaps mid-twenties, with dark hair falling across his brow and gray eyes that seemed older than they should have been. The face was his, but not quite the one he remembered.
Was I always like this? he wondered. Or is this another mask the cycle gives me?
He looked up. On the opposite bank, someone stood watching him.
It was a boy—perhaps sixteen, with light hair that caught the sun and a fishing spear in hand. He didn't look alarmed, only curious.
"You're the one who came from the river," the boy said across the water.
Ren nodded slowly. "So I've been told."
"My name's Cael," the boy continued. "You must've drifted down from the highlands. Not many survive the falls up there."
Ren smiled faintly. "I suppose I'm lucky."
Cael tilted his head. "Lucky, or chosen? The river doesn't give things back without reason."
The words lingered strangely.
Before Ren could reply, Cael raised a hand in greeting. "If you're staying in Lirwen, you'll see me around. I fish most days. The old folk say the river speaks to those who listen long enough."
Ren's eyes narrowed slightly. "And have you heard it?"
Cael grinned. "Maybe I have." Then, without another word, he turned and disappeared among the trees.
Ren sat there for a long while, the boy's words echoing in his mind. The river murmured softly beside him, its rhythm oddly similar to the faint pulse of the Logbook beneath his fingers.
He opened it again. Another line had appeared at the top of the page in that same faint, ghostlike script:
Every current leads to memory.
Ren stared at it, his breath shallow. Then, as if the river itself had exhaled, the words dissolved once more.
That evening, the village gathered for supper in the square—a custom Elara called the sharing meal. Lanterns hung from ropes between the houses, their light flickering gold on smiling faces. Music drifted from a stringed instrument, soft and lilting. Children ran in circles; elders traded stories by the fire.
Ren sat among them, invited as a guest. Though he smiled and nodded when spoken to, part of him remained detached, watching from behind the veil of his own thoughts.
He listened to the rhythm of laughter, the clink of bowls, the hum of night insects. For the first time since awakening, a fragile sense of belonging brushed against him.
When the food was done and the music softened, Elara sat beside him, offering a mug of berry wine.
"You seem somewhere else," she said gently.
Ren took the mug, watching the light ripple across its surface. "Everywhere feels somewhere else to me right now."
She smiled faintly. "You've got the eyes of someone who's seen too much. Maybe that's why the river kept you."
He met her gaze. "Do you believe that? That the river chooses?"
"I don't know," she admitted. "But I believe it carries stories. Some end, some begin. Sometimes they meet again."
Her words resonated with something deep inside him, something just beyond reach.
He turned the Logbook over in his hands beneath the table. Stories that begin again.
When he looked up, the night had deepened. The moon was full above the hills, its light painting the river silver in the distance.
He excused himself quietly and walked down toward the bank once more. The lanterns of the village glowed behind him like fading constellations.
By the time he reached the water, the world was hushed. The air smelled of moss and moonlight. He sat by the bank, setting the Logbook on his lap.
"I don't know who you are," he said softly, "or what I've become. But if I'm meant to remember, then show me."
The pages fluttered of their own accord. The wind had gone still, yet the book moved as if alive. It stopped midway through, the paper glowing faintly.
Ren stared, heart pounding. The faint outline of words appeared—shifting, fragmentary.
First Life. Before the forgetting.A promise was made.
The ink bled outward into shapes—brief visions forming in his mind: two figures standing by another river, one handing the other the same Logbook. A voice, faint and feminine, whispering, "Write so the next you will not be lost."
Then the vision fractured like glass. The glow faded. The book fell still once more.
Ren sat frozen, the whisper of the river answering softly beside him. He felt both closer to understanding and further away than ever.
Slowly, he wrote:
The river remembers. And through it, perhaps I will too.
He closed the Logbook, and this time, he noticed—the spiral emblem on its cover was glowing again, faintly, like a pulse beneath the leather.
The sound of the water deepened, as if the world itself was listening.
Ren leaned back on the grass, eyes on the moon. For the first time, he felt the weight of infinity—not as terror, but as quiet awe.
If this is the first of many lives… then perhaps every beginning deserves to be lived as though it were the last.
He exhaled, and the world seemed to exhale with him. The leaves shifted; the river hummed its endless lullaby.
And as Ren drifted toward sleep beside the silver water, the faint outline of another figure watched from the opposite shore—a silhouette wrapped in light, its voice carried only by the current:
"You remember more than you think."