Free Web NovelChapter 24: Chapter 24: The Ash of Memory
Ryophlira POV
The darkness after the blade entered my chest wasn’t a peaceful sleep. It was a heavy, suffocating descent into a past I spent every waking hour trying to remember but had forgotten.
When my eyes opened, I wasn’t in the mirrored palace corridor anymore. I was standing in the royal glasshouse gardens, bathed in a soft, golden afternoon light that felt decades away. The air smelled of blooming rose and damp earth untouched by smoke, untouched by blood.
I looked down. A few feet away from me sat a ten-year-old girl with bright, unburdened eyes and wild silver hair with red highlights. My younger self. She was kneeling in the grass, a tiny, soft smile lighting up her face as she gently patted a small, fox with oversized ears.
"I am pretty sure Mother told you to leave that thing alone," a sharp, youthful voice called out.
I turned my head. A younger Aiyolistra stepped onto the stone path, her vibrant curls bouncing with every steps. Even back then, she held herself with the rigid posture of a perfect princess.
"It’s not a thing," my younger self protested, shielding the little creature with her small hands. "He’s my friend. And his name is Benny."
Aiyolistra rolled her eyes, crossing her arms over her purple dress. "Well, Benny needs to go back to where you found him, so he can be with his family."
Without waiting for a response, Aiyolistra whipped around and ran off toward the grand pavilion. Three other little girls the haughty, giggling daughters of the Southern King immediately scrambled to chase after her. From the distance, the faint, overlapping sounds of ladies laughing and gossiping over tea echoed through the garden. The whole world felt safe. It felt normal.
"Come on, Benny," my younger self whispered, scooping the little fox up into her arms. "Let’s go find somewhere quiet."
She turned, her small feet carrying her right toward the boundary line where the manicured gardens met the deep, ancient royal forest.
A cold spike of sheer terror struck my chest. I knew this day.
"No! Stop! Don’t go in there!" I screamed, lunging forward. I threw my arms out, desperate to tackle my younger self to the dirt, to drag her back to the safety of the pavilion. But the moment my fingers struck her shoulders, my hands passed clean through her like mist. I was nothing but a ghost in my own nightmare. "Please, turn around!"
The transition happened in a horrific, instantaneous heartbeat.
"Fire! Fire!" freewebnoveℓ.com
A distant, blood curdling scream tore through the air. I whipped my head around to see who was shouting, but the glasshouse, the tea pavilion, and the gossiping ladies had completely vanished into thin air.
The sky above bruised, turning a suffocating, pitch black as thick, churning columns of smoke swallowed the sun. The gentle scent of rose morphed into the acrid, choking stench of burning flesh and melting pine.
"Help us! Please, someone help!"
The agonizing shrieks of dying servants and guards echoed from every direction, bouncing off the invisible walls of my consciousness. All around me, the trees erupted into towering walls of , unchecked flame, the heat so intense it felt like it was blistering my skin.
"Stop it! Stop!" I cried out, dropping to my knees. I slammed my palms over my ears, squeezing my eyes shut as the sheer, overwhelming weight of the terror crushed down on me. I was so scared. I was so entirely helpless.
When I finally forced my eyes open, the burning forest shifted again, narrowing down to a single, devastating clearing.
My younger self was there, trapped in the center of the ash. But she wasn’t walking anymore. She was trembling in our father’s arms, her small white dress completely drenched in a splatter of blood. Father was shouting something, his face mask of absolute panic, but no sound came out.
And there, lying in the scorched grass just inches away from her feet, was the small, severed head of the little fox. Benny.
"Noooo!"
A ragged scream tore from my throat as the sheer horror of the memory ripped me completely out of the dream.
My eyes flew open. My heart was racing like a trapped bird against my chest, a cold sweat slicking my forehead. The smell of smoke vanished, replaced by the scent of polished leather and expensive lavender oil.
I wasn’t in the burning forest. I was lying down, my head resting flat against the soft, fabric dress of my mother lap. The gentle, rhythmic swaying motion told me we were inside a moving car. fгeewebnovёl.com
Across from us, sitting silently was Ari and Mother’s chief lady in waiting. Her light blue eyes fixed on me with a mixture of intense relief and lingering exhaustion. She had used the blade to force my mind to shut down before I had lost control.
The terror from the nightmare, my sister and Yue-Senn was still claws-deep in my chest. My breath was shallow, coming in ragged, uneven gasps.
Instinctively, I squeezed my eyes shut again. I tried to force my mind to go back to the dream, wishing with everything inside me that I could change it, that I could stop my ten-year-old self from entering the woods, that I could save Benny, that I could fix the broken pieces of my family. But the darkness wouldn’t take me back. The real world was unyielding.
Unable to stop the overwhelming wave of hurt, anger, and exhaustion from crashing over me, I reached out with a trembling hand, tightly squeezing my mother’s leg. I buried my face into her lap, my shoulders shaking as I finally let the hot, bitter tears stream down my cheeks.
Lying there in the dark of the moving car, processing my sister’s devastating words about Yue-Senn and the ghosts of my past, I knew with absolute certainty that this was the worst day of my entire life.
