The sky above the edge was wrong.
It wasn't broken, not quite—but it shimmered with a flaw, like cracked glass pretending to hold. Light bled through seams no one else could see, bending wrong around the boy standing at the boundary. He stared at it the way someone might stare at a name they'd forgotten, written in a stranger's hand.
He didn't remember how he'd come here.
Worse—he remembered remembering. But the memory was gone, gutted and echoing like a house that once held fire.
I was someone, he whispered. The words had no weight. No name answered.
Wind pulled at the edges of his coat, frayed and dust-worn. A sigil—barely visible—was sewn near the wrist: a cracked circle. He traced it with a trembling thumb, and the world around him shivered.
Just for a moment.
A breath.
A truth trying to be born.
Don't say it yet, a voice warned.
He turned—but no one stood there.
Or rather, they almost did. The shadow of a figure clung to the rocks like a burnt reflection, too flat, too late. It mirrored his stance, but its head tilted in the wrong direction. Not curiosity—anticipation.
The boy blinked. The shadow was gone.
But something had heard him.
---
Further down the ridge, a village slumped beneath the dying sun, roofs like broken backs, streets bent in on themselves like regret. No one called. No dogs barked. But smoke rose from a dozen chimneys, steady and unquestioning.
He remembered the village.
But he also didn't.
Like a name said in a dream—close enough to feel familiar, but far enough to fall apart when chased.
And someone—he was sure—had told him not to return.
So why had he?
Because I left something behind.
The thought wasn't his.
Or maybe it was.
It echoed too clearly to belong.
He stepped off the edge.
The moment his foot touched the slope, a sudden pulse hummed in his skull—like a string pulled too tight. He staggered, caught himself. For a split second, the world split.
He stood on the ridge.
And he stood in the village, as a child. Blood on his hands. A name screamed in the wind.
Then it was gone.
The sigil on his coat flared faintly, a single crack brightening like a second heartbeat.
You're fracturing, the shadow said again. This time behind him.
Good. It means you're close.
He didn't turn. He didn't have to.
Because in his bones, something had already turned.
And in the sky above—one of the cracks had widened.