Amara wasn't there at breakfast the next morning.
Elowen noticed before she even sat down. The chair beside her remained empty, a folded napkin untouched, a soft gap in the hush of morning clatter.
She didn't ask aloud. Not yet. But something hollow opened up in her chest, like a cup waiting to be filled with worry.
The manor felt colder. Or maybe she was just noticing what Amara usually softened.
The day passed in strange pauses. Elowen tried to focus—on folding linens, drying herbs, reading the same paragraph three times. But her mind floated back to the orchard, to the nearly-kiss, to the quiet promise they hadn't dared to name.
That night, Elowen went to the east wing.
She stopped in front of the window with no glass, hoping for a breeze, a whisper—something to ground her. But the air felt still, the silence too sharp. And Amara's presence was a missing color in the world.
Later, she found Mira in the kitchen, humming softly over a pot of stew.
"Have you seen Amara today?" Elowen asked, keeping her voice casual.
Mira stirred slowly. "She left early. Said she needed quiet. She took the old trail behind the moss stones."
"Did she say when she'd be back?"
"She didn't say much at all," Mira replied. "Just looked like she was carrying something heavy."
Elowen nodded once and turned away before the ache in her chest betrayed her.
The moss stone path was narrow, winding deeper into the woods than most dared to go alone. The air there always seemed thicker, more watchful.
Elowen didn't hesitate.
She followed the bend of the trail, her boots brushing soft ferns, her breath steady. The sun dipped low, and shadows braided themselves between branches.
And then—just before the trail split into three—she saw her.
Amara stood by the edge of a shallow stream, barefoot, her arms wrapped around herself as if holding something in. Her dress was slightly damp at the hem, and her hair was a mess of wind and memory.
Elowen stopped, watching her for a long moment.
"Hey," she finally said, stepping forward.
Amara turned, slowly.
Her eyes were red. Not fresh-crying—but like something had been leaking out of her all day, drop by invisible drop.
"I thought you might come," she said softly.
"I always will."
Amara gave a breath of laughter, but it cracked at the edges.
"I didn't want you to see me like this."
"I'd rather see all of you," Elowen said, "than only the parts that smile."
Amara looked away. "I don't know how to hold this feeling. It's like I'm full of something that won't say its name. Something I don't have words for."
Elowen stepped closer. "Is it sadness?"
"Partly."
"Fear?"
"Maybe."
Elowen reached out, gently touching her arm.
"Or is it love?" she whispered.
Amara's lips parted. Her gaze flicked up, searching Elowen's face like it might save her.
"I don't know how to love without vanishing a little," she said. "Every time I let someone in, I fade. I become what they need."
Elowen shook her head. "You don't need to disappear to be loved."
"That's easy to say when you've never been left behind."
Elowen's voice was steady. "I have."
Amara blinked.
"I've been forgotten by people who once held my hand like it was home," Elowen said. "And I've forgotten pieces of myself just to be enough for someone else. But I'm not asking you to be enough for me, Amara. I just want you to be you."
Amara's bottom lip trembled.
"I'm afraid," she whispered. "That if I give you everything, I'll have nothing left."
Elowen pulled her gently into an embrace.
"Then give me just a little. One breath. One truth. One piece at a time. I don't need all of you at once."
They stood there, wrapped in twilight and waterlight, the stream murmuring at their feet like a lullaby for lost girls.
And as the first star appeared overhead, Amara exhaled slowly, resting her forehead against Elowen's shoulder.
"I think," she said, "this is the first time I've ever felt like fading isn't the same as falling apart."
Elowen held her tighter. "You're not fading. You're becoming."