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Chapter 8 - Chapter 8 : A Room with a Ribbon

The guest room was quiet, too quiet. The kind of silence that made Liora's ears ache from the absence of her sister's voice. She layed still beneath the soft cotton sheets, very unlike the coarse wool blankets she was used to at Nan Theda's cottage. The bed was large, the ceiling tall, and the pale blue curtains fluttered faintly with the spring wind.

Her small hand remained clenched beneath the covers, fingers curled tightly around a single thing: Linna's ribbon.

It was frayed and faded now, once a cheerful yellow that had dulled to cream. It had tied Linna's hair in a crooked little braid, always slipping free during her silly songs or when she ran too fast through the orchard paths. Liora pressed it to her chest, feeling the ghost of her sister's laughter curl around the memory.

A memory unfolded behind her eyes, delicate as snow on a branch.

They sat by the hearth back in Meerfeld. The wind howled through the cracks in the wooden door, but inside the little cottage, it had been warm. Liora sat behind Linna, fingers tugging gently through knotted strands of pale hair.

"Stop moving, Linna," she had murmured, tongue peeking from the corner of her mouth.

"I'm a duck today!" Linna had chirped, flapping her arms. "A very important duck!"

"You're going to be a very bald duck if you keep jerking like that," Liora replied with a giggle.

Linna had turned, grinning up at her. "You'll still love me if I'm bald?"

"Always," Liora whispered, brushing a strand from her sister's forehead. "I'll love you always."

A weight stirred beside her. Liora blinked, pulled back into the present by the soft rustle of sheets.

Mathilde.

The small girl had curled against her sometime in the night, her golden curls pressed to Liora's shoulder. In her tiny hand, held between two curled fingers, was the ribbon. Linna's ribbon.

Liora's breath caught. For a moment, the world stilled. Her instinct flared, to snatch it back, to scold. But something in Mathilde's soft sleeping face stopped her.

She reached out with slow fingers and gently pried it free.

"That belonged to someone I loved," she whispered, her voice low, brushing a tear from her cheek. "More than anything."

Mathilde stirred but did not wake.

From the doorway, a figure stood in silence.

Lady Amalia, wrapped in a midnight-blue shawl, had come to check on her daughter. She had not intended to linger. But when she saw Liora cradling the ribbon like a relic, something deep and long buried stirred in her.

She watched in stillness, her hand pressed over her mouth, her heart squeezed between memory and mourning.

Later that morning, after breakfast, during which Elias stuffed three pieces of honeyed bread into his cheeks and Annalise tried to braid Liora's hair, Amalia retreated to her study.

The room still held the scent of old books and pressed roses. She pulled out a fresh sheet of cream parchment and dipped her quill.

Her handwriting was deliberate, graceful, touched with emotion.

Dearest Theda,

Forgive the suddenness of this letter. You and I have not spoken in some time, though you remain one of the few whose words I have always valued.

A child came to us yesterday, Liora, she says her name is. She brought Mathilde back to me after the little one wandered into the orchard. I would have thanked her and sent her on her way, but… I could not. I saw something in her. A strange familiarity, not only in her eyes, but in her silence. There is a grief that settles around her like snow that does not melt.

I must ask, who is she? What has she endured? My heart aches with questions I do not yet know how to ask aloud.

And yet… I feel I know already.

Yours,

Amalia Edelhardt

She set the quill down and exhaled.

Her eyes drifted to the soft cradle tucked in the corner, empty now for nine years. Covered in lace and lavender sachets. She had never removed it.

Later that day, Liora stood near the garden, uncertain. She had helped Mathilde wash her hands after lunch, had shared a pastry with Elias, and even joined in when Annalise insisted on naming flower petals.

But her heart tugged toward Nan Theda's cottage. It felt wrong to be gone so long. She wasn't meant to be here, was she?

"I should return," she said, almost too quietly to be heard.

Amalia looked up from her book, seated on a stone bench among the early blooming roses.

Liora stood just beyond the gravel path, her arms crossed, ribbon now tucked safely in her skirt pocket.

"I should help Nan… she'll be worried."

Amalia folded the book gently, placing it on her lap. "Nan Theda knows where you are. She received my letter this morning."

"You wrote her?"

"Yes. I wanted to thank her… and to ask about you."

Liora's throat tightened. "Why?"

Amalia stood and approached slowly, her footsteps light, never imposing.

"Because I wanted to understand the girl who returned my daughter to me… and who carries such deep sadness in her eyes."

Liora looked down.

"I don't mean to keep you," Amalia continued. "But if it is your choice to go, I will not stop you."

Liora's lips parted, words catching in her throat. She hadn't expected that.

"But…" Amalia's voice softened, "…if you'd like to stay a little longer, just a few days more, I would be glad."

The sun caught her pale golden hair and made her look like a figure out of a bedtime tale. Not a noblewoman, not a stranger. Just… someone who had once lost something, too.

Liora stared at the ribbon in her hand.

Linna had told her: "You have to go now. But you won't be alone."

A breeze rustled through the rose vines.

Liora nodded once.

That night, she sat on the edge of the guest bed, brushing out her tangled hair.

The ribbon sat beside her on the coverlet.

Mathilde wandered in with a blanket and climbed beside her without a word, placing a small wooden toy, an elk, on Liora's lap.

"Leopold made it," she mumbled sleepily. "He said you're brave."

Liora smiled faintly, then tucked the ribbon behind the carved antlers.

And for the first time in a long while, she whispered a thank you to the quiet room.

Outside, the stars blinked awake one by one, and the Edelhardt house, touched faintly by warmth and grief, took one more breath of spring.

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