The dreams started the night after Brother Kang's funeral.
Amelia, now thirteen and alone once more, had found shelter in an abandoned shrine on the outskirts of a village called Thornhaven. It wasn't much—four walls, half a roof, and spirits of forgotten gods who barely noticed her presence—but it was dry and out of the wind.
She fell asleep on a bed of dried leaves, Brother Kang's meditation techniques helping quiet her mind for the first time in weeks.
And then she was… somewhere else.
-----
*A garden.*
*Unlike anything Amelia had ever seen. Flowers bloomed in colors that had no names—something between blue and silver, between gold and green. Trees grew in impossible spirals, their branches heavy with fruit that glowed softly in the perpetual twilight.*
*The sky above was neither day nor night, but the exact moment between—that perfect balance when the sun has set but darkness hasn't fallen. Stars were visible but faint. The air was warm but not hot, carrying scents of jasmine and something sweeter, something that made her chest ache with longing.* it was paradise.
*"You shouldn't be here."*
*Amelia spun. A woman stood among the flowers, tall and radiant, with silver-gold hair that seemed to move in a wind Amelia couldn't feel. Her eyes were the color of dawn, and her face—*
*Amelia knew that face. Had seen it in mirrors, in still water, in the frightened reflections of those who looked at her and saw something wrong.*
*It was her own face. Or rather, her face as it might be someday, if she lived long enough to become beautiful instead of cursed.*
*"Who are you?" Amelia whispered.*
*The woman smiled, sad and loving. "You know who I am. Deep down, you've always known."*
*"I don't—"*
*"You're dreaming, little one. And in dreams, the binding weakens. You can remember things your conscious mind has forgotten."*
*Amelia took a step back. "What binding? What are you talking about?"*
*But the woman was already fading, the garden dissolving like mist in morning sun. Her last words echoed as everything crumbled: "We love you. We've always loved you. Remember that when the darkness comes."*
-----
Amelia woke gasping, her heart racing.
Just a dream. It was just a dream.
But it had felt so real. The garden, the woman, the overwhelming sense of being… home. Of belonging somewhere, even if that somewhere didn't exist.
She tried to shake it off, to focus on the more immediate concerns of finding food and avoiding the village constable who'd already chased her away twice. But all day, fragments of the dream lingered.
*We love you.*
No one had ever said that to her. Not once in thirteen years.
Why would her mind create a dream where someone did?
-----
The second dream came three nights later.
*The same garden, but different. Now there were two figures.*
*The woman from before, but no longer alone. Beside her stood a man—tall and powerful, with dark skin that seemed to absorb light rather than reflect it. His eyes glowed crimson like dying embers, and shadows gathered around him like loyal hounds.*
*But when he looked at Amelia, those terrifying eyes were infinitely gentle.*
*"She's growing so fast," he said, though not to Amelia. To the woman beside him.*
*"She's strong," the woman agreed. "Stronger than either of us at her age."*
*"She'll need to be." The man's voice held such sorrow. "What we've asked of her—what fate has demanded—it's too much for a child."*
*"I know." The woman's form shimmered, became translucent. A spirit. They were both spirits. "But we had no choice. Not if we wanted her to live."*
*Amelia found her voice. "Wanted who to live? Who are you talking about?"*
*They turned to her as if noticing her for the first time, though they'd clearly been aware of her presence. The woman knelt, putting herself at Amelia's eye level despite being incorporeal.*
*"You, precious one. We're talking about you."*
*"You're dead," Amelia said, because she knew death when she saw it. "Both of you. Spirits."*
*"Yes."*
*"Then how can you be here? In my dreams?"*
*The man moved closer, his expression achingly tender. "Because we're bound to you. Have been since the moment you were born. Death cannot sever that bond."*
*"I don't understand."*
*"You will," the woman promised. "When you're ready. When you're strong enough to bear the truth. But for now…" She reached out as if to touch Amelia's face, her hand passing through. "Know that you are loved. That you have always been loved. That everything we did, we did to protect you."*
*"Protect me from what?"*
*But the garden was crumbling again, faster this time. The man and woman faded, their expressions filled with anguish and love in equal measure.*
*"From the one who killed us," the man's voice whispered as darkness swallowed everything. "From your grandfather."*
-----
Amelia woke with tears on her face.
Grandfather? She had a grandfather? And he'd killed these spirits—these people who claimed to love her?
None of it made sense.
She was an orphan. Had always been an orphan. Her parents were unknown, probably dead, certainly not invested enough to protect her in life or watch over her in death.
These dreams were just… just her mind playing tricks. Creating a fantasy to cope with loneliness. Brother Kang had taught her about that—how the mind created stories to fill in gaps, to make sense of senselessness.
That's all this was.
A Fantasy.
A Delusion.
*Lies her heart told her because the truth was too painful.*
And yet…
The dreams kept coming.
-----
*Night after night, the garden appeared. Sometimes empty, sometimes with the two spirits, occasionally with a third figure—a woman in servant's robes who looked at Amelia with fierce devotion and whispered, "I'm searching for you. Hold on. Please hold on."*
*The man and woman—Amelia's mind had started calling them Father and Mother, though she tried not to—showed her fragments of things.*
*A battle. Swords clashing. Light and shadow colliding.*
*A baby crying, wrapped in a blanket that glowed.*
*Hands weaving intricate patterns in the air, magic Amelia had no words for.*
*"Hide her," the Mother's voice commanded. "Make her invisible. Make her safe."*
*"The binding will hurt her," the Father warned. "Suppress her powers. Make her seem cursed."*
*"Better cursed than dead."*
*Then darkness. Screaming. The sound of steel piercing flesh.*
*"I love you," the Mother gasped. "Live, my daughter. LIVE."*
-----
Amelia woke from that dream sobbing so hard she couldn't breathe.
Daughter.
They'd called her daughter.
But that was impossible. Her parents were dead, had died when she was born or shortly after, she'd been found on a doorstep, she was nobody, came from nowhere, meant nothing—
*You are loved.*
The words echoed in her mind, relentless.
*Everything we did, we did to protect you.*
What if the dreams weren't fantasy? What if they were… memories?
No. That was insane. She'd have remembered having parents. Remembered being loved. Remembered—
But what if she couldn't remember? What if something—the binding they kept mentioning—had taken those memories away? Locked them so deep that only dreams could access them?
Amelia sat in the cold shrine, wrapped in her threadbare cloak, and tried to make sense of impossible things.
If the dreams were real, if those spirits truly were her parents, then:
She wasn't just an orphan. She was the child of something powerful—powerful enough that someone wanted her dead.
The "curse" that followed her might not be her fault but the result of suppressed power leaking out.
The visions, the spirits, the "sight" Brother Kang had talked about—all of it might be fragments of abilities she wasn't supposed to have yet.
And somewhere, a grandfather who'd killed her parents was looking for her.
Or maybe…
Maybe she was just a lonely, desperate girl creating stories to feel less alone.
She didn't know which option was more terrifying.
-----
The dreams continued, growing more vivid each night. The garden became familiar. The spirits' faces burned into her memory. And slowly, painfully, Amelia began to believe.
Not fully. Not without doubt.
But enough to start asking questions.
Enough to start watching for signs.
Enough to wonder if maybe, just maybe, she was more than the cursed orphan everyone thought she was.
On the night of her fourteenth birthday—a date she'd chosen arbitrarily years ago since no one knew her real birth date—Amelia made a decision.
She would find out the truth.
Whether the dreams were real or delusion, whether she had parents watching over her or just an overactive imagination, she needed to know.
Because living in uncertainty was its own kind of death.
And Amelia had survived too much to die of not-knowing.
The next morning, she left Thornhaven with a purpose she'd never had before. Not just surviving. Not just enduring.
Searching.
For truth. For answers. For the garden that existed somewhere between dream and memory.
For the parents who might have loved her.
Or for proof that she was as alone as she'd always believed.
Either way, the dreams had changed something fundamental.
Amelia was no longer content to merely survive.
She wanted to live.
And to live, she needed to understand what she truly was. Who she truly was.