Jett's POV
There were two kinds of people in Oakhaven.
People who belonged.
And people like me.
You could tell the difference by the way people said your name.
Mara said mine like she was calling a friend.
The baker said it like she was calling a customer.
The merchants said it like they were calling a thief.
Most others said it like they were trying to remember why they didn't trust me.
I had lived in Oakhaven for seventeen years.
That should have been long enough.
It wasn't.
I had no family name.
No house that had belonged to my parents.
No relatives.
No birthplace anyone could name.
And no memories from before I was five.
People found that strange.
I did too.
The story everyone knew was simple.
Garran found me near the Greywood when I was five years old.
He brought me home.
I was injured.
Feverish.
Barely alive.
He never told anyone where he'd found me.
Whenever someone asked, he gave the same answer.
"Near the forest."
That was all.
Near the forest.
It was a good answer.
Simple.
Boring.
And completely useless.
Children asked where I came from.
I never knew what to tell them.
Adults asked who my parents were.
I never knew what to say.
So eventually, people stopped asking.
They just made up their own answers.
Some said my parents were travelers.
Others said they were criminals.
One woman claimed I had been abandoned by a noble family.
Someone else said I was an elf.
That one lasted almost a year.
I was not an elf.
At least, I didn't think I was.
I didn't have pointed ears.
That seemed like an important requirement.
The strangest rumor was that I had been born in the Greywood.
I laughed the first time I heard it.
Nobody else did.
That was when I realized they might actually believe it.
I walked through the village that morning carrying a box of repaired tools.
People moved aside as I passed.
Not obviously.
Just enough.
A small step.
A slight turn.
A little distance.
I was used to it.
The butcher nodded.
The blacksmith across the road didn't.
Two farmers stopped talking when I approached.
I kept walking.
At the bakery, the woman behind the counter looked at me.
"You're late."
"For what?"
"Your bread."
"I didn't order bread."
She pushed a loaf toward me.
"Take it."
I stared at it.
"Why?"
"Because I owe you."
"You don't owe me."
"Three weeks ago, you fixed my oven."
"You paid me."
"You charged me half."
"I charged you what it was worth."
She sighed.
"Take the bread, Jett."
I took it.
"Thank you."
She smiled.
For a moment, I felt like I belonged.
Then an old man behind me muttered,
"Don't spoil him."
The feeling disappeared.
I left.
That was Oakhaven.
A hand reaching toward you.
Another pulling you back.
I ate the bread outside Garran's workshop.
The workshop was mine now.
I still wasn't used to that.
People came to me for repairs.
They trusted my hands.
They didn't trust me.
That contradiction followed me everywhere.
A farmer would give me a broken plow and say,
"Can you fix it?"
I'd say yes.
He'd leave.
Then he'd come back five minutes later and ask,
"You didn't take anything, did you?"
It happened often enough that I stopped being offended.
Mostly.
I understood why.
People knew I stole.
They knew I wandered into the Greywood alone.
They knew I had no family.
No history.
No explanation.
People trusted what they understood.
I was difficult to understand.
Sometimes I wondered if Garran had understood me.
Then I remembered the notebook.
He is remembering.
I still hadn't decided whether to hate him for writing that.
I opened the workshop door.
The lantern I'd repaired sat on the bench.
I picked it up.
The mechanism worked perfectly.
Too perfectly.
I turned the small plate beneath it.
Click.
Blue light flickered inside.
I immediately closed it.
I didn't like what happened when I used things I couldn't explain.
I put the lantern down.
Then I noticed something underneath the workbench.
A box.
I'd never seen it before.
I crouched.
Pulled it out.
Dust covered the lid.
There was a name carved into it.
Not Garran.
Not mine.
A name I didn't recognize.
I touched it.
The vision hit me.
A hand.
Small.
My hand.
Someone was holding me.
Running.
The world was burning.
I heard a woman crying.
"Don't let him remember."
Then another voice.
A man's.
"Garran, take him."
The vision changed.
Garran stood in the forest.
Younger.
Blood covered his coat.
He was carrying a child.
Me.
He looked over his shoulder.
Someone was following him.
Then the vision ended.
I dropped the box.
My breathing became uneven.
Garran had lied.
Not just about the forest.
About everything.
I picked up the box again.
Inside was a piece of cloth.
Dark blue.
Burned along one edge.
There was a symbol stitched into it.
Seven lines.
Around a circle.
I knew it immediately.
I sat on the floor.
For seventeen years, I had wondered who my parents were.
Now I wasn't sure I wanted to know.
Because if Garran had taken me from someone—
Who had he taken me from?
And why?
A knock came at the door.
I quickly put the cloth back.
Marek stepped inside.
"You look terrible."
"Thanks."
"You're welcome."
He looked around.
"You find anything?"
I froze.
"What?"
"You're terrible at lying."
"I don't know what you're talking about."
He grinned.
"Good."
He walked over to the bench.
"You hear?"
"Hear what?"
"Three more people disappeared."
My smile vanished.
"Who?"
"Two hunters."
"And?"
"A soldier."
I stared at him.
"A soldier?"
He nodded.
"They came from the kingdom."
"When?"
"Last night."
I looked toward the Greywood.
"Where?"
"North."
Of course.
North.
Everything seemed to be moving north.
Marek studied me.
"You going?"
"Where?"
"You know where."
I didn't answer.
He sighed.
"Jett."
"What?"
"You don't have to do everything alone."
I looked at him.
Nobody had ever said that to me before.
I wanted to believe him.
I really did.
But trust was difficult when you didn't know who you were.
Maybe that was why I had never belonged anywhere.
I didn't know where I came from.
So I didn't know where I was supposed to belong.
Marek left.
I stayed in the workshop.
Outside, the village continued its ordinary life.
People argued.
Children shouted.
Hammers struck metal.
Someone laughed.
It should have felt comforting.
Instead, it felt temporary.
I opened Garran's notebook again.
I read the same sentence.
He is remembering.
I turned the page.
There was another line beneath it.
One I'd somehow missed before.
If he ever asks where he came from, tell him the truth.
My heart stopped.
Below it, Garran had written one final sentence.
Tell him he was not born here.
I stared at the words.
Not born here.
For the first time in seventeen years, I wondered whether Oakhaven had ever really been my home.
Then the bell rang.
Once.
Twice.
Three times.
I walked outside.
The entire village had stopped.
Everyone was looking toward the Greywood.
Seven blue lights were glowing between the trees.
And for just a moment—
I remembered a place I'd never seen.
A city beneath a golden sky.
A woman holding my hand.
And someone calling me by a name that wasn't Jett.
I blinked.
The memory was gone.
But this time, I remembered one thing.
The name.
I whispered it to myself.
"Aren."
The forest went silent.
Then something beneath the earth answered.
Clang.