Chapter 32 - The Forgotten Paths

😁 A Little Note Before We Begin

Worlds Reconciled has recently been reworked to improve the reading pace. Some longer chapters have been split into two, which has resulted in new numbering for the chapters already published.

Don't worry: you haven't missed anything! 

The story remains the same; only some chapters have been reorganized to make the reading experience smoother.

So you can simply continue reading: tonight's Chapter 26 has been moved and is now Chapter 32.

🤍 Elea

What if the paths we have forgotten were precisely the ones that could still save us?

The first blow came before Numa could even speak. His back slammed violently against the damp floor of the old tunnel. One hand pinned him against the concrete while another was already searching his pockets with almost mechanical precision.

Blade crouched in front of him. His gaze was calm.

"Where is she?"

Numa ran his tongue over his split lip, immediately tasted blood, and realized that Blade was far more dangerous than he had thought.

"Who?"

The second blow was harder. His head struck the asphalt. For a second, the outlines of the tunnel blurred around him.

Blade simply waited for his vision to return.

"Soren."

Numa struggled to breathe.

Blade watched him for several seconds.

His interface was already analyzing the micro-variations in his voice, the dilation of his pupils, the irregular rhythm of his breathing. Numa wasn't really lying. He had seen Soren looking toward the tunnels. He had heard her talk about the east. The rest, she had kept to herself.

Blade straightened.

"He doesn't know anything."

The other Watchers remained still. One of them asked:

"Do we take him back?"

Blade looked at Numa one last time.

"No."

He gave him one last blow to the ribs, almost without anger.

"He'd make us lose too much time."

Then he turned away. A few seconds later, the footsteps were already fading into the old tunnel.

Numa remained on the ground. He waited for the silence to return before trying to move. A sharp pain immediately shot through his side.

"Great..."

He spat out a little blood, then let out a painful laugh.

"Thanks, Soren."

He leaned against the wall and briefly closed his eyes.

"I really hope your plan works."

Several kilometers away, Soren was already moving in the opposite direction.

She was no longer running. No one runs for long when they want to disappear. Running draws attention, changes rhythms, turns an ordinary silhouette into an emergency.

So she walked, quickly, but not too quickly. She followed an old drainage pipe almost entirely overgrown with plants. Thin stems grew out of cracks in the concrete. Some roots had already lifted the metal plates.

Someone had shown her this passage years before.

She had never really understood why he insisted on teaching her paths that no one used anymore.

Today, she understood.

People always look at the big doors. They forget the paths that no longer look like paths.

Soren placed a hand against the damp wall. The passage was still there, narrower than before, darker, but open.

She thought of Numa for a second, then of Neris. Her breathing changed despite herself.

"Hold on a little longer..."

She didn't really know which of the two she was talking to.

Then she stepped into the darkness.

In the forest, the group had been walking for several hours. The walk was nothing like it had been during the first few days.

There was no longer any identifiable path, even for Jazz. The trees sometimes seemed to open a passage in front of them before closing it again a few meters farther on. Immense roots rose from the ground like walls, and some ferns reached their shoulders.

The Deer-Man still walked at the front, without a map and without hesitation. As if he were following a direction written somewhere other than in space.

Jazz rolled slowly through the wet leaves, often helped by Sophie.

"I officially confirm that this forest still refuses to cooperate with my sensors."

Aria stepped around a root.

"Finally, something we have in common."

The Deer-Man didn't react. Aria had been watching him for several minutes, and not very discreetly.

She could make out certain details more clearly now: the way the mask was fastened behind his head, the pieces of moss caught in his antlers, his clothes sewn from different materials, fabric, leather, plant fibers.

And especially his hands, completely human hands. They were large, marked by scars.

"Why did you save me?" she finally asked.

He kept walking.

"At the factory," she clarified. "That was you."

Still no answer. Aria quickened her pace to walk beside him.

"You could at least answer."

The silence lasted a few more steps. Then he simply said:

"You were still breathing."

Aria looked up at him.

"That's not really an answer."

"Yes, it is."

"No. It's an observation."

He turned his mask slightly toward her.

"You ask a lot of questions."

"Because I like to understand."

Aria remained silent for a second.

"And you, do you always answer with observations?"

"Only when the questions want to go too fast."

Jazz rolled between them.

"Analysis: Aria's frustration level steadily increasing."

"Thank you, Jazz."

"I facilitate communication."

The Deer-Man moved a little farther ahead. Aria continued to study the mask.

"You know it's obvious you're a man underneath?"

He stopped. For the first time since they had set out, he turned completely toward her.

"I am."

Then he resumed walking.

Aria remained still.

"That's it?"

Jazz rolled past her.

"Personally, I found that revelation very clear."

"I'm going to throw you into a stream."

"Threat recorded."

Sophie laughed softly, and Neris gave a small smile. For a few seconds, the tension seemed less heavy.

The terrain suddenly sloped downward. The previous day's rain had left a thin layer of moss on the stones. The Deer-Man stepped onto it without slowing down. Aria tried to do the same.

Bad idea. Her shoe slipped.

Her body tipped sideways, but before she could hit the ground, an arm caught her firmly around the waist.

The Deer-Man.

For a fraction of a second, Aria remained suspended against him. She felt his warmth through the layers of fabric, his breathing closer. Her heart sped up without her really knowing why. She immediately hated that her body had noticed this closeness. And especially that almost embarrassing realization: behind the mask and the antlers, there was nothing unreal.

Only a man. A tall man.

She immediately regained her balance and moved slightly away.

"Thank you."

He released his arm.

"You don't like falling."

Aria adjusted her bag with a little too much attention.

"I like being caught even less."

Something passed through the eyes visible behind the mask. A broad, amused smile.

Jazz reached the edge of the slope.

"Analysis complete: the ground wins. Zero points for the humans."

Aria gave him an annoyed look.

"Keep going and I'll test your resistance to falls."

"Immediate withdrawal of analysis."

They resumed their journey.

Sophie, who was walking behind them, watched Aria for a few seconds. She said nothing, but she smiled.

Half an hour later, the Deer-Man stopped abruptly. No one understood why.

In front of them, the passage seemed perfectly passable. A strip of dark earth stretched between two rows of tall trees. Farther ahead, the light even seemed a little brighter.

Aria looked around.

"Why are we stopping?"

The Deer-Man raised a hand.

"We wait."

"For what?"

He didn't answer.

The group remained still. One minute passed, then two. Jazz turned his dome slightly.

"No danger detected."

"That's reassuring," Aria murmured.

The Deer-Man knelt and placed his fingers on the ground.

Sophie then felt something. A slight vibration could be felt in the air.

She looked up.

High above, the branches had begun to move, all in the same direction, then the birds appeared. First a few, then dozens, then hundreds.

They crossed the canopy in a vast, almost silent movement, abruptly changing direction above the passage they should have taken.

A few seconds later, a distant buzzing crossed the sky.

Jazz immediately turned off all his lights.

"A drone."

Aria looked up.

The device briefly appeared between the branches, far to their right. It wasn't coming toward them. It followed a regular, methodical trajectory, scanning another part of the forest before disappearing behind the canopy.

The group remained still until the buzzing had completely faded away.

Aria looked at the Deer-Man.

"You knew?"

"The birds knew."

"And you understood the birds."

"I listened."

Sophie watched the branches slowly begin to move normally again.

The forest hadn't saved them the way a person might have. It had warned them, and he had heard it.

Aria was still looking at the sky.

"I really feel like this forest walks with you."

The Deer-Man resumed walking.

"No."

A few seconds passed before he added:

"I'm the one who walks with it."

They changed direction. Their progress became slower. The ground was covered with dead branches and thick leaves.

Sophie suddenly stopped.

Something tightened slightly in her chest, like a feeling. She looked at the passage in front of them. Then another one, almost invisible, to the left.

"Wait."

The entire group stopped.

The Deer-Man turned toward her.

Sophie hesitated. Before, she probably would have kept that feeling to herself. She would have waited for a clearer sign, an image, a certainty.

But nothing came, only that persistent feeling.

"I don't think we should go that way."

Aria looked around.

"Why?"

"I don't know."

She pointed to the passage on the left.

"I think we should take this one."

Jazz immediately analyzed the area.

"No detectable advantage. Wetter terrain, slower progress."

Sophie felt the doubt return.

"I know it doesn't make sense..."

The Deer-Man looked at her for a few seconds. Then he changed direction without asking a question.

Aria frowned.

"You trust her?"

"Yes."

"Based on what?"

"She listened."

Sophie felt something relax inside her.

He had recognized her intuition.

They took the passage on the left. A few minutes later, a low rumble echoed behind them.

Part of the ground they would have had to cross had just collapsed under the weight of an ancient tree.

Aria slowly turned around and looked at Sophie.

"Okay."

Jazz rotated his dome.

"Analysis revised: Sophie's intuition statistically annoying."

Sophie smiled. For the first time, she hadn't just sensed something. She had trusted it, and so had he.

Neris walked a little behind the others. She had spoken very little since Jazz had managed to pick up fragments of a message.

SOREN — ACTIVE HUNT — WATCHERS

The rest had disappeared before she could read it.

Since then, the words had been circling in her mind.

Watchers. Soren. Active hunt.

And despite herself, the Pulse-9 came back to her.

The music had been low that evening. Almost over. The bar had gradually emptied. Only a few regulars remained, along with the reflection of Biel's lights on the windows.

Soren was sitting at her usual table, a cup between her hands.

"You always look outside," Neris had remarked.

Soren had smiled, a genuine smile.

"Sometimes I forget there's a Wall."

Neris had laughed.

"It's impossible to forget something like that."

Soren hadn't answered. She had simply continued looking at the city, as if she could see something behind it.

That was probably the evening Neris had truly fallen in love. Not all at once, but rather like when you realize that a song is playing all the time in the back of your mind.

A few weeks later, when the Pulse-9 was almost empty, Neris had gathered her courage and spoken.

"You mean more to me than you should."

Soren's expression had changed. Not with surprise, but rather with a slight sadness she already seemed to know.

"Neris..."

"Don't say my name like that."

Soren had lowered her eyes to her cup.

"You're Kaïssa's daughter."

The words had hit harder than she had expected.

"So what?"

"So everything around me can become dangerous for you."

"You don't get to decide that for me."

Soren had closed her eyes for a second.

"There's also someone waiting for me."

Neris had frozen.

"Someone?"

"Yes."

Soren hadn't said in the forest. She hadn't spoken directly to Neris about the Alliance. She had only added:

"I already gave them my word."

From that evening on, Soren had begun to distance herself. Shorter messages, canceled meetings, longer silences.

Neris had let her.

And that was what hurt the most today. Not only that Soren had pushed her away, but that she had never insisted. That she had accepted losing someone before she had even tried to hold on to her.

"Neris?"

Sophie's voice brought her abruptly back to the forest.

"Are you okay?"

"Yes."

The word came out too quickly.

Sophie slowed down to walk beside her. They walked a few meters in silence.

Then she whispered:

"You care about her a lot."

Neris looked straight ahead. This time, she didn't try to lie.

"Yes."

Her voice broke slightly on the word. She took a breath before continuing:

"More than I would have wanted."

"Does she know?"

Neris gave a small, joyless laugh.

"That's exactly the problem."

Sophie didn't ask another question. She simply stayed beside her.

That silent presence did Neris more good than she would have admitted.

Neris slowly raised her eyes toward the canopy. Over there, in the streets of Biel, somewhere, on the other side of the Wall...

Soren was alone.

And for the first time, Neris was afraid of arriving too late.

The Guardian Angel: Intuition is a voice whispered deep within us, an echo of the Mother of the World. It opens our perception to the nocturnal side of existence, that of the invisible, and gradually attunes us to what escapes the eye. Through it, we learn to read life differently. It does not reason, it knows. It is direct knowledge. And when we attune ourselves to it, it reveals and unveils what, for others, remains hidden.