"Stop the carriage."
Harrin turned, startled. "Young Master?"
"Stop."
The wheels groaned to a halt. Ardin stepped down before his servant could open the door for him.
The children scattered the moment they saw the crest on the carriage. The merchants did not. They only straightened their backs and put on the kind of smile that came with a price.
"A fine morning, my lord," said the one holding the keys. "Looking for something special?"
Ardin didn't answer. He was still looking at the cage.
Up close, the creature was even smaller than he had thought, barely the length of his forearm, with stitched seams along its arms like a doll that had been repaired too many times. But its eyes were not a doll's eyes. They were golden, and alive, and staring at him as if he were a ghost.
"How much?"
The merchant blinked. "For that? My lord, it bites, it curses, and it hasn't stopped talking since we caught it. We have far better..."
"How much."
"...Ten silver."
"TEN?!" the creature exploded. "I am the Great Gelepttin! I am worth a kingdom! Two kingdoms!"
"Eight," the merchant said quickly.
"HOW DARE..."
Harrin paid before the price could drop any further.
The cage opened with a rusty click. Gelepttin walked out with its chin raised high, tripped over the edge of the door, stood up, and continued walking as if nothing had happened.
Nobody laughed this time.
Inside the carriage, the silence was heavier than before. Gelepttin sat on the opposite seat, legs dangling far above the floor, studying Ardin's face.
"You don't remember me."
It wasn't a question.
"Should I?" Ardin asked.
Something flickered in those golden eyes. Not anger. Something older, and much more tired.
"You promised you wouldn't forget," it muttered. "Idiot."
"Watch your tongue!" Harrin snapped. "That is the second son of..."
"I know exactly who he is." Gelepttin did not even look at the servant. "Better than you do. Better than he does."
Ardin raised a hand, and Harrin fell silent.
"At the lake," the creature said quietly. "When you drank it. What did you see?"
Ardin hesitated. He had told Harrin the potion failed. That was easier than the truth.
A gray sky. A small room. A notebook filled with numbers he somehow understood.
And a question that still had no answer.
"A crack," he said at last. "In the air."
Gelepttin went completely still.
"Then it has already begun."
"What has?"
The creature leaned forward, and for the first time, there was no arrogance in its voice.
"Listen carefully, Ardin Vale. Whoever gave you that potion did not want you to remember."
A pause.
"They wanted to know if you *could*."
Ardin's fingers tightened against his knee.
Outside the window, the towers of the Vale estate rose above the trees. And just above them, thin as a strand of hair against the morning sky...
A line.
Splitting something that was never meant to be broken.