“Another scouting party will most likely be deployed into the city tomorrow night,” Clarissa said, a few days later. After sending the letter, she had told me that we just needed to wait. Apparently, someone would be in touch from the Hidden Moon soon but, for the time being, we were going to be playing defensively. Lying low and acting from the shadows. This hadn’t stopped Clarissa from sending me on one or two missions already though. Just smaller groups of wolves that had wandered into Lockdale from the Silent Forest pack, trying to find us. Barely worth our attention or fight but still something that needed to be taken care of. …And I’d done it without question. With Zac’s help to clean up, of course. It was almost as if the two of us were back working together again, only, this time, it wasn’t under my father’s direction. Nevertheless, it was a role I slipped into naturally, doing what needed to be done. In my spare time, I had also been practising my ability, just as Myra h

I couldn’t get back to sleep after that dream. No… that memory. That haunting, painful memory. The image of Kieran’s eyes filled with so much hatred still weighed on me. Everything from the way he spat my name, to the way he looked at me… it was as if he despised me more than anything else. And I could understand why, given what I’d put him through. But just like the memory of those burning hazel eyes, another detail had lingered with me as well. The rejection. The searing pain of having my soul torn in half, a hole forming inside that threatened to make me lose my sanity. Why had I told Clarissa that the pain wasn’t so bad over time? I couldn’t imagine that feeling ever granting any respite. Yet this was a process I apparently started to initiate first in every timeline. Rejecting him immediately before doing much else. I willingly put myself through that pain… and I’d promised to do so again in this one. ‘…Whatever it takes.’ That was the rule I’d said in the memory, and so

“Allison…?” Kieran repeated, warily. “How could Allison have that sort of capability?” Clarissa had been explaining everything to Kieran for quite some time. Everything from her connection with Selene, to what triggers the end. …And also about me. He’d been quietly taking it all in so far but after Clarissa had finished talking, he finally spoke up, albeit he seemed to be slightly dazed. An understandable reaction. Clarissa shrugged. “She devoted her whole life to her faith. That sort of connection is incredibly difficult to sever. It just goes to show the potential that even those without our lineage abilities can possess.” “And… Rae…,” he said, slowly turning to me. “You’re… a Saintess now? How many times did you say…?” “This is the seventh timeline…,” I answered. “Though I don’t have any of my memories.” Or, rather… I had just one. Clarissa hadn’t gone into too much detail regarding my previous involvement with him, thankfully, but he still understood that it was mostly… u

“Aria…? The….?” my voice trailed off, almost as if I were in disbelief. She simply smiled at my reaction though and nodded her head. “I’ve been watching you for a while now,” she continued. “You’ve been through so much. I’m so sorry you’ve had to experience any of this. I know better than any how unpleasant it can be.” “You… how can you be here?” I asked, still confused. “Here? You mean in the Abyss? This has been my home for many years now. I learnt how to navigate its plane and break free of my memories back when I was alive. Not like Selene is around to keep tabs either. Finding you before Clarissa revives you was the difficult part though.” “…Then why are you here? Why did you try to find me?” And she then looked up at the stars above, a longing in her eyes. “…Because I felt it was time I intervene,” she said. “I swore to stay neutral but, with every death you endure, my heart breaks a little bit more to watch. How many times will this be now, Rheyna…?” Her eyes then met m

“Why are you still being so moody?” she asked me, speaking as I carried her on my back.Between her behaviour towards Kieran and whatever plan of Clarissa’s this was now, I was certainly more quiet than usual.“I’m not,” I mumbled, continuing to walk.I’d agreed to go to the meeting, if only because I’d been the one to request that my cousin come here originally. As Clarissa had said, it would have been rude to make him come all this way only to then ignore him.“Are you being like this because of this morning?” she asked, sounding concerned. “Or did something happen last night?”However, after she’d gone and organised this without consulting me, and after she’d treated Kieran so terribly, I really wasn’t in the mood to put up with her questioning.“I thought you said you didn’t care what happened between us?” I snapped back, quoting what she’d told me in the kitchen. “So stay out of it.”And she was instantly quiet after that.I continued to walk into the nearby forest for some time,