Big, wind-driven raindrops knocked audibly against the window, like the sky tossing pebbles at glass.
Outside, the sky lay flat with hard, iron-dark clouds, a single slab of gray carved across the world. It poured a rain that soaked sight and sound, drumming the earth into mud.
The Holy Maiden kept her gaze on the dome and rubbed her stinging eyes. She’d slept at pale dawn and woke into a black stitched tight with cloud.
Hedi hadn’t changed her posture; only the rain had rewritten the room. The clock on the wall ticked on, brass hands pacing a small circle. By the time she’d gone under, she’d had two, maybe three hours.
Her head felt misbuttoned, like a cardigan fastened wrong—stairs up to reality losing their rungs, one by one. She curled herself small and shut her eyes again.
Exhaustion pooled like cool water in a basin; the work at daybreak had wrung her dry. She’d been strung tight, and only now did fatigue settle like silt.
She wanted to think through the unknown that blocked healing magic. To choose without wavering, but all she could conjure was protective magic and silence.
Drowsiness crept in like mist. She slipped into a shallow doze.
Footsteps whispered outside, near then far, circling like anxious flies that refused to land.
“Don’t knock!” A woman’s voice snapped, nerves taut. “The Holy Maiden just lay down!”
“I haven’t slept either. We hauled that guy back and interrogated him till now.”
“No means no!”
The Holy Maiden opened her eyes. She smoothed her white hair, rose with quiet grace, and pushed the door ajar. “It’s fine. I’m not planning to rest.”
The policeman took off his cap, shook off the rain like a dog, and set it back on. “Anything special in the Sacred Cathedral?” he asked, lifting a cigarette to his nose as if tobacco’s ghost could chase sleep away.
“I don’t understand,” the Holy Maiden said, tilting her head. “What could be special about a church?”
“Something that draws criminals.”
“In theory, no.”
“Theory?”
“As far as I know, the only thing of value in the Sacred Cathedral is Dark Magic books.”
“Historical value,” the policeman cut in. “Buying or selling those is illegal. No one dares take them.”
“Beyond that, I don’t know.”
“Mm… there’s something. Otherwise they wouldn’t head for that mountain forest.”
A thought flashed across her mind. “Could it be gold? Some believers donate gold to the Cathedral.”
“This morning I sent a team to survey the site. No signs of digging.” He scratched the stubble along his lip, rain still clinging there. “You bury gold out there?”
“There’s no gold.”
“Then don’t jam my thoughts with imagined riddles.”
“Sorry. I’ve only slept a few hours. My head’s still fogged.”
He saw the fatigue on her face and gentled his tone. “Too much at once in Naghtown. Magic, disappearances, last night’s blast, and now this strange storm. I’m afraid we’ll see another landslide.”
“I understand.”
“That man won’t say a thing. His partner ran. We checked the inn’s registry—fake names.”
“The short woman comes to the Cathedral often. She donated once.” The Holy Maiden paused, memory threading back. “She signed… Canary…”
“If she’s using an animal alias, the man probably has one too.”
The Holy Maiden thought for a beat. “The short woman is Canary. The tall man should be something like Bear, or Elephant.”
“Based on build? Even if that makes sense, it won’t give us their real names.”
“Too many riddles.”
He inhaled the unlit scent of tobacco, noncommittal. “How are Melvina and the other black-haired one? I don’t mean you. I mean the Melvina with gray-white hair.”
“She hasn’t woken.”
“Ask them when you can. We might get a lead.”
“Selina, you can see this afternoon at the Sacred Cathedral,” the Holy Maiden said, words hesitant. “If you want the little gray-hair, she won’t wake any time soon.”
“Little gray-hair? Isn’t that too familiar?”
She heard what he meant and took the girl’s side. “Even if she set off the magic incident, she’s changed in the Cathedral’s confinement room.”
“Fine.”
“Does the man you took connect to the missing-persons case?”
He nodded, then ran his tongue along the corner of his mouth, tasting rain and ash. “My gut says yes. No proof. Don’t think ‘gut’ means we act wild. Whether someone’s dirty, we can see it.”
“Case work. Experience.”
“Maybe.” He held the filtered cigarette without lighting it. “Honestly, I came to Naghtown to drift steady and quiet. Who knew it would all break loose at once?”
“It’s always been peaceful.”
“The only big thing was John’s death. Six years ago, right?”
The Holy Maiden nodded, her silence like a thin veil.
“I saw you twice at the Cathedral. Sat under the tree reading, a quiet, well-behaved girl.” He combed his sleepy memory like leaves through fingers. “Your hair was this long then too. Still down to your waist.”
“What about the other one?” she asked, probing gently. “Always dragging me everywhere.”
“You mean Alina? After John died, she must’ve left the Cathedral. I never saw her again. Or I didn’t notice. I’m not fond of girls who romp like boys.”
“Why?”
“Giggly and loud. Girls are better quiet.”
“They quiet down when they grow up.”
“Come on. Three-year-old shows the old man.”
The Holy Maiden smiled without sound. “Everyone thinks that?”
“Just my take. A few old men liked Alina. No sons, no daughters, I guess.”
“If they had children, they wouldn’t?”
He scratched his stubble, feeling a strange heat in her calm words, a windless anger. Her tone stayed even; her face was a mask. “Old folks have time. A lively girl eases their loneliness.”
“So Alina existed only to ease loneliness?”
“That’s not what I meant. You get me. I’m lousy with words.”
“I’m sorry,” the Holy Maiden said, and looked at the rain drifting through the window lattice like gauze. “I just miss Alina a little. I miss running through the hills, climbing trees for cicadas, wading the river for little shrimp. After the Priest passed, everyone left.”
“They might come back in another form.”
“Why?”
He searched for comfort. “Because someone came who shares your full name, and your hair. A kind of mirror.”
“You mean fate?”
“I mean romance,” he said, showing off the word like a polished coin. “Two people living utterly different lives, crossing paths—that’s romantic.”
She smiled and said nothing. To her ear, it wasn’t romance. It felt more like a bad relative reminding her she was a figure on paper.
Because in the six years I pretended to be Melvina, I lost so many things—list them out, and the stack would be as thick as a year of donation records.
Some were past moments I never cherished and now regret beyond repair. Some were treasures I grieved at first, then let fade with time.
And the losing seems to go on. It keeps peeling people, events, and feelings from my life like bark from a tree.
It’s as if the coat pocket that stands for me carries a fate-cut hole that no needle can stitch shut.
Against that backdrop, even if someone flung the shutters open, leaned in, and shouted, “Wear another’s face, and you’ll lose your own!”
I’d have no strength to argue. Because it’s true. There’s nothing I can hold up to deny it.
