Chapter 15 — Fragments That Bleed

The sand was silent once more. Too silent.
Yusuf sat with his knees drawn up, the shard burning faintly in his palm. His chest still heaved from the strain of holding on—of remembering—but the silence made it worse. It was as though the desert itself had paused, waiting for him to unravel on his own.
The child without a face knelt before him, cocking their head to the side as if examining if he was still tangible.
"You nearly dropped it."
Yusuf produced a rueful laugh. "I felt it. Like… pages being ripped out of a book. One after another. I could feel myself getting thinner. If I hadn't—" He swallowed. "If I hadn't remembered you, I think I would've followed them."
The faceless head of the child moved, the slightest glimmer of acceptance in their stance.“Good. That’s why the Codex gave you me.”
Yusuf blinked, holding the shard more firmly. "Gave me… you?"
The Codex, lying in the sand between them, quivered slightly. Its pages had closed once more, but a faint light seeped from the edges, like ink that would not dry.
The child drew a finger across its cover. It knows you cannot do this by yourself. Every Archivist who came before you—" they paused, words faltering, as though there was something weighty behind them. "—lost themselves. Bits broke off until there was nothing remaining. That is why I am here.
Yusuf scowled. "To prevent me from being deleted?"
The kid slowly shook their head. "No. To remember you when you can't."
The words struck him harder than the Watcher's attack had. He opened his mouth to protest, but the shard in his hand throbbed again, keen enough to hurt. Yusuf looked down—and saw his palm bleeding.
The glow of the shard was eating into his skin.
"Wait—" He let it fall with a gasp, and the sliver rang against the sand, still glowing softly.
The kid didn't budge. They just looked on.
“Fragments cut. That’s their cost. They remember things even you shouldn’t. That’s why the Watcher hates them—they resist forgetting.”
Yusuf wrapped his hand in the hem of his sleeve, still trembling. He gazed down at the shard there in the sand, softly glowing like a heartbeat. Rae's shard.
"Why give them to me, then?" he asked softly.
The child’s voice was calm, almost sad.
"Because you'll need them. To survive what's coming. To find him."
The pronoun him constricted Yusuf's throat. His father's face still lingered at the edges of his mind—the way the Watcher had used it as a mask.
Yusuf's voice was a whisper. "He's alive, isn't he?"
The child tilted their faceless head, silent.
The Codex opened by itself, pages writhing until one line showed itself. The ink ran across the parchment like new blood:
Thread Convergence Approaching. Prepare.
The words rang in the desert air, louder than any voice. Yusuf gazed at the message, his heart pounding. If this was merely the start, then the subsequent world—the next thread—would not wait for him to recuperate. And in it somewhere, the truth about his father awaited.