Chapter 21 – The Garden of Forgotten Names

They were expelled by a shower of ash. One moment, Yusuf was pushing forward through ash with the faceless child's hand in his own, the Codex pulsing like a receding heart. The next—

Green.

Endless green.

He landed on moss that yielded under his palms like damp cloth. It was rich with the smell of rain-wet earth, although it did not rain. Vines twisted up around him into unnatural forms: arches, pillars, a dome that puffed and drew in its breath.

They weren't vines. Not exactly.

Names passed across them like veins. Words inscribed in curving script, shifting, flickering slightly in the low light. When Yusuf moved closer, he heard them being whispered. A multitude of voices speaking at once, one on top of another, a stream of sound.

The boy pulled at his sleeve. "This place. recalls differently.

Yusuf swallowed. He was on the adjacent vine and a soft whispering voice said:

"Amina

That sudden sound made him jump. That was his mother's name. That image in his mind of her scribbling again fluttered before his eyes—the same image that Memory Eater struggled and could not digest.

He immediately withdrew his hand.

They walked. The garden twisted in unnatural paths, a green puzzle etched in names. Some names burned brilliantly. Some dimmed as if whatever was left was withering. And some were only half-present, as if erased mid-syllable.

Yusuf froze in his steps uponseeing it.

A legible but faintly written owner's name on a fells branch:

Rae.

Letters pulsed weakly, as if fighting against Effacement.

"She's here," Yusuf whispered. His throat was closed. "Some part of her survived." His head stirred. "Only fragments. This place does not contain the entirety. Yusuf pushed toward the name, to anchor it—to remember. The vine retreated, stepping back again, and letters dissolved a second time, drifting beyond recall like mist.

"Wai—at!" His voice broke.

The whispers changed. Hundreds of voices conflicted and died away, but a single sentence lingered in the garden:

"They already have me."

Rae's tone.

Yusuf's knees buckled. It was her farewell, repeating like a wound that could not be cured.

The boy lifted him up. "Yusuf. Listen.

He froze.

From amidst the sea of whispers came a single voice that wound itself up clearer than the rest. One that he hadn't listened to since years back—strong and intentional and weighed down in conviction.

"We

It was his father's voice.

Vines alongside him ignited in chilly white script, and then it was:

Yus.

His own name.

He stumbled backward. The letters pulsed brighter, and with each pulse he felt something leave him—his first taste of bread in the museum’s backroom, the melody of a lullaby he once hummed under his breath.

It was not only recalling. It was reclaiming.

Boy's grip constricted further around his hand. "We need to go. Now.".

But he was unable to move. His father's voice was repeating his call out in his name by the same tone when he was not calling a son—but a student, a shadow.

And all other names began going out of use one after another.

As though something unseen was walking the garden, harvesting them.