Chapter 34 — The Glass That Remembers

Yusuf knelt, his eyes on the glass fruit that pulsed with his name. The letters glowed gently, etched in fire along the smooth curve. His hand hesitated.

The faceless child's voice was thin and sharp. "Don't. Once you touch it, it's yours."

He swallowed. "What are you saying?"

"It means you'll carry it. And if it breaks." The child didn't finish.

The figures had stopped moving. Dozens—hundreds—of them were between the crystal trees, each with their own orbs, each broken in some way. Their eyes were vacant, yet Yusuf felt the weight of their attention on him.

He forced himself into a sit, recoiling a step. The glass fruit on the floor vibrated, as if begging to be picked up.

"Who shut this up?" Yusuf whispered, repeating his question.

The child tilted his head. "A man who wanted to save everything. Too much, too tightly. This. orchard is a vault. But vaults don't live. They don't breathe. And when memory can't breathe."

Yusuf finished the sentence, a knot in his chest. "It dies.".

The orchard groaned, a chorus of crashing noises that pained his teeth. One of the crystal trees split in two with a resounding crack, its shards tumbling around him.

He picked up the Codex. Its leaves fluttered, landing on a partially written entry:

The Orchard of Glass. Held past death. Sealed past time. Rule: Do not shatter what has to be held.

His hand trembled. He looked again at the fruit on the ground—the one with his name.

"If I hold it, what does it do to you?"

The child remained silent. Instead, they bent, picked up another shard of glass from the ground, and held it out. In it shone the face of a woman Yusuf had never seen. Her face was twisted with grief.

The shard cracked in the child’s hands. The image split in half—and vanished.

“Gone,” the child whispered. “Even the Codex won’t find her again.”

Yusuf felt the weight of the orchard’s silence. The air was sharp, metallic. He realized every figure was still watching him, their spheres glowing brighter, cracks widening.

“They think you’ll break theirs,” the child said.

As if at a signal, the nearest figure stumbled forward, clutching its fruit to its breast. Glass veins traced across its shape, spilling light from inside. Its mouth opened—not with words, but with a scream of shattering glass.

The others responded.

Guardian by guardian, the orchard's guardians woke.

Yusuf's heart hammered. He opened the Codex, but its ink ran pointlessly, the pages fighting into words.

The boy tugged at his sleeve. "We need to run, Yusuf. Now."

But his eyes stayed on the globe with his name on it. It shone all the brighter, boomed all the louder, called to him.

What would he give up leaving it behind?

What would he risk taking it?

The garden groaned again, branches shaking like scimitars. The first watchdog rushed.

And Yusuf decided.