Our Crosses

The cold bites harder at night, I think, as Yuki and I go on another barrier patrol.

I’m not sure if it’s really that cold or if I’m just losing more pieces of myself to the wind. The barrier flickers faintly behind us, a faint shimmer at the edges of the woods. Yuki walks two steps ahead, as always, eyes scanning the treetops like they might bite.

“Last perimeter sweep for the night.” She mutters. “Then you’re going back to bed. No arguments.”

I grunt. Which is my way of agreeing. Or maybe not.

My legs feel like chalk. Every step a scrape. Every breath a reminder I’m still here - somehow.

Then I hear the crunch of boots ahead, just where the moonlight breaks through the trees.

Oh, joy.

Dalylah steps into the clearing like she’s been waiting for a stage cue. Armor gleaming, arms crossed, jaw set with that paladin perfect righteousness that makes me want to scream into a pillow.

“You shouldn’t be out here.” She snaps.

Yuki’s already rolling her eyes. “We’re on patrol.”

Dalylah ignores her completely. Her eyes lock on mine.

“You’re shaking.” She says, tone razor-sharp. “You’re unraveling in front of us and still expect us to trust your magic? Your decisions?”

I open my mouth, but the sarcasm I usually keep locked and loaded just… Doesn’t come. I’m too tired for snark. Too tired for her.

So instead, I let the truth slip out.

“You think I want this?” I bite back. “You think I’m choosing to fall apart for fun?”

“You think falling apart makes you qualified to protect anyone?”

I take a step forward, fists clenched.

“I’m the reason this village still stands!”

“Enough!” Yuki’s voice cracks the air like thunder. She steps between us, hands raised, eyes blazing. “Both of you are acting like this is some pissing contest.” Yuki spits, and I wince because I know she’s right. “But guess what? No one gives a damn about who’s right. There are people out there losing children. Homes. Lives. So maybe, just maybe, shut up and stop making this about you!”

Dalylah’s jaw clenches.

I breathe, ragged. She’s not wrong. Neither of them are.

But that doesn’t stop the ache behind my ribs, like something in me is already breaking in anticipation.

Then -

A scream.

High-pitched. Frantic. Distant, but not far enough.

Yuki spins toward the sound. “East. That’s near the old well.”

Dalylah’s already running. Yuki grabs my arm.

“Can you…?”

I nod before she finishes.

Gods, I’m exhausted.

But there’s no version of this where I don’t go.

We run.

The mist thickens the deeper we go, like something breathing just out of view. It clings to my skin, to my lashes, to my thoughts. Each step hits the ground like a question I can’t answer.

The child’s scream echoes again, sharper now. Close.

“There!”

Yuki points, a flicker of movement near the abandoned garden trail behind the baker’s house. A small figure, crouched low, twitching.

No. Not twitching.

Convulsing.

The child’s eyes catch the moonlight, and, for a moment, it’s like staring into a mirror made of Roderick’s voice. Bright, inhuman, cold.

A sob racks my chest before I can stop it. My hand moves by instinct, pulling the feather from my coat. It burns against my palm like guilt given form.

I step forward… And the world tilts.

Pain punches behind my eyes. The trees blur. My knees almost buckle.

No. Not now.

I blink, hard. Try to anchor myself. A breath. Then another.

The child snarls, ripper paper sounds that a throat that young shouldn’t be able to make.

I hear armor shift behind me.

Dalylah.

She moves forward, too fast, reaching for her sword.

And then -

“Look,” Yuki says. Her hand clamps on Dalylah’s wrist. Not violently. Just… enough. “Just look.”

It costs everything I have to stay upright. My fingers shake as I raise the feather, the diary pages open in front of me. My magic glows softly. Too faint. My vision flickers again.

The child lunges.

And Yuki moves.

A single shot. No hesitation. No waste.

The projectile hits the child’s side, a numbing dart, not a kill shot. The child freezes mid-lunge, body locking up, eyes wide and wild and still there.

I stagger forward. Drop to my knees.

The ritual nearly slips from me.

I write the words, willing the child to come back. To be alive again. The don’t come easy, nor cleanly. They don’t come powerfully. But desperately.

The feather pulses in my hand, just once, and then the golden ink floods outward.

The mist around the child peels back, like smoke chased by wind. The snarl breaks into a gasp. And then a sob. The child crumples, human again. Small. Terrified.

Alive.

And the child inside of me also crumples, the shape of my favorite teddy bear, the one I had till the day I came here, fading from memory.

I exhale like I’ve been drowning.

My body folds forward. I barely catch myself on one hand.

The ground feels very far away.

“Hey.” I whisper, to no one, maybe to myself. “I’m still here. Still Aya.”

I don’t dare look up. I don’t want to see pity in Yuki’s eyes. I don’t want to see smugness in Dalylah’s.

But the silence that follows… Isn’t smug. Or cruel. Or anything I expected.

It’s just quiet.

I glance sideways.

Dalylah is standing perfectly still. Her expression is cracked at the edges. Not softened, but shaken.

She didn’t just see the spell.

She saw the choice.

She saw me take one look at that kid and step forward anyway. Trembling. Useless. Breaking.

And doing it anyway.

And she saw me do what Roderick had done before at the square, but better. Because the child in front of us is not a shell of a human, but a whole being, crying for his mom while Yuki comforts him.

I step back. Not far. Just enough to stop shaking.

Dalylah hasn’t moved. Not since I collapsed with the feather in hand. Her expression is unreadable - not angry, not smug. Just… Unsettled. Like the shape of the world has shifted and she hasn’t figured out how to stand on it yet.

I don’t wait for the next argument. I turn away.

The night breathes around me, heavy with fog and the scent of trees and the scent of almost blood. I need a moment. A breath. Five. Maybe more.

I walk.

I’m not even sure where I’m going, only that it’s away from the eyes, from the noise in my head, from the ache in my chest that feels like forgetting something important.

That’s when I hear voices. Not far ahead. Through the trees.

One of them is hers.

Dalylah.

The other… Makes my blood freeze.

I crouch low behind the undergrowth, heart clawing at my ribs.

Roderick.

He’s standing in the clearing like he belongs there. Like the mist made space for him. Like the world bends to let him speak.

And Dalylah… Dalylah followed me. Or maybe she wandered here, too. But she’s facing him now, chin lifted, fists clenched at her sides. I can’t see her eyes from this angle, but I can feel them. Conflicted.

“I saw her save him.” She says, voice quieter than I’ve ever heard it. “Even when she could barely stand.”

Roderick smiles.

“She’s good at gestures.” He says gently. “But gestures don’t save the world. You know that.”

Dalylah doesn’t reply.

“I remember you, you know.” He continues. “Back when the title of Hero meant something to you. When you still believed you could live up to it.”

“Shut up.” She says, but there’s no bite.

He takes a step closer.

“You failed, Dalylah. Not once. Repeatedly. You broke. You questioned. You hesitated.”

Another step.

“And yet they expect you to lead.”

I see her shoulders tense.

“I could take all of that away.” He says, his voice softer now. “No more doubt. No more fear. No more wondering if you're enough.”

He raises one hand.

“I can make you perfect. The Heroine you were meant to be.”

It hits me then: he’s not threatening her. He’s recruiting her.

And worse, she’s listening.

I want to shout. Step in. Do something.

But I wait.

Because part of me needs to know what she chooses.

Dalylah breathes in, slow and shaky.

“And what happens to me?” She asks.

“You become what they need.” He says. “What you need. No more guilt. No more being second best.”

There’s a silence so heavy it sinks into my bones.

Then Dalylah speaks.

“I don’t want to be Aya.” She says. Roderick blinks. “I don’t want to be pitied. Or unstable. Or breaking all the time just to prove I care.”

My throat tightens.

He smiles again. Patient.

“You won’t be.”

She looks down at his hand.

Just a second.

And then she lowers her own.

“I just… Need to think.”

He bows his head slightly. “Of course.”

And then he walks away, softly vanishing into the mist. No lights, no magic. Just mist folding back into itself.

Dalylah stays frozen for a moment longer. Then turns, and sees me.

We lock eyes. No words pass through us. I don’t ask what she’s going to do. She doesn’t explain.

But something raw flickers across her face.

Not regret. Not resolve. Just… Being seen.

She doesn’t move.

Neither do I.

For a moment, all we do is breathe the same cold air between us, filled with leftover fog and unsaid things.

Then I speak.

Quietly. Flatly.

“So?” I ask. “Gonna take the offer? Become perfect?”

Dalylah turns, finally. Her eyes still carry the shadow of him, of what he said, what he promised. But her jaw tightens at my tone.

“Were you spying on me?”

“I was here.” I say, shrugging. “Same as you. Just more awake to the bullshit.”

Her nostrils flare.

“You don’t get it.” She hisses. I shrug.

“Try me.”

There’s a still second between us before she breaks.

“You always had choices!” She snaps, stepping closer. “You had a family! Grew up with people lobing you and was never trust into battle until this whole… Ordeal started. And even then, you still. Had. Choices! You got to break. You got to fall apart. You had people picking you back up. I never had that. I had expectations. Orders. Responsibility from the moment I could hold a sword.”

My laugh is bitter.

“Poor princess.” I say. “Being crushed under a burden. Welcome to the club.”

She glares. “You think I’m privileged?”

“I think you’re terrified.” I answer truthfully, and my honestly must has bled into my voice, because she stops raging. “That if you stop performing, no one will know what to do with you.”

Dalylah scoffs. “Says the girl who can rewrite reality.”

I step forward too.

“Yeah. Rewrite. Not erase.” I say, tiredly. “You think this power makes me free? I forget more of myself every time I use it. Every name I lose, every page that fades, it’s my soul bleeding out nicely.”

My hands are shaking again. I don’t hide them.

“You want to be perfect?” I ask, softer now. “Go ahead. Trade your guilt, your doubts, your cracks. Trade them all for marble skin and a scripted smile. But don’t lie to yourself. That’s not being a hero. That’s being a product. A puppet.”

Dalylah’s lips part, but no words come.

“You are who you are because you failed.” I continue. “And kept going. You clawed your way through every mistake and still showed up. I know, because I went through it too. Still am going, if I’m being honest. You think perfection will make that grind go away?”

Silence.

Then, a whisper:

“…You think that’s noble?”

“No.” I say. “I think it’s human. And that, in turn, makes us beautiful.”

She exhales, ragged.

I let the silence stretch again. But it’s different now. Thicker. Not tense with anger, but full of weight. Real weight.

Between us, something shifts. Not trust. Not yet. But something adjacent. Recognition. A mirror neither of us wanted to look in, finally cracking just enough to reflect both sides.

I look at her, and this time, I don’t see a rival.

I don’t see my teenage self.

I see someone holding on.

She looks at me, and maybe - just maybe - sees the same.

Two girls, one war, zero certainty.

What a beautiful failure we are.