70. The Keeper

Reyna

I step into the forest clearing, a familiar dreamscape woven of fog and whispers. The fog is a tactile thing tonight, curling around me as if it knows the burdens I carry. My eyes land on the charred tree stump that stands like a sentinel in this sacred place.

Four tiny green sprouts breathe life from its scorched trunk, and something about that breaks my heart and mends it at the same time.

“Keeper,” I say, my voice not much more than a husky whisper, laced with a sense of impending dread.

The Keeper manifests from the fog as though woven from it. His eyes are like the night sky on the clearest of nights—limitless and deep. “Ah, Reyna, child of complexity, you stand at the threshold of choice, do you not?”

“Yes,” I confess, my eyes reluctantly leaving the tiny sprouts. “Much has happened since we last spoke. I’ve come to seek your counsel, but I can’t shake the feeling that the lock and key you speak of are slipping through my fingers.”

He seems to sigh. “Each time you step