Chapter 71: The Girl Who Was Sold

The small room in the inn was quiet.

Kōya had been asleep for hours, his breathing steady beneath the thin blanket.

Lyra sat awake near the narrow window, knees drawn to her chest for warmth. Her new wand rested across her lap.

She had held it for several minutes without attempting to use it. The clear crystal at its tip caught the pale moonlight whenever she shifted.

It was a strange sensation.

She was used to items temporarily assigned by an overseer, handed over with strict instructions, or taken away on a whim. This wand was hers.

Her fingers tightened around the polished wood.

She looked across the dark room toward the small table.

The warm clothes Kōya had bought for her sat stacked beside her bed, next to the magical books. A coil of rope. A medical kit. A cooking set. A water container.

The ordinary things travelers carried on the open road.

Things Lyra had never been allowed to think of as hers.

Lyra looked back toward Kōya.

He slept on the other side of the room, turned slightly away, one hand resting near the hilt of his dagger. He trusted her enough to sleep in her presence.

The realization tightened something inside her chest.

She had spent years expecting people to demand a price for basic necessities. Kindness had become suspicious. Every time Kōya gave her something, a plate of food, a cloak, a wand, she waited for the price to follow.

She waited for the price to be named, for the command, for the moment he would finally state what he expected in return.

He never did.

He hadn’t asked a single question about the slave collar display in the market. He had seen the terror on her face and simply taken her away from the danger. When she told him she wasn’t ready to talk, he accepted it as a tactical fact.

There had been no pressure, no anger.

*I will wait. Tell me when you are ready.*

Lyra lowered her eyes to her hands. Maybe she was ready.

She stood from the window seat.

“Kōya.”

He stirred instantly. His eyes opened, clear and focused.

“What is it?” he asked, sitting up.

Lyra hesitated.

“I want to tell you.”

Kōya swung his legs over the edge of the bed. He didn’t ask what she meant.

“The collars in the market?”

She nodded.

Kōya moved slightly, giving her open space rather than ordering her to sit. Lyra sat on the edge of the mattress. She placed her wand beside her.

“My father wasn’t a powerful or important man,” she began, her voice quiet in the dark room. “He wasn’t an adventurer or a soldier. He possessed no magic.”

She stared at her hands.

“He just worked. That was all he did.”

Kōya remained silent.

“He came home tired every night. Sometimes he complained about his aching back, the freezing weather, or the cost of food at the market.”

A fragile smile appeared on her face. “It sounds stupid and boring now.”

“It doesn’t,” Kōya said.

Lyra searched his face. He showed no pity or boredom. He was simply listening.

“My mother was taken first.” The smile disappeared. “I don’t know what happened to her. One day, she just didn’t come home from the fields.”

Kōya’s eyes lowered.

Lyra swallowed hard.

“My father spent months looking for her. He sold almost everything we owned. He borrowed money from dangerous people. He stopped repairing the house because he couldn’t afford materials. Eventually, he couldn’t afford to keep the house.” Her voice grew brittle. “Everything we had disappeared.”

She looked toward the dark window.

“I think that was when the wrong people noticed us.”

Kōya didn’t interrupt.

“They knew which families were struggling, who owed money they couldn’t pay, and who had no one left to protect them.”

Lyra’s hand trembled. “I was taken a few months ago.”

Kōya’s eyes sharpened. “A few months?”

She nodded. “It wasn’t years ago.” She gave a humorless smile. “I suppose that is why everything still feels close to the surface.”

She took a deep breath. “They took me directly from my father.”

“I remember him trying to stop them.” Her voice broke. “He wasn’t strong enough.”

Lyra looked at the floorboards, tears welling in her eyes. “I remember him shouting my name as they dragged me away. I thought if I kept looking back at him, I would somehow be able to stay.”

Silence stretched between them.

“But I couldn’t.”

Kōya’s hand tightened into a fist against his knee.

Lyra noticed the shift in his posture. She shook her head, offering a watery smile. “Don’t.”

Kōya looked at her, jaw locked.

“I’m not telling you this to make you angry for me, Kōya.”

“I am listening.”

She nodded. “After that night, I was sold into the system.”

She gathered her thoughts. “The first place wasn’t the dungeon you might imagine.”

Kōya waited.

“I worked as a tavern waitress in a border town.” She looked at the wooden wand beside her. “I carried food, cleaned tables, and served cheap drinks. I learned which dangerous customers wanted to be left alone and which ones wanted someone to listen to them complain.”

A sad smile returned. “I was actually good at it.”

Kōya’s mouth moved in acknowledgment. “I can believe that.”

Lyra almost laughed. “But I wasn’t free.”

The smile vanished. “I couldn’t leave when I was tired. I couldn’t decide where I slept, where I worked, or what I wore. Someone else owned the right to decide all of those things for me.”

She looked directly into Kōya’s eyes. “That was the part that terrified me.”

Her voice steadied. “Not knowing what would happen tomorrow, or if I would be alive next week. Wondering what kind of monster would buy me next if the person who owned me decided they were finished with my services.”

She looked down at her hands. “I kept thinking that if I worked hard enough and didn’t cause trouble, someone would eventually have mercy and let me go.”

Kōya said nothing.

“But nobody ever did.” Her fingers curled into her palms. “Then, I was sold again.”

Kōya’s expression hardened. “To Zeref.”

Lyra nodded. “Yes.”

The mention of Zeref silenced the room.

Even dead, his name still carried weight.

“He saw me in passing before the transfer was completed.” Lyra’s eyes became distant. “He stopped and stared at me for a long time. Then he said something strange.”

Kōya waited.

“He said I reminded him of someone.”

Kōya’s expression shifted. “Yuna.”

Lyra nodded. “I didn’t know who she was at the time. I didn’t understand why a resemblance mattered to a Demon Peer. But he kept looking at my face.”

She hugged her arms around herself. “I thought I had been sold to someone worse.”

Kōya’s jaw tightened. “You weren’t?”

“No.” Lyra shook her head. “Not in the way you mean. Zeref didn’t force me. He simply kept me. He watched me. He seemed interested in the physical resemblance. But mostly I was locked inside the upper levels of his territory, cleaning the halls.”

She looked toward the floor. “I was still a slave. That was enough.”

Kōya nodded.

Lyra continued, her voice quiet. “I had already learned what happens to your mind when you belong to someone else. Even when they don’t hurt you. You still wake up every morning knowing your life isn’t yours.”

Neither of them spoke for a moment.

Kōya looked at her. Lyra’s eyes were shining with tears.

“But then… you came.” She wiped her eye with the back of her hand. “You destroyed everything. The fortress. Zeref. The people stationed there. And then…”

Her voice softened into a whisper. “You told us we were free.”

Kōya remembered the broken people leaving the ruined fortress, their hesitation and disbelief as they stepped into the rain.

Lyra had been the only one who stayed.

“I didn’t know where to go.” She smiled weakly through her tears. “So I just followed you.”

“You said you would leave at the next town,” Kōya reminded her.

“I know.”

Kōya looked at her. “You didn’t.”

“No.” A small laugh escaped her lips. “I kept finding ridiculous reasons to stay. The next town wasn’t far enough away. Then I needed new clothes. Then I needed a wand. Then I wanted to learn magic.”

Kōya gave her a flat look. “You make it sound planned.”

“It wasn’t.” She smiled warmly. “That’s the strange part.”

For a moment, she looked like the carefree girl he had seen laughing at the healing spring. Then, her expression became thoughtful.

“I think I just…” She searched the ceiling for the right words. “I wanted to know what would happen if I kept walking forward.”

Kōya didn’t answer immediately. Lyra lowered her gaze.

“I don’t know what my life is supposed to look like anymore. My father is gone. My mother was taken. I don’t know if there is anything left of my home. And sometimes…” She touched the polished wood of the wand. “Sometimes I don’t even remember what it feels like to belong somewhere.”

Kōya looked at the wand, then up at her face. “You don’t have to know yet.”

Lyra blinked. “What?”

“You do not need to decide tonight what the rest of your life looks like.” He leaned back against the headboard. “You can figure it out one step at a time.”

Lyra stared at him. “Is that how you live your life?”

Kōya considered the question. “Probably.”

She smiled. “That is a terrible tactical plan.”

“I am well aware.”

She laughed quietly. The sound was small in the dark room, but it was real. Kōya watched her.

For a fleeting moment, her expression reminded him of Yuna. Another part of it carried something of Mirei.

This time, Kōya didn’t chase either memory. He simply watched Lyra smile.

She noticed him watching. “What?”

“Nothing.”

“You were staring at me again.”

“I was not.”

“You were.”

Kōya looked at the far wall. Lyra smiled wider.

“You were staring.”

“I was thinking.”

“About what?”

He hesitated, then answered with his usual blunt honesty. “That you look different when you genuinely smile.”

Lyra’s expression softened. “Different from what?”

Kōya looked directly at her. “From the terrified girl I met shivering inside that fortress.”

She lowered her eyes. “That girl was scared.”

“She still is.”

“I know.”

“But she is not the only version of you that exists.”

Lyra’s fingers rested against the wand. She was quiet for a long time. Then, she whispered into the dark: “Thank you.”

Kōya nodded. “For what?”

“For listening.”

He looked confused by her gratitude. “That is all?”

Lyra laughed softly, shaking her head. “Yes.” She picked up the wand and held it to her chest. “Most people don’t.”

Kōya looked toward the window. Outside, the town had gone quiet for the night. “We will leave first thing in the morning.”

Lyra nodded. “Where are we going?”

“East.”

“Toward Mizuki?”

Kōya’s expression became serious. “Yes.”

Lyra looked down at her wand. Then toward the dark window. “Then I will come with you.”

Kōya didn’t respond immediately. He studied her face. “Are you sure about that?”

“No.”

The honest answer caught him off guard. Lyra smiled up at him. “But I’m learning that I don’t have to be sure about everything.”

She stood up from the bed. “Good night, Kōya.”

“Good night.”

She walked back toward her bed. Then, she stopped and turned back. “Kōya?”

“What?”

“I am glad you were the one who found me.”

He watched her for a long moment. Then, he quietly answered, “So am I.”

Lyra smiled.

This time, she didn’t look like someone waiting in the dark for permission to be happy. The smile stayed.

And for the first time since she had been dragged away from her father, tomorrow morning did not feel like a certainty that another person had decided for her.