The moment the twins became visible, the world answered.
Not with fire or thunder, but with movement.
Across the island, wards adjusted their pitch. Signals that had slept for generations woke and passed themselves along stone, root, and bone. Watchers who had not been named in centuries lifted their attention—not to intervene, but to count.
Imade felt it before anyone spoke.
She stood at the overlook with the twins beside her, the wind tugging at her sleeves like an impatient child. What she felt was not threat. It was assessment. The sensation of being measured by something that had already decided how measurement worked.
"Don't let go," she said quietly.
Kafé and Taye tightened their grip on each other.
Below them, the land folded in subtle ways. Paths lengthened or shortened by half-steps. Distances lied. Sound carried when it should not have. The trap Kola had fallen into was not a cage—it was a declaration.
We know where you are now.
Seyi arrived breathless, his composure cracking just enough to confirm the stakes.
"It's done," he said. "They've registered the twins."
Imade did not turn. "Define registered."
Seyi swallowed. "The abyss doesn't catalog people. It catalogs disruptions. Until now, the twins were theoretical. Protected variables. Now…"
"Now they're data," Imade finished.
"Yes."
Taye frowned. "We didn't do anything."
"That's the problem," Seyi said gently. "You were observed without acting. That tells them you exist independently of their script."
Kafé absorbed that. "So we broke it."
"No," Seyi corrected. "You bent it. Breaking comes later."
Far from the overlook, Kola knelt on soil that refused to remember his weight.
The trap had dispersed his group, spacing them just far enough apart that shouting felt useless. Each of them occupied a pocket of altered terrain—identical enough to confuse, different enough to prevent coordination.
Kola's heart hammered.
This wasn't how heroes were supposed to fall. There was no enemy to strike, no wall to break. Just silence that pressed too close and symbols etched into the air like unfinished thoughts.
"Cowards," he muttered, though his voice sounded thin.
The response came not from ahead, but everywhere.
You came loudly.
The voice was not sound. It was alignment—his thoughts suddenly agreeing with something they had never agreed with before.
You wanted to be first.
Kola clenched his fists. "I wanted to protect them."
No, the presence replied calmly. You wanted to end uncertainty.
That struck deeper.
Back at the stronghold, the Resistance argued.
Not loudly. Loudness had passed. What remained was fracture spoken in measured tones.
"They should never have been brought out," one commander said.
"They felt it anyway," another countered. "Hiding them only delayed this."
Imade listened, saying nothing.
Leadership, she had learned, was not about winning arguments. It was about choosing which truths survived discussion.
"The enemy didn't strike," she said finally. "That matters."
"It captured Kola," someone snapped.
"It isolated him," Imade replied. "Those are different verbs."
Eyes turned to her.
"They are provoking reaction," she continued. "They want us to move rashly, loudly, heroically. If we charge, we confirm their model."
"And if we don't?"
"Then we learn what else they prepared."
Silence followed.
In the inner sanctum—now no longer sealed—the twins sat on the floor, backs against the wall, Seyi with them. For the first time, no guards stood watch.
Taye traced a faint crack in the stone. "They talked to him," she said.
Seyi nodded. "Yes."
"Will they talk to us?" Kafé asked.
"They already are," Seyi said. "Just not with words."
Taye looked up sharply. "That's not fair."
"No," Seyi agreed. "It's efficient."
Kafé frowned. "Then we should answer."
Seyi stiffened. "Carefully."
Outside, the sky shifted again. Not geometry this time—depth. The clouds appeared farther away, as if the world had inhaled.
Imade stood alone at the edge of the courtyard.
She felt the weight of every choice she had made since accepting stewardship. The easy path—keeping the twins hidden—had been an illusion. The hard path—allowing them agency—was now unavoidable.
"You broke the silence," she said softly, not knowing if she was heard.
The air cooled.
Not in response.
In acknowledgment.
Kola screamed.
Not in pain, but in fury.
The presence had shown him something—an image of the twins standing at the overlook, alive, aware, unbroken. It was not threat or promise.
It was contrast.
They will outgrow you, the presence said.
"No," Kola shouted. "They'll need us."
They will outgrow need, it replied.
That was when Kola understood the cruelty.
The enemy was not trying to destroy the Resistance.
It was trying to make them irrelevant.
At the stronghold, Imade gathered the council.
"We are no longer reacting," she said. "We are preparing the twins to choose."
Murmurs rose.
"They're children."
"They are protagonists," Imade replied. "The story has already decided that. We can either guide how they step forward—or let the abyss teach them instead."
Seyi met her gaze and inclined his head.
The twins stood in the doorway.
They had not been summoned.
Taye spoke first. "We want to see him."
Kola's name did not need saying.
Imade's jaw tightened. "That may not be possible."
Kafé nodded slowly. "Then we want to understand what he's facing."
The room shifted.
For the first time, the Resistance was not deciding for the twins.
They were listening to them.
Far away, the presence registered another disruption.
Not panic.
Not defiance.
Participation.
And for the first time since the prophecy was edited into something smaller than truth, the abyss hesitated.
The price of being seen had been paid.
The cost of what came next had not.