The Umbrem prophecy

---Before the Storm

The sun bathed Vale Hollow in gold, painting the rooftops and its crooked paths in warm light. The village stirred slowly bustling from the days activities—smoke curling from chimneys, the aroma of baking yam, bread filling the air, and chickens clucking wildly as children chased them through the dusty paths and narrow roads.

Aelina sat on the edge of their wooden porch, barefoot and restless. Her fingers scratched across a carving sharp lines into a flat stone with a pocket blade she had borrowedfrom the blacksmith weeks ago. Her eyes filled with focus, dark and stormy like a sky waiting to break.

Just beside her, Was her twin sister ,Yvonne she knelt quietly, humming a song no one had taught her. Her fingers moved gently over a bowl of water, watching ripples form and vanish. She wasn’t sure why, but the water always made her feel calm—connected. Like it listened.

“Stop scratching the stone,” Yvonne murmured. “The sound it makes, It makes my ears tickle.”

Aelina raised an eyebrow. “That’s not possible.”

“It is. When you’re too loud, the birds stop singing.”

Their conversation was odd,but not to then, sometimes to the people around them—then again, most people in the village had stopped asking questions about them.

They were twins, yes—but nothing alike.

Aelina was fire, fierce and quite stronger than her agemates, She argued with the older boys at the market, climbed the highest trees just to prove she could, and once bit a soldier’s hand when he mocked Yvonne for being strange. Though the scene was quite funny, buh Thalia, their mother scolded her.

“Learn to keep your anger locked in" she said

" There is more to you than you understand” she added

“But, he said my sister is strange” Aelina added in defense

Still……

Yvonne was water. She stayed close to her mother’s skirts, memorized the names of every herb in Thalia’s garden, and sometimes said things she couldn’t explain—like knowing when rain would fall, ,Yvonne was the really exact opposite of Aelina.

Yes, the villagers loved them. But they also whispered.

“Sweet girls,” the baker would say, handing over to them the warm buns, “but there’s something... not quite right, no one knew how to say it. But they knew. “One talks to the shadows” added the baker to his wife as they left.

“Which one?” his wife would ask.

He never answered. He didn’t know. The twins were identical

That morning, Thalia stood at the well, drawing water while chatting with the healer’s apprentice. She was calm, but always watchful, like a hawk guarding its nest, she knew about the” prophecy”, the villagers did also. Twins were dreaded in the city of Vale hollow.When she saw the girls, her smile reached her lips, but not her eyes.

“Come,” she called. “We have herbs to grind, and then a visit to the temple.”

As they walked home through the winding path lined with whispering trees, Thalia spoke softly. “Have either of you... felt anything strange lately for a while now all?”

Aelina blinked. “Like what?”

“Dreams. Voices. Anything new.”

Yvonne frowned. “Only that I saw Mira’s shadow move before she did.”

Thalia paused—but only for a heartbeat. “Did she see you?”

“No. I didn’t tell her.”

“Good” she thought then heaved a sigh of relief

Thalia held her chest tightly and said “Good. Keep such things to yourself.”

The girls said nothing. They had learned to listen to their mother’s silence as much as her words.

That evening, darkness came too early. The birds stopped singing all at once.

At the fire, Aelina sharpened sticks for no reason, eyes darting toward the window. Yvonne held her pendant in her hand, the silvered blue stone pulsing faintly. Neither of them mentioned it.

“Do you think we’re….. you know, maybe doesn't belong here?” Yvonne asked at last.

Thalia looked at her long and hard, her sewing forgotten in her lap.

“No, my love,” she said. “ You belong here, you do. She added hugging her

Then, as if the moment never happened, she smiled again and said, “Now, let me tell you the story of the Hollow Demon.”

But the girls were not interested tuwy seemed to be concerned with the festival coming up

“Oh mom, the festival is around the corner, we need to prepare for it. Can we not talk about old legends today?”

“We have decorations to hang and find our dancing sashes” added Yvonne

“Oh,yes,the festival” Thalia said amidst laughter

But Thalia was not at rest. She knew she was meant to begone.

For the Vale hollow’s sake

For her daughter’s sakeq

For one more night, the world let them pretend it was safe.

---