Part 2:
At first, the distance between Azure village and the bustling city felt manageable. Moren called Odoni every weekend, her voice bubbling with excitement about her classes, the towering glass buildings, and the bright city lights. Odoni would sit by her small radio, smiling through her tears, feeling that every skipped meal and blistered hand had been worth it.
But as the months turned into years, the calls grew shorter. Then, they became less frequent. “I’m busy studying, Mom,” Moren would say, her voice sounding different—colder, sharper, clipped with an accent that didn’t belong to the village.
What Odoni didn’t know was that the city had begun to poison Moren’s heart. Surrounded by students from wealthy, elite families, Moren felt a deep, burning shame about her calloused hands and cheap clothes. To fit in, she began weaving a web of lies. She told her new, glamorous friends—and her wealthy new boyfriend, Julian—that her parents were successful merchants who lived abroad. The truth of Odoni, the humble fish seller of Azure, was buried deep in the shadows of Moren’s new life.
Back in the village, Odoni spent four years saving every single coin. She patched her only good wrapper and bought a modest bouquet of fake flowers, determined to surprise her daughter on graduation day.
When Odoni finally arrived at the grand university campus, she felt like a speck of dust among the designer suits and sparkling dresses. Then, she saw her: Moren, radiant in her graduation gown, laughing arm-in-arm with a handsome young man and an older, distinguished gentleman who looked suspiciously familiar.
Odoni rushed forward, her heart bursting with pride. “Moren! My beautiful daughter!”
But instead of an embrace, she was met with the freezing scene that would shatter her soul.
“Get that filthy woman away from here!” Moren had shrieked, looking terrified as Julian’s wealthy father stared at Odoni. “This is not my mother.”
Odoni had walked away that day, the fake flowers left abandoned in the dirt, her spirit completely broken. She took the long, agonizing bus ride back to Azure, crying until she had no tears left. She locked herself in her tiny, dark hut, praying to the gods to end her misery. She had lost her husband, and now, she had lost her daughter.
But three days later, the quiet peace of Azure village was shattered.
A sleek, black luxury car—the kind never seen on these muddy roads—pulled up right outside Odoni’s fragile door. The villagers watched in stunned silence as a tall man in a tailored suit stepped out. He didn’t knock; he pushed the door open.
Odoni looked up from the floor, her eyes swollen. “Who are you?” she whispered.
The man removed his sunglasses. It was the older, distinguished gentleman from the graduation—Julian’s father. The man Moren was so desperate to impress.
“You don’t recognize me, Odoni?” the man said, his voice dripping with a dangerous calm. “It’s been twenty years since Sei died in that forest. Did you really think that falling tree was an accident?”
Odoni’s blood ran cold. She couldn’t breathe.
The man pulled a faded, crumpled photograph from his jacket and tossed it onto Odoni’s lap. “Your daughter thinks she has tricked her way into my family. But she doesn’t know who I am. And worse… she doesn’t know who she really is. If she marries my son next month, the curse will destroy us all.”
Odoni stared at the photograph, her hands violently shaking as a horrifying truth from the past clawed its way into the light. Moren’s entire life was built on a lie, but the biggest secret wasn’t Moren’s—it was Odoni’s.
(To be continued in Part 3…)
