That was the state of mind I was in when that eager girl showed up. My god, they grow so tall these days, don’t they? We got along, which surprised me, given that I have not had a conversation with someone her age in years. Looking back, it was not so surprising. You see, she was a lot like you. Let me explain in a way that even you will not be able to deny.

There was that brief period of our lives when I knew about Reforging and you didn’t. You knew there was something we were hiding from you, and how furious you were in those days! I would have told you in a heartbeat, but Mother warned that your grandmother was the last person we wanted to cross, that we only had a home because she agreed we could stay. You probably don’t even remember how much you threatened me, how much you lied to both of our mothers to try to get more information. You were so desperate to have this family link. The day your mother finally said you could learn was the best of your life.

Still not convinced? Then how about when only you did not know the other way of Reforging? We were so young then, even our mothers, and we had no idea how to talk about sex or pleasure. And when we wouldn’t share this knowledge with you—how easily you set fire to our relationship, the final weeks of our time together.

That tall, eager girl was much the same. She was so desperate for a connection to something, anything, really, to feel a part of her own history and family. And I saw how Edward had changed from having a story of his own to hold on to. Nobody was around to tell me I couldn’t, so I told her our secret. I figured she might take it for the babbling of an old woman, but that if it could help her, she would latch on to it. You cannot imagine my surprise when, right before she was due to head home, she told me your granddaughter had contacted her. It was fate, it seems, some string that has always tied us together across decades and continents.

And so I write this note for you, using one of the few Phoenix Pencil Company pencils I have left. I’m not interested in filling you in on all that has happened since we parted. It would be too painful. But I needed to tell you about these two—your son and this girl. They don’t know each other, don’t even know the other exists, and yet they came to me with the same look in their eyes, and it was your look, the one that wanted to belong to our family so desperately.