Hmm, hmm, hmm ♪
I’m Zoe. I live in the Great Forest with Selina, an old witch grandma, and with Mary, my white goat nanny, and Ben, the brown-spotted goat. Sometimes baby goats are born, but Selina takes them to sell in Lang Village.
I cried and begged, “Don’t sell them!” but the grass inside the barrier can’t feed the kids too. Besides, I think Selina probably wants to sell Mary and Ben as well. She’s just grudgingly keeping them because a growing child needs milk.
This morning I’m doing my daily chore of milking the goats. When I’m doing such simple work, I can’t help but hum. But I don’t know many songs. That’s because I grew up here in the Great Forest, inside Selina’s barrier.
“There are monsters in the forest, so you must never leave my barrier,” she’s told me every day since I was a baby.
“But I can’t get out anyway, can I?”
I can’t see it, but if I walk fifty steps from the house, I hit a wall. When I was little, I wondered if I could break through by running really fast, so I bumped into it many times before I gave up and accepted that this was the barrier.
One day in late autumn—probably around the time I was abandoned—Selina started telling me something surprising. “I’m thinking of unsealing you soon, so I’m being cautious.”
“Unseal what?” That made no sense!
“Did you seal the memories of my parents or something? Are you a wicked witch who kidnapped me?”
This isn’t my fault—it was from a story in one of Selina’s books.
“Zoe! How can you say such a thing? Especially after I raised you from a baby!”
Once Selina gets angry, she doesn’t stop. I got a long lecture about the hardships of raising a baby who’d been abandoned in a basket on her doorstep on a cold, windy night.
If I argue back, it’ll just go on longer, so I listen quietly. Besides, even though she’s bad at cooking and cleaning, she did somehow manage to raise me from a baby. I’m grateful for that, at least.
“I’m sorry… but when you said you’d unseal me, it just reminded me of ‘The Witch in the High Tower and the Princess.’”
Selina is short-tempered and bad at cleaning and cooking, but she seems to be a skilled witch. Well, I don’t know anyone else to compare her to. She also taught me to read—though that might have been because she wanted me to stay quiet when she was reading.
“Ah, what I sealed was your magical power, Zoe. When babies have magic, they’re very difficult to raise. So we seal it until they develop some sense… though I wonder if you’ve developed any sense yet.”
Ugh, that’s mean! But I want her to break the seal, so I’ll endure it silently.
Will I be able to use magic? I’m trembling with anticipation.
“Well, you’re seven now… old enough to start learning magic.”
I was born in autumn, so my birthday present seems to be having the seal broken. I would have preferred a musical instrument, though. So tired of making tooting sounds with grass whistles.
While I waited nervously, Selina pressed her index finger to my forehead. My head started spinning.
“Zoe!”
I must have fallen to the floor. This is strange! I’m too dizzy to stand up.
“Magic sickness? Or maybe… let me take a little look.”
I’d rather be put on the bed than left on the floor. Selina hates cleaning, so I do it, but I haven’t cleaned this morning yet. It rained yesterday, so it’s muddy down here!
“Hmm, hmm, it seems you have memories from a past life! So that’s why you learned to read so quickly? I did think you were a clever child, but it’s a bit different from that. Now, what to do? Your past life memories were slightly affected by my seal, but… it seems you haven’t remembered everything completely.”
She’s an old lady—shouldn’t she know better than to force such a big decision on a little kid like me?
“Selina, is having past life memories advantageous for living? If not, I don’t want them.”
I’m me! I don’t want memories of bad things I might have done before.
“I’ve never met anyone with past life memories, but I’ve read about it in books. Sometimes they know useful spells or magic circles.”
Is she saying I should recover my past life memories?
“Isn’t that... maybe because you’re curious about magic you might not know?”
That launched another tirade about the hardships of raising baby me.
“What if my past self was a really bad person? Someone whose hobby was killing wives...”
Selina glared at me. That was from an adult book I wasn’t supposed to read. But there are so few children’s books, and I’ve memorized them all.
“You’re not supposed to read Bluebeard! It’s inappropriate for children.”
Mhm, the story about a man who kills wife after wife was scary.
I suspected there might be men’s corpses in the preparation room Selina said I couldn’t enter. Annnd, when I snuck a peek, there were monster meat and bones. My heart was pounding—what if those bones were human?!
“But what if my past self was a horrible person! If the memories of a mean person come back, I might put lots of salt in Selina’s porridge.”
Selina is bad at cooking but hates bad-tasting food. She’s making a terrible face.
“You’re right! Zoe, you’ve only been alive for seven years. If memories of an entire lifetime until death came back all at once, you might be confused. I know—what if the memories came back gradually by age? Then, if your past self was a villain and completely hopeless, I’ll stop the memories from returning.”
Selina has come to her own conclusion and looks satisfied, but wait!
“I mean, if that’s the case, wouldn’t it be better to just leave my past life memories sealed from the beginning?”
“Hmm!” She crosses her arms and thinks.
“No, Zoe! I think your current self is already quite influenced by past life memories. I’ve seen children your age in Lang Village, but they’re nothing like this. They run around getting covered in mud. At most, they help tend goats.”
Are the children in Lang Village like that? I was hoping I could go to the village once the seal was broken. Friends and... getting muddy and running around sounds fun too, but that would have been earlier—like when I was three.
“Will I always have to live with you, Selina?” I’ve wanted to ask this for so long.
“Once you can use magic properly, you can live outside the forest too.” Selina puts her hand on my shoulder and says this, but...
“But Selina, you’re not living in the village or the royal capital—you’re living in the Great Forest with just me!”
She smiles wryly and adds, “Adults have all sorts of circumstances.”
“Adults are unfair! Saying kids can’t understand just because we’re not grown up... Fine! Restore my past life memories little by little! And if I say I don’t like it, seal them again!”
I brush the mud off my clothes and get into my bed—just in case I faint again.