The jungle let him go, but it didn't forget him.
Thuta emerged from the thicket as the light broke across the hills, skin streaked with mud and blood, body hollowed by something that felt like exhaustion but wasn't quite physical. It felt deeper. As if something had been peeled from him — or something inside had just awakened.
The sigil on his palm hadn't cooled. It was worse now — a slow, steady pulse that sent heat curling up his arm, mapping its way along his veins.
It didn't hurt.
But it didn't feel like it belonged.
He reached the edge of a small monastery compound that clung to the side of a quiet hill. Bamboo walls, saffron robes, faint bell chimes. A haven.
Or at least, it looked like one.
---
The monks didn't question him.
He was given tea. Food. A woven mat in a meditation hall that smelled of old incense and damp wood.
He didn't plan to stay long.
But something kept him there.
A sensation. A whisper under his skin. And the fact that, for the first time in days, his dreams didn't burn.
---
On the third morning, a boy — no older than ten — knelt beside him with a bundle of cloth and said, "Your sigil. I've seen it before."
Thuta blinked. "Excuse me?"
The boy pointed to the mark on his hand.
"We keep records. In the back hall. In the old scroll room. Master doesn't let anyone go there. But I go anyway."
Thuta followed.
---
The archive wasn't much — a single shelf of palm-leaf manuscripts, some crumbling, others preserved with wax.
The boy pulled one free. Opened it. Flipped halfway through.
Then pointed.
On the page: hand-drawn spirals, similar to his sigil. Each paired with a name — most ancient, others recent. Every few entries had notes: "Reclusive," "Burned," "Sealed."
Then, in red ink, an entry without a name:
"Fire at east orphanage. One survivor. No burns. Residual markings present. Watch status: Unknown."
The date matched the fire that had nearly killed him.
Thuta's breath caught.
"They saw me," he whispered.
"They recorded you," the boy said. "But didn't claim you."
---
Later that evening, Thuta sat on the steps of the meditation hall, hand open, studying the mark.
It had changed again.
A third spiral had begun to form — tight, almost complete, nested into the others like a blooming seed.
He didn't remember activating it.
Didn't know how it happened.
"Why do I fit this?" he muttered.
The scroll stirred.
Words emerged faintly:
"Echoes recognize echoes. Flame follows residue."
"Residue," he repeated. "I'm just… leftover?"
But the word stung.
Not because it felt wrong — but because it felt true.
---
The boy returned after dark.
He looked nervous.
"There's one more thing," he said. "An old carving. At the edge of the grounds."
They walked in silence to the base of a massive bodhi tree, roots half-buried in stone.
There, in the wood — a carving, weathered by time.
A child, holding a staff of fire.
Standing in front of a grave.
No name. Just a word:
"Zawgyi."
Thuta stared.
It wasn't the word that hit him.
It was the angle of the child's shoulders.
The way the fire curved.
The scar under the left eye.
It was him.
Or someone who wore his shape centuries ago.
He stepped back.
The scroll vibrated in his satchel.
And a final line wrote itself:
"Blood remembers. Even when the name is lost."
Thuta closed his eyes.
And felt the spiral inside him complete another turn.
-----