My Mother Died Three Years Ago—But Every Night She Appeared in My Dreams Begging Me to Find Her in a Forgotten Village Called Medanna… Then I Discovered the Truth

Chapter 7

And then it happened. I ran into my mother.

She was lifting a heavy basket of wet bedsheets. When she looked up and our eyes locked, the basket dropped from her hands. “Joshua?!” she whispered, voice cracking.

I did not care about the guards or the rules anymore. I rushed forward and we hugged tightly. I could feel how thin and bony her body had become. I cried softly against her shoulder. “Mom, it’s me. I found you.”

But she pulled me back to reality.

“Stop! They will suspect something. How did you locate me here?” She pushed me away quickly, looking around with deep terror in her eyes. “If the chief guard sees us, they will kill you instantly. Joshua, how did you find this hidden village? Who directed you?”

I told her how — the dream. She was stunned.

“Every night, Mom,” I whispered, wiping my tears. “You always come to my dream crying, telling me you are dying in a village called Medanna. So I followed the dream.”

Time was ticking. Any guard could pass at any moment. I had to ask the question burning inside me.

“How did you get here? Did they lure you, or what?”

Her face changed completely. Sadness turned into a deep, painful sorrow. She looked down at the soapy water on the floor.

“Hmm. Don’t trust humans, my son. If I told you who betrayed me like this, I wouldn’t even believe it myself.”

“Who sold you out?” I asked, my blood running cold as I stepped closer. “Tell me, Mom. Who did this to you?”

She looked into my eyes.

“My brother. He was the one who arranged the slavery I’m going through right now.”

The same uncle who told me my mother had died three years ago.

Kitorrah, the king’s daughter, had already fallen in love with me, so I decided to act fast.

She was completely taken with me. Every evening she made sure I was the one standing outside her royal door. But I was not there for romance. I was there on a deadly mission. Baba’s words kept repeating in my head like a broken record. “If you can poison the king, all the slaves are free to go.”

Yes. The king needed to die, for all the slaves to be released. There was no other way out of this wicked village.

I went to Kitorrah, and we talked. I told her I was a great cook, that I could cook even as a man. It was just a random, funny conversation on the surface.

“You? A whole security officer, you know how to cook?” Kitorrah laughed, leaning against the balcony rail. “Men from the city are very funny. What can you even cook?”

“Princess, if I cook my special traditional soup for you, you will want to eat it every day,” I joked, smiling brightly while secretly calculating how to get into the royal kitchen. “A man must know how to take care of a beautiful woman with good food.”

“Hmm, I will hold you to your words o,” she said, looking into my eyes with deep affection.

I left her room that night feeling satisfied, thinking my plan to enter the kitchen was working perfectly.

But I did not know that Kitorrah had already gone to tell her father that she loved me and wanted to marry me.

When the king heard it, he flew into a heavy rage. He slammed his royal staff on the floor and ordered the chief guard to watch my movements even closer. To him, I was a dirty opportunist trying to steal his daughter and his wealth.

Meanwhile, I was completely blind to what the princess had done. I was busy preparing the deadly substance Baba had helped us secure.

As I was thinking of instructing my mother to poison the food, then have her give it to Kitorrah to serve her father, the goddess of the village visited the palace.

She walked straight into the king’s assembly area, her eyes rolling back into her head as she began to speak in a creepy, double voice that echoed everywhere.

She revealed that someone among the maids or security guards was planning to poison the king.

“Oh king of Medanna!” the goddess chanted through the woman’s body, pointing her wooden staff at the crowd of servants. “There is a snake in your house. A stranger has entered your gates with a dark heart. Someone among your maids and your security is holding a deadly powder, planning to end your life and scatter this kingdom.”

The king did not think twice. He did not order an investigation. He did not ask the goddess for a name. He already hated me because of my closeness to his daughter.

To the king, this was the perfect opportunity to finish the boy who was trying to touch his royal daughter. He stood from his golden throne, eyes burning with pure hatred, and pointed his royal finger directly at my face.