The morning broke gray and restless, as though the sky itself had not slept. Seraphina sat upright in her bed, her nightgown clinging to her with cold sweat. The dream still clung to her skin — vivid, real, alive. She could still see Selene's eyes, wide and terrified, reaching for her through that flickering veil of darkness.
She pressed a trembling hand to her face. Help me… please… I can't find my way back.
Those words refused to fade.
Her chamber felt different somehow. The curtains barely stirred though the window was slightly ajar, and the hearth that should have been rekindled by dawn was stone cold. The mirror across the room still bore faint marks of condensation, like fingertips dragged across its surface.
Seraphina rose slowly, her bare feet touching the cold floor. Her mind ached with confusion. It was only a dream, she told herself. A cruel dream born of exhaustion and worry.
But the echo of Selene's voice — the desperation in it — said otherwise.
She moved toward the window, pulling the curtains open. Outside, the gardens that once bloomed with morning dew seemed wilted, the air weighed down by a thin mist. Even the birds were hesitant to sing.
Something had changed.
When she descended the grand staircase, the manor was unusually quiet. The servants moved like ghosts — silent, hurried, eyes averted. Seraphina noticed the unease in them; they bowed too quickly, their hands trembled as they set trays upon tables.
At the breakfast table, Selene sat already dressed, sipping tea from a delicate porcelain cup. The light fell across her face — calm, almost serene — but there was an unfamiliar sharpness to her smile.
"Good morning," Selene greeted softly, though her tone lacked warmth.
Seraphina hesitated before sitting across from her. "You're up early."
Selene's eyes flicked toward her. "I hardly slept."
For a moment, Seraphina thought she caught a flicker of something — amusement, or maybe cruelty — in her twin's gaze. She forced a smile. "Neither did I. I… had a strange dream."
"Dreams," Selene said lightly, cutting into her toast. "They're only what our fears look like when we close our eyes."
Her words were casual, but they landed heavy. Seraphina studied her sister carefully. "You don't believe dreams can mean anything?"
Selene set down her knife with a faint clink. "Meaning is a fragile thing, sister. People assign it where there is none." Then, almost teasingly, "Did yours frighten you?"
Seraphina swallowed. "It was about you."
Selene's smile froze — just for a moment. "Was it?"
"You were calling for help," Seraphina continued, her voice quiet. "You sounded… lost."
For a fleeting instant, something dark flickered behind Selene's expression. Her gaze hardened — then softened again into a feigned gentleness. "You always were the sensitive one," she said. "Perhaps it's just your guilt speaking."
"Guilt?"
"For wanting what was never yours," Selene said simply, her tone like silk pulled over glass.
Seraphina stared at her, speechless.
Then Selene rose gracefully, brushing invisible dust from her gown. "Do not let dreams trouble you so deeply, sister. They have a way of making fools of us all."
As she left the room, Seraphina felt her breath catch in her throat. That wasn't her sister's voice. It was too steady. Too void of warmth.
The rest of the morning passed in a haze. Seraphina wandered through the corridors, her thoughts a tangled storm. The manor itself seemed to breathe differently — shadows stretched longer than they should, whispers slipped through the cracks of silence.
She paused by the portrait hall, where generations of Valemonts stared down from gilded frames. Her eyes drifted to the one that always unsettled her most — her father's sister, the late Princess Evelyne. The resemblance to her own features was uncanny, yet there was something more haunting in the painted woman's eyes — a kind of knowing sorrow.
Today, though, something was wrong. The portrait seemed fresher somehow, as though it had been recently retouched. The reds deeper. The skin warmer. Almost… alive.
A faint prickle crept down Seraphina's spine.
Later, she sat by the window of her chamber, staring at her reflection in the glass. For the first time, she didn't trust what she saw. Her own eyes seemed foreign, her face ghostly.
"What are you trying to tell me, Selene?" she whispered.
The wind outside stirred, low and hollow, carrying a faint echo. It almost sounded like her sister's voice again — faint, broken, pleading.
Find me…
Seraphina's hand flew to her chest. "Selene?"
No answer — only the flutter of the curtains, the slow, rhythmic creak of the manor's bones.
She closed her eyes, her pulse quickening. The dream hadn't been a dream.
Maybe it was for her to protect her sister.
That night, the manor felt restless. Wind moaned against the windows, making the glass tremble like a pulse beneath invisible hands. The candles burned low in their sconces, casting trembling halos of gold that did little to chase away the thickening dark.
Seraphina couldn't sleep. Every time she closed her eyes, she heard that faint voice — her sister's real voice — calling for help from the depths of her memory. So she sat upright, listening to the hush of the corridors, the shifting of the old beams.
Then she heard it.
A sound — soft, rhythmic, unlike anything she had ever heard before. It drifted through the wall like smoke, a whisper layered in strange syllables. Not speech. Not prayer. Something older.
She froze. The sound was coming from Selene's room.
Quietly, she slipped from her bed, wrapping a shawl around her shoulders. The cold bit at her skin as she stepped into the hallway. The candles there were nearly spent, their flames short and struggling.
As she neared her sister's door, the sound grew clearer — melodic yet dreadful, like a song made from breath and pain. It rose and fell with an unholy rhythm, the language unrecognizable, as though pulled from a time before words.
Seraphina pressed her ear to the door.
"…Esmara… Thalen… Koraveth…"
Her blood ran cold. She didn't understand the words, but they pulsed through her bones like the echo of a heartbeat not her own. The voice was definitely Selene's — or rather, it wore her tone — yet it was deeper, deliberate, almost reverent.
A faint sound followed: the drag of something across the floor. Then a low hum — not human, not animal, something else entirely.
Seraphina hesitated, her breath shallow. Every instinct screamed at her to step away. But she couldn't. Not when her sister might be in danger.
She slowly pushed the door open — just enough to peer through the narrow crack.
The sight froze her.
Selene knelt in the center of her room, surrounded by candles arranged in a perfect circle. Their flames burned unnaturally blue, flickering without smoke. The light cast ghostly shadows that crawled along the walls, moving like living things.
On the floor before her was a small mirror — old, its silver backing cracked. Selene's reflection was warped, her face stretched into something cruel, her eyes black pools without light.
She was chanting softly, her hands hovering over the mirror as if drawing energy from it. The air around her shimmered faintly, as though the space itself were bending.
"Kora velth… eshmar… the blood remembers…"
The words chilled Seraphina to her core.
Then Selene's head tilted slightly — not toward the mirror, but toward the door. Her voice stopped. The silence that followed was heavier than any sound.
Seraphina's heart thudded painfully. Had she been seen?
For a long moment, nothing moved.
Then Selene whispered — almost tenderly, almost amused —
"You shouldn't be watching, sister."
Seraphina gasped and stumbled back, her shoulder hitting the corridor wall. By the time she dared look again, the door was closed, the light within extinguished.
The hall was plunged into darkness.
She stood there, trembling, barely able to breathe. Her mind raced — she wanted to tell herself it wasn't real, that fatigue had played tricks on her senses. But she could still smell the faint trace of burned wax and something metallic — blood, perhaps — lingering in the air.
Slowly, she backed away and returned to her room, her steps unsteady.
When she shut her door and pressed her back against it, her reflection in the mirror caught her eye.
For a moment, she thought she saw someone else standing behind her — a shadow with eyes that glowed faintly blue.
She spun around. Nothing.
Only silence.
Yet even as she crawled beneath her blankets, Seraphina knew she would not sleep again. Not that night. Not while her sister — or the thing that wore her sister's face — whispered to something ancient in the dark.