Season 1 Episode 2
The air still tasted like iron. Somewhere behind Sage, the wind pressed through the fractured stone arch, carrying the faint hum of the wards struggling to hold. She didn't turn. She couldn't—not with Lucien's gaze locked on her like a blade pressed to the back of her neck.
"I told you not to open it," his voice was low, but the tremor in it was rage, not fear.
From where he stood, Lucien saw her shoulders tighten—not with guilt, but with something colder. She was weighing him. Judging how far she could push him before he broke. He had seen that look before—on people who had already decided they were alone in the world.
"You weren't here," Sage replied, her voice flat. "You don't get to—"
"Don't what? Keep you alive?"
The hum in the air thickened, and for just a moment, Sage's gaze drifted past him. The flicker of movement in the shadows made her breath hitch—just like that night years ago.
—Flashback—
She's ten, crouched beneath the sagging wooden steps, knees scraped raw. Voices above her—her father's shout, the heavy slam of a door—send vibrations through the boards. Something wet drips onto her hand. She doesn't look at it. Doesn't dare. The air smells like copper.
The humming starts low, vibrating through her bones. At first she thinks it's the fridge in the kitchen, but then it moves—sliding under her skin.
Sage, a voice says—not aloud, but inside her.
Her breath stutters. She clamps her hands over her ears. The humming doesn't stop.
—Present—
Lucien's hand came down hard on her shoulder. "Sage."
She blinked, the shadows folding back into the half-light of the ruined hall. The thing in the corner wasn't her father. It wasn't even human. But the sound—low, almost pleading—was the same.
Lucien caught the flicker in her expression. He didn't know what memory had just grabbed her, but it had drained the fight from her face. She looked… smaller, for a heartbeat. And that scared him more than the shifting dark.
"I said stay with me," he murmured, low enough that the walls wouldn't hear. His wards flared—a faint blue tracing the inked spirals along his forearm.
The figure in the corner stepped forward, the sound of bare feet on stone muffled by the pressure in the air. It was smiling. Too wide. Too human for something that wasn't.
Lucien's mind was already breaking it apart: height—average; gait—off-balance; eyes—black rimmed, no whites; mouth—wrong. His fingers twitched toward the dagger at his belt, but he didn't draw it yet. Monsters like this fed on reactions.
Sage, however, wasn't calculating. She was staring—no, recognizing. Her nails dug into her palms until she felt the skin split.
—Flashback—
She's thirteen now, standing barefoot in the backyard at night. The grass is cold, damp with dew. The humming again—closer this time, inside her skull. A figure is at the edge of the woods. It doesn't move, but somehow she knows it's smiling.
Her mother's voice calls from inside, sharp and annoyed. Sage doesn't answer. She can't. The figure tilts its head, and her heart skips a beat. Then it mouths something—two words she will never forget.
Come home.
—Present—
The figure in the ruined hall mouthed the same words.
Lucien swore under his breath and stepped between them, the wards on his skin flaring bright enough to sting the air.
"Sage," he said without looking at her, "when I move, you run. Do not look back."
Her eyes locked on him—not the monster, not the dark. Him. And that was the only reason she didn't argue.
The hum rose to a deafening pitch.
If you want, I can continue straight into the fight sequence, using Lucien's perspective for strategy and Sage's for emotional and sensory overload, so the battle feels both calculated and chaotic. That's where the real explosion of tension will hit.
The hum swelled until it became a physical thing, pressing against their skulls, vibrating through the stone underfoot.
Lucien moved first. One sharp pivot—boots scraping stone—and his dagger was in hand, a thin silver line catching the weak light. The wards along his skin flared white, burning like a brand.
The thing didn't flinch. It tilted its head the same way Sage remembered from the woods.
Lucien advanced, every muscle tight, mind cutting through possibilities like a blade: It's feeding on sound. Break the tone. Force it to ground. Keep Sage breathing.
The hum shifted pitch, and Sage's vision stuttered. The hall twisted—not literally, but her eyes told her the walls bent inward, dripping with shadow like tar. Her heartbeat became part of the hum, each thud echoing in her ears.
She heard her own breath—ragged, shallow—and over it, the voice from childhood.
Come home.
"Sage!" Lucien's shout shattered the trance. He lunged forward, blade flashing, and the figure jerked back—not in fear, but in play.
It moved impossibly fast, circling them, bare feet whispering against the stone. Lucien spun with it, every step calculated to keep his body between it and Sage. He felt the air shift an instant before it struck—its arm sweeping low, clawed fingers aiming for his ribs.
He blocked, steel meeting bone with a sharp crack. Pain shot up his forearm, but he didn't falter. "You're not taking her."
Sage's hands trembled, nails digging into her palms, but she couldn't stay still. The humming was inside her now, threading through her blood, dragging her toward it. She took a step forward before she realized she'd moved.
Lucien's eyes flicked to her—just for a fraction of a second—but that was enough. The creature lunged again, its mouth splitting wider, too wide, black spilling from the corners like smoke.
—Flashback—
Fourteen years old. Rain pounding on the roof. Her father gone, her mother screaming into the phone. Sage pressed herself into the corner of her room, headphones over her ears, but even with the music loud enough to hurt, the hum still came. And then—knock knock—three taps against her window glass. She'd pulled back the curtain. The same smile, the same tilt of the head. And the same impossible feeling that part of her belonged to it.
—Present—
The creature's claws raked Lucien's arm, tearing through leather and skin. He grunted but pivoted with the blow, dragging the dagger across its side. The blade caught, burned, and the thing shrieked—no longer a hum, but a jagged, inhuman sound that shattered the air.
Sage flinched, clutching her head. The hum was gone—but it left a hole, an aching emptiness. She hated it. She wanted it back.
Lucien caught her look and knew exactly what it meant. "Don't you dare," he snarled, voice sharp enough to cut.
The thing stumbled back into the shadows, its smile lingering long after its body vanished. The hum faded to nothing.
Lucien turned to Sage, his breathing hard, blood seeping from his arm. "Talk. Now. What the hell was that to you?"
Sage didn't answer. Not because she wouldn't—but because in the silence, the hum began again.
Lucien's eyes narrowed, his hand still clamped over the bleeding gash in his arm. The shadows along the far wall were still. Silent. But the sound…
The hum was back. Faint, steady, low enough you'd think it was a trick of the ears.
Lucien took a slow step toward Sage. She was standing too still—shoulders relaxed, hands loose at her sides. Not defensive. Not afraid.
"Sage," he said, voice deliberate now, as if speaking to something through her.
Her eyes lifted to his. No flicker. No confusion. Just calm.
Then he heard it—not in the air, not in the walls, but in his bones. The hum was resonating from her. Not around her. Inside her.
He froze. For a moment, the battlefield calculations stopped. There was no strategy for this.
Sage's lips parted just enough to whisper, but the words weren't hers.
"Come home."
Lucien's dagger was in his hand again before the last syllable faded, wards flaring to full light. His voice was harsh. "Get out of her."
Sage smiled—too wide.
The hum spiked, sharp enough to rattle the stone arch overhead. Somewhere deep within it, another voice—quieter, older—laughed.
Lucien stepped forward, heart pounding in sync with that sound, knowing they weren't alone in this hall anymore.