The past faded like smoke drawn into the hollow lungs of memory—its embers still glowing, but distant now. A mother's scream, a father's final gasp, a boy with wide eyes standing in the doorway of the dead—these things drifted back into silence, sealed behind the iron clasp of time.
The quill stilled.
August's fingers hovered midair for a breathless second before curling inward, slow and uncertain. He blinked once. Twice. Then brought the back of his hand to his mouth.
The first cough came soft—no more than a whisper scratched into the stillness.
The second split the silence in half.
Elias sat up straighter from the armchair tucked beneath the narrow bookshelf. He'd been watching from a distance for the better part of an hour—half-bored, half-irritated, wholly unsure why he remained in this gilded tomb of books and candlelight. But now his gaze sharpened.
August doubled forward with a quiet gasp, one hand gripping the edge of the desk.
The coughs came harder now. Violent. Ripping from his chest like something unholy was trying to claw its way out. The pages beneath his fingertips fluttered like dying wings.
"August—?" Elias stood at once, his voice sharper than he intended.
Another fit. Shuddering, brutal. August's pale frame bowed over the desk as though the very breath had been stolen from him.
Elias crossed the room in a few long strides. "Has anyone here!"
His voice rang through the hallway just beyond the study doors.
He caught August's shoulder—lightly, carefully. It was burning.
The boy was trying to breathe through clenched teeth now, his cheeks colorless, one trembling hand pressed over his chest like he could hold his ribs together by force of will alone.
Footsteps approached at last—soft but steady. Then the door creaked open.
Giles.
Dressed in his neat dark waistcoat, hair gone thin and snow-white at the temples, the butler entered with the speed of a man much younger—but the breath of a man who had long passed the prime of easy movement.
He took one look at August, and his lined face folded with gentle alarm.
"Oh, child…" Giles stepped forward. "This often happens when he skips meals and refuses sleep."
"You knew this was coming?" Elias snapped, still holding August upright.
"I feared it," Giles said calmly. "But he's difficult to stop once he's lost in his mind."
"He's coughing up blood."
Giles didn't flinch. "and he looked away."
Elias turned sharply to the old man. "Then why in hell hasn't anyone done something?"
The butler's eyes, kind but weary, met Elias's. "Because he only listens to those he remembers."
There was no accusation in the words—but they struck Elias all the same.
He looked down.
August was still coughing, but weaker now. Exhausted. His head dipped, silver hair veiling his face. A few strands clung to the sheen of sweat along his cheekbones.
Giles stepped closer and touched his master's back gently. "We must get him to his chamber."
He hesitated—then looked to Elias.
"I'm old," he said simply. "Would you help me, sir?"
Elias's jaw tensed.
He didn't speak at first. His arms remained stiff, unmoving, as though every part of him warred against what he already knew he'd do.
But then—
He exhaled once through his nose.
"…Fine."
Between them, they shifted August up from the chair. Elias slipped an arm beneath his shoulders, the other behind his knees. Giles steadied the boy's trembling frame from the other side.
August didn't protest.
His eyes had drifted half-shut, lashes fanning against skin too pale, lips parted with shallow breaths. He didn't speak. Didn't resist.
As though for once… the weight was too much.
"Careful," Giles murmured as they moved from the study.
The hallway outside was dimly lit, gilded sconces flickering with low flame. Portraits watched from darkened walls as Elias carried August through the silence—past mirrors that blurred, past rugs that muted their footsteps to near-nothing.
The boy in his arms felt weightless.
But Elias knew better.
He wasn't carrying a body.
He was carrying the aftermath of too many sleepless nights. Of loss, and obsession, and nobility so rigid it cracked. The warmth against his chest was fevered. August's head had lolled gently against Elias's shoulder, silver curls brushing his collar.
"He always worked too hard," Giles said softly, leading them down the corridor. "Even as a child. Quiet. Brilliant. Terribly alone."
Elias said nothing.
He didn't know why his throat tightened at that.
At last, they reached the chamber doors.
Giles opened them with a soft creak, and Elias stepped inside.
August's bedroom was large, stately, soaked in greys and ivory—an echo of the study, but quieter. A four-poster bed stood at the center, draped in fine linen. Books littered the bedside table. The fireplace glowed with low embers.
Elias laid him down carefully.
August murmured something—inaudible, half-conscious.
Elias paused. His hand lingered a moment longer than necessary on the boy's shoulder.
Then he drew back.
Giles pulled the blankets over his master with quiet hands. "Thank you, Mr. Elias."
Elias stepped back, jaw tight. "I didn't do it for thanks."
"Still," the old butler smiled faintly. "You did it."
He turned to tend to the fire, and Elias lingered at the threshold—caught between leaving and not knowing why he hadn't already.
He looked once more at the boy in the bed.
Silver hair spilled across the pillow like moonlight across snow. Breath shallow. Brow faintly furrowed even in sleep, as though even dreams were not peace for him.
Elias did not leave the chamber.
Not yet.
The fire whispered in the hearth, low and tender, casting flickers of gold against the carved walls. August lay motionless beneath the blankets, breath slow, lashes unmoving against his pale skin.
And yet—Elias remained rooted in place, his eyes drawn elsewhere.
Drawn to a portrait.
It hung above the mantel in solemn grandeur, wide as a tapestry, its frame ornately carved and gilded with gold leaf that had dulled over time. Dust clung softly to the corners, as if even memory had grown too heavy to polish.
But the figures within it—
They shone.
Annalise Everheart, seated upon a velvet chair the color of dusk roses, held a young child nestled in her arms.
August.
No older than three, perhaps two and a half, swaddled in ivory lace and pale silk, his little cheek resting against his mother's shoulder, a faint pout upon his lips even in sleep.
And she—
Her golden curls so soft, like sunlight. Her amber-brown eyes, wide and warm, gazed forward with a grace so gentle it hurt to look at. And her smile—
That smile.
Elias staggered a half-step closer.
It was the same.
The exact same smile he had seen in his dreams—soft and quiet and knowing, as though she had lived his life twice and still chose to meet him kindly.
Behind her stood a tall man with sharp cheekbones and silver-hair—Raden Everheart, one hand resting lightly upon Annalise's shoulder.
A portrait of nobility. Of family. Of a moment untouched by tragedy.
Elias's breath slowed.
He stared.
The woman from the dream… had not been a dream at all.
She was real.
She had lived. Breathed. Held August to her chest the way only a mother could—and the same way, in that strange field of light and silence, she had stood beside Elias with a hand upon his wrist and said, "Well? Why are you just standing here?"
He swallowed.
Something inside him ached. A deep, wordless ache that didn't belong to memory—but to muscle, to marrow.
He didn't understand it.
He didn't want to understand it.
And yet…
Elias stepped closer to the frame. He looked at the child—August, barely more than a bundle of bone and silk, already pale, already stubborn in the tilt of his mouth. And at Annalise, cradling him as though she had already foreseen every pain he'd come to carry.
"You…" Elias whispered.
He didn't finish the thought.
He couldn't.
The silence held it for him.
Outside the windows, the moon swam behind slow-moving clouds. The ivy along the stone arched gently in the wind. Somewhere deep in the manor, a clock struck—soft chimes that rang like footsteps in a cathedral.
Elias turned away at last.
But something had shifted.
The fire no longer warmed the chamber. The portrait no longer felt like painted memory—it felt like a tether. A reminder.
Of something he had once known.
And lost.
His gaze drifted one last time to August—still curled in sleep, his hair a silver mess across the pillow.
And then, without another word, Elias stepped into the hallway and shut the door softly behind him.
As though he feared waking the dead.
The wind had stilled.
Upon the jagged cliff overlooking Blackwood Manor, shadows stretched long like black fingers cast by ancient gods. The world below glittered faintly beneath the moon's half gaze, cloaked in silver mist and muffled breath.
There—
A silhouette, sharp and still as obsidian.
Killian Vesper.
He stood upon the cliff's edge, cloak pooling like liquid night behind him, his gaze pinned to the faintest flicker of light moving within the manor's west wing.
The window had glowed moments ago.
And now—dark again.
But that was all he needed.
His crimson eyes narrowed, glowing faintly beneath the moonlight like twin embers caught in a wolf's stare.
"He lingered," Killian said aloud.
His voice was not loud, but the air made way for it. Clear, precise, like ice slipping across glass.
Behind him, a quiet shift.
Elysian Nevan stepped from the misted veil of trees, pale hair catching moonlight, footsteps soundless as ever.
Killian did not turn.
"He didn't leave immediately," Killian murmured, eyes still fixed on the window. "He stood there. Staring at something."
Elysian tilted his head slightly. "The boy?"
"No. The portrait."
Killian's lips curled—not in amusement. In revelation.
"There's something shifting," he continued, quieter now. "He's starting to react. Feel. Question. That is not how he behaved before."
Elysian folded his arms, silent, unreadable.
Killian's voice dropped to a darker register. "Do you remember when he came for the Everheart boy?"
Elysian did not answer.
He didn't have to.
The memory hung between them like a blade suspended midair:
The burning field.
August chained, bloodied.
Elias—charging through smoke and fire, reckless, brilliant, teeth bared like a starving beast.
And Killian—waiting.
"I struck him down myself," Killian said, eyes distant. "He bled beneath my hands. He wouldn't stay down. He fought like a man with nothing to lose."
"And then," Elysian added softly, "he forgot."
Killian exhaled once. It might've been a laugh.
"His memories shattered. His fury vanished. His soul rewrote itself in silence. And now…"
He turned, at last, toward his companion.
"…Now he lingers. He stares at ghosts. He responds to the boy like he remembers. Not with his mind—no, not yet. But something in his blood knows."
Elysian's gaze shifted back toward the manor. "That could be dangerous."
Killian's smile returned, cold as frost.
"That could be useful."
He let the silence hang for another breath.
Then his voice darkened, smooth and final:
"Elysian. We return to Elarith Vale."
Elysian blinked once. "You found something."
"I found the wound," Killian replied. "And the man who's beginning to remember it."
He turned, cloak rising with the motion like the wings of a dark bird. The cliff beneath his boots gave no sound as he stepped away from the ledge.
"Let the boy rest," Killian said softly. "Let Elias dream a little longer. When the truth wakes him, we'll be waiting."
Elysian followed, the two of them vanishing into the woods like a prophecy swallowed by fog.
And far behind them, Blackwood Manor slumbered.
But not for long.