"Hope you enjoyed your little trip to the graveyard and the prison," the commander said, his voice laced with sarcasm so sharp it almost cut the air.
None of them replied. Their heads bowed, guilt painted on their faces like a confession.
Karl's boots clicked against the dirt as he approached the car. His eyes narrowed.
"What's this thing under the white sheet, Tyler?"
Tyler froze. Panic clawed at his throat. If the commander found out it was a body, they were finished.
He opened his mouth—but no words came out.
"It's... my lover," Leo said suddenly, his tone dripping with fake shyness.
Everyone turned to him in disbelief. Karl's expression shifted from amusement to suspicion. He leaned closer, studying the shape beneath the cloth. Then, without warning, he grabbed the sheet and yanked it away.
"Your lover, huh?" Karl muttered. A bitter smile crept across his face. "How touching. An honor to meet my nephew's beloved."
He looked at each of them in turn—Leo, Tyler, Aileen—his gaze cold and heavy.
"Now, would anyone care to explain why there's a dead woman in my car? And please, spare me the comedy. Don't tell me you killed her. Our family's reputation is already buried deep enough—I'd hate to dig it any deeper."
Tyler forced a shaky grin. "Explain... what exactly, sir?"
Karl's eyes flashed. "Are you stupid, or just pretending?"
Tyler looked down, words dying in his throat. Aileen stepped back, half-hidden behind the others, her fingers trembling.
Karl began pacing, his voice rising with every accusation. "Breaking into royal property without permission. Locked up for trespassing and murder. Bribing the head of the guard on top of it."
He let out a harsh laugh. "Brilliant. Absolutely brilliant. You three really outdid yourselves this time."
No one dared to respond. Silence swallowed the air around them.
Karl sighed, rubbing his temples. "You three—come with me. Effective immediately, you're relieved from all duties for the next month."
He turned, his tone softening only slightly. "Consider it mercy... before the storm hits."
"But—" Tyler started to protest, but Karl cut him off with a single, cold command. "No 'buts'… follow orders."
"Leo, you — bring your so-called lover with you."
Leo slung her over his shoulder like a sack of potatoes and fell into step behind them. Each pace felt heavier than the last, as if the world itself were piling weight onto his shoulders. The moonlight blurred; his breath came short. They walked until the corridor opened into a room that did not belong to the castle's public face — a cramped, strange chamber smelling of antiseptic and old perfume.
Veronica sat there, perfectly composed, a blade resting in her lap. She smiled when she saw them, a soft, delighted curve that didn't reach her eyes. "So the three fugitives return," she purred.
Her smile vanished in an instant. In one smooth motion she produced a pistol and leveled it at Leo. The shot cracked like a thunderclap. For a heartbeat the world froze — then Veronica staggered, a spray of crimson blooming on her temple. At last, the others registered what had happened.
Veronica collapsed to the floor. Leo's arms tightened as if the weight on his shoulder had become unbearable; he began to cough, a raw, hacking sound. Blood slicked his palm and dripped from his lips. Panic ripped through him.
"Help me… help me!" he cried, voice breaking. His knees threatened to buckle.
"Put him on the table. Now!" Veronica — though fallen — barked the order with the same iron cadence as before, as if someone else had pulled a string and her voice moved independently of her body. Hands grabbed him, hauled him upright, and laid him on the cold metal table. The room smelled of copper and antiseptic; fluorescent lights hummed above like a persistent insect.
Pain burned behind Leo's eyes. He tasted iron with every ragged breath. Around him faces blurred into a whirl of fear and urgency: Tyler's jaw clenched so tight the muscles twitched; Eileen's fingers trembled as she pressed at the wound, her nails whitening.
But in the back of Leo's mind, under the assault of pain and dread, a single thought kept surfacing like a stubborn bubble.
The room stilled as if someone had pressed a hand against the world. The body that had lain motionless on Leo's shoulder twitched, then rose with an unnatural grace and planted herself a few paces away. For a moment she simply stared at him — eyes like cold coin — and the rest of the chamber blurred into insignificance. It felt as though they were alone in a bubble carved out of the night.
Leo blinked, trying to anchor himself. The room was the same, the table the same, yet he felt exposed as if the others had been erased from existence. The woman took a step closer and spoke, her voice soft but carrying a weight that made the air ache.
"You did something you should have done," she said.
He adjusted his position on the table, every movement stiff with shock. She was familiar and impossible at once — the curve of her cheek, the tilt of her smile, and yet something under the surface that did not belong to the living.
"What do you mean? Who are you?" he managed to ask.
She sat down beside him as if she had always been meant to. "I'm Jeriko."
"J—Jeriko?" Tyler's shout came from somewhere far away, a panicked echo. "Get away from her! You mean that damm woman?"
Jeriko smiled like a blade. "A flattering description. Part of it is true — but not all. This is not my true body."
"How are you alive? Didn't Tyler kill you? I saw you dead." Leo's voice cracked; the memory of blood, of the shroud—images tumbled in his head, refusing to settle.
"Tyler? Who is Tyler?" Jeriko tilted her head, amused. "You killed me, Leo. You ate my heart. Remember?" She tapped the spot at her throat, a slow, deliberate motion that made his stomach drop. "You kissed me."
"What? That's impossible. I— I couldn't have— you're— you're imagining things."
"So why am I the only one who can see and hear you?" she asked, eyes narrowing. For the first time the hint of accusation cut through the amusement. The question hung there, heavy and accusing.
Leo swallowed. A pressure started behind his eyes and the room seemed to sway. "Jeriko—where are we? Where is everyone else?"
"If I tell you where you are, I disappear."
"Then disappear. I don't want you here. I want out." He tried to swing his legs off the table, to stand, to put some space between himself and the thing that looked like her.
The moment his foot touched the floor it was like stepping into a current. Cold blackness licked at his ankles. He felt himself sinking as if the stone beneath him had turned to water. Panic flared, bright and hot.
Jeriko's voice was close now, not unkind but merciless. "Don't worry. I won't come back to haunt you twice. But you should know this — I was the shield that kept them safe. You killed Jeriko. Because of you, many will die."
Leo's voice cracked through the darkness like a desperate echo.
"What? Who's going to die? How—what does any of this have to do with me?"
Jeriko's gaze softened, though her tone carried the weight of something ancient and final.
"You shouldn't have killed Jeriko."
He frowned. "You keep talking as if Jeriko is someone else. You're not the same person, are you?"
She stepped closer, the sound of her bare feet whispering against the floor. Then she sat beside him, her presence cold but strangely familiar.
"I am her… and not her. Two halves of the same whole. She was the one bound to flesh, I am what remained. The other side."
Her eyes flicked upward as though she were watching time itself slip away. "It seems my time's run out."
"Wait—what are you talking about?!" Leo reached for her hand, but his fingers met only air.
She smiled faintly. "Find Emily Lubbens. She'll give you the answers you seek." Her voice trembled now, fading like smoke. "And… thank you. You freed me from my chains. Please—save them. Before it's too late."
Her figure shimmered, dissolving into the black air. The world snapped back into motion.
On the other side of that darkness, the others were fighting to keep Leo alive. Blood wouldn't stop pouring from him; it darkened from red to a disturbing shade of black, thick like spilled ink. His body convulsed, eyes open yet unfocused, trapped somewhere far beyond their reach.
"Leo! Leo, wake up!" Tyler shouted, shaking him violently.
Nothing. Only the rasp of breath and the sickening drip of blood on tile.
An hour crawled by before he finally gasped and came to. His hand shot out, grabbing Tyler's wrist with frightening strength. His eyes — now streaked with veins of shadow — locked onto his friend's.
"Remember… Emily Lubbens."
The words froze everyone in place.
Veronica's scalpel slipped from her grasp and clattered against the floor. She turned to Karl, disbelief etched across her face. "Did he just say—Emily Lubbens?"
Karl's jaw tightened. He stared at Leo for a long, heavy moment before replying with a voice low and sharp.
"Where did you hear that name?"
Leo tried to sit up, his breathing ragged. "You know her, don't you? Please—I need to find her."
Karl's expression darkened. "That's impossible."
Tyler stepped forward, his tone pleading. "Sir, I know we're under punishment, but please, let him see her."
Karl's eyes flicked toward them, the faintest tremor in his voice. "This isn't about punishment. He can't see her… because Emily Lubbens is dead."