Raya didn't sleep.
How could she?
Every shadow in the room now felt like it had a heartbeat—slow, patient, waiting.
Eren sat on the edge of the bed, elbows on his knees, head bowed. The lamplight cast a soft halo around him, but even that seemed too fragile to protect her.
"Eren…" Raya whispered.
He lifted his gaze slowly—too slowly.
"You said the Sovereign… watches me."
"Yes."
"How?"
Her voice cracked.
Eren's jaw flexed. "Shadows bend for him. Darkness is his sight. If you stand in the shade of a tree, he sees. If you step into night, he listens. He is everywhere light ends."
Raya swallowed hard.
"So he's watching right now."
Eren's silence was her answer.
The lamp flickered.
Raya's breath trembled as she clutched her hands in her lap. "Do you know him? Have you seen him?"
Eren stood abruptly—like the question burned him.
"No one sees him and remains human."
Her blood froze.
"Then how do you know what he looks like?"
"I don't," Eren said, voice tight.
"I know what he feels like."
He walked to the window, staring into the thick black outside.
"It feels like cold hands tightening around the world. Like a breath behind your neck that isn't human. Like a presence that can unmake you with a thought."
Raya's skin crawled.
"Why would something like that want… me?"
Eren turned, and for a heartbeat, she saw fear in his eyes—not of the Sovereign.
Of losing her.
"Because," he whispered, "you were never meant to belong to the human world."
Raya's breath stopped.
"What are you saying—"
Before he could finish, a whisper brushed her ear.
Not from Eren.
Not from the room.
From the shadow behind her.
"Found you."
A cold rush of darkness spread across the wall like ink spilled in water.
Raya screamed.
Eren was already moving—grabbing her, pulling her behind him, blade flashing with silver fire.
"DON'T LOOK AT IT!" he shouted.
But she already had.
A face—no, the idea of a face—shifted inside the shadow. Something ancient. Hungry. Curious.
Claimed.
"Mine," it hissed.
Eren slashed it with the burning blade; the creature shrieked and dissolved, melting into black smoke.
Raya collapsed to her knees, shaking violently.
Eren caught her shoulders, breathing hard.
"That wasn't a Revenant," he whispered.
"Then… what was that?"
Eren swallowed.
"A messenger."
"A messen
ger from who?"
His answer was a whisper she wished she had never heard.
"The Shadow Sovereign."