From the silence came footsteps; they were quiet, soft, and steady. Each one pressed against the rubble with a weightless rhythm, yet every sound cut through the haze clouding my skull like a blade against glass. The world was muffled, spinning, but those steps rang clear, pulling me back from the edge.
"Are you trying to kill yourself?" The voice slipped through the air, low and edged, carrying a sharpness that stung more than the wound pinning me down.
I forced my eyes open, the effort making my vision swim, dark spots crawling across the edges, but I managed to focus just enough – and my breath snagged in my throat.
"Ne-Nellie…?" My voice cracked apart, a fragile thing barely held together by pain. A weak, broken chuckle rattled out of me despite the ache in my chest. "Is that you… or am I just hallucinating again?"
But she didn't answer.
Her figure sharpened slowly through the blur, like a memory dragging itself into the present. And when I finally saw her clearly, I froze.
The long hair I remembered; the way it used to fall down her back to her feet in silken strands that caught every fragment of light was gone, cropped short. It now framed her neck and jaw, reshaping her face into something unfamiliar. It stole away the softness I remembered, the gentleness I once held onto, and left behind sharp edges and cold lines.
She stood steps away in silence, carefully watching me. The world seemed to hold its breath with her, dust drifting lazily in the air between us, tiny fragments catching the dim light, but her expression remained unreadable, cold and still, as if carved from stone.
Maybe she had just come to watch me die.
I dropped my gaze, unable to meet her eyes. I didn't want to see whatever lingered there; pity, anger, or worse, indifference.
She rarely spoke anyway, that was always her way. But now, in this moment, her silence felt heavier than words could ever be. It pressed down on me, impossible to read, leave alone to escape.
But then she moved, the sound of her footsteps closing the distance, steady and unhurried, until the shadows of her frame swallowed mine. She knelt beside me, and for the first time, her voice slipped through the quiet; soft, almost a whisper, carrying the weight of a thousand unspoken things.
"Ash," she breathed, the name trembling faintly on her lips. "Where is Van?"
Her question cut deeper than the pain lacing through my body. 'Van.' Of course. Even now, at this moment, her first concern wasn't me, it was him.
I was startled: she had to be real. No one called me Ash except her. To everyone else I was something else, Grandma with her gentle 'Little Ash,' others with their own names. But this? This was hers alone. And hearing it now felt like a jolt of reality.
"I… I don't know," I muttered weakly, forcing the words past dry lips. "But since he's not here… then something might have happened." The admission scraped against my throat, heavier than I expected.
I blinked slowly, fighting the fog pressing in on my vision, struggling to hold her shape in focus. A shaky laugh escaped me, bitter and tired. "First… How did you even find me? Maybe you're not real, and you're just a shape-shifter messing with me."
The silence thickened as she didn't move or speak, she remained still as stone, debating whether to answer me or let the silence burn me alive.
"It's been two weeks since you went missing," she finally spoke, her tone low and steady, but carrying a shadow I couldn't quite name. "Van asked me to find you… but now he's disappeared, too."
Her words hit harder than the pain crushing my ribs.
Two weeks?
My breath caught but I couldn't say my heart beat fast because I no longer had it. Two whole weeks… I'd been lying there in the crumpled building, half-buried beneath stone and dust, the world above me moving on, changing, without me.
Two weeks and Van too was still missing?
The thought clawed through me, and for a moment the haze returned, darker and heavier, threatening to pull me under again.
---
Somewhere in a spacious, extravagant room that looked more like a private suite than a bedroom, polished marble floors gleamed beneath velvet curtains that swept the ground. A crystal chandelier scattered golden light across the ceiling, illuminating sleek shelves lined with rare collectibles and walls adorned with framed art worth more than most cars. A king-sized bed lay draped in silken sheets untouched, almost too perfect, like a room meant to impress guests rather than comfort its owner.
Elyen sat at a side table, hunched over his computer, sharp green eyes narrowing at the search bar. His fingers tapped rapidly as he typed: The Book of Vanik'shur.
The screen blinked, cold and unhelpful: No results found.
"Tch..." He clicked his tongue and leaned back slightly. It felt like the city itself wanted to keep its secrets buried.
With a quiet sigh, he pushed his chair back and stepped toward the window. A notification flashed on the screen: CLASSIFIED INFORMATION. The words lingered, almost taunting him, before fading away.
He paused, looking at the city lights glowing against the dark skyline as the night breeze slipped through the slightly open window. Below, the city stretched out like a field of stars, bright, restless and alive.
"A lot is happening tonight," Elyen muttered, his voice low and thoughtful. "And for some reason… I feel restless."
---
It had been almost an hour, the weight of time pressing against me, but Nellie hadn't moved. She sat by me like a statue, her gaze locked on my chest, unblinking. The very rise and fall of my breath carried an answer she refused to look away from.
She hadn't spoken a word, the silence between us stretching thin and brittle, like glass about to crack. Every second of it gnawed at me until I shifted uneasily, the scrape of rubble beneath me loud in the stillness.
With a lot of effort, I finally turned my head toward her, my voice breaking the quiet, hoarse and cautious.
"Nellie… when did you last talk to Van?"
Her lashes lowered, shadowing her eyes. For a moment, I thought she might retreat into silence again; but she didn't.
"Wednesday evening," she said softly, after a pause that felt far too long. "He sounded… panicked."
Her words struck like an invisible blade between my ribs. To anyone who didn't know, Van and I were just a Master and his spirit. But to me, he was more like a brother. We might not show it too obviously, but that is the affection we share.
Wednesday evening: the same day I was kidnapped, was the same day Van disappeared, too. Was this all connected somehow? A conspiracy?
Her voice softened, but the words still hit like a hammer. "I've been looking for you for two weeks now," her gaze shifted, sliding down to my chest. "…And here I find you, lying in a place like this with your heart missing."
The way she stared at me, I almost believed she could see straight through me, into the hollow where it used to beat. Everything about her felt… different, colder and sharper. But at the same time, more talkative than the Nellie I remembered.
I forced a weak chuckle, the sound breaking awkwardly in my throat. "What happened to your hair, Nellie?" The question slipped out before I could stop it. Wrong timing, but it escaped anyway.
"I cut it," she replied flatly without hesitation, her eyes fixed on me. "Figured I might creep you out less this way. But first…" her voice thinned into a razor, "…where is your heart?"
Yeah, of course she knows she creeps me out. That explains the new hair cut, the sudden sharpness in her tone and the way her gaze is pinning me like a needle through glass.
I hesitated before speaking, squinting at her as if narrowing my eyes might make her feel less unreadable. Everything about her felt different and I couldn't stop myself but ask the unnecessary questions instead of worrying about my condition.
"Nellie… why are you suddenly talkative and open with me? You're usually quite and polite when speaking..." But also crepy. I couldn't say that part out loud, but I might had also chosen the wrong words even if they came out weaker than I'd meant them to. But the silence was pressing, and I needed to break it.
Her eyes flicked toward me in a swift, cutting glance, cold and sharp. The kind of look that told me I'd touched a nerve.
"You've never given me a reason to talk," she began. "And because of that, for two years we've lived together, you thought I was mute. You always sat far away when I was close, clinging to Van like he was your shield. Even when I tried…" her voice thinned, almost breaking, "you always gave me that creeped-out look, the one you couldn't hide whenever I stood in front of you."
Her tone fell to a whisper. I couldn't catch the rest, just the shape of her lips as she breathed the words: "You were always scared of me, Ash… and it was never fun to experience."
I let her words sink in. Two years with Nellie and she had tried to open up. No, not tried. She did. She opened herself to me and let me in, but the way she unsettled me always kept me at arm's length. And yet… I did like Nellie, it was comforting having her and Van in our wooden house at the edge of the woods. Like a brother and sister who cared.
But closeness with her? That was harder.
I might sound crazy, right? Since both Nellie and Van were ghosts. But who cares, at least not me.
A laugh stirred in my chest, bitter and faint, but it never made it past my throat. It caught there, strangled by the weight pressing down on me.
Her presence always had that effect. Like a shadow waiting to swallow me if I dared to lower my guard. Still… compared to that demon's presence, hers was only a whisper. That thought gnawed at me, ugly and raw.
I shut my lips, biting back anything I might say. The truth was heavier than her words. I had been blaming her for being creepy, for making me feel small, when I'd never once tried to look past it. Never once tried to see her for who she was beneath it all.
She tilted her head slightly, a slow, deliberate movement, as the ends of her cropped hair brushed against her cheek. And for a moment, the motion was almost too calm, too deliberate, as though she were deciding what to do with me.
"Who took it?" she asked at last, her voice unwavering, it was steady, but darker now, carrying a weight that made the air feel thick.
My pulse stumbled: I couldn't tell but it might had been the first time I saw her mad face, given how her long hair used to cover her whole body. It was subtle, but I'd seen enough to know. The flatness in her tone, and the heaviness in her stare, it was the storm just before the lightning struck.
At that point, lying wasn't just pointless, it was dangerous. She'd been pressing me since the moment she came, and I kept feigning deafness. Patience was never her strength – although, not with me. But she'd already given me more than enough.
"Might as well just tell you, Nellie" I muttered under my breath, then forced the words out louder. "Some demon took it." The confession slipped free, fragile and unsteady, and even as I said it, I wasn't sure if speaking it aloud was the worst mistake I could've made.
She rose to her feet, not a flicker of surprise in her eyes. Nellie had seen me in worse states before, but this; me still breathing without a heart was a first. And she didn't even blink.