The lights died with a hiss, plunging the Morano estate into suffocating darkness.
A heartbeat later, the backup generator coughed once — then failed.
The silence that followed was not empty. It was listening.
Alessia pressed herself against the cold wall, her chest heaving.
The shattered window framed the night like a wound. Outside, moonlight spilled over the courtyard — and the cloaked figure was gone.
Only the wind remained, whispering through the broken glass.
"Daisy?" she called out, her voice trembling.
There was no answer.
She took one careful step forward.
The faint scent of ash and iron filled the air. On the floor where Bianca had sat moments before, only black soot remained — and a faint crimson smear that pulsed once before fading into nothing.
Gone... All of it, like she had never been there.
The whisper came again, this time behind her.
"Alessia…"
She spun around — but there was only the empty corridor.
