Lalin's heartbeat thundered louder than the footsteps that stalked her. The darkness spread like a rising tide, swallowing the air until she struggled to breathe.
"Leave…" she whispered, trembling, but the figure only halted in front of her—close enough for the icy chill of his presence to seep into her skin.
Moonlight sharpened his features, and her breath caught. That face—it wasn't unfamiliar. She had seen it before, in an old, yellowed photograph tucked away in the storage room. A man who had died more than fifty years ago.
"Have you… forgotten me?" His voice fractured, layered—half a whisper, half an echo, speaking all at once.
Lalin screamed and bolted from the room. Yet no matter which way she ran, the whisper clung to her—endless, relentless—echoing through every wall, every shadow, and deeper still, inside her very heart.