Prologue
She dreamed of the sound again—
that soft metallic click before her world split open.
"Mama…?"
Her voice quivered down the dark hallway. Bare feet against cold marble. The air smelled faintly of smoke and sleep. She was only seven, hair tangled from nightmares, clutching a stuffed rabbit as if it could protect her from what she didn't yet understand.
Her parents' door stood ajar. A sliver of moonlight cut through the gap.
She pushed it open.
Time slowed.
A girl stood by the window—dark hair, pale skin, eyes as still as glass. The silencer of a pistol whispered a trail of smoke between them. Behind her, the curtains swayed with the night breeze, and for a moment, everything was silent except the ticking of a pocket watch.
Then clink.
The watch slipped from her mother's lifeless hand, hitting the floor as blood spread across the white sheets.
The melody began to play—soft, sorrowful, almost beautiful.
The blonde girl couldn't scream. She couldn't even breathe. The sound seemed to hold her in place, as if the tune itself were a spell.
The girl with the gun glanced back once—expression unreadable—then stepped into the night and disappeared.
The music kept playing.
The little girl just stood there.
Her world, frozen in the sound of that melody.
When the butler and her uncle burst into the room, everything moved too fast: the shouting, the trembling arms around her, and the smell of blood.
Then came one word.
"Bomb!"
A flash. A roar.
She woke on the shore, face against wet sand. The sea hissed quietly beside her. In the distance, the mansion burned like a star collapsing into itself.
Sirens screamed. Someone shouted. A rough hand reached down—blue uniform, the smell of salt and gunpowder—and pulled her out of the rising tide.
The melody was still there, echoing in her mind, the sound of that watch that would never stop playing.