It started before the rain.Before the city began to smell like wet earth and secrets.
Aarohi had never believed in omens — she believed in deadlines, coffee, and the sound of her camera shutter. As a freelance photographer, she loved chasing moments — sunsets, city lights, people lost in thought. But that week, every picture she took seemed to have something wrong in it.
A blurred shadow.A shape behind her shoulder.Eyes — black, endless — in the glass reflections.
She deleted them all. Told herself it was just her tired mind.
But then, the whispers began.
They weren't loud, not at first. Just soft murmurs when she was about to fall asleep.A man's voice — calm, deep, and strangely familiar.Saying her name.
"Aarohi…"
She'd wake up with her heart racing and her pillow damp with sweat. Every night, it grew louder — and every morning, she'd forget the words, but remember the feeling.The feeling of being known.
Two Weeks Later
The city was wrapped in clouds that day.Aarohi had just returned from an assignment — wedding photos in the old part of town. She was exhausted, yet something in the air made her restless.
She kept looking at her window, drawn to the view outside. Rainclouds gathered like bruises in the sky.And then — a single black feather landed on her windowpane.
Not crow-black. Not raven-black. Darker.
She frowned, picked it up, and felt a sudden chill travel up her arm. For a split second, she saw something — a flash of a face, a pair of eyes, so dark they almost pulled her in.
She gasped, dropping the feather.
Her phone buzzed — a message from an unknown number.Just one line:
"Don't be afraid. It's starting again."
Her stomach knotted. Again?
She typed back —Who is this?But before she could hit send, the message disappeared. Vanished. Not even in her chat history.
That night, the dreams returned.
She stood in an empty field, the world painted in shades of grey.The wind carried whispers she couldn't understand — but they sounded like her name.And then she saw him.
Far away at first.Then closer.Until she could see the curve of his jaw, the faint scar below his lip, and those eyes — blacker than night, deeper than memory.
He didn't speak. Just looked at her — like someone remembering what it feels like to breathe.
When he finally did, his voice wasn't loud. It didn't need to be.
"You found the feather."
Aarohi blinked. "What… what are you talking about?"
"It means the veil is thinning again," he said."You'll start to remember me soon."
"Remember you?" she whispered. "I don't even know you."
He smiled faintly — the kind of smile that hides a thousand heartbreaks.
"You say that every time."
And then the sky cracked open — a thunderclap that felt like a scream. The ground trembled, wind tore through the field, and everything dissolved into black.
She woke up gasping, her sheets damp with rain — even though the window was closed.
On her desk, right beside her camera —lay the same black feather.
The whisper returned that night. Closer. Clearer.
"You'll forget me again, Aarohi. But I'll still find you."
And for the first time, she whispered back in the dark,
"Who are you?"
A pause.Then — soft, broken —
"I was your death once… and your love always."