BY N.M. Samuel.
When the shadow knows her name
Chapter 1: WISPERS IN THE SHADOWS
Night clung to Sera's dorm room like something alive.
The overhead light was off, leaving only the soft blue glow of her laptop screen brushing against the walls. She'd meant to finish her psychology notes an hour ago, but her mind kept drifting—restless, buzzing, unfocused. Typical. She rubbed her eyes, exhaling through her nose.
The room hummed with the quiet, familiar sounds of campus at night: a door closing down the hall, muffled laughter, the distant hum of someone's late-night shower.
But there was something else tonight.
Something she couldn't name.
A chill crept along the back of her neck, like a finger tracing her spine. Sera froze. The air shifted—barely, but enough that she noticed. Her breath hitched before she could stop it.
She wasn't alone.
"Get it together," she muttered, brushing her hair behind her ear. She told herself she was overworked, sleep-deprived, imagining things.
Then she heard it.
Sera.
A whisper so soft she should've dismissed it as a draft, except it wasn't carried on air. It wasn't directional. It slid straight into her mind like breath against the inside of her skull.
Her head snapped up. "Hello?"
Silence. Her heart thudded, but the strange tug in her stomach wasn't fear. It felt more like being… noticed.
She stood slowly, her socks whispering against the floor. The corner didn't change—didn't move—but it felt aware of her. Like something inside it was holding its breath.
She took another step closer.
The temperature dropped.
A chill brushed along her arm, feather-light and deliberate, not the random cold of an AC vent. She froze. The cold drifted higher, sliding up her shoulder, curling along the back of her neck—like a finger tracing her skin.
Her breath hitched.
It wasn't aggressive. It wasn't threatening.
It felt… curious.
She whispered, "Who's there?"
The lights flickered—once—and then steadied. Her laptop dimmed as if something sucked the energy from the room for a single heartbeat.
The shadow in the corner thickened, pulsing—almost like something shifting just behind a curtain.
"Sera."
This time, the whisper was unmistakably a voice. Low. Velvet. Close enough to feel the shape of it against her ear.
Her stomach flipped, heat blooming beneath her ribs despite the cold. She stumbled back to her bed and sat down; her pulse racing too fast to be normal but too warm to be fear.
"What do you want?"
The corner darkened again, and for a split second she thought she saw the impression of a figure—tall, undefined, watching her with eyes she couldn't see but felt like pressure against her throat.
The shadows receded, softening, leaving her room looking perfectly normal. As if nothing had happened at all.
Except she still felt that cold tracing the inside of her wrist.
And she couldn't shake the feeling that something had answered her… even if it chose not to speak again.
Sera closed her laptop. Sleep was impossible now, Because something in the dark knew her name—and for the first time in her life, the attention didn't scare her.
It thrilled her.