## Chapter Two: The Stolen Mercy
The "Red Room" had left Calla Vance hollow. In her line of work, people often compared emotional removal to cleaning a stain, but the reality was far more visceral. It was like swallowing broken glass and being told not to bleed. Every time she absorbed an Echo of that intensity, it felt like she'd ingested a handful of hot needles that refused to settle in her stomach.
She woke up on a velvet chaise lounge in the corner of the study, her head throbbing in a rhythmic, dull beat that matched the ticking of the grandfather clock in the hall. A cold, damp compress was draped over her forehead, smelling faintly of lavender and the sharp, medicinal scent of antiseptic. The room was blissfully, terrifyingly silent. The screaming red mist that had previously stained the mahogany walls like a fresh wound was gone, replaced by the mundane scent of old wood, expensive ink, and the rhythmic, scratching sound of a fountain pen.
Calla sat up, the room spinning like a carousel. Elias Thorne was sitting at his grand oak desk, his silhouette framed by the dying embers of the fireplace. He was sketching with a ferocity that seemed at odds with his frozen expression. He didn't look up, but his voice cut through the quiet like a blade.
"You were out for twenty-two minutes," he said, his tone clipped and professional, though there was a new, jagged edge to his voice. "The agency didn't mention you were a fainter, Miss Vance. Had I known you were fragile, I might have sought a more... robust Remover."
"I'm not fragile," Calla rasped, her voice sounding like it had been dragged over miles of gravel. She reached for her water bottle on the side table, her hands still trembling with the phantom tremors of the anger she had just consumed. "Your father's rage... it wasn't just a memory, Mr. Thorne. It was an anchor. It didn't want to leave the wood. It fought the extraction every step of the way because it had been fed for so long."
Elias finally stopped sketching. He looked down at his own hands, then at the desk where the red stain had lived for twenty years. "For the first time since I was a boy, I can sit in this chair without feeling like my skin is on fire. You're efficient, I'll give you that. Even if you are a bit dramatic."
It was a compliment, but it felt like a cold breeze hitting a raw nerve. Calla looked at him, and because she was still "saturated" with the Echoes she had taken from the hallway, her vision was skewed. She didn't just see a cold, arrogant billionaire. She saw the *Harmonic Shadow* of a boy who had been left alone in a house that screamed at him. Through the golden haze of his grandmother's joy and the red heat of his father's rage, Elias looked less like a man and more like a puzzle with missing pieces.
"We should stop for today," she whispered, clutching the edge of the lounge to steady herself. "The legal limit for a licensed Remover is three Levels a day. I've already taken a Four from the hall and a Five from this room. My system needs to neutralize the emotional chemicals before I can take more. If I over-absorb, the Echoes start to bleed into my own personality. I'll forget where Calla ends and the Thornes begin. I'll start liking the things your father liked. I'll start hating the things you hate."
"No," Elias said, finally standing. He moved toward her, his shadow stretching across the floor until it swallowed her feet. His eyes were desperate—a look that didn't match his stoic face. "There is one more. The Nursery at the end of the East Wing. It's a Level Ten. A Black Echo."
Calla's breath hitched. "A Black Echo? That's impossible. Black Echoes are only formed by... by a death. A trauma so deep the human soul actually snaps under the pressure. You're asking me to commit professional suicide. A Level Ten could erase my own memories entirely. I could wake up and not know my own name."
"My sister," Elias said, his voice dropping to a low, jagged vibration. "The night she fell from the balcony. I was ten. I was supposed to be watching her. The house hasn't let me forget the sound of her crying out for a single second. If you leave now, I'll spend another night listening to a ghost. Do your job, Calla. Clear the air so I can finally breathe."
### The Shadow in the Nursery
The Nursery was sealed with heavy iron chains, not to keep thieves out, but to keep the "vibration" of the tragedy from leaking into the rest of the manor. As Elias unlocked the door, the air pressure dropped so sharply Calla's ears popped.
The room was a void. While the other Echoes were vibrant colors—gold for joy, red for rage—this one was a hole in reality. A jagged, pulsing shadow sat in the center of the room, shaped vaguely like a small girl. It didn't make a sound. It was a "Silence Echo"—it ate all noise, all light, and all hope.
"Scrub it," Elias commanded. He was shaking now, though he tried to hide his hands in his pockets. "I want to forget the weight of her hand letting go of mine."
Calla stepped forward, her heart hammering against her ribs like a trapped bird. She felt the "Stolen Mercy" secret even before she touched the shadow. As a Remover, she could sense the frequency of a memory. This frequency was wrong. It was jagged, synthetic, like a piece of music played backward and layered over a lie.
She reached out and touched the Black Echo.
The world turned to ice.
*Suddenly, she was ten years old. She was standing on a rainy balcony. She felt the slick, wet marble under her bare feet. She saw a small girl dangling over the edge, her nightgown fluttering in the wind. But as Calla looked through the eyes of the memory-holder, she saw the truth.*
*In the memory, Elias wasn't standing by the balcony. He was locked in his bedroom down the hall, pounding on the door from the outside, screaming to be let out. The person standing on the balcony—the person who had watched the girl's fingers slip and done absolutely nothing—wasn't Elias.*
*It was his father. Arthur Thorne.*
The shock of the truth hit Calla like a physical blow. The memory had been **transplanted**. His father, a man of immense power, had used a rogue "Emitter" device to push his own guilt into his son's young mind until Elias believed it was his own fault.
Calla screamed, the Black Echo rushing into her chest. It felt like her heart was being turned into stone. She fell to her knees, the sheer weight of a "Borrowed Sin" nearly crushing her lungs.
Suddenly, strong hands were on her shoulders.
"Calla! Let go! Break the connection!" Elias was shouting.
He pulled her back, his strength surprising her, breaking the psychic link. Because she was still vibrating with the truth, Calla looked up at him—really looked at him. She saw the "Blank" man who had spent his entire life hating himself for a crime he never committed.
"I saw it," she gasped, her eyes wide and watering.
"I know," Elias whispered, pulling her against his chest in a rare moment of vulnerability. He smelled like sandalwood, rain, and old grief. "You saw what I did. You saw her fall. Now you know why I am the way I am. Why I don't deserve the air I breathe."
Calla opened her mouth to tell him. *It wasn't you. Your father lied to you. You are innocent.*
But as the words formed, she felt the "Black Echo" inside her pulse with a deadly, poisonous warning. The transplant was stabilized by the lie; if she spoke the truth now, while the Echo was still settling in her soul, the psychic feedback loop would shatter Elias's mind. She was the guardian of a truth that could kill the man she was starting to love.
"I've got you," Elias murmured, his face buried in her hair. It was the first time he had ever shown warmth, seeking comfort from the woman who had just stolen his worst nightmare.
"Thank you," he whispered. "Thank you for taking the weight away."
Calla couldn't speak. She just wept into his shoulder, her heart breaking for him. She had saved him from the memory, but she had become the prisoner of a lie. She looked toward the door, knowing that the basement was next—where the records were kept. She would find the proof. She would give him back his soul, even if it cost her everything.