The crushed petals bled between his fingers like a stain that wouldn't wash away.
Miles looked at his hand for a moment, then let the dust fall to the ground. The garden didn't move. It watched.
"You shouldn't compare me to her," Ivy said quietly, though her voice shook.
"I didn't," he replied. "You did."
She swallowed.
The metal box sat cold and heavy on her lap, like it had been waiting years just for her hands. The roses around them rustled again—this time not from the wind, but from something deeper, a low stirring beneath the soil.
Miles shifted closer. Their shoulders touched.
"Do you know what this place does?" he asked softly. "It keeps what people leave behind. Feelings. Promises. Regrets."
"Is that what the box is?" Ivy asked. "Something she left?"
"Something she couldn't take with her."
Her fingers trembled against the rusted lock. "What if I open it?"
His eyes flicked to hers. "Then you don't get to pretend you didn't want to know."
That was the truth of it, wasn't it?
Ivy inhaled slowly and turned the box over. The lock was old—simple. Corroded. One sharp tug and it snapped with a dull crack.
The sound echoed unnaturally loud.
Inside the box lay three things:
A silver hairpin, bent slightly out of shape.A folded scrap of paper, yellowed and brittle.And a ring.
The ring was delicate, darkened with age, a thin band set with a small red stone that caught the moonlight like a living eye.
Ivy's chest tightened.
She picked up the paper first. Her fingers brushed Miles's as he leaned in, close enough that she could feel his breath.
The note was short.
If he asks you to stay, don't. Love shouldn't feel like drowning.
Ivy's heart slammed against her ribs.
"She wrote that," she whispered.
Miles didn't respond.
She looked up at him. His face had gone still—not cold, not angry. Just… empty. Like something had closed behind his eyes.
"Was it for you?" Ivy asked.
"No," he said. "It was for herself."
The ring pulsed faintly in her palm. She hadn't imagined it. The stone was warm.
"What happens if I put it on?" she asked, half joking, half terrified.
Miles's gaze snapped to her hand.
"Don't."
The sharpness in his voice startled her.
"That was the first honest thing you've said all night," she murmured.
He exhaled slowly, dragging a hand through his hair. "You don't understand what binds people to this place."
"Then explain it to me."
He met her eyes again, and for the first time, something like fear flickered there.
"She loved him," Miles said. "And love—real love—doesn't end just because someone dies."
Ivy thought of the journal. The promises. My soul belongs to him.
"Does she still—" Ivy began.
A sudden chill swept through the garden.
The angel statue creaked.
Behind it, just for a heartbeat, Ivy saw her.
Miss Jessel stood beneath the tree, dress dark and dripping, hair hanging loose around her pale face. Her eyes were fixed on the ring in Ivy's hand.
Not angry.
Hungry.
Ivy gasped.
The vision vanished—but the cold didn't.
Miles stood abruptly. "We're leaving. Now."
He grabbed Ivy's wrist—not rough, but firm enough that she didn't resist. The box clattered shut as they moved, forgotten on the bench.
As they hurried toward the path, Ivy glanced back once.
The roses were red again.
And the bench was no longer empty.
Someone was sitting there.
Waiting.
Miles didn't slow until they were back inside Bly, the door slamming shut behind them like a held breath finally released.
In the dark hallway, he let go of her wrist.
"You didn't listen," he said quietly.
Ivy's pulse thundered in her ears. "You didn't stop me."
His eyes searched her face, intense, conflicted.
"No," he admitted. "I didn't."
They stood there, inches apart, the house looming around them.
And Ivy knew—with terrifying certainty—that whatever she'd opened in the Red Garden hadn't stayed there.
It had followed her home.