Chapter Sixty-Seven: Blood and Memory

Ivy

The night after Chamber Null felt like a weight pressing against my skin.

Lucien hadn’t spoken much on the way home. Neither had I. But his hand had never left mine in the car. Fingers locked. Knuckles white. Like we were both afraid that letting go would mean we’d fall—into the old world, into the memories that were no longer dead.

Back in the Blackwood Estate, everything felt… smaller. Less pristine. As though the house sensed something in me had changed.

It wasn’t just me who’d walked out of that vault.

It was the girl who’d died in it, too.

I didn’t sleep.

My body buzzed with something hot and coiled. Not adrenaline. Not fear.

Awakening.

At 3:14 a.m., I found myself standing in the mirror of the guest wing. My hair tangled from the wind. My eyes hollowed by too many truths. And for the first time, I didn’t recognize the woman staring back.

She blinked—and I didn’t.

I stepped back. The air snapped like static.

Was I losing my mind?

Or were the pieces just finding their way back?

Lucien knocked once. Then again, softer.

“Ivy,” he said through the door. “Let me in.”

I opened it before I could change my mind.

He didn’t ask if I was okay. He didn’t try to fix me with words. He just stepped inside and pulled me into his chest.

I buried my face in his shirt and let silence hold me.

But inside me, something whispered.

Nyx.

Later, after Lucien fell asleep, I went exploring.

The east wing hadn’t been used in years. It was cold, unlit, covered in canvas sheets and the scent of dust. But something drew me there. I wasn’t walking—I was pulled.

The second door on the left.

I didn’t know how I knew. I just did.

Inside was a room I’d never seen.

A private lab.

Old computers. Medical tools. Memory drives lined in glass tubes. One screen still glowed faintly blue. The HALCYON insignia sat on its boot menu.

And on the table—

A leather journal.

No markings. No title. But when I opened it, I found pages not written in ink.

They were written in blood.

At first, I thought they were nonsense.

Lines of code mixed with handwritten memories. Scattered thoughts. Equations.

But as I read them aloud, something inside me responded.

Images flickered through my mind.

A needle. My spine. My mother screaming. Then… silence.

“Day 31: My skin burns at night. I hear her crying inside me. They say she’s not a real baby, but I feel her heartbeat.”

"Day 52: They took my voice. But I found a way to scream inside their code.”

"Day 81: I am Nyx. I am Ivy. I am the girl who cannot die. But they keep trying.”

The next page held a small photograph.

A sonogram.

At first, I didn’t understand.

Then I saw the name printed across the bottom in faded ink.

Subject X: Viable Embryo / Project Nyx / Host V.3

I dropped the journal.

It hit the floor with a finality that rattled my bones.

She was pregnant.

The first Ivy. The first Nyx.

But why?

What had they planned to do with a child?

Clara’s voice crackled through the encrypted line Lucien had given me.

“Ivy? You’re not supposed to be in that lab.”

“Did you know?” I whispered.

A pause.

Then, softer: “Yes.”

“Who was the father?”

“They never told us. The DNA was scrambled in the record. But they preserved the embryo.”

My stomach twisted. “Where?”

A longer pause.

Then Clara whispered:

“Level -18. Below Chamber Null. It’s cryogenically stored.”

I didn’t wait for permission.

Lucien followed when I stormed down the staircase, barefoot, wrapped in a robe. The elevator denied access.

He overrode it with his blood.

“Where are we going?” he asked, panting, shirt half-buttoned from sleep.

“To find the part of me they buried.”

Level -18. Unlisted Access.

It was colder than any room I’d been in.

Frost coated the floor.

Inside, there were five cryo-units. Four were empty.

One pulsed with a soft red glow.

I stepped forward and placed my palm on the glass.

Inside was a tiny form.

Not quite human.

Not quite… anything.

But something alive.

Lucien stood behind me. “Is it yours?”

“No,” I said. “But it’s part of me.”

“Do you want to keep it?”

I turned slowly.

My voice broke.

“I don’t know what I want anymore.”

Back in the hallway, I finally let myself cry.

Lucien didn’t try to fix it. He just sank beside me against the wall, held my hand, and waited for the tears to pass.

And when I looked up, I saw his eyes weren’t dry either.

We were both falling.

And somehow, falling together was the only thing keeping me sane.