LOGINSaphira povThe night tasted like metal.Cold. Bitter. Heavy on my tongue as the wind rushed past my ears while I stood at the threshold of the shattered compound the place Lars once called the academy, though everything about it looked more like a graveyard for the forgotten.The last coordinates he’d ever whispered before the world stole him from me.The world had already gone silent when I stepped inside.But this silence was different.It wasn’t empty.It was watching me.I tightened the straps on my gloves, forced my breath to steady, and pulled the cracked door open. The hinges exhaled a long, tortured groan that echoed down the hallway like I’d just awakened something that had been sleeping.Or hiding.A warped sign hung crooked on one wall, its lettering half-burned:WARD C NEUROBEHAVIORAL DEVELOPMENTMy gut twisted.“This is your legacy?” I whispered to the shadows. “This is what they turned you into… before you fought your way out.”The lights flickered even though the buil
(Saphira’s POV)They say the worst pain is losing someone you love.But they’re wrong.The worst pain…is finding out they might still be alive.---I woke to the taste of smoke.And metal.And fear.My eyes snapped open to unfamiliar shadows, the world tilting sideways before it clicked into place. A ceiling fan spun lazily above me, its creaking rhythm scraping against my nerves. The sheets beneath my fingers were rough, not the silk of the penthouse, not the sterile fabric of a hospital.A safe house.Or something pretending to be one.Pain pulsed through my body sharp in my ribs, dull in my shoulders, angry beneath my skin. I tried to sit up, but the room spun like I’d been tossed off the edge of the world.“Easy.”A hand pressed gently to my shoulder.Caelum.His voice was low, steady, but the tension rippled beneath it like an underground river.“You inhaled too much smoke,” he said. “And you took a nasty hit to the head. You were unconscious for two hours.”Two hours.Two hours
Saphira’s POV---Love makes you blind, they say.But no one warns you about what happens when love opens its eyesand the person staring back isn’t the same one who left.---The world fell away the moment his gaze met mine.Christian.Or what was left of him.For weeks, I’d whispered his name into the dark like a prayer. I’d imagined his voice, his laugh, his touch every piece of him etched into the hollow places grief couldn’t reach.But the man sitting in that glass cell was a ghost wearing his skin.“Christian…” The word slipped out before I could stop it.He looked at me, slow and deliberate, as though the syllables meant nothing. His lips curved not the warm, easy smile that used to melt the world, but something crueler. A replica with the soul stripped out.Caelum’s hand tightened on my arm. “I said wait.”I barely heard him. My body moved on instinct, pushing forward, pressing a trembling palm to the cold glass. “Christian, it’s me. Saphira.”He blinked, head tilting slightly
Saphira’s POVThey say ghosts can’t hurt you.But they never said what happens when the ghost is the man who once saved your lifeand now holds it in his hands.---The hum of the engines was too steady, too calm for the panic clawing at my chest. My arm burned from the gunshot, the metallic scent of blood mixing with cold recycled air. I pushed myself upright, blinking through the fog that blurred my vision.The man standing before me shouldn’t have existed.“Caelum,” I whispered, my voice breaking on his name.He looked the same and yet utterly different. His dark hair was shorter now, streaked faintly with silver at the temples. His jaw was sharp as ever, his suit immaculate despite the turbulence, but it was his eyes that hit hardest no longer the steady, guarded warmth I once trusted, but something colder. Calculated.“Hello, Saphira,” he said softly, as if we’d met for coffee, not after months of death, loss, and betrayal. “You look… tired.”My pulse thundered. “You were dead.”
Saphira’s POV---They thought taking him would break me.But grief has a strange way of becoming purpose.And love real love doesn’t die quietly.It turns into something sharp, dangerous, unstoppable.Tonight, I’m done waiting for ghosts.I’m going to bring him home or burn the world down trying.---Rain hammered against the city, each drop slicing through the night like falling glass. I sat motionless before the darkened laptop screen, my reflection staring back ashen, hollow-eyed, trembling but alive.The message still glowed in bold white letters:He lives because we allow it. Come alone if you want to see him again.I must’ve read it a hundred times, searching for hidden meaning. Each word burned deeper, a cruel reminder that somewhere, he was alive but suffering.Christian.His name was both a wound and a promise.The world thought he was dead. They’d buried the story, swept it under the smoke and twisted metal. But I knew better. I’d seen him. Bloodied, restrained but alive. A
Saphira’s POV ---The world burned around me, but I could be heat.Only the hollow echo of his name Christian ringing through my bones like a prayer the universe refused to answer.They said he died in the explosion.But I knew better.Love doesn’t vanish that easily. It leaves traces like smoke, like whispers.And somewhere beneath the ash, I could still feel his heartbeat.---The night was painted in shades of ruin.Smoke curled from the penthouse like the last breath of a dying star, painting the skyline in bruised gold and gray. Sirens wailed in the distance sharp, merciless cries that tore through the silence and echoed against the marble towers of the city. The air stank of gasoline, ash, and broken promises.I stood there barefoot on the cracked pavement, my dress torn and streaked with soot, the taste of blood still metallic on my tongue. My ears rang with the memory of the explosion the deafening roar, the blinding flash, the shockwave that sent me crashing into the concret







