Semua Bab The Queen of The Rouge Blood: Bab 11 - Bab 20

The sun had risen like a ghost from the ashes, spilling pale light across the rust-streaked rooftops and half-buried hills. But I stood frozen on the dorm balcony, unmoving, as if the chill had crept beneath my skin and rooted me to the spot.Sleep hadn’t touched me last night—not even for a moment. My breaths had stayed shallow and uneven, like my lungs had forgotten how to function unless prompted. My pulse still thudded in my neck, loud and urgent, as though my body knew something I didn’t.I clenched my phone in one hand. I wanted—no, needed—to turn it on and call home. To hear my parents’ voices and convince myself that I was still tethered to something normal. But I didn’t.Because that life? The one before the woman, before the fire, before Layla's scream cracked the sky? That life had slipped behind me like a burnt photograph. Until I uncovered the truth, until I knew what the hell was happening to me—I couldn't go back.I dragged myself downstairs, each step heavier than the

Matthew convinced me to go back to Cavenshade—the ghost town where nightmares didn’t just exist, they lived.I stood in the dorm hallway, dressed, packed, but not even close to ready. My hands were clenched so tight around my bag’s strap that I couldn’t feel my fingers. The burn on my stomach still pulsed like a warning siren, hidden beneath layers of clothing.Why me? Why now?My gaze landed on the dusty mirror near the front door. I looked like a ghost myself—hair limp, face pale, eyes wide and too hollow. Part of me expected to see her behind me in the reflection, burned and breathless, waiting.Footsteps sounded from the stairwell. My breath hitched.But it wasn’t Matthew. It was Jonas.He stepped into the hallway, suitcase in hand, and stopped when he saw me. His eyes narrowed—cold, accusing. There was no hello, no nod, no human decency. Just silence so sharp it cut.I opened my mouth, but no words came. Maybe it was better that way.He didn’t look away. Just stared me down like

The hallway groaned around me like it remembered the pain. My breath didn’t hitch—it was completely gone. A steel band of terror wrapped around my chest, squeezing until my ribs protested. Every step I took deeper into that house made the air colder, heavier, like the walls themselves were inhaling my fear.I glanced over my shoulder. The door was gone. Or maybe it had never been there. Either way, I was trapped in a nightmare with peeling wallpaper and the stink of soot lodged in the floorboards.This was the house—the one I had seen in my dreams, in my visions. The house where I’d first met her."Matthew?" I called, my voice barely a whisper, but there was no response. Of course there wasn’t.And then the laughter started.It wasn’t the kind of laughter that made you laugh with it. No—it crawled along your spine, a rusty chuckle laced with sorrow, like the sound of someone who had laughed so long they forgot how to cry.I slapped my hands over my ears. “Stop! Just stop!”But the hou

The whispers didn’t stop.They never really did, not even when the lab buzzed with fluorescent lights and the scent of coffee and latex gloves masked everything unnatural. The voices curled under my skin like smoke—soft, persistent, and impossible to ignore. Sometimes I caught pieces of words, names I didn’t recognize, hymns in a language I couldn’t understand. But most of the time, it was just... noise. A sound like breathing too close to my ear. Always there. Always watching.I didn’t tell Matthew.Not because I didn’t trust him. But because I did. And that’s what scared me the most.He was being too kind. Too present. Too much.We walked the halls of the lab like two normal interns working a long shift. He even handed me a cup of coffee with too much sugar—just how I liked it. I tried not to smile. He looked proud of himself.“You’re settling in really well,” he said as we entered the research bay. “Everyone’s impressed.”“Everyone?” I asked, raising an eyebrow.“Well… everyone but

It was strange how quickly things could shift. One minute, I was shattering glass with a scream. The next, I was sitting on a cracked bench outside a convenience store with Andre beside me, sharing a can of cheap beer.The night was cool, but not biting. The air held that quiet stillness only small, sleepy towns could offer—like the universe hit the mute button just for us.Andre took a long sip and exhaled. “Okay, so the guy who runs that ramen place on 3rd Street? Still alive. Still creepy. Still thinks I’m twelve.”I snorted. “He once told me I’d make a good ‘quiet bride.’ I was fourteen.”He gagged and took another sip. “Disgusting. If I ever become famous, remind me to sue him for emotional damage.”“Done.”The beer was bad—bitter and watery—but somehow perfect. For the first time in weeks, I wasn’t seeing flashes of death, or hearing whispers that didn’t belong in this world. I wasn’t watching Matthew closely to guess if he was a liar. I was just… Eztli. Sitting with someone who