Tous les chapitres de : Chapitre 21 - Chapitre 30

Grace arrived at the Hale estate carrying a leather folder stuffed with catering menus and seating charts nobody was ever going to look at. Seriously, she smoothed her skirt at the door and reminded herself this visit had nothing to do with dinner.The maid let her into the sitting room, where Tristan's mother waited, already poised on the settee like she'd been carved there years ago, hands folded, a small, unreadable smile in place.Grace set the folder down on the low table between them and took her seat across from the older woman.“I brought a few options for the dinner,” she said, sliding the folder forward.“How thoughtful of you,” Grace Tristan's mother said without looking at it once.“I wanted everything perfect for the family.”“I'm sure we can discuss menus later.”“Of course there's time for that.””The maid returned with tea, filling the porcelain cups in silence while both women waited her out, neither speaking until the door clicked shut again.“Tea Grace”“Thank you,

Sera sat in the campus library the next afternoon, her laptop open in front of her. The umbrella incident was still two chapters away, but the overpass was already gnawing at the edges of her focus. She needed a name; she needed something to hold onto besides tired eyes and a voice that wouldn't leave her alone."Pixy, can you help me search the student database?” she typed into her notes more out of habit than necessity.[I have limited access to campus records]“Limited is better than nothing.”[Understood what parameters I should search for.]“Male mid-twenties, maybe tired eyes soaked in rain”She leaned back, watching the search populate rows of names and photos, scrolling past none of them anywhere close to right.The list came back with thin faces that didn't match a jaw too soft, eyes too bright, and nothing carrying that same unnatural stillness she remembered so clearly.“None of these are him,” she muttered[Confirmed no visual matches within current parameters]“Expand the

Sera's phone rang just as she was locking up the suburb house for the night, the screen flashing Tristan's name in a way that made her stomach tighten on instinct alone.She almost let it go to voicemail.Something made her pick up."Sera, please, you have to come," the voice on the other end said, breathless and ragged in a way that sounded almost convincing."Tristan, what's going on?”"It's my mom; she collapsed. They took her to the hospital. I don't know what to do.”She sat down slowly on the porch steps, her pulse ticking up despite every warning bell already sounding somewhere in the back of her mind."Which hospital?”"St Aldric's, please, Sera. I know things are weird between us, but I can't do this alone.”"I'll be there. ”"She ended the call and sat there for a moment longer than she needed to, something about the whole exchange scraping wrong against her memory, though she couldn't place exactly why yet."Pixy," she said quietly, "can you verify a hospital admission for

The lecture hall buzzed with the usual pre-class noise: laptops opening, papers shuffling, and someone two rows back complaining about the reading load. Sera slid into her usual seat near the middle notebook, open more out of habit than any real intention to take notes.Professor Crowe swept in the way he always did, unhurried, commanding without ever seeming to try for it, silver-haired and sharp-eyed, the kind of professor students genuinely liked instead of merely tolerated."Settle in, everyone," he said, setting his materials down at the front. "Today we're doing something a little different.”A ripple of interest moved through the room, laptops closing partway, students sitting up straighter."I want to run a thought experiment," he continued, "purely hypothetical, of course.”He clicked through to a slide showing a simple diagram of a virus, a spreading infection curve, nothing dramatic, just clean academic lines."Suppose," he said, "a viral mutation emerged. Highly transmissi

Daisy showed up at the suburb house uninvited but never unwelcome, dropping onto Sera's bed with the particular heaviness of someone who hadn't slept properly in days."Please tell me you have snacks," she said. "I will accept literally anything at this point.”"There are crackers downstairs.”"Bless you.”She didn't get up right away, though, just lay there staring at the ceiling, one arm flung over her eyes, and Sera recognized the posture immediately—the stillness underneath the joke."You okay?” Sera asked."Fine, just final stress.”"Daisy""I said I'm fine.”After a moment Daisy dropped her arm from her eyes and sighed."Okay, fine, I've been having these dreams," she said."What kind of dreams?”"Stupid ones probably have brains doing finals things.”"Daisy""The city's on fire," she said finally, quieter now. "Not like a normal fire. Everything—buildings, streets, Everything I'm running, and I can't see what I'm running from. I just know I have to keep going orShe stopped."O