I’mthere. And he’s watching me remember.
The chapel vanishes. Not in fire or smoke, but in a slow, terrifying pull of a curtain.
Suddenly I’m there again. A hallway, flickering with the ghosts of candlelight. Cold tile biting at my bare feet. That sickly-sweet smell of burning incense and something worse—something rotten, like spoiled wine and dried blood.
I blink, but I can’t wake up. My chest rises in short, sharp bursts. This is a door I locked years ago… and it’s swinging wide.
I see a girl walking ahead of me. Me. A younger version of myself with tangled hair and hollow eyes, wearing a white dress that became seductive only because they told us purity meantobedience. She walks stiffly, trying to disappear inside her own skin so the darkness won’t notice her.
But it always did. He always did.
A hand reaches from a cracked-open door. Thin, dry-skinned fingers curling in a beckoning gesture. I watch my younger self freeze. Her eyes scream.
And then—a shadow. A boy. Damien.
Not the man I know now, but the child he used to be—shoulders tense, jaw locked, fury in his expression. I watch him lunge forward. I watch him shove the man’s arm back and slam the door shut. His voice cracks when he screams, but he fights like he’s made of pure vengeance.
And then he’s dragging me away.
Just before the memory blurs, I see his eyes flick to the candle flames. I see his door. The one the priest used to keep him in. And I know.
He didn’t just burn the man. He tried to burn the memory out of the world.
The vision snaps away like a whip.
I jolt upright with a gasp that tears through my throat. My body is soaked in sweat, the cold air hitting my raw skin.
“Raven.” His voice is tight. I can’t look at him yet.
“He wanted me too,” I whisper, the realisation carving itself into my lungs. “He said I was… special.”
Damien’s silence is an answer.
“You knew,” I say, turning to him.
He looks shattered. Not the obsessive stalker, but just Damien. A boy who grew up in hell and dragged me out before I knew I’d been swallowed.
“I saved a ghost,” he murmurs, his voice splinters. “You weren’t you anymore. And I… I wasn’t me either.”
I reach for him, and his body crumbles against mine.
“Why did you find me again?”
“Because I couldn’t live in a world where you didn’t remember me.”
His confession wraps around my spine like a noose. He’s been drowning in this while I lived a lie.
“Damien, how much do you remember?”
“I remember everything, Raven. I remember the way he looked at you—like he already owned you. I remember the night I set him on fire. I remember thinking if I could just get you out—if I could just keep you safe—I’d survive anything.”
I press my palm to his chest. His heart is racing.
“Why didn’t you tell me?”
“Because you were already broken. I didn’t want to be the one to remind you of what did it.”
I step closer. “You said I left you. That I walked away.”
