A woman in an elaborate gown stood at the corner, hands raised as if adjusting a mirror that wasn't there. She repeated the same gestures over and over. Patting her hair, touching her throat, smoothing her skirts. Her mouth moved in silent words.
"She's getting ready for a party," Dante said quietly, and Brynn hated how his voice softened with compassion. Hated that even now, even when she was angry with him, glimpses of the man beneath the Reaper made her chest ache. "One that happened sixty years ago. She's been preparing for it ever since."
Her throat tightened.
Trapped in a single moment. Unable to let go. Repeating the same actions forever because moving on meant acknowledging what was lost.
She glanced at Dante before she could stop herself.
Is that what he's doing? Trapped in the moment Elizabeth died?
Near a lamppost, a man in a soldier's uniform marched ten steps forward, stopped, saluted an empty space, then turned and marched ten steps back. His boots struck the stones in perfect rhythm.
"He's delivering a message," Dante continued. "Orders that might have saved his regiment, if they'd arrived in time."
The weight of repetition pressed against Brynn's mind. These weren't just ghosts. They were souls caught in the most critical moments of their existence, playing them out forever because they couldn't accept that the moment had passed.
"How do you resist it?" she asked, watching a child chase the same ethereal butterfly in a circle.
"Focus on what's real now, not what was real then." His voice carried the weight of experience. "They can pull the living into their patterns if you're not careful."
She tried counting her heartbeats to track the passage of time, but even that felt unreliable. Her pulse seemed to slow and quicken without rhythm. Steps that should have taken seconds dragged on for minutes. Conversations felt rushed even when spoken slowly.
Around them, the spirits began to take notice. Not threatening, but curious in a way that made her skin crawl. Their movements slowed as the living visitors passed, and she caught fragments of their words:
"…told him I would write, but the letter's still on my desk…"
"…if I'd just left five minutes earlier…"
"…she never knew how sorry I was, how sorry I am, how sorry…"
The repetitive nature of their words created an almost musical quality, a chorus of regret that seemed to harmonize with the fog. Brynn found herself slowing to listen, to understand what each spirit was trying to resolve.
A cool tendril of shadow wrapped around her waist.
Her breath caught.
The shadow wrapped around her middle like a possessive hand, pulling her back from the spirits. It pressed against her ribs, curled around the curve of her hip, held her with an intimacy that made her pulse stutter.
Cool pressure that felt almost like a caress. Almost like being claimed.
She looked back at Dante.
He stood frozen, every line of his body rigid. His eyes were fixed on where his shadow wrapped around her like he couldn't quite believe what his power was doing.
Like he couldn't make himself call it back.
The shadow tightened.
Her mouth went dry.
For a moment, neither of them moved. The air between them crackled.
Then he yanked it back, his hands flexing at his sides.
"Don't listen too closely," he said, voice hoarse. "Their regrets are contagious. You start thinking about your own mistakes. That's how they pull you in."
It was too late for his warning. She was already thinking about her parents—the words she'd never said. The life stolen from all of them. The grief felt suddenly fresh, as if it had happened yesterday.
