That hits me somewhere low and dangerous.
“I noticed you don’t like the other guys,” I say after a moment. “The ones with the Halloween masks.”
A flicker of irritation crosses his face before it’s smoothed away. “They mistake spectacle for authority,” he says. “Noise for power. They act like it’s dress-up day at school. They’re performative and frivolous. There are better uses for masks. As you will see.”
“Really?”
“Masks are for erasing the man inside,” he says almost dreamily, looking up at a dingy, cracked skylight coated in bird shit.
Silence stretches between us, long enough to stop feeling empty and start feeling charged.
“Why are you telling me this?” I ask finally.
He considers me, head tilted slightly, as if the answer isn’t simple.
“Because you brought it up,” he says. “And because I’d rather you hear it from someone who doesn’t enjoy watching you misunderstand.”
That feels like a warning. Or an offer.
He shifts again, subtly adjusting his stance so the space between us narrows without changing the fact that he still hasn’t touched me. The proximity makes my breath hitch despite myself.
It grinds on me that he notices.
“Be careful,” he says. “You’re starting to confuse proximity with permission.”
“And you’re starting to confuse self-restraint with kindness,” I reply.
For the first time, something sparks behind his eyes. Not anger. Interest. “Kindness,” he says, “is expensive.”
“And self-restraint?”
“Self-restraint is free.”
We hold each other’s gaze, the moment stretching thin and dangerous. Then he steps back. Just like that. The corridor opens again. Air rushes into the space he vacated, and I feel the absence more sharply than the closeness.
“You’ll be moved later,” he says. “Until then, stay where you are.”
“Or?” I ask.
He glances back over his shoulder as he turns away. “Or you’ll learn the difference between being noticed and being protected.”
He leaves without another word.
I sit there, pulse still elevated, skin buzzing, aware of every inch of space where he stood.
No touch. No threat. Just containment—and the unsettling knowledge that part of me wants to know exactly how far his control extends.
Because whatever this is?—
It’s deliberate. And it’s only just begun.
23
VI
Time drags once Armen leaves.
Not dramatically. Not in a way I would’ve noticed before the Hunt. It drags the way a room does when people stop pretending to be busy, when the noise thins, the movement slows, and what’s left behind feels heavier because there’s nothing distracting you from it. Like a freeze frame.
