Doors lined both sides of the corridor. Most were sealed, their access panels dead, but one at the far end showed a faint greenglow. He approached it cautiously, every sense alert for traps or alarms.
The door slid open at his touch.
Beyond lay a room unlike anything else in the tower. Where Liora’s spaces were warm and lived-in, this chamber was sterile—white walls, white floor, white ceiling, all gleaming under harsh overhead lights that flickered to life as he entered. Medical equipment lined the walls: scanners, diagnostic terminals, and a table that looked disturbingly like an operating surface. Everything was covered in a thin layer of dust, untouched for years.
But it was the storage unit in the corner that drew his attention, still humming with active power despite the neglect surrounding it. The unit’s display showed a single prompt: AUTHORIZATION REQUIRED.
He tried the obvious first—Liora’s name, the tower’s designation, a series of numerical combinations based on dates he’d gleaned from her stories. Nothing worked.
Then, on impulse, he typed: NURSEMAID.
The unit clicked. A drawer slid open, revealing a collection of data crystals nestled in protective foam. Each was labeled in careful handwriting: Day One. Week Three. Month Six. Year One. Year Five. Year Twelve.
Year Twelve. The year the nursemaid had died.
He took the first crystal and looked for a playback device. He found one built into the wall, old technology, but still functional, and inserted the first crystal.
The female who appeared on the screen was older than he’d expected with grey hair pulled back in a severe knot and deep lines carved around her mouth and eyes, but her gaze was sharp. She sat in this very room, the medical equipment visible behind her, a tablet clutched in weathered hands.
“Day one,” she said. Her voice was raspy, as if she’d spent years breathing recycled air. “The infant arrived this morning. Healthy, by all external measures. Three months old. Beautiful. Golden hair like her mother’s.” A pause. “The father was... brief. He gave me my instructions and left within the hour. I don’t think he could bear to stay longer. The resemblance to her mother is too strong.”
He leaned closer to the screen.
“My orders are clear. Raise the child. Protect the child. Never allow her to leave the tower. Never allow anyone else to enter.” The female’s expression tightened. “And never, under any circumstances, allow her blood to be collected or analyzed by outside parties.”
Blood.
They’d known. Even at three months old, they’d known.
He removed the first crystal and inserted another. Year Five.
The nursemaid looked older now, more tired, but her voice remained steady.
“She scraped her knee today. She was climbing the greenhouse shelves to reach a plant she wanted to examine. I cleaned the wound and applied a bandage, as any caretaker would. But then I noticed...”
A pause. The woman’s hands trembled slightly as she adjusted something off-screen.
“The bleeding stopped within seconds. By the time I’d prepared the antiseptic, the wound had already begun closing. An hour later, there was no trace that it had ever existed.”
Year Eight.
“I’ve been conducting discreet tests. Nothing that would alarm her—just a few drops when she inevitably cuts herself during her experiments. The results are... unprecedented. Her blood doesn’t just heal her own body. It heals anything it touches. Damaged tissue regenerates. Infections clear. In laboratory conditions, it even shows signs of reversing cellular degradation.”
His jaw tightened.
“I understand now why her father built this tower. Why he programmed ARIS with such strict protocols. Why he chose such an isolated location for her prison.”
Prison.The nursemaid had used the same word Liora was beginning to use.
“If anyone discovered what her blood could do... the wars that would be fought over her. The experiments. The captivity that would make this tower seem like paradise.”
Year Twelve.
The woman on the screen looked like death. Pale, thin, her hands shaking so badly she could barely hold the tablet. But her eyes were fierce.
“I’m dying. Some kind of systemic failure—ARIS can’t determine the cause, and there’s no treatment available here. Fitting, perhaps. I’ve spent twelve years in isolation, caring for a child who will never know why she’s truly trapped here. Maybe this is the universe’s way of releasing me.”
A rattling cough. The nursemaid paused, gathering herself.
