The crystal hum of the Spire deepened as Kurumi pressed her gloved palm to the containment glyph. A pulse of warmth licked her skin, and for a moment, she swore she heard someone sigh inside.
She exhaled sharply, hand trembling.
"Focus," she muttered to herself. "Mind stable. Glyphs aligned. No leaks."
But the glyphs weren't aligned. Not anymore.
They pulsed in time with her heartbeat.
The Queen's stasis crystal, once pristine and silent, now shimmered with a sickly inner fire. Fresha's hair floated like silver ink in the gel, her eyes half-lidded and flickering beneath lashes that hadn't moved in years.
Kurumi didn't notice the first hallucination.
A strand of hair brushed her cheek.
Except she had tied her hair back this morning. Tightly.
She reached up slowly—nothing there.
Then she saw it. Not in the crystal—but behind it.
A reflection.
Her own face—no, Fresha's face—smiling at her from the mirrored glass, eyes twinkling with amusement.
"You remember, don't you?" the reflection said. "How warm it was? His hands… the way he said your name like a promise."
Kurumi staggered back, clutching her head.
"Not real," she hissed. "Not again—"
But the vision didn't stop.
She blinked—and found herself in a different time. The crystal chamber had vanished, replaced by moonlight streaming through a stained glass window. She stood on a marble balcony, wearing a white velvet robe, barefoot.
And in front of her… Justin.
Much younger. Eyes wide, voice cracking.
"Don't do it," he begged.
His tunic was open at the chest, revealing glyph scars along his collarbone. Old, raw. A pledge to a queen he once loved—or still did.
Kurumi couldn't speak. She could only watch, paralyzed in the memory.
"You don't need to erase it," Justin pleaded, stepping forward. "I remember what I said. I remember her. What we were. If you take that from me… who am I to you anymore?"
Fresha's voice—her voice—whispered from Kurumi's lips. "Someone who'll do what I ask. Because he must."
Kurumi felt tears roll down her cheeks, even though she wasn't crying.
"Please," younger Justin whispered. "If you erase it, I won't love you anymore."
A kiss. Soft. Painful.
Then darkness.
Kurumi snapped back to the present, gasping, fingers clawing at her robes. She'd collapsed against the side of the crystal. Her legs were sprawled on the floor, exposed slightly through her torn slit-skirt. Her stockings clung damp to her thighs, sweat-drenched. She was panting.
From inside the crystal, the Queen's body twitched.
A voice echoed in Kurumi's skull—no, deeper. Her chest.
"Vessel."
Kurumi shivered.
"Stop calling me that," she whispered, her voice breaking. "I'm not your anchor. I sealed you. I was loyal."
"Loyal? You carried my heart into exile. You spoke my name while touching yourself in the dark."
Kurumi slammed her fist against the floor. "Enough!"
The Queen's laughter echoed across the chamber—though her body didn't move.
The glyphs on the crystal shifted. A new one emerged.
Intimacy.
"Why now?" Kurumi asked, fingers trembling. "Why me?"
"Because he failed me."
The doors hissed open.
Kurumi scrambled to her feet, wiping her mouth and flattening her skirt as Justin entered. His steps halted instantly at the sight of her disheveled appearance—her pale chest heaving, cheeks flushed, legs half-curled beneath her robes.
"Kurumi," he said carefully. "What… happened?"
She turned away. "Nothing. A spike in resonance. I had to stabilize her."
Justin approached, eyes flicking between her and the crystal. "That's not all. I felt it."
Kurumi clenched her jaw. "I said I handled it."
Justin stood in silence for a long moment. Then, softly: "She's reaching out to you now… not me."
Kurumi didn't respond.
"She never spoke to me in visions," he said, almost bitterly. "Never called me a vessel."
Kurumi turned, her violet eyes sharp. "You tried to stop her before the rebellion. That's why she locked you out."
Justin's face hardened. "You saw it?"
"I lived it," Kurumi whispered. "I was her then."
He took a step closer. "She's choosing you. She wants you to remember everything."
"I don't want it."
"But you already do." He touched her shoulder. "Don't you?"
She trembled again. She could feel her skin buzz beneath his fingers. Not from him—but from her. The Queen.
"She showed me the night you begged her," Kurumi murmured. "You cried. You kissed her."
"I loved her."
"She erased it."
"I asked her to," he said, voice low. "After I betrayed her. After I told the Council."
Silence.
Kurumi's voice cracked. "Why didn't she choose you again?"
Justin looked up at the Queen's body, suspended in crystal.
"She doesn't want love anymore."
Kurumi stepped back from his hand.
"She wants control."
A glyph pulsed at the back of her neck.
Justin noticed.
His voice turned sharp. "You've been marked."
Kurumi's eyes widened. "No. I would have felt—"
He grabbed her wrist, drawing her toward the light.
"Turn around."
She hesitated.
"I said turn."
Kurumi turned.
Justin parted her hair and gasped. A glowing glyph—a shared one—flared just beneath her collarbone, high on her spine.
Not just any glyph.
Memory Transfer.
He looked down. His hand, still on her back, began to tremble.
"She's not just using you to wake," he whispered. "She's embedding herself into you."
Kurumi turned around, her breath hot.
"She wants to survive," she said. "And I'm just the vessel."
"You're more than that."
She looked up.
His eyes searched hers. And for a moment, the room tilted.
Not because of glyph pressure.
But because of them.
He was standing too close. Her chest still rose and fell rapidly. She was keenly aware of the way his eyes sometimes drifted—lower than they should. She wanted them to.
A beat passed.
He stepped back.
"You need to be monitored. No more unsupervised visits to the crystal."
"I'm the only one who can stabilize her," Kurumi snapped.
"Then I'll do it with you."
Kurumi gave a half-smile. "Jealous of a ghost, Justin?"
He didn't answer.
She brushed past him toward the door, hips swaying just slightly.
Before she left, she looked back.
"I remember everything now," she said. "Even the way she touched your face when you slept."
Justin's breath caught.
"Be careful," she whispered. "You might not be her anchor anymore. But I'm starting to think I'm not either."
He watched her go.
And behind him, the Queen's body smiled in her sleep.
---
To Be Continued.