The dreams had begun to bleed into her waking hours, refusing to be contained by the fragile boundary between sleep and reality.
Kaelith couldn't remember the last time she'd had a full night of rest. Not that she needed it. She'd trained her body and mind for exhaustion. Residency had taught her how to survive on nothing but caffeine and sheer will. Years in forensic psychiatry had taught her to lock her emotions behind walls thicker than any padded cell.
But nothing—nothing—had prepared her for him.
Saevus Caelum was no longer just a patient.
He was an itch beneath her skin. A shadow too long and dark to be cast by daylight. A whisper she wasn't sure existed outside her mind.
She stared at her reflection in the dark glass of her office window. Her face was unchanged, but her eyes weren't hers anymore. They belonged to someone unraveling from the inside out.
She didn't tell anyone. Not about the dreams. Not about the fire that flared under her skin every time he spoke her name. Not about the way her hands trembled when she reached for the doorknob to the west wing.
If she did, they'd pull her from the case.
And for reasons she dared not examine, the thought of that made her stomach twist.
The intercom crackled.
"Dr. Nyraen. Patient 77 is secured and awaiting your clearance."
She didn't answer.
She only reached for her coat, squared her shoulders, and stepped toward the one place in the building that made her pulse race for reasons no textbook could explain.
The hallway outside Cell 77 was quieter than usual. Reverent, almost.
This time, she didn't look at the guard.
She just gave a single nod.
The door buzzed. The lock groaned.
There he was.
Exactly where she'd left him.
Only now, Saevus stood.
His hands folded neatly behind his back, his eyes lifted to meet hers—waiting like a man who had expected her since before birth.
She didn't flinch.
She didn't say a word.
But he smiled anyway.
"You came back."
"I'm assigned to you," she said, voice clipped and controlled. "This is a schedule. Not sentiment."
He stepped closer to the table. "Tell yourself that as many times as you need."
Kaelith sat down slowly, her hands brushing the edge of the table before folding in her lap.
She didn't open her folder.
She didn't need to.
"I want to talk about the woman in Montana," she said.
Saevus blinked slowly. "Is that what we're calling her?"
"Her name was Amara Vale. Twenty-five years old. She disappeared three months before your surrender."
"And reappeared," he said quietly, "four days after."
"In a hospital," Kaelith said, voice hardening. "Comatose. Covered in the symbols your cult used. Want to explain that?"
He said nothing.
Just stared at her like he was hearing something else entirely.
Then, after a long pause, he murmured, "Do you know what Amara used to dream about, Kaelith?"
She swallowed hard, narrowing her eyes. "You knew her."
His gaze darkened. "I knew all of them. Every single one who believed in what we were building."
Kaelith's voice sharpened. "Did you hurt them? Did you break them?"
He shook his head slowly. "No. I gave them purpose. A reason to hold on when everything else was falling apart."
"That's not an answer," she pressed, her voice rising. "You either protected them or destroyed them. Which is it?"
He leaned forward, his eyes locking with hers. "It's neither simple nor easy. It's a truth you're not ready to accept yet."
Kaelith leaned in, jaw tight. "I'm not here to be converted, Saevus."
"No," he said softly. "You're here to be remembered."
Her fingers clenched into fists.
"Why do you keep saying that?" she demanded. "What the hell do you think I've forgotten?"
"You think I'm in this cage because I'm guilty," he said quietly. "But I walked into it. Because the only way to bring you back was to find you where they put you."
She stared at him.
Her heart pounded hard in her chest.
"You surrendered… for me?"
"No." His smile was slow, deliberate. "I returned for you."
The silence between them stretched—heavy and full—like the moment before a storm breaks open the sky.
Kaelith stood abruptly.
This time, he didn't try to stop her.
But as she reached the door, his voice trailed after her like smoke curling in the cold air.
"Do you still have the scar?"
She froze.
Her hand hovered over the steel door.
"What scar?"
His voice was barely a whisper.
"Behind your left ear. The one no one ever noticed—not even you—because you forgot the night it happened."
She didn't turn.
Didn't answer.
She just opened the door and stepped out into the cold hallway.
That night, alone in her office, Kaelith stood in front of the mirror, hair pulled aside, fingers trembling as they brushed behind her ear.
And found it.
A faint ridge. Pale. Almost invisible.
But real.
She stared at it.
Stared at herself.
And for the first time, she didn't know which reflection was the stranger.