Alberta stepped into the half-collapsed shrine. The air felt heavy—thick with silence and memory. Moss grew over shattered stone, yet the faded symbols of Jesmeurdam still pulsed faintly, as if they remembered her.
Her breath hitched.
"I've been here before."
Dantes, leaning just a little too casually against the wall, narrowed his eyes. "When?"
She didn't answer right away. Her fingers brushed over a broken relief—two figures entwined, their faces eroded by time.
"I used to run here. When I was little. I thought it was a dream. But it was real."
Dantes stepped forward, voice lowering. "Run from what?"
"…Things no one else could see."
She spoke like the words had waited years to be spoken.
"Duke Aslac started locking the doors after that."
The cold came quickly. Not wind, but a creeping pressure—rising from beneath the shrine itself. Alberta's amulet pulsed against her skin. Once. Twice. Then silence.
Dantes drew his blade without hesitation. "Whatever this place was… it's not just ruins."
He turned to her—really looked at her. Not the priestess, not the noble girl. Just her.
"You're connected to it."
Alberta froze. "What are you saying?"
"You knew this place. The Wane reacts to you. You said you ran here as a child—why?"
"Because I didn't understand what I saw!"
"But it did," he said, colder now, gesturing to the amulet. "Whatever's pulling us here—it knew you'd come back."
A low bell tolled in the distance.
But no wind moved it.
From behind the crumbling altar, a shadow unfurled—tall, wide, bleeding like smoke. It wasn't the Wane beast from before.
It was worse.
"We need to go," Alberta whispered.
Dantes didn't argue. But as they turned to flee, he muttered beneath his breath—
"What the hell are you?"
They didn't stop running until the edge of the shrine was a memory, swallowed by the forest's breathless hush.
Dantes winced as he leaned against a tree. His shoulder, still half-healed, throbbed beneath the makeshift bandage.
Alberta moved toward him, concern in her gaze.
He caught it.
"Don't. Start."
She hesitated. "You're still recovering. We should—"
"I said don't." His voice was sharp, but then came the smirk. "Look, if you feel the overwhelming urge to gossip, tell Francesca. She already thinks I'm an idiot."
A beat.
"But Ceasare and Cornelius?" He let out a breathy laugh, all teeth and sarcasm. "Yeah. Let's not hand those two anything. Especially not the fact that the 'dead mercenary' is walking again."
Alberta blinked. "…You really don't trust them."
He tilted his head, smile fading.
"I trust wolves more."
Then, quieter—but sharper, aimed at no one and everyone—
"Especially you… son of that betrayer."
POV: Cornelius
Somewhere, far from the shrine—under the weight of too many questions and too little truth—Cornelius felt a chill crawl down his spine. He didn't know why.
But he would soon.
And when he did, it would be too late to pretend he'd never been part of the lie.