He sighed and sat on the edge of the bed, rubbing his temples. Sleep would be useless. His mind was too wired, too full of possibilities and threats.
A knock at the door made him tense instantly.
No one visited him unannounced.
He reached for the knife hidden under the mattress, moving to the door without making a sound. He pressed his ear against the wood. Silence.
Then, another knock. Softer this ti.
Jude flipped the knife in his grip and opened the door just enough to see who it was.
A woman stood there, dark hair pulled back, sharp eyes scanning his face.
"You’re a hard man to find," she said.
Jude didn’t lower the knife. "Depends on who’s looking."
She gave a small, amused smile. "If I ant you harm, I wouldn’t have knocked."
"Try again."
She sighed. "I’m not here to fight, Jude. But if you make stand in this hallway much longer, I might change my mind."
Jude hesitated. There was sothing about her ,sothing that set off every instinct in his body, but not in a way that scread danger . Not yet.
He stepped back, gesturing for her to enter.
She did, eyes flicking briefly to the entity before settling back on him. "So, it’s true," she murmured. "You really have one."
Jude closed the door behind her. "You know what it is."
"I know of it," she corrected, leaning against the wall. "And I know the people watching you are terrified."
Jude watched her carefully. "Who are you?"
She smirked. "Let’s not start with nas. Nas co with assumptions, and we don’t know each other well enough for that."
Jude exhaled sharply. "Then why are you here?"
"To offer you sothing."
He raised an eyebrow. "And what’s that?"
"A choice."
Jude leaned against the opposite wall, crossing his arms. "I don’t like gas."
"This isn’t a ga, Jude. You’re in the middle of sothing bigger than you realize. The people watching you? They aren’t just so underground group looking to control rogue powers. They’re part of sothing old. Sothing that’s been dealing with entities like yours for centuries."
Jude’s grip on the knife tightened. "Then why haven’t they done anything yet?"
"Because they don’t know if you’re worth the effort."
That stung more than it should have.
The woman pushed away from the wall, stepping closer. "You have two options. You can keep going like this ,alone, hunted, always looking over your shoulder, waiting for them to make their move. Or ," She tilted her head slightly. "You can learn how to fight back."
Jude narrowed his eyes. "And you’re offering to teach ?"
"I’m offering to help you survive."
He studied her, weighing the risk. "What’s in it for you?"
Her expression didn’t change, but there was sothing in her gaze ,sothing unreadable. "I have my own reasons for wanting to see them fail."
That wasn’t an answer, not really. But it was enough for now.
Jude glanced at the entity, still hovering silently nearby. Then he looked back at the woman.
"If I say yes, what happens next?"
A slow smile spread across her lips. "Then we stop waiting for them to make a move."
The night air in Leonork carried a weight that pressed against the skin, thick with the scent of damp asphalt and distant exhaust. The streets were quieter now, but silence was never truly silence in this city. There was always sothing beneath it ,the faint hum of electricity, the rustle of unseen movent, the whispers of things that didn’t quite belong. Jude had learned to listen to those sounds, to separate the ordinary from the unnatural. And tonight, he could hear it.
The woman, still standing in his apartnt, studied him with a patience that set his nerves on edge. She hadn’t given a na, hadn’t given much at all except the promise of knowledge, but Jude knew better than to trust a stranger offering answers so freely. He had spent too long living in the space between knowing and surviving to believe in easy solutions.
He let the silence stretch between them, waiting to see if she would break first. She didn’t.
Finally, he spoke. "If you know who’s after , why should I trust you?"
Her expression didn’t change. "I never said you should."
That caught him off guard. Most people tried to convince, tried to push their way into trust. She didn’t.
She leaned back against the wall, arms crossed, as if she had all the ti in the world. "I don’t need you to trust . I just need you to understand that you’re running out of ti."
Jude glanced toward the entity, its form still and patient, watching without eyes. It had been with him long enough for him to recognize when it was alert. It didn’t react to normal things the way people did ,it responded to threats . And right now, it wasn’t recoiling from her presence. That, more than anything, unsettled him.
He t her gaze again. "How do you know about them?"
"They’ve been doing this a long ti," she said. "Long before you. Long before . People like us don’t just slip through the cracks unnoticed."
"People like us?"
Sothing flickered in her eyes, gone too fast to catch. "You think you’re the first?"
Jude’s fingers tightened slightly. "You’ve had one too."
"I have one," she corrected.
That stopped him. His instincts scread at him to be careful, to put distance between himself and whatever she was, but there was no fear in her posture. No threat.
She exhaled slowly, watching him with a sharpness that reminded him of a blade held just out of sight. "They don’t just go away, Jude. Whatever you think this thing is, whatever you’ve been telling yourself ,it’s more than that."
Jude stayed silent.
"You’ve seen it," she continued. "How it changes, how it reacts to you. But you haven’t figured out what it wants yet, have you?"
He hated how close she was to the truth.
Reviews
All reviews (0)