She was given time. The moment unfolded without hurry. Patience shaped what came next. Nothing pushed her forward. Everything waited.
Odd, really. The moment didn't fit.
Once the corpse stayed where it fell - with nobody rushing back - it took Elena by quiet steps across worn stone floors. Not dragging, not hurrying, just moving under arches that held old dust. As if the path knew her boots already. This wasn't new. The air didn't shift.
Later on, the woman up front gave her name - Mirelle Harth. Next to her moved Oswin Keel, wide across the shoulders, saying nothing, so calm he might have been shaped from stone instead of breath.
Words came only when Elena broke the silence. Still, replies arrived stripped bare - somehow edited to keep just what was needed.
Later, Elena spoke up. Her words came out calm, though inside she trembled. A quiet moment passed before she wondered aloud - how common was this?
Mirelle walked on without turning. Then came her voice - soft, low - "What happens now."
"Elaborate silences after someone is killed."
A pause.
Then, calmly, "More often than it should."
Long after, the reply lingered - more than she'd thought it would.
Twisting farther than seemed possible, the hallways wound on. Twice now, she must have seen that slim window again. That thin split in the rock face stood out just as before. Damp iron floated in the air, familiar yet hard to place.
One day, her hands dropped the compass. The lines on paper made less sense each time she looked. Following paths became something she used to do. Curiosity faded like ink in rain. Trying to trace where things led - she let that go too.
"Where are we going?" she asked.
"To the king," Oswin replied.
A fact stands bare. Nothing wraps it up tight. It just sits there, clear. Not dressed in fancy words. Plain truth stays on display. Empty of extra weight. Simple bones hold it upright.
At the far edge of a stretched-out hallway stood two doors. Tall ones. Made of deep-toned timber. Thin lines cut into them - no rhythm she could name. Not like climbing plants. Not signs either. A shape caught halfway through becoming something else.
Mirelle stopped. Her fingers brushed the door, just barely touching it.
"He is expecting you," she said.
Frowning just a bit, Elena said, "Where would he even get that idea?"
Yet the doors had begun to swing wide.
Out past the door opened up into something big, yet somehow less dazzling than expected. Not a single throne stood there. There wasn't any elevated floor either. Instead, an open stretch ran along walls filled with towering glass panes, all covered by thick cloth pulls that softened daylight instead of shutting it out.
A figure appeared in the distance. He remained still near the edge. His presence broke the silence without a sound.
Standing, not sitting. No guards near him at all. Just his fingers touching the edge of a thin table - like he'd paused mid-movement, caught between arriving and staying.
Stillness took hold of Elena, just for a second.
Then he turned.
Stillness came first. A pause without warning. Then, slowly, his head turned - drawn by a sound too faint for most to notice. Something far off had caught him. Not force, but curiosity pulled him there.
Right away, his gaze landed on her eyes.
And held.
Crimson.
Darkness sat heavy around it, yet the red showed clear. Not shining, never flashing - just there. A shade that felt pulled from inside, not brushed on top. Quiet, but impossible to miss.
A weight pressed inside Elena's ribs.
It wasn't fear. Or at least, not quite.
Awareness.
"You're here now," he told her.
Quiet settled in his words. Not a hint of shock showed through. Curiosity never appeared either. Simply recognition filled the space.
Elena spoke up. I do.
Forward she moved, sensing Mirelle and Oswin holding back. Not gone - just waiting. Just giving space.
A pause stretched between them, his gaze fixed on her just past the point of ease.
"Your journey was uneventful?" he asked.
Elena exhaled softly, almost laughing - only she held it back before it could form.
"I witnessed a man die less than five minutes after stepping inside your castle."
For just a moment, something shifted in his face. A trace of change slipped across his features. His look wavered, barely noticeable. Then it was gone again.
Something lingered. Hardly noticeable. Yet present.
"I get it," he replied.
That was all.
Her head leaned a little to one side. Was that really what you had to say?
"What would you prefer?" he asked.
Her reply came later. The silence stretched first.
Because she wasn't sure.
For just one breath he stayed still, before tipping his chin down a touch.
"I am Rowan Dacre," he said. "King of Hollowthorn."
It came without noise. Light, somehow empty of what she thought would follow. Yet beneath that quiet lay a feeling - faint but fixed. Sharp where words fail.
Her voice came out quiet when she said her name.
"Yes," he said.
Too quickly.
A breath came loose the moment her voice dropped, as if he'd already heard it. Maybe even hoped.
Elena noticed.
"So you already know who I am," she said.
For a moment, Rowan stayed quiet. Away from the table he moved, drawing nearer by just a step - close, though not too close, altering what lay between them.
"I know enough," he said.
"That sounds like an answer that avoids being one."
A pause.
Out of nowhere, a trace of change crossed his face. It wasn't laughter. More like a sliver of something quieter.
"Perhaps," he said.
Elena crossed her arms lightly. "Then let me be clearer. Why am I here?"
Staring ahead, his eyes stayed fixed. Still locked on, he did not look away.
"You were invited," he said.
"I don't remember accepting."
"Yet you came."
True it was, irritatingly enough.
A breath escaped her lips as her eyes flicked to the windowpanes. Outside, the glow stayed just as it was when she walked in. Unmoving, almost like something brushed onto canvas.
"When I was a child," she said slowly, "someone told me stories about this place. Hollowthorn. A castle that didn't quite belong to the world around it."
A quiet change passed through Rowan's stance, though his face stayed the same. Not a word. Just the soft freeze of motion, as if air caught in his ribs.
"I thought they were just stories," she continued. "I'm starting to think they weren't."
Quietly, he spoke. Not a chance, those were not
A hush settled over the space for just a moment.
Now her eyes lingered on him a moment longer.
A man stood there, ordinary at first glance. What made it strange? He seemed so normal. Nothing dramatic marked his appearance. Not a hint of fangs. No ghostly skin. Calm demeanor. Neat clothes. Simply human.
Yet things felt slightly off.
Stillness clung to his stance like frost on glass. A pause that didn't breathe. Not moving, just rooted - odd in its quiet. Like time forgot to pull him forward.
His eyes stayed open longer than normal, fixed without flicker. A stillness that felt odd, almost unnatural. Not quite right, how they held their gaze. Like something behind them wasn't fully present. Long seconds passed before one slow close. Then another stretch without movement. Watching, but not in the usual way.
A quiet tightness in his fingers, as if some weight never left them.
Out of nowhere, she said, "You eat?".
Out it came, faster than her thoughts could catch up.
Something moved behind her - Mirelle adjusting, barely. A small change, but it registered.
For a moment, Rowan stayed still. Then silence stretched longer than expected.
Then, slowly, "That's an unusual question."
"I've had an unusual evening."
This moment stretches just a bit more than before.
Finally, his voice broke the silence. "I do," came out slow and steady.
Elena watched him.
"You're lying."
That comment carried no blame. Only facts sat inside it.
Nothing happened, just for a moment.
After that, just a flicker really, his gaze shifted. Still the same shade, almost unchanged. Yet the crimson looked darker now. More focused, maybe. As if whatever lived behind them had edged nearer.
"You're very direct," he said.
"I don't see the point in pretending otherwise."
Another silence.
He gave a single nod.
"Fair enough."
Just then, he shifted his stance, edging closer to the table again, like something in the talk clicked into place for him.
"You'll be given rooms in the east wing," he said. "Mirelle will see to it."
"That's it?" Elena asked. "No explanation? No attempt to reassure me that people don't regularly die in your hallways?"
His eyes darted behind him.
"No reassurance I give you would be entirely true," he said. "And I suspect you'd notice."
At any rate, it seemed truthful.
Unhelpful, but honest.
Forward she stepped, after a pause, Elena moving despite her doubt.
"One more thing," she said.
Rowan waited.
"When I said my name," she continued, "you didn't react like you were hearing it for the first time."
Again, his eyes locked onto hers.
This pause stretches further. Stillness hangs heavier now.
"You notice things," he remarked.
"That's not an answer."
"No," he agreed. "It isn't."
Just then, silence hung as if words waited behind his lips.
A flicker passed across his face - barely there, as if an idea nearly broke through.
After that, silence took its place.
"You should rest," he said instead. "Tomorrow will be… clearer."
Elena nearly smiled - just then.
Almost.
"Somehow, I doubt that," she said.
He didn't respond.
Mirelle moved ahead just then, her touch soft yet steady as she directed Elena toward the exit.
Just before stepping out, Elena turned to look back one last time.
Stillness held Rowan Dacre in place.
There he stayed, right in the spot she'd walked away from. His fingers touched the edge of the table, light but steady. Not looking at the doorway. Not scanning the walls. His eyes held still, aimed at a point beyond what was visible.
As if his eyes followed a scene invisible to her.
Still sitting here, not moving until it shows up.