L I R A

The chapel feels too crowded for how cold it is. Rows of students shuffle into lines, uniforms pressed, collars stiff. Heritage ceremonies are supposed to be boring, tradition, headcounts, council speeches about pride. But nothing about today hums right.

The names are called in no order I recognize. Not alphabetical, not by grade. Just…random. Alma Sorell before Jace Moriyama, then someone from track whose name I barely know, then Pia’s. People whisper, trading confused looks. Even Ezra frowns, and Ezra never frowns during school functions.

The choir starts up, twins leading with their eerie harmony. But the pitch slides sideways, sharp where it should be warm. It makes the pew wood vibrate under my palms, like the whole building’s out of tune.

I glance toward Sister Margo at the podium. Her eyes are closed, lips moving around words I can’t quite hear. It isn’t the school’s anthem. It isn’t even Latin. It’s…something else. The twins hum louder, following her rhythm, and the sound warps until it feels like a rope strung too tight.

My chest hurts. A pressure, faint but growing, pressing under my ribs like I swallowed static.

Ezra notices my shift. He leans just enough to whisper, “You okay?” His tone is calm, but his eyes track every twitch in my face like he’s already mapping it into a pattern.

I nod, but my throat is too dry for words. The names keep coming, strange groupings, pauses too long. Every time Sister Margo says one, the choir hums again, like punctuation.

Mara is recording from the aisle, her lens flashing faint. When she lowers it, her brows knit. “Glitching,” she mouths at me. She tilts her camera again. The twin on the left appears normal through the lens, but the right one? Nothing. Just a blank space where a body should be.

I shiver.

The hum deepens. My bones start to vibrate like tuning forks. Students around me rub their arms, frown at the sudden chill, but no one speaks up. The ceremony keeps pulling forward, unstoppable, like we’re all part of a script we didn’t agree to read.

The wood of the chapel wall creaks. My breath clouds faint, even though it isn’t winter.

And then a faint, icy lines begin sketching themselves across the paneling near the altar. Not letters. Not yet. Just the threat of them.

The pressure in my chest doesn’t fade. It sharpens. Each breath feels like I’m inhaling through broken glass.

The names echo, bouncing wrong inside the chapel. My classmates shuffle in the pews, restless but too polite to question. No one else hears the difference, not the way I do. To them, it’s just a choir piece slightly out of tune. To me, it’s a countdown.

The sound threads into my bones, tugging. My ribs ache like the bell itself is trying to vibrate through me. I press a hand against my sternum, as if I can hold myself steady.

Ezra notices, of course he does. He leans close again, voice taut but quiet. “Lira.” Just my name. A question disguised as a warning. His hand hovers, not quite touching my arm.

I want to answer, but the resonance swells. Too loud, too real. My head tips back involuntarily, eyes catching on the rafters above the altar. For a second, I swear I hear it, the low scrape of a bell preparing to toll. Not yet. Not audible to anyone else. But I feel it coiling, waiting.

The choir twins hum another note, and the air wavers. Mara’s camera clicks, then stutters into static. She swats it like that’ll help, muttering something I can’t hear.

My vision blurs at the edges, frost spidering faintly across the wood beams above. No one else reacts. I bite down on a gasp, forcing my breath shallow.

Because it’s here. The bell.

It isn’t ringing. Not yet. But its presence wraps around me, heavier than any hymn. The resonance doesn’t sound like music, it feels like pressure, like something ancient pressing its hand against my chest to remind me I belong to it.

I squeeze my eyes shut, willing it away, but the vibration only climbs. It rattles my teeth, trembles through the pew beneath me.

Ezra’s whisper threads sharp: “What’s happening?”

I don’t answer. If I open my mouth, I’m afraid the bell will answer for me.

Instead, I grip the wooden pew until splinters dig into my palm. The pain anchors me, barely. My heart slams in uneven rhythm, like it’s not beating for me anymore, but syncing to a toll that hasn’t struck.

The frost along the rafters thickens. Lines connect, curve, try to shape into letters. My skin crawls.

LIST

The script stutters out before finishing, like even the wall is holding its breath.

And that’s when Sister Margo lifts her hands at the podium.

Her lips part. But the words that pour out aren’t prayer.

They’re command.

Sister Margo spreads her hands wide, eyes shut, face tilted toward the vaulted ceiling like she’s listening to something only she can hear. The choir cuts off mid-phrase. The silence aches.

Then she starts to speak.

The words don’t belong to our hymnals. They’re rough, jagged syllables that scrape at the air, not soft prayers but something older, harsher. Every note the twins hum beneath her turns the chapel colder, their pitch bending sharp until it thrums against my teeth.

I brace a hand against the pew, because the resonance spikes hard. My ribs vibrate like they’re tuning forks struck all at once. My vision swims.

The fog enters her voice.

It slides through the chapel doors in long, pale streams, curling along the aisle, winding between shoes. Not like the weather. Not like smoke. It’s thicker, dense, and deliberate. Liquid breath.

A girl in front of me squeaks when it brushes her ankle. Another kid swats at it like it’s a bug, but the fog only climbs higher, licking at calves, sliding up knees. Students murmur nervously, some glancing toward the teachers along the walls, but none of the adults move. Not one.

Ezra leans close, his whisper fierce. “Lira. Don’t move.” His grip hovers near my sleeve, ready to anchor me.

But the fog doesn’t feel like it wants us to move. It feels like it wants us to listen. Each inhale chills my throat, thin as ice. And in the currents of it, I swear I hear my name, faint, distorted, like it’s been dragged through water.

Lira.

My pulse stutters.

Sister Margo’s voice rises, her chant unfurling into something that rattles the stained glass. Her lips curve into a smile, beatific, as if this isn’t terror, but salvation.

The fog curls higher. Whispers thicken. My bones ache with the bell’s not-quite toll.

And then, footsteps cut the chant in half.

Callen emerges from the fog, hood shadowed, storm-gray eyes locked on me. The mist parts around him, recoiling, as if it knows he doesn’t belong to it.

He stops between me and the podium. His voice is low, but it carries.

“Not this time.”