L I R A

I don’t breathe until I’m three turns down the hall. My shoes slap tiles too loudly. Everything echoes. I’m pretty sure half the school hears my heartbeat ricocheting off the lockers. My throat burns, but I can’t stop moving. Not after the way Ezra looked at me. Not after the way Callen held my wrist like he’d been wired into my pulse.

Stupid. I’m so stupid. I cut through a side corridor, nearly slipping on the glossy floor wax someone forgot to dry. A knot forms between my ribs, tight and mean. God. Ezra’s face when he saw us. Shock first, then something brittle twisting behind his eyes.

And Callen— No. Thinking about the way his thumb brushed the inside of my wrist makes my stomach flip over. I can feel the ghost of that touch like it’s still there, lingering under the skin. The lockers beside me shiver. Not metaphorically. Literally. A thin frost quivers along the top vents, skittering like a nervous animal.

“Oh, come on,” I whisper. “Not now.” The hum starts again. Low. Pressure building in the air like someone slowly pushing a hand against the back of my neck. I wrap my arms around myself and inhale sharply through my nose.

If I go to a crowded hallway, the whispers will swallow me alive. If I run outside, the fog tends to follow. My feet already know where I’m going before I decide anything. The choir loft. Of course. The one place quiet enough to hear yourself break.

The loft greets me with a breath so cold it hurts my teeth. The door creaks behind me and I wince. Even the sound feels too loud. Too sharp. The air smells like dust and sheet music no one’s opened in a decade.

A crow sits on the outside ledge of the stained-glass window. Its black shape is just a cutout against the bruised-looking sky. It tilts its head at me like it’s disappointed. Tink. Its beak taps the glass. Frost spiders out from the tap point, a slow white burst that crawls like veins. I swallow hard, backing up a step on instinct.

“Please don’t start writing,” I whisper. “Just.. take the afternoon off.” The frost twitches like it heard me. Great.

I press a hand to my forehead and squeeze my eyes shut. I can still feel Ezra’s voice chasing me down the hall, even though he never said a word. I can still feel Callen’s fingers on my wrist, warm and steady and wrong in a way that makes my skin buzz. Why me? Why any of this? The hum pulses, louder now. Like the tower itself took a breath.

“Lira.” My heart nearly punches out of my chest. Callen stands in the arch of the doorway, hood down this time, hair mussed like he dragged a hand through it on his way up. His chest rises a little too fast, like he ran. Or like something pulled him here harder than gravity ever could.

“You shouldn’t be up here alone,” he says. His voice is lower than it was in the hall. Rough at the edges.

I cross my arms over my chest. “You can’t keep saying that every time I exist somewhere.”

His jaw flexes once. “Then stop existing in cursed places.”

“If I knew how to do that, I’d teach a class.” He steps inside, and the hum jumps like it recognizes him. The frost on the glass brightens, following his movement. His wristband, half hidden under his sleeve gives a faint metallic pulse. Like a heartbeat not his own. I notice. He notices me noticing. He tucks his hand into his pocket.

“Why did you follow me?” I ask, and I hate how small my voice sounds.

“I didn’t.” He glances toward the window. “It did.”

The frost threads one shaky line downward, almost a scratch. Like a warning. Great. Beautiful. Perfect. I let out a shaky breath and rest a hand on the railing, just to steady myself. The room swims for a second. Everything feels too close, Callen, the cold, my own thoughts. I drop my gaze to the floor.

“About the hallway,” I start.

“Don’t,” he says. Quiet but firm. I look up at him. His eyes, God, those eyes—are storm gray today, like all the color drained out.

“You were scared,” he says. “That’s all I was responding to.”

“You grabbed me like.. ”  I bite my tongue. Too late. The words already want to spill.

“Like what?” he asks. Not challenging. Just honest.

“Like you knew what I was feeling before I did.” His breath catches. Barely. A fraction. But I hear it.

“I did,” he says. My stomach swoops. He takes one step closer. Slow. Testing. The railing presses into the back of my legs because apparently I forgot how to move.

“Lira,” he says softly, “you were breaking. I felt it across the hall.” That shouldn’t make sense. But it does. It makes horrifying, dangerous sense.

I drop my gaze to the floor. “Ezra saw us.”

“I know.” Of course he does. He senses everything. His hand lifts, hesitates and then the back of his fingers graze my cheekbone. Barely a touch. More a question than anything else. My heartbeat stumbles forward like it’s trying to crash into his.

“Tell me to stop,” Callen says. Quiet. Too quiet. I can’t. My throat closes around the word. He steps closer until the cold air between us warms. His fingers slide from my cheek to my jaw, his palm cupping lightly like I’ll shatter if he applies a gram more pressure. His other hand braces on the railing beside mine, boxing us in without touching anywhere else. My breath stutters. Everything inside me tightens at once.

“Look at me,” he murmurs. I do. His face is so close I can see the tiny crescent scar near his mouth. His breath brushes mine. My pulse is going too fast and too slow at the same time. Callen leans in, just enough that our noses almost touch.

If I moved an inch, we’d.. The hum in the air dips. Like the whole tower is holding its breath. His thumb strokes once along my jaw, slow, grounding, intimate in a way that sends a shock down my spine.

“Stay still,” he whispers. “It stabilizes the signal when you’re calm.”

My lips part in a shaky inhale. “I’m…not calm.” His eyes flick to my mouth for half a second. Half a heartbeat.

“Yeah,” he says, voice breaking slightly. “I know.” He leans in a millimeter more.. And that’s when the frost on the window detonates.

A sound like splitting ice blasts through the loft, and a white fracture streaks across the window straight between us, like something took a knife to the glass. Callen jerks, hand snapping from my jaw to the railing, pulling me half behind him. The temperature drops so fast it punches the air out of my lungs.

“Oh god,” I whisper. Because the frost is writing again, fast, frantic, slashing lines that twist into something horribly clean.

DUE / 1. One.  It’s at one. My knees go weak. My pulse hammers in my ears instead of my chest. Callen swears under his breath. “It’s accelerating. Too fast.”

“It..  it skipped,” I say, my voice thin. “It skipped numbers. Ryke was two. Wasn’t he?”

“Don’t move,” Callen says. “Just—.. Don’t.” But I’m already stumbling back from the window, because the frost under 1 pulses once like a heartbeat syncing with mine. Like it’s answering me. Or claiming me.

The hum in the air deepens into something heavy and wrong, rounding into a note that wants to become a toll. Footsteps slam up the stairwell.

“Lira!” Ezra bursts into the loft, eyes wild, breath ragged. He takes one look at Callen’s arm around me, at how close we are, and something shatters in his face, not loud, not dramatic, but clean and sharp, like glass dropped from too high.

“What did he do?” Ezra demands.

“It’s not.. ” I start, but he’s already crossing the room toward us. Then he sees the window. Except… he doesn’t.

He stares right at the frost, right at DUE / 1, and confusion wrinkles his brow like he’s looking at a blank wall.

“What are you looking at?” he asks.

I blink. “Ezra.. it’s right there.” Callen steps in front of me again, jaw tight. “Don’t come closer.”

“Move,” Ezra snaps. But there’s fear in his voice now. A crack in the logic, the control. He glances between us, between the window and Callen’s hand braced near mine, and I can’t tell which terrifies him more.

Before any of us move, the frost shivers again. A jagged line carves down through the 1, then hooks sharply left, curling into a crooked symbol that burns neon-white for one breath before fading dimmer. I don’t know what it means, but Callen’s face goes white. Ezra sees nothing. Absolutely nothing. Not even the glow.

“Lira,” he says quietly, “are you sure you’re seeing..”

“It’s there.” My voice cracks on the second word. Callen’s eyes stay locked on the symbol, throat working once before he speaks.

“That mark means,” he says hoarsely, “it’s not waiting anymore.” A shadow moves in the hall. Sister Margo appears in the doorway, her silhouette stiff. Her gaze sweeps right over the frost, the cracked glass, the freezing air. She sees it. She definitely sees it.

Her eyes meet mine, one brief, tight, warning look, then she steps back and shuts the door quietly. Like she’s closing a curtain on a crime.

My stomach drops. “Did you see.. ”

“They always see,” Callen mutters. “They just don’t intervene.”

Ezra looks shaken. “Why would she ignore..” He stops. Because there’s no logical answer, not for this. Another vibration rolls through the floorboards, stronger this time.

Callen’s wristband heats enough that steam curls off it. He winces and yanks his sleeve over it. The hum finally breaks into a sound. A note. Low, metallic, rising like a breath pulled through copper.

Ezra steps backward. “No. Not here. Not now.” A crow slams into the window so hard the glass bows inward. I scream. Frost splinters in every direction like exploding stars. Callen’s hand finds mine without asking. Without hesitation.

The first TOLL rolls through the tower. Deep. Violent. Nothing like a school bell. It feels like someone is ringing the inside of my bones. The frost on the window fractures completely. The crow slams again. Harder. The air pressure crushes inward like the loft is suddenly underwater.

“Run,” Callen says, voice raw. Another toll gathers. Ezra grabs my other wrist, pulling the opposite direction.

“Lira, MOVE!” And the whole loft shakes as. Everything goes white.