They went through the evidence. Lira told them about the crow. Ezra talked about the streetlights that blinked only over his head. Ryke admitted the scrape had been following him even when no one else was around. Lira added a small thing she had seen: the fog that moved like it was listening. Callen said nothing. He kept his hood up and his head tilted like he was hearing something the others could not hear.

“It’s always four?” Ryke said. “Like… exactly four?”

“Every time,” Ezra said. “And after the first death, the rest followed within a week.” His voice was steady. His hands shook a little. He put them flat on his knees.

“So who’s the fourth this time?” Ryke asked.

No one answered.

The air inside the gazebo grew colder than the air outside. Lira could see her breath even with the wind blocked. Frost began to grow from the nail heads in the wood. It feathered out along the railing in thin white veins.

Lira stepped back. “Is anyone else seeing this?”

“Yeah,” Ryke said. “And I hate it.”

From the far side of the quad, the bell tolled once. The sound did not carry the way it should. It came in pieces, like echoes stitched together from different streets. They all looked up even though there was nothing to see from here.

A line of streetlamps toward the tower flickered in sequence. One. Then the next. Then the next. It looked like something was walking under them. The fog there pulled in, then let go, like breath.

Ryke blew out a shaky little laugh. “Nope,” he said. “Not doing this before I’ve finished my coffee.”

He turned and left without waiting for an answer. “Checking something,” he muttered, mostly to himself.

Ezra watched him go. His jaw tightened. “That’s stupid.”

“He’s scared,” Lira said.

“We all are,” Ezra said. He did not say it to get credit. He said it because it was true.

Callen did not move. His eyes stayed on the fog where Ryke had gone. His stillness felt like a decision.

“You know who the fourth is, don’t you?” Lira asked him. She kept her voice low.

Callen’s mouth changed shape. It was not a smile. It was something like one. “You’ll find out soon enough,” he said.

The words sat heavy in her stomach.

No one spoke for a while. Lira looked at Ezra’s folder. Some of the pages were old newspaper clippings. Some were photos printed from the library copier. Some were hand-written notes. Ezra worked fast when he was scared. He made piles and lists and rules. It helped him stand up.

“Okay,” he said finally. He seemed to make a choice inside his own head. He pulled out a single folded sheet and handed it to Lira. “Read this later,” he said. “Not now.”

“What is it?” she asked.

“It will make more sense when you’re home,” he said.

She did not like that answer. She took the paper anyway. She shoved it in her coat pocket.

They broke up soon after. Ezra said he would keep digging at first light. Callen said, “Don’t answer if it calls you.” He said it like a weather report. Lira nodded even though the words did not feel like something a person could do or not do on command.

She left the gazebo and walked the long way home. She did not want to cut past the tower. Even from far away, the square black mouth of it felt like a set of eyes. The fog by the playing fields looked like a low tide that had forgotten to leave.

Her phone buzzed once in her pocket as she crossed the empty street by the diner. She did not check it. She kept walking. Her boots made small wet noises on the pavement.

Halfway to her block, Lira took the folded paper out of her pocket. She did not want to open it in the street. She opened it anyway. The light from a porch lamp nearby fell across the page.

It was an old witness record. The kind of form that lived in a metal cabinet in a dusty office. The date at the top was from fifty-two years ago. The handwriting on the lines was sharp and dark. The name at the bottom made her stop walking.

Callen Vey.

Lira’s brain tried three answers in one second. One: It was a different Callen Vey. Two: The record was fake. Three: This Callen Vey had been alive then and was somehow alive now.

There was no way to decide in the middle of the road. She folded the paper again with hands that did not want to work. She put it back in her pocket.

A scrape echoed behind her. It was quick and close. It sounded like something heavy being dragged just out of sight.

She turned fast. The street was empty. The fog pushed toward her and then pulled away, like a person telling her to back up without moving.

She walked faster.

Her house rose out of the fog in uneven pieces. Porch. Steps. Door. She felt like she was walking into a photo that was still printing. The porch light buzzed faintly over the door. It flared each time she took a step, like the light was reacting to her.

She climbed the steps. Her key shook in her hand and scraped the lock. She stopped.

A crow perched on the railing, black and wet-looking in the light. Its eyes were glassy. They reflected the weak bulb in dull chips. The bird did not startle. It watched her.

“In the dream,” Lira said out loud before she could stop herself. Her voice sounded wrong on the empty porch. “You were in the dream.”

The crow did not move. It held something in its beak. A strip of metal. Thin. Tarnished. The edges were worn smooth like it had been handled a lot. The metal caught the porch light and showed letters stamped into it.

RYKE.