Chapter 17: Room Seventeen
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"You were told never to come here."
I froze, spinning toward the voice, certain I'd find Dante standing behind me in the empty corridor. There was no one there. Only dust-filled silence and the faint hum of old lighting fixtures I doubted anyone had replaced in years.
I looked down at the photograph clutched in my hand, at the number scrawled across its back. 17.
The corridor stretched ahead of me, unused and forgotten, until I found it, a door nearly swallowed behind a decorative wall panel that didn't quite sit flush with the stone. I stepped closer, and a faded metal plate caught the dim light.
17.
My heart pounded as I reached for the handle, understanding s
