I knew I shouldn’t be walking toward that corridor. I knew the air was too quiet, the shadows too still, and the voices i just heard still burned behind my eyes like something half-forgotten but fully dangerous. But my feet didn’t listen. My body was still aching, sore in the softest places. My thighs stuck when I walked, not from sweat… from memory. From Jasper. From what he didn’t do and still managed to do anyway.
The west wing wasn’t technically off-limits. But no one went there after dusk. Not unless they belonged. Not unless they had reason. I had neither.
The door to the old lecture hall was cracked open. Just enough. Just enough to whisper that someone had forgotten to latch it. Or maybe… someone hadn’t.
I should’ve turned around. I should’ve walked the other way. But I didn’t.
