The silence at Lex's house was thick. Moonlight slanted across the floor, casting long shadows as the jar sat still in the center of the room—untouched, yet present.
Lex stood barefoot in the doorway, eyes blank but body tense, like something ancient had seized control. The whisper left his lips,not his voice, not entirely.
"Anarudi kwa damu... na kwa damu, atakamilika."
(*She returns through blood... and through blood, she will be complete.*)
As the jar pulsed, the sigil beneath his collarbone lit up in searing crimson. In three other places—on Kian's rib, Adrian's palm, and a stranger's spine—flesh burned, as though branded from within. None of them knew yet, but the mark had been chosen.
Back at Naya's, the girls returned to chaos.
The jar was gone.
"I locked the damn place!" Naya shouted, pacing. "There was no sign of a break-in."
Sasha pressed a palm to her chest where the pendant now sat—a cool weight that had, just the night before, wrapped itself around her neck on its own.
Sienna combed through Tasha's recordings again, slowing one down until symbols began to align with drawings they'd found at the chapel ruins.
"These aren't just protection sigils," she murmured. "They're seals."
"Seals for what?" Alani asked, voice low.
"Containment."
Meanwhile, in a quiet town miles away, Tasha stared at her reflection again.
She had grown used to the woman behind the glass. It wasn't always her,sometimes the reflection wore older clothes, sometimes had eyes that didn't blink.
Tonight, the reflection spoke.
"You touched the jar, even in story. The web spun around you now speaks back."
"I didn't even *know* my name was placed," Tasha replied. "I didn't ask for any of this."
"You didn't have to."
"What do you mean?"
But the reflection only leaned in closer, lips parting slowly before whispering:
"You already chose once. Long before now. And the consequence... follows."
Tasha's eyes filled with tears. "What consequence?"
But the reflection faded,and the mirror cracked down the middle.
In a café tucked inside a Nairobi street, Sienna, met her cousin, Zalika.
Zalika was soft-spoken but wore her dreadlocks like armor. A spiritual medium and energy reader, she had always been odd, but tonight, her tone was serious.
"You brought no object, but something rides your energy," Zalika said after a moment of silence. "You're caught in a ritual of reawakening."
"We thought it was a curse... a jar that binds people. But it's more, isn't it?"
Zalika nodded. "It's a vessel. Not of power—of memory. The past wants to be known. And if it can't be *heard*, it will be *relived*."
"Can we stop it?"
Zalika looked at her gravely. "Only if those bound are willing to face the truth—no matter how painful."
Sienna hesitated. "I haven't told the others I came to you."
"You don't need to. But you *will* need each other soon."
That night, Kian and Sasha met at an old library, chasing the trail of the name 'Naima'. They weren't sure what they were looking for,an ancestor, a myth, a match.
But instead, they found each other—again.
The silence between them was too loud. Too charged. His fingers brushed hers as they reached for the same book.
Sasha pulled away first. "This isn't why we're here."
"I know," he said. But didn't move.
He reached for her face. "I tried to stay away. I really did."
"I tried to forget you."
They didn't try anymore.
Meanwhile, Liona stood in a candlelit room, the jar finally in her possession. She watched it from a distance, unsure if it was her obsession or her fear guiding her.
She didn't notice the way the shadows behind her thickened, or the fact that her reflection no longer mirrored her movements.
She knelt, her hand brushing the jar. It didn't react. So she gripped it tighter.
A wind hissed across the room.
Then her voice echoed—but she hadn't spoken.
"You can't own what was never meant for you."
Liona dropped the jar. But it didn't fall—it hovered.
And as it glowed, she stumbled backward, breath caught in her throat.
At that very moment, across the city, Kian gasped—his side flaring with pain as the sigil branded itself.
Lex, in his house, dropped to his knees, clutching his chest.
Adrian, asleep, awoke screaming.
And far away, in a country they did not know yet existed in their story, a woman opened her eyes in the dark, touching the mark on her back.
Sasha's was glowing too—but hers didn't burn.
It pulsed.