Their captor — the man who had called himself Casimir's disciple — walked a few paces ahead. He hadn't given a name yet. He carried himself with the unsettling calm of someone entirely convinced of his purpose. His coat swung neatly with his stride. His breathing was even. The pistol in his hand had vanished somewhere into his jacket, but Kazou hadn't missed the subtle bulge under his ribs.
Natalie moved stiffly. Her arms were folded tightly, her jaw clenched. She stayed close to Kazou without realizing it, her shoulder brushing his once, then again.
Kazou walked beside her, upright but cautious. His eyes scanned the architecture, the halls, and the layout. He was trained to observe quietly — habits from a life he hadn't quite left behind. His hands were open, not clenched. He wasn't going to start a fight he couldn't win. But he was ready to act if one found them.
The disciple glanced over his shoulder, a faint, sardonic smile curving his lips.
"I suppose introductions are overdue," he said, voice smooth like silk but edged with menace. "My name is Anders. Anders Grayson."
Natalie's grip tightened on the pistol, though Kazou gently placed a hand on her wrist.
"Why should we trust you?" Kazou asked quietly. "You just shot men we were supposed to escape from."
Anders shrugged
"Trust?" he echoed, amused. "No. You don't get to choose trust here. Not with me, not with Casimir, and certainly not with your past."
"And what exactly is your purpose here?" Kazou pressed, scanning the dim halls.
Anders paused, turning to face them fully now. His eyes gleamed—not quite human, but not entirely otherworldly either. They were the eyes of a man who had stared too long into darkness and found something waiting back.
"My purpose," he said slowly, "is to prepare you. To usher you into Casimir's vision and see the end of the world."
The group walked in silence for a mere thirty seconds.
"You won't be harmed," Anders said suddenly, glancing back. His voice was measured, as though he'd been waiting for the right moment to speak. "You'll be treated well. That was the instruction."
Natalie didn't answer. Her gaze was sharp but unreadable.
Kazou spoke first. "Instruction from Casimir?"
A nod. "He's been preparing for this for a long time."
"But he's not here," Kazou muttered
The man gave a slight smile. "No. Not yet. But he will be."
They passed under a heavy iron chandelier, its candles long melted into black stubs. A draft stirred somewhere above, carrying a faint scent of ash.
Natalie finally spoke. "Why us?"
The man looked over his shoulder. His expression softened. "He'll tell you himself."
"He's hiding," she said flatly.
"No," the man replied. "He's watching."
They came to a stop before a thick wooden door bolted with dark iron hinges. The man reached into his coat, withdrew a small ring of keys, and selected one without looking.
He opened the door.
It wasn't a prison cell — not exactly. The room was small but intact. A narrow bed. A desk with a chair. A window, high and narrow, with iron bars across the middle. A single light bulb flickered overhead, its wiring snaking into the wall like veins.
"Here," the man said, stepping aside.
Kazou walked in first. He scanned the corners. No cameras. No mirrors. The kind of room built to keep people inside — but not to hurt them.
Natalie stepped in after him, slow, cautious. She didn't sit.
The man stayed in the doorway.
"You'll stay here until he arrives," he said.
Kazou turned. "For how long?"
"As long as it takes."
Natalie shot him a look of disbelief. "You're just going to hold us here like animals?"
"No," the man said quietly. "You're not animals. You're important. Especially you."
He looked at her. Something flickered in his gaze — recognition, maybe. Or pity. Or something stranger.
Natalie's shoulders stiffened.
"Don't call me Sasha," she said before he could.
The man blinked. "I wasn't going to."
He stepped back, just slightly.
"You'll be fed. You'll be checked on. You won't be mistreated. That's what he wanted."
Kazou narrowed his eyes. "And if we try to leave?"
The man met his gaze. "You won't. There's nowhere to go."
He closed the door gently, as if not to startle them.
Then the click of the lock.
Silence settled into the room like cold smoke.
Natalie stayed standing. Her hands were trembling, though she tried to hide it by tucking them into her sleeves. Her back was to the window. Her eyes scanned the walls, as if looking for something to hit.
Kazou sat on the edge of the bed. He didn't speak right away. His breath was slow, even. He was thinking.
"You all right?" he asked eventually, gently.
Natalie shook her head. "No."
She paced once, then stopped. "This… This feels like a trap I walked into. But I didn't do anything. I didn't choose any of this."
Kazou looked down at the floor. "Neither did I."
For a long moment, all she heard was the hum of the light above them.
Then she said, "Do you think he's watching us right now?"
Kazou shook his head. "I don't know. But I don't think he needs to. I think the point is that we know he could be."
Natalie rubbed her arms. "That man—" she paused, "—the one who brought us here. He doesn't act like a soldier."
"No," Kazou agreed. "He acts like a believer."
She turned to face him. "Do you think he'd kill us if Casimir asked him to?"
Kazou met her eyes. "Yes."
The answer came too easily.
Natalie turned away, biting her lip. She sat in the chair. It creaked under her.
For a few minutes, neither of them spoke.
Then she said, "What if I really am Sasha?"
Kazou glanced at her.
She wasn't looking at him. Her eyes were fixed on a crack in the wall.
"I've had… dreams," she said. "Or maybe memories. Places I've never been. Words I've never spoken. I used to think it was just stress, but now…"
Her voice trailed off.
Kazou leaned forward, resting his elbows on his knees.
"It doesn't matter who you were," he said quietly. "What matters is who you are now. And what you choose."
Natalie's jaw tensed. Her hand curled into a fist on her knee.
"I don't want to be someone's project," she whispered. "I don't want to be a symbol."
Kazou nodded. "Then don't be."
Outside, wind scraped against the narrow window. The light flickered briefly.
Somewhere beyond the stone walls, footsteps passed.
They didn't knock.
Didn't speak.
Just passed by.
Kazou stood and walked to the window, peering up through the bars. The sky was dark, starless. Snow had begun to fall — slow, drifting flakes that melted against the cold glass.
Natalie stood beside him.
"I don't know if I trust you," she said softly. "But I trust you more than him."
Kazou looked at her. "That's enough."
She nodded.
The silence that followed wasn't comfortable, but it was honest.
And behind the door, the man in the coat waited. Alone.
He didn't pace. He didn't mutter.
***
They sat in opposite corners of the small room now. Time had passed — maybe an hour, maybe more. It was hard to tell. The light overhead buzzed intermittently. Outside, the wind rattled softly against the narrow iron-barred window. Somewhere deep in the stone halls of the castle, something creaked — slow, distant. Then silence again.
Kazou had taken to sitting on the bed with his coat draped over his knees, head bowed slightly, hands folded. He hadn't spoken in a while. His thoughts were moving quietly, constantly — calculating the layout of the corridors, the disciple's words, the weapons he'd seen.
Natalie sat on the floor, knees drawn up to her chest, back pressed against the cold stone wall. Her arms were wrapped around her legs, tightly. She looked smaller than she had before. Not in size, but in something harder to name — like the sharpness of her had dulled.
She hadn't looked at Kazou for a long time. But she was watching him now.
"Kuroda," she said finally. Her voice was low, strained.
He looked up.
She hesitated — then dropped her gaze to her knees. "I'm sorry."
He waited. Said nothing yet.
"This is my fault."
Her throat tightened. She pressed her forehead to her arms.
"I should've just… I should've burned the letters when they started showing up. I should've ignored them. I should've thrown them into the river."
"Natalie—" he started, but she cut him off.
"No. Just let me say it."
Kazou closed his mouth, nodded.
"If I hadn't opened that envelope… if I hadn't gotten obsessed with finding answers… I never would've gone to that address. I never would've called the cab. I never would've walked into that trap." Her voice cracked. "And you wouldn't be here. You'd be safe. Back in Warsaw. Doing your work. Living your life! You don't deserve to get tangled in this Casimir's mess!"
She looked up now, her eyes rimmed red but dry. "You wouldn't be in this place, stuck in some cold cell in some place you didn't even want to be in."
Kazou met her eyes. He looked calm, but not distant. His expression held something weightier — a kind of quiet sorrow that wasn't for himself.
"You didn't drag me into this," he said.
"But—"
"I chose to come with you. I could've jumped out of that cab once I realized the foul play. I didn't."
Natalie shook her head. "Why didn't you?"
He leaned forward slightly, resting his forearms on his knees.
"I don't know," he said truthfully. "Maybe I should've. But when I glanced at you again, I didn't want a young girl to get tangled in a mess alone."
She blinked. Her lip trembled slightly, but she pressed it tight. She didn't speak. Just stared at the floor.
Kazou continued. "You're not responsible for the mess he made. He is."
The room was still.
Natalie wrapped her arms tighter around herself.
"I don't remember any of it, in the letters, he said I was Sasha and that we knew each other..." she whispered. "But it feels like it's all my fault anyway. I don't even know who Sasha is. But if she's the reason for this…"
Kazou stood slowly, the mattress creaking beneath him. He crossed the room, sat down beside her on the stone floor. Close, but not too close.
"Even if Sasha existed," he said gently, "she doesn't get to define who you are now. That's something only you can do."
Natalie looked over at him. Her face was pale, her eyes tired.
"I don't know who I am."
Kazou nodded. "Then we'll figure it out. Together."
Silence stretched between them, softer this time.
Natalie breathed slowly, her shoulders less tense now.
"…Thank you," she said after a while.
He offered a quiet smile.
The wind hissed against the window's iron bars like something trying to claw its way inside. It was late now, or at least it felt that way. The world beyond the castle had quieted, but inside, there was only the stillness. Waiting.
Natalie rubbed at her arms, her fingers raw from anxiety more than cold.
Kazou sat beside her, back to the stone wall. He'd closed his eyes for a few minutes — not sleeping, just thinking. His breathing was slow, controlled. It was a habit. A way to keep himself grounded in unfamiliar places. In dangerous ones.
Natalie broke the silence.
"Kuroda…"
He opened his eyes slowly. "Yeah?"
She swallowed, her voice low.
"I don't want to wait here."
He turned slightly toward her.
She continued. "We keep saying he's coming. Casimir. That this is just a place to hold us until he arrives. But what if that's not true?"
Kazou watched her carefully, silently encouraging her to go on.
"What if this is it?" she asked. "What if no one's coming? What if they're just trying to break us?"
Kazou didn't answer right away. Her voice had an edge to it — not panic, exactly, but something like urgency spiraling.
"I don't want to wait in this place," she said again, more firmly. "I want to get out."
Kazou finally spoke, calmly. "I've been thinking the same."
She looked at him sharply, surprised. "You have?"
He gave a faint nod. "Since the moment we stepped inside."
Natalie exhaled shakily, some invisible pressure easing just slightly.
"I thought maybe you were just... enduring it," she said. "You're good at that. Waiting. Enduring."
Kazou gave the ghost of a tired smile. "I've had practice."
Natalie leaned her head back against the wall. Her hair was tangled at the ends, her eyes bruised from lack of rest. But there was a clarity now in her expression — the kind that comes only after fear has run its full course and resolved into quiet determination.
"I don't want to be here when he arrives," she whispered. "Casimir. I thought I did. I thought I needed answers, that I needed to see him with my own eyes. But I was wrong... I don't need to know the answers."
Kazou spoke softly. "If we're going to try to escape… We'll need to be careful. We don't know how many people he has inside this place. Or where they are."
Natalie's voice lowered. "And that disciple… the man with the gun. The one who said we're guests."
Kazou nodded. "He's not going to let us walk out."
"No," Natalie said. "But I don't think he wants to kill us either."
Kazou looked at her.
"He enjoys the control," she said. "The power. But I saw it in his eyes. He's not planning to finish this. He's waiting for someone else to do it."
Kazou considered her words. "That gives us a window. But we'll only get one chance."
Natalie nodded. "Then we make it count."