The call to Fajr echoed gently through the stillness of Lahore's sleeping dawn.
Noor rose in silence, her room barely lit by the soft silver glow seeping through her window. She performed her ablution, wrapping herself in a shawl and kneeling on her prayer mat. With each verse she recited, a weight lifted from her shoulders.
But it always returned.
The dreams hadn't stopped.
Each night, the shadowed figure returned—watching, waiting—not with menace, but with longing. She still couldn't see his face, yet his presence lingered in her bones even after she woke.
This morning, she whispered in prostration:
"Ya Allah… if this is a warning, protect me.If it is a sign, make it clear.But if it is a deception… guard my heart from it."
After prayer, she moved to the window. Her garden lay quiet, kissed by dew and untouched light. But she wasn't alone.
Across the wall, just behind the hedgerow—
A flicker.
Movement?
Her heart skipped.
For the briefest second, she thought she saw him.
Not fully. Just a sliver of dark—a silhouette in a window of the old guesthouse.
She blinked, and it was gone.
"Noor," she chided herself under her breath, "You need to stop imagining things."
But deep down, she knew she wasn't.
Across the Wall
Leonardo had been careless.
Just for a moment, he had leaned too close to the guesthouse window, caught off guard by the soft sound of her voice as she recited something before dawn. The moment hung heavy in the air—he didn't think she had seen him.
But his instincts told him otherwise.
Still, he didn't pull back.
He stayed until the last note of her prayer faded.
Then he exhaled and pressed his head against the glass.
This had gone too far.
He needed to leave.
Azfar had warned him two nights ago—rumors were swirling in the underworld. The Milanese families suspected he was still alive. His younger brother Luca had posted a bounty under a false name. And here he was—bleeding into the life of an innocent girl.
He told himself again: Just one more day. Just one more moment of her.
But the longer he stayed, the more he forgot who he had been.
And that was dangerous.
That Afternoon
Noor gathered her lesson materials and left for the masjid. Her students would be waiting in the small girls' study circle she ran three times a week. She passed the old guesthouse as she always did, clutching her books tighter.
It had once belonged to a traveling scholar who moved back to Turkey years ago. Since then, it had remained empty—at least officially.
She glanced at the upper window.
Nothing.
Still, her steps quickened.
But she wasn't afraid.
Curious, maybe. Uneasy, yes. But not afraid.
And that made her question everything.
Flashback – Leonardo (Age 19)
His knuckles were bleeding when his father handed him a glass of vodka.
"This," Don Silvio said, "is what a man feels after his first kill."
Leonardo hadn't wanted to drink. He hadn't wanted to kill either.
But they'd told him the man was a traitor, a mole leaking plans to the DeLorenzo family. The man had begged. Pleaded. Mentioned his daughter.
Leonardo had pulled the trigger.
And vomited behind the warehouse when no one was looking.
His father had laughed. "You'll get used to it."
He never did.
He stopped throwing up. Stopped shaking.
But he never stopped feeling it.
Until one day, he stopped letting himself feel anything at all.
And now… now a girl who didn't even know his name was threatening to undo that.
Present – At the Masjid
Noor's student, little Hira, asked innocently, "Miss Noor, do you believe Allah shows us signs in dreams?"
Noor paused.
"I believe Allah shows us what we need, in the way He knows is best," she said gently.
Hira nodded. "I saw a man in my dream. He had no face, but he was sad. I gave him water and he disappeared."
The words unsettled Noor more than she admitted.
After class, she walked home slower than usual, eyes flicking toward the guesthouse with every step.
When she reached her gate, she found something unusual.
A white lily tucked into the iron lattice.
Not a note. No name. Just the flower.
Her fingers hesitated.
She looked around.
No one.
Still, she plucked the lily and brought it inside, heart pounding with the kind of tremor that comes not from fear… but from the start of knowing.
That Night – In the Guesthouse
Leonardo hadn't meant to leave the flower.
He didn't even know why he picked it.
But the way her fingers lingered on it—how she looked around in confusion, not disgust—it ignited something.
He wanted her to know she wasn't alone.
But he didn't want her to run.
He stood at the cracked mirror in the guesthouse and stared at his reflection.
For the first time in years, he saw a man, not a monster.
His beard was untrimmed, his arm still stiff from the wound, his clothes no longer pristine.
But his eyes…
They had light in them.
Or perhaps… Noor.
The Phone Call
Azfar called that evening.
"They found you," he said without preamble. "Two men at the airport asked about a tall European fitting your description. And they've paid someone to search the inner city."
Leonardo cursed under his breath.
"I can arrange for you to get to Peshawar tomorrow night," Azfar added. "From there, border crossing is possible. But if you stay, you're dead."
Leonardo was silent.
"Do you hear me?" Azfar barked. "You can't protect her if you're dead!"
And that—that—was what broke his resolve.
Noor – One Last Time
That night, Noor woke with her heart racing.
There had been no shadow in her dream.
Only stars.
And a voice.
One she had never heard before but knew instinctively.
It said one thing:
"Forgive me for leaving before you know me."
Midnight – The Garden
Leonardo stood in her garden again.
He didn't know how long he had.
Minutes? Hours?
The flowers glowed faintly in the moonlight, and her window was dark.
He knelt in the grass and whispered softly, "Noor… I never believed in God, but I believe in the way your voice carries verses. I never believed in heaven, but I believe your eyes hold a light that burns everything wrong in me."
He placed one final item beneath the fig tree.
A torn page from his journal. The only one left.
And disappeared into the shadows.