The fog clung to the city like a second skin—thick, damp, and heavy with rot. In Vullum, it never lifted. It crept through alleyways and broken cathedral windows, curled under doors, and settled into the lungs of those who'd forgotten how to breathe without mourning.
Deadlight Square was still at dawn. The cobblestones gleamed with old rain. White lilies, long dead, hung limp in the window boxes of shuttered homes. And beneath my feet, I could feel the heartbeat of something ancient and breathing, pulsing faintly through the stone.
Inside the apothecary, I moved through the familiar gloom like a ghost through its crypt,Why not as the rumors from the children seen me as a ghost floating about.My gloves creaked as I ground root into a thick paste. Bitterwort and sleepleaf, crushed to a fine, pungent dust. The scent stung my nose beneath the silk of my mask. I preferred it to the smell of people though.
A knock at the door startled the flame in the lantern. Two soft taps.Slow and Hesitant.
I wiped the pestle clean on my worn out apron covered in stains and holes and opened the door.
"Miss Lenora?" rasped the man on the stoop. He was hunched in a patched coat, shaking slightly. "It's the ache in my bones again. Worse this week. Like... something's crawling inside 'em." states the man in a low and weary tone.
I nodded once and stepped aside. He didn't move, only stared at my eyes—red as blood, red as the lilies that bloomed for the dead. He clutched his hat tighter, squeezing it so tightly you'd think he would tear it in half.
"They say you were born under the blood moon," he whispered. "That you were marked."
I said nothing. I never did. Let them think what they would. I turned away and began to measure the tincture. He followed after a moment, cautious, like a man crossing ice.
I passed him the bottle without a word. He didn't try to touch my hand.He knew better. They all did. He awkwardly took the bottle being sure to not come close to my gloved hand.
He left his coins on the counter and shuffled out into the fog. The door creaked closed behind him. I stood a moment in silence, listening.
Then I felt it.
A shift in the air—subtle, electric, wrong. The flame in the lantern flickered,But it wasn't due to a breeze but rather something more ...sinister. Somewhere beyond the apothecary walls, a bell tolled once, low and distant.
I crossed to the window.
There, on the edge of the square, where no life should grow, a single spider lily bloomed.
Its petals were deep crimson, glistening wet. It trembled though there was no wind.
I stared at it, heart slowing. The last time I'd seen one bloom like that was the day I woke covered in blood and carved in glyphs I didn't remember earning.
Something was stirring...
He arrived in the early afternoon.
I knew it was him before he opened the door. His presence was like a storm brewing behind a locked window—sharp, bitter, hard to ignore. He never knocked. Just pushed his way inside like the rules of other men didn't apply.
"Lenora," said Dorian Vale, voice laced with tired amusement. "You haven't changed. That's either a miracle or a threat."
I looked up from the counter. He was soaked to the knees, coat flared open, hair damp with mist. His smile was crooked, practiced. His eyes were sharp.
He dropped a folder onto the counter. It landed with a soft thud, louder than it should've been.
"Council sent me," he said. "Not by choice, believe me." he said with an annoyed expression and creases in his brows.
I didn't answer. Just opened the file. Even though I didn't truly care of what the council had to say. We weren't on best terms.
The photograph was grainy, black and white. A man slumped in a high-backed chair, his face twisted in an expression I recognized too well—grief so deep it swallowed the soul. No wounds. No blood. Just the bloom.
A spider lily, vivid and full, sprouting from the center of his chest, gleaming like blood under candle light.
I closed the folder slowly.
Dorian studied me. "That look in your eyes," he said. "It's the same one you had the last time people started dying."
Still, I said nothing.
"I told the Council you wouldn't talk. That you'd just stare at me until I felt guilty for being born."
I lifted the folder again and traced the edges of the photo with one gloved finger.
"Who was he?" I asked. In a cold and stern tone
"Lord Erastus Alven. High-blood, low-brained. Threw a gala last week,full of debotchery of course,as he was known for, fell asleep in his parlor. Servants found him this morning, frozen like that. They say he was crying."
"Alone?"
"No forced entry. No sign of struggle. Just that flower."
He paused.
"And this."
From his coat pocket, he drew a scrap of cloth—black silk, embroidered with a symbol I hadn't seen in ten years. My heart hitched.
A single looping glyph. Familiar. Intimate. Burned into the skin on my back, just below the shoulder blade.
"They found it in his hand," Dorian said. "Clutched so tightly they had to break his fingers to get it out."
I stared at it, the mask over my mouth suddenly too tight.
"You know what it means."
It wasn't a question.
I nodded.
His voice softened. "They're scared, Lenora. The Council. They don't know what this is. But you do. You've seen it before."
I glanced toward the window. The lily was still there, vibrant and glistening. Watching.
So what if they are scared, I thought to myself. They only care when it can ruin their power and their reputation.
"I'll need the body," I said quietly.
"I thought you might."
He turned to leave, then hesitated at the door,his hand frozen on the handle.
"Tell me something," he said, voice lower now. "Have you felt it too? That cold at the edge of things? Like something's... waiting?"
I met his eyes. "Yes."
He lingered, as if expecting more. But I had nothing else to give.
Dorian nodded once and stepped into the fog. The door shut behind him with a sigh and a thud.
I stood alone in the apothecary, heart aching in my chest.
Outside, the spider lily swayed, and in the stillness that followed, the old glyphs on my back began to burn.