Selene didn't sleep.
Her mouth still tasted like him — salt, smoke, and rot. Her teeth still ached from the bite. Her lips were cracked, blood dried down her chin. The walls had gone silent, but not still.
They pulsed.
The wallpaper peeled like skin.
The floors groaned with every breath she took.
She had hurt him — and the house was punishing her for it.
Lights no longer flickered. They burned steady. Too steady. Watching. Mocking. Every mirror reflected her but a little wrong — her head tilted when she hadn't moved, her smile twisted when her lips were closed.
"He's inside everything," came the girl's voice in the wall again. "He's not a ghost. He's a virus."
Selene pressed her palm to the crack. It was colder now.
"Why are you still alive in here?"
"Because someone has to remember," the voice whispered. "Because pain keeps me breathing. And he never finishes anything. He just starts… over."
Selene turned from the wall, heart pounding.
She walked barefoot through the apartment, slow, tense, like prey in her own skin. Her bruises bloomed darker now — not purple or blue, but gray. Ashen. Like something dead had touched her too long.
When she reached the kitchen, the table was covered in photos.
Not hers.
Women.
Dozens. Maybe hundreds.
All dark-haired. All pale. All branded with the same symbol Lucian carved into her wall.
MINE.
And every single photo had red ink slashed over the eyes.
She scanned them, hands shaking.
One of the photos made her stop cold.
It wasn't old. It wasn't faded.
It was her.
Taken from the hallway.
From behind.
Last night.
She staggered back from the table, breath catching, when she saw it—
A second picture.
Not of her.
Of her mother.
Younger. Broken-looking.
Same face. Same eyes.
Same fucking apartment.
"No," Selene whispered. "No, no, no—"
She flipped the photo.
A date scrawled in blood-red ink.
1989.
Selene was born in 1990.
The floor underneath her trembled. A laugh echoed through the vents — not Lucian's. This one was higher, more animal, less human.
"You weren't just drawn here," the voice whispered.
"You were born here."
The lights exploded.
The walls screamed.
The floor split open beneath her, and Selene fell.
She didn't land on wood or tile. She landed on bodies.
Thousands.
Women. Rotting. Whispering. Reaching for her with broken hands and shredded nails. Their mouths didn't open, but she could hear them — their thoughts like blades slicing her mind.
"He loved us."
"He took us."
"He left us here."
"You're his favorite. You'll be the last."
Selene screamed — not in fear, but fury.
She shoved their hands off her, clawed her way upward, using bones as ladders. And when she pulled herself out of the pit, soaked in blood and breathless, Lucian was waiting.
He was smiling.
But something was… off.
His eyes were hollow. His hands were shaking. His body burned at the edges — like the bite she gave him was spreading.
"You think you hurt me?" he rasped, voice cracked. "You marked me. I've had thousands… and none ever left a scar."
Selene stood tall, filthy and trembling, but unbroken.
"Then maybe I'm the one thing you can't possess."
Lucian took one step forward.
And she saw it.
Behind him.
A door.
Ancient. Bolted. Breathing.
The others had mentioned it.
The Red Door.
Where the original Selene lived.
Where the house was born.
And in the shadows, someone else was waking up.
🔥 End of Chapter 7 🔥