The next morning, Blackwood Academy buzzed like a hornet's nest. Students clustered in tight groups across the courtyard, their voices low but urgent, their eyes darting toward the girl who walked alone.
Toward her.
Elara kept her gaze on the cobblestones, shoulders hunched as if the weight of their stares pressed her down. She had barely slept after the nightmare in the dormitory—the voices, the scratching, the endless chant—but the cruelest part was knowing she wasn't the only one who'd heard it.
Everyone had.
Which meant no one could pretend anymore.
"She was calm while we all screamed," one boy muttered as she passed.
"She didn't move an inch," whispered another.
"I saw her lips moving. Like she was talking back to it."
Elara quickened her pace, but the murmurs followed like shadows.
At breakfast, the whispers sharpened into accusations. When she entered the dining hall, the noise dipped, then rose in hushed tones that stabbed at her ears. Students shifted away, leaving empty spaces at tables where moments before there had been none.
"She's cursed."
"She brought it here."
"First Lena vanishes, then the blood, then this? It's her. It has to be her."
Her spoon trembled in her hand. She couldn't eat. Couldn't breathe. Every glance, every word pressed against her ribs like a blade.
Across the hall, Damian watched her. His expression was unreadable, but his eyes were sharp, calculating. He wasn't like the others—he wasn't afraid of her. He was trying to understand her. Somehow, that was worse.
When Elara rose to leave, a girl blocked her path. Claire. Her roommate.
"Elara…" Claire's voice cracked, loud enough for others to hear. Her eyes brimmed with fear. "Tell me it's not true. Tell me you're not the reason this is happening."
A hush fell over the hall. Dozens of eyes fixed on her.
Elara's throat tightened. She wanted to scream that she wasn't the cause, that she was just as terrified as they were—but the words died. Because deep down, she wasn't sure anymore.
"I…" Her voice shook. "I don't know."
Gasps rippled through the room. Claire's face crumpled. Students recoiled as though Elara had confessed.
The whispers turned into a wave of murmurs, hisses, and scorn.
And for the first time, Elara realized she was no longer just an outsider.
She was the enemy.
---
Damian's Perspective
Damian clenched his jaw as the crowd shifted, whispers growing sharper, more venomous. He didn't step in—not yet. Because while everyone else looked at Elara with fear, Damian saw something else.
Not guilt. Not malice.
Desperation.
And that desperation told him more than her words ever could.
She wasn't the cause.
She was the target.