The chair was colder than she expected. Metal bit through the fabric of her coat, sending a shiver down her spine. Lina's hands gripped the armrests until her knuckles blanched.
The Sculptor stood before her, silent, studying her face the way an artist might study a blank canvas. He was close now—too close—and she realized he carried no tools, no instruments. Only those hands.
"What will it feel like?" she asked, her voice breaking the heavy stillness.
His eyes gleamed, catching the faint light of the vials behind him. "Like being seen too deeply. Like being opened where no blade could ever reach."
Her throat tightened. "And when it's done?"
"Silence."
He raised his hand, and before she could flinch away, his fingers brushed her temple. His touch was cool, but not cold—like river water at night. She expected pain. Instead, she felt a tug, as though her mind itself were unraveling.
Images flickered behind her eyes: a smile she knew too well, the press of lips against her forehead, the sound of rain against glass the night he left. Her chest heaved as the Sculptor's fingers moved in slow, deliberate arcs, tracing invisible patterns across her skin.
It was too much. Every memory of him surged forward at once, crashing like a storm. She gasped, her nails digging into the chair. "Stop—"
The Sculptor's voice cut through the flood, calm and steady. "If I stop, he will remain. Do you want that?"
Tears burned her eyes. Her body screamed no, but her mouth whispered, "Take him."
And then it happened.
The storm inside her broke apart, shards of memory drawn out in strands of light that bled through her skin. She saw them—saw him—rising into the Sculptor's hand, glowing fragments twisting like smoke trapped in glass. Her heart lurched as the last image faded: his laugh, sharp and bright, turning to silence.
Her chest was suddenly hollow. Empty in a way that felt worse than pain.
The Sculptor placed the shimmering fragments into a vial and sealed it. The light dimmed instantly, as though even memory could die.
Lina slumped against the chair, trembling. "It's… gone."
The Sculptor tilted his head, studying her with that unreadable expression. "Yes. But you are not free."
Her eyes snapped up to him, raw and desperate. "I don't feel anything."
His lips curved, almost a smile, but sharper. "That is not freedom. That is absence. You've traded grief for emptiness, love for silence. Tell me, Lina Veyra—will you endure the weight of nothing?"
The vials on the shelves pulsed faintly, as if they knew the answer already.
She couldn't. Not yet. Not ever.
But she forced herself to meet his gaze. "What now?"
The Sculptor leaned closer, his whisper brushing her ear like a blade.
"Now," he said, "we see what you'll give me next."