Henry's promise hangs in the small kitchen, solid and heavy.
Elsbeth's breathing catches, her fingers loosening slightly around the edges of the black leather book.
Then, the sound in the room begins to bleed out.
It starts with the low hiss of the hearth, fading until it disappears entirely.
Henry's lips continue to form words, his head tilting toward the princess, but his voice drops into an absolute, dead vacuum.
The light against the window pane curdles from a crisp morning gray into a thick, stagnant yellow.
"You're coming with me..."
The phrase settles behind Leonard's ears, a low, dry vibration that carries the exact, soft cadence of a memory he buried years ago.
Leonard blinks, and the kitchen warps. The steaming clay bowls, the salted fish, the rye bread—all gone.
Across the table, the chairs where Henry, Grace, and Elsbeth sat are empty, tucked flush against the timber.
A heavy layer of gray dust sits undisturbed over the wood, thick enough to mask the grain.
The air smells of dry rot and old linen.
Leonard's chair screaks against the floor as he bolts upright. His heart strikes his ribs like a hammer.
"Henry?" his voice cuts the quiet, sounding thin and hollow.
He grips the leather hilt at his hip and rips his broadsword from the scabbard, the cold iron catching the jaundiced light of the room.
"Grace! My lady! Where are you?"
Silence presses back against him.
He dashes through the narrow kitchen, his heavy boots kicking up plumes of gray dust from the floorboards.
He hurls his weight into the front door, slamming it open, and bursts onto the porch.
He drops into a low guard, his iron blade extended, his eyes scouring the open square.
Rose is standing at the base of the steps.
She wears the pink wool dress, the fabric spotless and bright against the rotting wood of the surrounding structures.
Her long, vibrant red hair falls loose over her shoulders, shifting slightly despite the absolute stillness of the air.
She looks up at him, her hands clasped behind her back, her lips curved into a soft, patient smile.
Leonard's fingers turn slick with sweat against his leather grip.
The iron tip of his sword shakes, drawing erratic circles in the gray air.
"Where is everyone?" he asks, his throat dry as flint. "What did you do to them?"
Rose takes a slow, measured step forward. Her leather shoes make no sound in the red clay.
She reaches out, her arm lifting with an unnatural, fluid grace, and presses the soft pad of her index finger directly against the sharp point of his blade.
She pushes. The steel bites into her skin. A single bead of dark, thick crimson wells from the puncture, trailing slowly down the flat of the iron toward the crossguard.
"You've changed," she murmurs, her voice sweet, carrying the familiar warmth of the high passes. "My Leonard would never talk to me like that and he would never point his sword at me or is it because you don't love me anymore?"
"You're not Rose," Leonard says, his spine rigid as he fights the tremor creeping into his thighs.
"She's dead."
Rose runs her bloody finger up the length of the steel, her skin scraping against the metal until her hand reaches the hilt.
She steps into his guard, completely ignoring the blade pressing against her chest, and rests her palm against his shoulder.
"Who's dead, honey?" she whispers, her gaze locking onto his wide, unblinking eyes.
"Can't you see me? I'm right here. Can't you feel my arm?" Her brow puckers with a small, wounded frown. "Put your sword down... you're hurting me. How can you do this to me?"
The strength vanishes from Leonard's wrist.
The heavy broadsword slips from his fingers, clattering into the weeds beside the porch.
Rose closes the distance, her arms wrapping tightly around his neck.
The scent hits him like a physical blow—dry lavender, birchwood smoke, and the clean cotton of her apron.
The weight of her body against his chest is solid, warm, and entirely real.
A violent shudder breaks through Leonard's massive frame. His calloused hands lift, his fingers bunching into the pink wool of her dress as he drags her against his armor, anchoring himself to the touch.
"You're really here..." Tears cut hot paths through the grit on his face.
He buries his jaw into her red hair, his chest heaving as three years of iron-clad restraint dissolve. "I missed you so much. I'm sorry... I'm so sorry about everything. I should've protected you..."
Rose draws a slow breath, her lips brushing the shell of his ear. "Yes," she whispers into the dark. "You should've protected me."
She takes three slow steps back, untying her arms from his neck.
The warmth drops from his skin instantly, replaced by an ice-cold draft that smells of wet copper.
The gentleness in her face vanishes, the features tightening into a sharp, jagged sneer.
Her eyes turn flat and glassy.
"I suffered because of you," she says, her voice dropping an octave, losing its warmth.
"You ruined everything. You're nothing but a loser who couldn't even protect his love."
Leonard reaches out, his bloody bandage unraveling from his palm as his fingers claw at the space between them. "Rose... what are you saying?"
"You act all mighty and brave with your titles and your steel," she spits, each word calculated and sharp.
"But you're just a coward. A coward who runs away when things get difficult. You abandoned us. You tore our family apart. You ran away."
Leonard drops to his knees in the red mire. He slams his palms against his ears, pressing his forehead into the dirt as the old guilt expands in his chest like gas.
Please stop.
Stop Rose.
"You're not denying it," her voice rises, carrying a high, mocking edge that echoes off the empty houses.
"Because you know it's the marrow of you. And now you're promising those people in the house that you'll keep them safe? A coward making vows? It's so ironic, don't you think, honey?"
She steps directly into his field of vision, her pink hem dragging through the wet clay. She leans down, her shadow blotting out the yellow light.
"Why don't you just die? You deserve to die, right?"
Leonard's hands drop from his head, his arms falling limp into the mud. His longsword lies useless in the weeds.
He looks up at her, his jaw slack, his spirit entirely hollowed out.
"Stop..." he whispers.
"Please stop..."
"I tried..."
Rose's expression shifts again, melting back into that sweet, tragic sorrow.
She kneels in the mud before him, her small fingers reaching out to gently wipe the tears and grit from his scarred cheeks.
Her skin feels smooth, but it carries the temperature of river ice.
"You're tired, aren't you?" she croons, her thumb tracing the line of his split lip.
Leonard stares into her dark pupils, unable to form a sound.
"You've carried this guilt for so long." She smiles, a small, sad movement of her lips.
"I'll take you with me tonight, honey. You don't have to carry it anymore. You can be free from everything."
Leonard looks at her, the exhaustion of the loop, the town, and the years of silence crashing down on his shoulders.
He gives a slow, submissive nod. "If I can stay with you a little longer... then maybe I don't mind what happens next."
Rose's smile remains fixed, but the corners of her mouth stretch slightly too far, the skin tightening unnaturally across her cheekbones.
She bows her head, her lips pressing flat against his ear, her breath freezing his hair at his temple.
"We'll be together again free from everything," she whispers.
The yellow light shatters. The single cadence of her voice splinters into a low, rhythmic drone as dozens of flat, echoed whispers rise from the dirt, from the empty windows, and from the deep dark of his own mind, speaking in perfect, terrifying unison.
"This is our little secret, Leonard."
"Don't tell anyone."
"They won't understand."
"You'll lose me again."