The child noticed it when nothing was happening.
No voices.No pain.No warnings.
They were in the sealed room again. The torches burned steadily, their pale flames no longer flickering. The man sat with his back to the wall, eyes closed—but not asleep.
The child sat opposite him.
Waiting.
At first, it was only a feeling.
The sense that the air was… delayed.
He lifted his hand.
A moment passed.
Then the feeling caught up.
The Blood Sigil did not pulse. His scar did not ache. Everything looked normal.
That was what made it wrong.
"Do you feel it?" the child asked quietly.
The man opened his eyes at once. "Do not describe it," he said. "Just answer this—does it feel close or far?"
The child hesitated. He searched his thoughts, his skin, the space behind his eyes.
"Neither," he said. "It feels… aligned."
The man's jaw tightened.
"Stand," he ordered.
The child obeyed.
Nothing happened.
Then the torches dimmed—not extinguished, but subdued, as if yielding. Shadows deepened along the walls, pooling where corners met stone.
The child's shadow stretched forward.
It did not twist.It did not distort.
It straightened.
The child's breath caught. "It's… normal."
"No," the man said softly. "That is worse."
The child took a step back.
His shadow did not follow.
It remained where it was, perfectly still.
The air pressed inward. The sealed symbols along the floor hummed faintly, vibrating beneath the skin rather than the ears.
The child wanted to look away.
He couldn't.
He felt it then—not a presence entering the room, but one that had always been there, finally deciding to be noticed.
Not watching him.
Watching through him.
His body reacted before thought. Muscles tensed. His marked arm lifted slightly, not in defense—but in readiness.
"Do not move," the man said sharply.
"I'm not," the child whispered.
He wasn't lying.
Something else was preparing him.
The shadow shifted.
Slowly—deliberately—it turned its head.
The child screamed.
The sound tore free before fear could stop it. The shadow's face was not a face, not really—just a suggestion of depth where none should exist.
And the feeling intensified.
Not hunger.Not malice.
Interest.
The man slammed his hand into the sigils. Light flared violently. The room shook as if struck from below.
"Enough," the man commanded.
The shadow froze.
The pressure receded—but not completely.
The torches flared back to life. The child collapsed to his knees, gasping.
The man was beside him instantly. "Did it speak?"
The child shook his head violently. "No. It didn't need to."
The man closed his eyes briefly.
"That means it is learning restraint," he said. "And that is worse than hunger."
The child looked up, trembling. "What does it want?"
The man met his gaze. His voice was quiet.
"It wants to know how much of you it already owns."
Silence followed.
Not empty.
Waiting.
The child looked down at his hands. They were steady now. Obedient.
Too obedient.
"If it doesn't talk," the child whispered, "how do I fight it?"
The man answered without hesitation.
"You don't," he said. "You endure."
The symbols dimmed. The room settled.
But the child knew—deep in the space where the Blood Sigil pulsed—that something had changed.
That night, as he lay awake, staring at the ceiling, his shadow finally moved again.
It leaned closer.
And for the first time, the child understood the true danger of the seal:
The thing inside him was no longer trying to escape.
It was trying to understand him well enoughto stay.