Water hit Mara's face with the force of a fist.
Cold.
Blinding.
Endless.
Her scream drowned instantly.
Hands pinned her shoulders, knees, wrists—an iron cage around her. The world shrank to the icy pressure swallowing her mouth and nose.
Her chest seized.
Her lungs convulsed.
Her body rebelled, fighting for air that didn't exist.
And the water—
It wasn't just water.
It was the lake.
The same suffocating cold.
The same weight dragging her under.
The same memory she had buried so deep she thought it had died there.
But Daniel had never let her forget.
He had only waited for it to wake.
"Mara—MARA!"
Evelyn's voice cracked from somewhere behind her. "Stop! You're killing her, you're—Daniel, PLEASE!"
The masked man lifted the bucket for a breathless moment.
Mara sucked in air so hard it stabbed her lungs.
Her vision swam.
Her body shook violently.
Daniel crouched beside her, his face calm, almost tender.
"Shh," he murmured, brushing wet hair from her forehead. "You're safe."
She stared at him with pure, animal terror.
"Why…" she rasped. "…why are you doing this?"
Daniel's eyes softened with something that twisted her stomach.
"Because you forgot," he whispered. "And forgetting is dangerous."
He nodded once.
The bucket tipped again.
Water crashed over her.
Her mind fractured.
Images burst like shattered glass:
A lake at dusk.
Their father's furious face.
Daniel yelling her name.
A hand gripping her ankle—dragging her under—
Her lungs burning—
A scream swallowed by water—
A shadow disappearing beneath the surface—
Mara's entire body convulsed.
"STOP!" Evelyn sobbed. "Please, she's going to die!"
Daniel lifted a hand.
The masked man froze.
Mara wheezed, choking, coughing water. Tears streamed down her face, mixing with the dripping cold.
Daniel leaned in close, eyes locked on hers.
"What do you remember?" he asked softly.
Mara shook her head weakly. "I… I don't know…"
"Yes, you do."
"I don't—"
"Mara."
His voice was a blade.
"You remember who tried to drown you."
Her heart slammed painfully against her ribs.
A shadow in the water.
A hand around her ankle.
Pulling—hard.
She saw it.
She saw it—too clearly.
And she heard a man's voice screaming—
"Daniel, grab her! Now!"
Her father.
Her father had—
A sob tore out of her.
"No. No, Daniel, you're twisting it—he was trying to save—"
"Save?" Daniel's expression hardened. "He had his hands on your head, Mara. He held you under while you begged. I pulled you out. He tried to kill you and you still won't face it."
Mara shook violently, breath hitching.
"I… I don't… Daniel, he wouldn't—Dad wouldn't—"
"You still don't get it," Daniel whispered, hurt slicing through his words. "I saved you. And he tried to drown me for it."
Mara's breath stuttered again.
Daniel's voice dropped.
"You want the truth?"
He pointed to the recorder on the table.
"You already said it. The night it happened. Before you forced yourself to forget."
He clicked a button.
Her own voice crackled through the room again.
Broken.
Terrified.
Small.
"…Don't let him take me again… Daniel, don't let him take me again…"
Mara closed her eyes.
And the memory hit her like a tidal wave:
Her father's face twisted with something she couldn't name.
His hands shoving her under the water.
Daniel screaming.
The lake swallowing her pleas.
Her own voice fading—
Then—
Hands grabbing her.
Pulling her up.
Daniel's hands.
She gasped sharply and curled in on herself as the memory tore through her body.
Evelyn's voice trembled.
"Mara… I'm so sorry…"
Daniel watched, eyes shining with fierce devotion.
"You were always mine to protect," he whispered. "And now you know why."
He rose to his feet.
"And now you understand why they want you."
Mara's head snapped up.
"Who?"
Daniel smiled softly.
"Father wasn't acting alone. He wasn't the first. And he wasn't the last."
Her blood ran cold.
"There's a reason I disappeared," Daniel said gently. "There's a reason they want you back."
Mara's skin prickled.
"Want me back for what?"
Daniel crouched again, lifting her chin with two fingers.
"To finish what they started."
Evelyn screamed, "Daniel, don't—!"
But he didn't look at Evelyn.
He looked into Mara's eyes.
"Tonight," he whispered, "they'll decide who you become."
Before Mara could breathe—
A door opened behind them.
Footsteps.
Someone else entered.
Not masked.
Not armed.
A woman.
Tall.
Calm.
Dressed in a long dark coat.
She stepped beside Daniel.
Mara felt something ancient and icy coil in her gut.
Daniel bowed his head slightly.
"Mother," he said.
Mara's heart stopped.
That was impossible.
Their mother had been dead for ten years.
But the woman smiled softly at Mara.
"My girl," she whispered.
"How long I have waited to see you again."
The room spun.
And Mara realized the darkest truth of all:
Her family wasn't dead.
They were the ones who had been waiting for her.