The air in the grain yard tastes like dust and impending doom.
I'm standing there, lungs tight, while the world decides to tilt on its axis again. I don't even see the body hit the dirt. I just hear it. A heavy, wet thud—the sound of a man turning into a sack of meat.
"Liu Qiang!"
The scream slices through the afternoon heat. It's high-pitched, jagged, and makes the hair on my arms stand up. I freeze. My vision goes grainy at the edges.
Less than an hour ago, Liu Qiang was leaning against my window. He had that look. That desperate, "I'm-brave-because-I'm-scared" look. He'd smiled, showing a chipped front tooth, and said the words that are starting to sound like a funeral rite.
I like you.
Now, he's face-down in the chaff. His strings haven't just been cut; they've been shredded.
"Don't move."
The command is low, vibrating right against my ear. Before I can even twitch, a hand clamps around my wrist. Gu Chen. His grip is like a steel shackle—dry, warm, and utterly immovable. He's not holding me to comfort me; he's holding me so I don't bolt.
"I didn't do anything," I blurt out.
The words are out before I can swallow them. Stupid. God, I sound like a toddler caught with her hand in the cookie jar. Gu Chen doesn't look at me. His eyes are fixed on the chaos five feet away. Liu Qiang's body gives one violent, ugly jerk, and then—nothing. Total stillness. The kind that makes you want to stop breathing just to match it.
"I didn't say you did," Gu Chen says.
His voice is too calm. It's the calm of a man watching a fuse burn down, knowing exactly when the explosion is coming.
I try to yank my arm back. My skin feels like it's crawling under his touch. He doesn't let go. Instead, he shifts his weight, subtly positioning his body between me and the crowd. Protection? Or is he just making sure his prime suspect doesn't vanish into the dust?
"Stay," he orders. It's a one-word cage.
"I need to—I should help," I lie. My heart is a frantic bird hitting the walls of my chest. I don't want to help. I want to run until my lungs bleed.
"You need to stay," he corrects, his voice dropping an octave.
The crowd is a living thing now, a multi-headed beast turning its gaze toward me. I can feel the heat of their stares. It's not sympathy. It's the look people give a house that's currently on fire—half-fascinated, half-terrified it'll spread to theirs.
"Omen."
The word is whispered, but in the sudden silence of the yard, it sounds like a gunshot.
I hate how my body betrays me. My shoulders hunch. My chin lifts, defensive and sharp. I look like a cornered animal, which in this village, is basically the same thing as a confession.
Gu Chen's eyes flick to me, then back to the body. He notices the way my pulse is visible in my throat. He notices everything.
"Move back!" he barks at the crowd.
They move. They always move for him. It's disgusting, really, how much gravity he has. He pulls the world toward him just by standing still.
Liu Qiang's sister pushes through, her face a mask of dirt and tears. She hits the ground next to her brother, shaking him so hard his head flops like a doll's.
"What happened? He was fine! He was just talking to her!" She points a shaking finger at me. Her eyes are bloodshot, wild with the kind of grief that needs a target.
Gu Chen finally drops my wrist, but he doesn't move away. He crouches, two fingers pressing into the side of Liu Qiang's neck. His jaw is set so tight I can see the muscle ticking.
"Still alive," he mutters. "Barely."
My knees hit the dirt. Not because I'm praying, but because they've turned to water.
Not dead. Not yet.
But that's not a relief. It's a stay of execution. If Zhang Wei died and Liu Qiang lives, does that make me a failed witch or a lucky one?
Gu Chen stands up. He looks down at me, and for a second, the mask slips. There's something there—curiosity? Distrust? Or is he just deciding which cell to put me in?
"He spoke to you," Gu Chen says.
"No," I whisper. The lie is a reflex now. A survival instinct.
"He did!" the sister shrieks. "He was smiling when he left your house. He told me last night he was going to tell you... he was going to tell you he wanted to marry you!"
The crowd gasps. A collective intake of breath that sounds like a hiss.
Gu Chen takes a step toward me. One. Two. He's looming now, blocking out the sun. "Yesterday, Zhang Wei confessed. Today, he's cold in the ground."
He pauses, letting the weight of it crush me.
"Now, Liu Qiang tells you he likes you. An hour later, his heart stops."
I look up at him, my vision blurring. "People get sick, Gu Chen. It's a coincidence. It has to be."
"Two men," someone in the back mutters.
"Two accidents," another voice joins in.
"One girl."
The whispers are a swarm of hornets now, stinging me from every side.
Gu Chen raises a hand, and the hornets go quiet. He turns back to me, his gaze steady, terrifyingly analytical. "Did you know this would happen?"
"No." My voice cracks.
"Did you feel anything? A chill? A premonition?"
I think of the way the air turned to ice when Liu Qiang smiled at me. The way my skin felt like it was being stitched together by invisible needles.
"No," I lie. I'm a professional now.
Gu Chen nods, but his eyes say he doesn't believe a word of it. "All right. Get him to the clinic," he orders the men.
They lift Liu Qiang, his boots dragging in the dirt. His sister follows, throwing a look over her shoulder that promises me a slow death.
The yard empties, but the atmosphere doesn't clear. It's thick, cloying. Gu Chen is still there, staring at the spot where Liu Qiang fell as if he can see the ghost of the event.
"You're not to leave the village," he says, his back to me.
"You can't do that. I haven't broken any laws."
He turns slowly. The look he gives me isn't angry—it's worse. It's the look a scientist gives a dangerous new strain of bacteria. "I'm not interested in laws right now, Lin Yue. I'm interested in patterns."
"I'm not a pattern. I'm a person."
"Are you?" He steps closer, his shadow falling over me like a shroud. "Because right now, you look like a trigger."
I laugh, a sharp, brittle sound that hurts my throat. "So what? You're going to lock me up because men have bad hearts?"
"I'm going to keep you where I can see you," he says, his voice dropping to a dangerous whisper. "For your safety. Because if the village decides you're the cause, I won't be the one you're afraid of."
He's right. And I hate him for it.
"Do you think I'm dangerous, Gu Chen?" I ask, my voice trembling with a mix of rage and genuine terror.
He studies my face, his gaze lingering on my lips, then my eyes, then the bruise on my neck. For the first time, something dark and unreadable flickers in his expression. It's not fear. It's hunger—the kind a hunter feels when he finally finds the tracks of something he's been chasing for a long time.
"I think," he says slowly, "that you are a beautiful disaster. And I want to see what happens when you finally explode."
He walks away without a second glance.
I stand in the middle of the empty grain yard, the sun beating down on my neck. I feel marked. Cursed.
As I turn to leave, I hear a voice from behind a stack of grain. A soft, terrified murmur between two old women.
"He didn't die," one says.
"Not yet," the other replies. "The Reaper just missed his strike. He'll be back for the rest."
I don't look back. I can't. Because deep down, I can feel it—the curse isn't broken.
It's just getting warmed up.