Aisha had avoided him for days—ignoring him in class, in the hallways, anywhere their paths might cross. But that afternoon, before their joint assignment began, Rasen stepped into her path with unsettling calm, blocking her way.
"Are you always going to run when I get close?" he asked, his tone free of accusation, merely stating a fact.
She didn't answer.
"We've never been close," he continued, "but I want to hear your name from you. Not from anyone else. From you."
Aisha studied him in silence. His face held no mockery, no threat—just a strange, patient waiting.
Finally, she exhaled and lowered her guard a fraction.
"If it's the only way you'll leave me alone… I'm Aisha."
Rasen gave the faintest nod, as if confirming something he'd long suspected.
"Then… your name—Aisha, right?—probably comes from your mother. You must look like her."
The word "mother" struck her chest like a whip.
"I never knew her," she whispered, eyes dropping.
"Why do you even care what happens to me?" she added, suspicion sharpening her voice as she looked back up.
Rasen never got the chance to answer.
"Murderer!" A voice like shattered glass cut through the air. Estrella stalked forward from the end of the hall, flanked by a group of girls, their whispers sharp as knives. "Where's the body? What did you do on the Red Night?"
The murmurs swelled. The crowd didn't intervene—they only watched.
Then a warm hand closed around hers, firm and unyielding.
"Let's go," Rasen murmured, pulling her toward the courtyard without waiting for permission.
"Let go of me!" Aisha snapped, struggling. The girls followed, hurling insults. No one stopped them.
Once outside, surrounded by prying eyes, Rasen raised his voice:
"Say what you want to say to her face!"
One of the girls stepped forward.
"We all know what you did, Aisha. That boy who disappeared… the one they found dead. What did you do to him?"
Rasen turned to Aisha, confusion flickering in his gaze.
"Is it true…?" he whispered.
Aisha didn't answer. She only stared back, shame and fury warring in her eyes.
He reached for her—but she pulled away.
From that day on, Rasen searched for her everywhere—in class, in the halls—but Aisha stayed a step ahead, always out of reach. Until one evening, he spotted her by the gate, a hat pulled low over her hair.
The crowd swallowed her, but he recognized her anyway. By the way she moved. By her silence. By her shadow.
Cristal sidled up to him with a mocking smirk.
"You actually care about that girl? You know Aisha's dangerous, right? You could be the next one to disappear."
The words burned inside him.
He found her. And when he did, all he said was:
"I don't care about your past. I don't care what they say about you. This isn't pity, Aisha. It's something else. And I'm not leaving you alone."
Aisha pressed her sleeve to her eyes before Rasen could see the tears—but he was already there, a silhouette woven into the haze of her memories, offering a hand that promised peace.
"What do you get out of this?" she whispered, her gaze a challenge.
The sharp click of heels cut through the air.
"Murderer!" Estrella swept forward like a storm, poison dripping from every syllable. "Where's the body?"
Aisha clenched her fists, refusing to let them tremble. She wouldn't cry. Not again.
A warm hand closed around hers.
"Let's go," Rasen murmured, pulling her away.
When he turned back to Estrella, his glare sent the girls retreating into the shadows.
"Get lost."
They fled. Aisha tried to pull free, but Rasen held on a heartbeat longer than necessary.
"Aisha… wait."
He caught her arm. She tried to walk away, but he stopped her—pulling her into an unasked-for embrace. Aisha collapsed against his chest, breathing in, for the first time in years, air that didn't smell like ashes.
"I'm no saint, Aisha. I know that. I pushed you. But I don't want you pushing me away. I care about you… no matter what's happened. I want your battles to be mine too. I missed you."
Aisha swallowed hard, then finally answered in a voice barely above a whisper:
"I didn't want you getting hurt because of me. You should stay away."
Rasen held her gaze, unshaken.
"I don't care about your past. I care about you. And I'm not leaving. That's my choice."
That night, at the mall...
The ice cream was melting between her fingers. Its artificial sweetness clashed with the cold knot coiled in her stomach.
Rasen paused. Something he heard—or maybe felt—pressed down on his chest like unseen weight. It stopped him in his tracks.
Aisha kept walking, unaware. Closer to the clothing displays. Closer to the jewelry counters.
Then she saw him.
Among the glass cases, a blond man was spinning a Victorian pocket watch. The golden chain shimmered with a violet glow she knew too well.
"Stefan..." Aisha whispered, her voice barely more than breath.
Above them, the red moon—just like the one from her nightmares—loomed high and hungry, devouring the world.
Part III: Secret (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TVDREzBijRI)
The dim glow of the hospital lamp carved Aisha's silhouette against the shadows, her breaths synced with the steady beep of the monitor. Rasen watched each flicker of the machine like a countdown. The sterile scent of antiseptic couldn't mask the bergamot and iron clinging to him—a reminder that his world no longer belonged to the living.
"Don't go," Aisha whispered, nails digging into the sheets. Not a plea. A challenge.
Rasen took her hand without asking. His calloused fingers brushed her IV line, and for a moment, the violet glow of the locket beneath his shirt lit the room.
Aisha squinted. Inside the worn pendant, a little girl with braids played beneath an oak tree. Herself—years before the Red Night erased everything.
"I'll take you far from here," he said, following her gaze to the window. "Where not even ghosts can reach you."
In the fogged glass, Rasen's reflection merged with Sanathiel's—two silhouettes, two beasts, one fate stitched in violet scars. Aisha turned away, but he caught her wrist with the gentleness of a serpent tamer.
"Why?" she demanded, feeling his pulse sync with the locket's eerie rhythm. "I'm not your cross to bear."
Rasen smiled—that barely restrained grin that promised storms.
"You're the bullet that'll kill my demons."
Thunder rattled the windows. Aisha tried to pull free, but his thumb traced her bandaged scar, pausing where the skin flushed violet.
"Tell me his name," he demanded, the locket burning against his chest. "The one who carved this sin into your skin."
The monitor spiked. Down the hall, a nurse hummed Clair de Lune. Aisha shut her eyes—that same melody had floated through her room the night Stefan appeared in her crib.
"He's… a mirage," she lied.
But Rasen smelled the truth in her sweat.
Even if she denied it, her skin remembered—the icy brush of Stefan's fingers, the way he whispered her name like she already belonged to him.
Rasen leaned in, lips grazing the scar on her neck as he sealed his vow:
"Mirages burn with fire."
Aisha gasped. In her mind, Sanathiel howled behind the bars of her memory, Stefan's pocket watch gleaming the same violet as Rasen's marks.
But this wasn't just a memory.
A shiver raced down her spine as the air thickened, suffocating. The IV drip trembled with a near-silent click. An invisible weight pressed against her chest—icy fingers tracing her collarbone. It couldn't be him. Not now.
The shadow on the window stretched, twisting into something neither human nor beast.
"He wants me dead!" she spat, voice laced with venom and fear.
Rasen clenched the locket until the chain drew blood.
"You'll die," he whispered against her skin, "when I breathe my last. And I still have enough air to burn worlds."
Outside, the storm tore a wire from the building. The spark illuminated three circles etched into the window frame—fleeting as a nightmare's laugh.