CHAPTER 1: The Departure
The house was too quiet for a goodbye. Ellara stood at the door one last time, watching shadows stretch across the walls that once held her family together. She hadn't cried at the funeral. Not when the casket closed. Not even when the house grew silent. Even when they packed the last box. Not when her brother signed the last papers. But now, as the car waited outside, something heavy and wordless pulled at her chest. As the car engine hummed and the town faded behind them, Ellara felt the crack beneath her skin. They were leaving. Not just a house, not just a street-but the only place where her family once felt whole. And where were they going? To a town that whispered through her dreams like a forgotten lullaby. A town she barely remembered but one her brother refused to talk about. Her new home. Her old home. A place thick with secrets. She felt like they were leaving behind more than a house- they were living a life. And the town they were headed to? It wasn't new. It was old. Hers. A place lost in the haze of childhood, stitched with names she couldn't remember and faces she might not recognize. Her brother called it going back. But Ellara knew better. It wasn't a return. It was a pull. A quiet calling. And though she didn't know why, something deep in her bones told her this return wasn't just a change of scenery. It was the beginning of something that had been waiting for her, or even better, it was the start of everything.
CHAPTER 2: The Return
They arrived just past sunset. The sky was a dull Gray, smudged with the fading blush of evening. The town looked older than Ellara remembered-quieter, too, as if it was holding its breath. The car slowed as they passed rusted signs and shuttered shops until it turned onto a narrow road lined with overgrown hedges and leaning fences. The house came into view like a ghost from a forgotten dream. Her brother didn't say a word. Just tightened his grip on the steering wheel and kept driving. The drive stressed on in heavy silence, broken only by the hum of the engine and the occasional rush of wind through the cracked window. Trees blurred past in smudged lines, and the closer they got, the more Ellara felt the weight of something unnamed pressing down on her chest.
Chapter 3: The House They Forgot
When they finally pulled up to the old house-weather-beaten, sun-stained, and still standing like a ghost that refused to move, neither of them spoke. Her brother killed the engine, but still, for a moment, jaw tight, eyes forward. Then, without a word, he got out and began unloading the bags. As they finished unloading, they unpacked in silence. Ellara glanced at her brother. He stood by the window, staring out into the darkening yard. His jaw was tight, like he was holding something back. She almost asked. But something told her- not yet. There were things he wasn't ready to say. And she wasn't sure she was ready to hear them.
Inside, the house was cold. Furniture still stood in place, coated in dust, the curtains hanging limp and Grey."Do you think they'll remember us?" she asked softly, her voice almost swallowed by the silence. Jay's response was a glance over his shoulder and a distracted grunt. He disappeared into the hallway. Ellara's fingers trailed over the fireplace mantle, tracing the name carved crudely into the wood: "J+E=Home."Her breath caught. She didn't remember carving it, but her heart did. Upstairs, she found her old room-still painted lavender, the ceiling dotted with faded glow-in-the-dark stars. Her bed was smaller than she remembered. Or maybe she had just grown too fast. Jay's voice broke the quiet. "Will need to clean out Mom and Dad's room tomorrow." "Why now?" She asked. "After all this time... Why come back?" Jay paused. He looked at her, then at the window. "I owed them," he said, "and I owe you." But he wouldn't say more.
CHAPTER 4: Ghosts in the Halls 17Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡzUTe4dlKIN
Reverend Watt High loomed like a monument to order. Red brick walls, Ivy winding like secrets up its sides, and windows that reflected the stormy sky. It smelled of vanish, bleach, and something faintly metallic-like blood from scraped knees and broken promises.17Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ72QTbrfMXa
Ellara walked the halls on her first day, her shoes thudding on the polished floor, her name echoing from whispered mouths she didn't yet recognize.17Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡqipD2Kig07
"She's the new girl."17Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡhMJebzF4pe
"Did you see who she sat with?"17Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡAkNouBVcoX
At lunch, the cafeteria paused as she made her move. She didn't mean to sit there. Not really. Her tray was just heavy, and the other tables were full-or perhaps empty in the worst ways. But something drew her to the back corner, where three boys sat like kings of a ruined court.17Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡk72l1DObKx
Kaeli looked up first. His eyes were cold fire-unreadable but aware.17Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡIlEtTrfJ6T
Eshon leaned back in his seat, arms crossed, watching her like someone trying to solve a puzzle with missing pieces. Valen barely spared her a glance, his fingers tapping out a rhythm on the table like he was counting down to something.17Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡGioXWye9tD
"You are in my seat," Kaeli said finally, his voice low but firm.17Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡgw7BBJW1Au
Ellara held his gaze. "I know."17Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡbvg3SmbsxP
Valen huffed out a chuckle, still not looking up. "Bold."17Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡxhN4kPt8js
Eshon tilted his head, a faint smirk tugging at his lip. "Or clueless."17Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡlOaw6ss2SI
Kaeli's eyes never left hers. Silence followed. Not hostile. Curious. Then-unexpectedly-he shifted to the side, giving her space.17Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡi9ZyXJVT37
"Let her sit."17Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡBvf13t3xld
Ellara sat, heartbeat thudding loudly in her ears.17Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ84dwLFsjEa
And just like that, the cafeteria changed. Conversations dropped, stares burned into her back, and Ellara sat down... Not beside them, but among them.17Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡKc5idnvM5p
Later that day, as she explored the school alone, she found a rusted door at the far end of the third-floor hallway. No one seemed to notice it. But as she stood before it, hand on the handle, her name echoed down the corridor.17Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡtc0Fyfk32W
"Ellara."17Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡzv1fuMUzSY
She turned. No one there.17Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡUSPYzYwrqg
Just the wind whispering through the cracks. Or was it something else?
"Ellara..."
She paused. The voice was faint, drawn thin like breath dragged through cloth.
She turned sharply.
Nothing.
The long stretch of lockers and a flickering ceiling bulb sputtered above her. The silence swelled again.
"Ellara..."
Her name, again, was barely louder than a breath.
She clutched her books tightly. "It's just the wind," she whispered to herself, even though every hair in her body stood alert.
The cracked window at the end of the hall moaned as another gust snuck through. She exhaled, shaky, and began walking again, quicker this time.
But the sense of being watched lingered.
Not in a way that made her afraid. No, it was...familiar. Like someone who knew her once, and never left.
CHAPTER 5: The Rules Of Silence
When school was over, Ellara went back home. There was silence in the house that didn't feel empty, only waiting. Like it was holding its breath.
Ellara sat cross-legged on the cold wooden floor of her room, her back against the windowpane. The curtains moved slightly, caught in the quiet hum of the evening breeze. Dust motes danced in the slanted light, shimmering like forgotten moments.
Downstairs, she could hear Jay moving. Not walking-just shifting. Pacing maybe. He hadn't left the living room since morning.
She picked at the thread on her sleeve. Her new school uniform still felt like someone else's skin, crisp and alien. Her fingers were calloused from tugging at it during class, a silent tic she hadn't noticed until Kaeli stared at her during lunch.
A rule was already forming in her mind: Don't draw attention. Don't ask too much. Don't pry.
Not because it was easier, but because it was the only way to keep what little ground she had.
Jay had only spoken to her a few words since she arrived. A nod. A hum. A forced half-smile. The kind people wear at funerals when they are trying not to fall apart. And every time she tried to ask if he was okay, his silence answered louder.
She had grown used to filling silence with noise. Her old life had been full of it- music, laughter, her parents' voices echoing through their cramped apartment. Now, silence was a hallway she couldn't run through. It was thick, sacred, and off-limits.
A new rule: Silence meant survival.
She stood and walked to Jay's room. The door was slightly open, but the light was off. She hovered at the threshold, like crossing it would violate something unspoken.
"Jay?" she whispered.
He was sitting at the edge of his bed, hunched forward, arms resting on his knees. He didn't look up.
"Did you eat anything?"
A beat.
His voice came in low and tired. "I'm not hungry."
She leaned against the doorframe. "You can't keep doing this."
His shoulders twitched slightly, like the words stung.
"There is no rule saying we can't talk," she added softly.
Jay looked at her, not angry, not sad, just ...distant. Like he was in another time and place. "Some things can't be said out loud, El."
She hated that. The way he shut her out. The way he wrapped his silence around himself like armor.
"Maybe not now," she replied. But one day...I'll be here. I just want you to know that."
A longer pause. Then he nodded barely.
That was all she'd get tonight, at least.
She turned to leave, then hesitated. "Do you remember Mom's rule?"
Jay finally looked up fully. "Which one?"
"The one about secrets."
A mall smile, but it didn't reach his eyes. "Secrets are just truths waiting for their turn."
"Yeah." She nodded. "So don't take too long, Jay."
And with that, she left him in the dark.
Back in her room, Ellara curled into her blanket, facing the wall. The rules of silence weren't written anywhere, but they were real. They lived in glances, in the words left unsaid, in the weight of the grief that pressed between two siblings too young to carry it alone.
But she was learning to live by them.
For now.
CHAPTER 6: The Table of Three
Ellara didn't mean to sit there again.
She had drifted through the morning like a ghost in borrowed shoes- her bag heavier than usual, not because of books, but because of thoughts. Jay hadn't said goodbye. He'd left before she even woke up.
The bell rang for lunch, but her head was somewhere else, tangled in the way his voice sounded last night. Fragile like the crack in a mirror, you only notice when the light hits it just right.
By the time she reached the cafeteria, most of the students had already claimed their usual spaces. Laughter floated in the air, laced with chatter and clinking trays.
And then, there it was.
That table.
The one no one sat at. The one she had chosen on her first day without knowing its weight. The table of Three
She didn't walk toward it intentionally. Her feet just...moved. Her tray was balanced carefully in her hands. She passed tables, where whispers quieted just enough to be loud. No one stopped her.
But this time, the table wasn't empty.
Three figures were already there-like they had always been, like they had risen from the shadows just for this moment.
Valen sat on the edge legs sprawled, drumming a steady beat against the metal leg of the table. His head was tilted slightly, a bored expression painted on his smooth, sharp face. His uniform jacket hung open, sleeves rolled, defiance stitched into every detail.
Eshon sat opposite him-more composed, more closed. His eyes tracked her movements not with suspicion, but calculation. Quiet intensity, like he could see the reason behind every step she took.
And then there was Kaeli, seated between them.
He looked up first.
His eyes were cold fire-unreadable, but aware. Like he had seen her coming before she even entered the room.
"You're in my seat," he said.
The words weren't loud. They didn't need to be.
Ellara blinked. "What?"
Kaeli didn't repeat himself. He just stared unmoving.
She glanced at the tray in her hands, then the seat at the end of the table- the same one she sat in before. "I didn't know it was..."
"You didn't." Eshon cut in. His voice was smooth, neutral. "That's the problem."
Valen let out a short breath, almost a laugh. "Let her sit. She's already here."
Kaeli didn't break his gaze.
The silence stretched, folding into something tight and strange. But Ellara didn't move. She met his stare-not aggressively, but not backing down either.
Finally, Kaeli looked away.
"You can sit," Eshon said more to Kaeli than to her. "Just don't make a habit of it."
Valen winked at her. "Welcome to the cursed table."
She sat carefully. The space between them felt charged, like sitting in the eye of a quiet storm.
No one spoke for a moment. Then Valen picked at his food.
"You're Jay's sister, right?" he asked.
Ellara stiffened, "Yeah."
"You don't look like him."
She didn't reply.
Eshon nodded slowly. "But you walk like him."
She swallowed.
Kaeli finally spoke again. "This table doesn't take kindly to curiosity."
"I'm not curious," she said, surprising herself.
Kaeli raised an eyebrow. "You shouldn't be. It's safer."
Eshon smirked. "What he means is some truths are buried for a reason."
Valen added, "But sometimes they dig themselves out."
She stared at them-all three-and realized: "They weren't warning her off. They were watching. Waiting.
For what, she didn't know. But somehow, she had stepped into something bigger than a lunch table.
And silence won't save her from this.
CHAPTER 7: The Ash Between Them
The sky that day was a veil of grey, the kind that muted colours and muffled sound. Ellara stood beside the old cracked fountain in the school courtyard, her fingers brushing the edge, flaked with time and green with moss. It had been a week since the hallway whisper-a week since that phantom voice clung to her mind like a lingering scent she couldn't place. She hadn't told Jay. He was buried in his father's blueprints, already sculpting the future with haunted eyes and sleepless nights. He wouldn't understand this.
She hadn't told anyone.
The silence around her wasn't empty. It breathed. It watched.
She turned at the shuffle of footsteps behind her.
"You shouldn't be here," a voice said-not scolding, not kind either. It was Kaeli.
He stood a few steps away, the weight of his stare making her straighten instinctively. Beside him were Eshon and Valen, hovering like twin shadows. The table of Three. The heart of the school's unspoken order. No one approached them. No one sat at their table unless invited.
But Ellara had sat.
"I wasn't planning to stay," she replied, her voice quiet but steady.
Kaeli's gaze dropped briefly to her hands. "Then don't linger. The school forgets people who linger."
Ellara narrowed her eyes slightly. "Is that a threat?"
Eshon smirked but said nothing. Valen's arms were crossed, eyes cool, unreadable.
Kaeli didn't move. "It's a rule."
A beat of silence.
"Like the others," Valen finally said, his voice sharp like slate scraping stone. "The rules of silence. Speak less. Listen more. Don't ask. Don't stare. And never sit where ghosts rest."
Ellara stepped forward, chin raised. "And what if I already did?"
For a moment, no one answered.
Kaeli's jaw tightened. "Then they'll come for you."
Ellara's heart thudded, but she didn't blink. "Who are they?"
Eshon scoffed, tossing his head. "She thinks we're joking."
Kaeli finally broke the tension with a sharp turn of his heel. "You broke the rules, Ellara. Whether you knew them or not. That means something here."
Valen muttered under his breath, "Everything echoes in this school."
The three turned and walked off, their figures disappearing into the mist-like shadow that crawled along the edge of the courtyard.
Ellara stayed there a moment longer. Not because she was afraid-she wasn't sure what she was-but because something in what they'd said settled deep in her spine like cold water.
The rules of silence. Ghosts. Echoes.
It sounded like fiction.
But it felt like a warning.
And warnings, she knew, always came before storms.
Chapter 8: Two Worlds
Scene One: Jay – The Inheritance of Ghosts
The skyline of Viremoor City shimmered in blue-gray glass, jagged and cold like memory.
Jay stood at the panoramic window of the Veiros Foundation, once a symbol of hope and healing, now a stone-heavy crown left by ghosts. His father's empire still pulsed with influence — medical research, infrastructure, humanitarian outreach — but the man behind it was long buried in the soil of Oradell, beside his wife, under marble and silence.
The boardroom behind him was dim, the table empty. He preferred it that way. He didn't need advisers whispering numbers or strategists painting fake futures.
He needed to feel what his parents built. To understand what was worth keeping.
The silence broke with the buzz of a message.
INCOMING FILE: 'Legacy—Phase VI'
Jay opened it reluctantly. Charts. Reports. Expansion plans into the outer cities of Dralis and Mirenfall.
He rubbed his jaw. "Elara wouldn't care about any of this," he muttered.
But he wasn't Elara. She had the luxury of fading into shadows. He had obligations stitched into his name.
Still, as his fingers hovered over the holographic interface, he hesitated.
What if I don't want to be them?
But he also knew—there was no one else left to be.
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Scene Two: The Girls Who Watch
Back in Reverend Watt High, the west wing classes buzzed with girlish frenzy.
"She sat with them."
Moira's voice cracked like gossip laced with envy. "She sat with Kaeli, Eshon, and Valen. She didn't flinch. She didn't even ask."
"Who is she?" Lianne pressed. "She came out of nowhere. One minute she's that quiet transfer from Oradell Heights, next minute she's Queen of the damned cafeteria."
"I heard she's not even scared of Kaeli."
"No one talks to Kaeli. No one even looks at him for longer than five seconds unless they want to get burned."
"She looked for longer."
The room fell quiet.
Aria, who hadn't spoken until now, said softly, "He looked back."
Moira scoffed, brushing her silver-blonde strands from her face. "It's a game. She'll disappear like the rest. Kaeli doesn't keep... anything."
"She's not like the rest," Aria said. "And that's why it's dangerous."
Outside the cracked classroom window, Kaeli passed — his face unreadable as ever, the ghost of a smirk teasing his lips. But only for a second.
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