Chapter 17

  NO TIME TO REMEMBER THE PAST

  The sun slowly sank into the horizon, and with it, light abandoned that house. What ruled within its walls was not silence, but something heavier: absence. Laura stood motionless at the entrance, contemplating with a mix of nostalgia and pain the place she had once called home. She understood, with cruel clarity, that the only thing that had kept her mother in the city had been her. When Laura ceased to exist in her life, her mother left. At first, Laura tried to look for her; later, she understood that perhaps that woman deserved a happiness unburdened by the weight of motherhood.

  —Corpus et anima unum; ex umbris, muta formam meam.

  The spell was born as a whisper, but the dusk heard it. The shadows stirred, alive. Laura’s eyes glowed with a faint red, and a black mist coiled around her body like a shroud. The crack of breaking bones tore through the air, and when the fog dissipated, her figure was no longer human: a black mouse, with dim crimson eyes, stood in her place.

  She slipped swiftly into the house. She needed to see it one last time, to say goodbye to the only place that had ever offered her safety. Once inside, the small body closed its eyes and the mist returned, devouring the animal form and restoring the human one.

  She walked through empty rooms, stripped of furniture and objects, yet saturated with memories that cut through her like blades. She longed to go back, to return to her life—but not as it had been. She wanted to return transformed. She dreamed of fixing things with her mother, of ending endless arguments, of apologizing to Jazmín and seeking help for her alcoholism… though that last demon no longer existed. Alcohol had no effect on the Beasts.

  Unauthorized duplication: this narrative has been taken without consent. Report sightings.

  The phone vibrated. Laura wished to ignore it, to remain trapped in that moment suspended in time, but she finally answered.

  —We have to leave now —Melody said.

  —Alright… —Laura looked out the window and saw her friend’s car waiting, like an anchor to the present.

  Melody was in the driver’s seat, hidden behind large black sunglasses, drinking a juice with apparent calm, though her entire body remained on alert. Her left arm rested on the window, her senses focused on the surroundings.

  Laura opened the passenger door and sat down, the weight of sadness pressing her into the seat. Melody was about to ask how she was feeling when something behind them froze her blood. She started the engine and slammed on the accelerator.

  —What’s going on? —Laura asked, disoriented.

  —Look behind us!

  Horror rose before their eyes. A swarm of insects advanced like a living cloud, black and vibrating, devouring the air itself. At its center, for an instant, Laura thought she could make out a humanoid silhouette.

  —It won’t stop following us! —Melody shouted, turning sharply, trying to lose them through streets that seemed to close in around them.

  Nothing worked.

  Suddenly, Melody braked hard. A little girl was crossing the street. Laura’s head slammed against the dashboard, but Melody was already out of the car. The swarm changed course, drawn to the most vulnerable prey.

  Without hesitation, Melody ran toward the girl and placed herself between her and the tide of insects. She extended her hands. The air charged with electricity, vibrating like the moment before a storm. Her eyes erupted in an ancient, ferocious golden glow.

  —Materia instabilis; caro disrumpe.

  The spell boomed like a primordial thunderclap. The swarm stopped dead, and one by one the insects began to glow a sickly orange before exploding grotesquely, splattering the asphalt. Melody shielded the girl with her own body. Laura watched, stunned, as a woman was hurled from the heart of the swarm and slammed into a building.

  —Disgusting —Melody muttered, pulling insect remains from her hair—. Are you alright? —she asked the girl gently—. Go back to your parents.

  The girl obeyed and ran off.

  Laura approached Melody.

  —It was a Beco… she was thrown clear. I don’t know if she’s dead, but we’d better leave —she said, noticing the exhaustion weighing on her friend.

  —They’re watching us —Melody replied gravely—. We have to be more careful outside the refuge. They can’t know where we are.

  Night finished falling, and with it came the certainty that the war was no longer advancing in the shadows—it had begun to claim the streets.