CHAPTER 32: A YELLOW FLOWER

  The corridors were quiet, too quiet, as if they had learned the art of keeping secrets. Each echo swallowed itself, leaving only the faint, metallic hum of distant ventilation.

  Not even shadows pooled along the walls like reluctant spectators.

  Suryel reached out toward a suncatcher dangling from an ivory column. Her fingers brushed it. Or at least, she thought they did.

  Her hand passed right through the glass-like prism, leaving only ripples in the golden haze that danced faintly around her. Her grin faltered.

  “Maybe I am a ghost. Hello?” Her voice bounced off the walls, swallowed immediately. No response.

  She waved her arms, poked the column next to her shoulder, slapped a nearby wall— Everything unresponsive, her hand passed through. Her pulse quickened.

  The magical wonder of this place was slipping, thread by thread, from her grasp.

  Time, it seemed, had forgotten her.

  Or maybe she had forgotten it.

  A faint thud echoed down a distant hallway. Then humming, soft and rhythmic. A beat of something alive— Something small, skipping.

  “Someone’s here! Wait, please I’m here! Wait for me!” Suryel called out, racing toward the bend in the corridor. Her bare feet barely touched the cold lapis stone.

  The air started to smell faintly of citrus and dust, an impossible combination.

  A child skipped past her— Gone through her, like light refracting in water.

  Flowers braided into long thick hair swung in arcs that Suryel could only watch in awe. The girl’s laughter was light and careless, almost tangible.

  “Oh—Bummer!” Suryel flopped onto the floor with theatrical resignation, resting her cheek against the cold stone. Her gaze lingered on the now-closed door from which the child had emerged.

  Behind it, light seeped through the edges, soft yet insistent, whispering of voices in serious conversation.

  One voice tugged at her memory but a teasing, familiar tone missing entirely.

  It felt almost… alien. And yet, somehow, it still felt dangerously familiar even in its absence. A shiver ran down Suryel’s spine as cold air brushed her cheek, snapping her attention forward.

  Alone again, the urge to follow, the pull of innocence— Overrode her fear.

  She scrambled upright, running, calling, “Wait up! Let me come with you!” Her words dissolved into the corridor, swallowed whole.

  Each step carried a subtle echo that seemed to synchronize with a heartbeat buried deep in her bones.

  She was moving to a rhythm she had known before, along with an urge to touch the walls… To confirm and know that she had been through here before.

  The scene shifted seamlessly through memory and present sensation.

  Young Suryel hummed while skipping lightly, flowers in her hair bouncing with each step. Her shadow flickered along the walls, sharp and quick.

  And then she bumped into something— Someone— Like a bird flying into glass.

  Current Suryel’s stomach twisted. She froze mid-step, instinct screaming to flee.

  But she could not.

  It was as if she was required to watch.

  Samael stood there. A wall of shadow sculpted from dusk itself, still as the night air.

  His gentle smile was almost believable. His soft voice floated, not threatening but perfectly calculated to seem safe. “Oh, if it isn’t my favorite, little star!”

  Samael leaned slightly forward, hands behind his back. Every movement deliberate, slow, controlled.

  “Out on a stroll, Suryel? Where are you rushing to?” His tone was gentle, staged for comfort.

  “How was your day?” He hummed along with the child’s own melody. “You’re dancing… I could hear it from the next corridor. You always hum when you’re happy.”

  Young Suryel’s face lit up.

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  She bounced slightly, uncontained joy spilling into motion. “Mmhm! Helel is home again! He even brought me flowers! Like he promised! See?” She pointed to her braid.

  Samael’s eyes narrowed slightly, a slow blink punctuating the controlled calm of his smile. “Ah. You’re happy he’s back. Then I am happy with you. You feel… dimmer when he is not around. You must have missed him.”

  “Mmhm! I did miss him.” She admitted, fidgeting with the braid. “He’s been doing a lot of grown-up things.”

  “I wish I could grow up fast! Strong, so I can help him too. Like Michael.” She flexed her thin arms, smiling brightly, unknowing of the weight behind the words.

  Samael tilted his head slightly, eyebrows knotting, sharp as a razor. “Oh? Doing too much, maybe? You seem… worried.”

  “I… Yes, a little.” She said honestly, innocence spilling out with no filter.

  “And why is that?” His voice remained honeyed, soft— A trap disguised as curiosity.

  “I don’t know why it worries me, but… I saw things.” She whispered, glancing at the corridor as if it might judge her. “On his table.”

  Samael’s eyes flashed, controlled, measured. “Oh? Like what, little star?”

  Her gaze darted around, nerves fluttering. “Hmm… Scrolls. Maps. Names I didn’t know. And… I asked what a rebellion was. But Helel won’t tell me…”

  Samael feigned surprise, slow and deliberate.

  “Oh dear— A rebellion.” His brows turned down in faux sympathy, connecting with her fear. “You must have been scared. Helel shouldn’t burden you with such things…”

  “He didn’t!” She stomped, defending Helel with all her tiny force. “Like I said, I just saw it! I just… I just want to help him, to be grown up.”

  “I know, little star.” Samael said softly, voice like a lullaby trap. “And because you want to help him… you could tell me what you saw. Yes? So I can help him too… just like you said.”

  Current Suryel clamped her hand over her mouth, chest tightening.

  The child stopped skipping, thinking hard in the earnest, innocent, and disastrous way children do.

  Words tumbled from her lips like water through a sieve— Vague, innocent, half-formed details of locations, markings, and names she could barely pronounce.

  To Samael, every half-memory confirmed it: Helel was already preparing. The rebellion was close to being contained. They have lost. They’ll be thrown.

  When she clasped her hands, proud of her disclosure, she beamed. “You’ll help him, right? You promised!” And she skipped past Samael, hair swinging with the rhythm of life itself.

  “Oh? That braid suits you.” Samael crooned, head tilting to study each flower. “Helel did this himself? With his own hands?”

  Current Suryel tried to stop the child, silently screaming— NO! With every motion of her head.

  But the laughter of the child rang like tiny bells as she twirled, humming off-key, pure and untouched. “Yup!” She confirmed and smiled.

  Samael’s polite smile remained, but his eyes narrowed, the corridor’s temperature dropping imperceptibly.

  “You always talk so freely.” He said lightly, voice a compliment folded into a threat.

  Then, ever so slowly, his head angled down.

  Shadows masked his gaze, the smile thinned.

  Predation replaced warmth.

  The plan seeded itself.

  Fate solidified.

  Current Suryel’s pulse spiked.

  Her hand pressed over her mouth as stomach fell away. “NO, THIS ISN’T HAPPENING!”

  A soft metallic whispered— Shink!

  It sliced through the memory.

  Young Suryel leaned, eyes widening.

  She dodged the first blade aimed at her head, having bent to pick up a shiny pebble, out of pure luck, she looked back as if time had slowed.

  The second cut came too fast— Slash!

  She froze, pain contracting her eyes.

  Then she collapsed.

  Current Suryel screamed internally.

  Samael lifted the small body delicately, almost reverently.

  Humming softly, an amused sigh escaped him, he continued to hum the same lullaby he heard from the child.

  It was as if he was not holding a child, not moving a victim.

  But a gift handled with careful malice.

  Half-conscious, fingers trembling, the child plucked a single yellow flower from her braid with stubborn strength.

  It fell, drifting to the stone floor.

  A tiny rebellion.

  A breadcrumb of hope, wrapped in her blood.

  Samael did not notice. But if he did he would not care.

  He hooked a foot under a rug, slid it aside, and revealed a hidden trapdoor.

  He lowered her body through the angled interior, watching her vanish.

  Then, waiting for a muffled thud, he smiled and closed the door.

  Still humming, he replaced the rug with the same gentle, deceptively benign motion, wiping the blade with clinical calm.

  Then, just like finishing a mundane chore, he walked away.

  No emotion.

  Nothing.

  The corridors swallowed the sound, leaving only the lingering echo of a lullaby.

  Author’s Note:

  I am spraying Samael like a cat.

  BTW readers if you keep blades for a hobby, that was a PSA to wipe the iron clean after you use it… I have a katana for tameshigiri.

  Anyway, Damn… I swear writing this made me want to wash my hands afterwards and go to church to confess to sins I haven’t committed. Bruh.