Chapter 37: Magnolia Finds the Last Page
Camille sat in silence beneath the narrow window of her holding chamber, watching the gray light of morning stretch across the floor in quiet ribbons. She hadn’t spoken since the mirror. The echo of the girl’s voice still trembled beneath her ribs. It hadn’t just been a reflection it had been a door. A gate to something she wasn’t sure she was ready to face. And yet, she had walked through it. She had come back changed. Not completely whole, but closer. Her thoughts, once fractured by dreams and false memories, were beginning to thread together into something solid. Familiar. Dangerous.
The door creaked open behind her, but she didn’t flinch. Only one person entered without asking.
Magnolia closed the door softly behind her and crossed the chamber without speaking. Her boots tapped lightly across the stone, and she carried a cloth-wrapped bundle in her arms. Camille watched her approach but didn’t move, even when Magnolia sat beside her, unwrapping the bundle with care. Pages. Old and cracked. Handwritten in dark, iron-rich ink. Camille’s heart clenched before her eyes had even begun to scan the text.
"They kept this from us," Magnolia said. Her voice was low, careful, as though she didn’t want to startle what little calm they’d found. "I found it buried beneath Elara’s private archives. Under a ward, wrapped in blood-bound seals. If I hadn’t been looking for something else, I wouldn’t have found it." She didn’t rush. She didn’t force Camille’s hand to move. She simply placed the final page in her lap and waited.
Camille read slowly. Her fingers traced the ink like it might smear. Her name was there Camille Voss, listed as Subject 4. A note beside it: Reclaimed under new designation. Bond-stable. Memory suppression successful. Her breath caught. Her pulse pounded louder than it should have, and her mouth felt dry. Her gaze moved up the page.
Subject 1: status unknown. Subject 2: deceased. Subject 3: unstable. Camille closed her eyes.
"They made us," she whispered.
"They made you," Magnolia corrected. "But you are not what they made."
The words should have comforted her. But Camille wasn’t sure she believed them yet. She had seen the gate. The bones. The runes that pulsed in her blood. She had heard her own scream reflected in another’s mouth, had seen her own face smiling back with malice. Subject 1 was still alive. Somewhere in the world. Perhaps here. Perhaps close. The thought settled in her chest like ice.
Magnolia watched her carefully. "You’re not the only survivor. But you are the only one that chose not to run."
Camille’s hands curled into fists around the page. "I didn’t choose this."