CHAPTER ONE24Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡyTWEGsNlHT
“Colonial Codes”24Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡHwWxgNEChf
The rain had stopped hours ago, but the scent of damp earth clung to the halls of Kisumu Boys’ like an old hymn. Jabari stood in the archive room of St. Theresa’s Missionary Annex, a dusty brick wing that had once served colonial officers and now housed forgotten files and moth-eaten school trophies. Light filtered through high, grilled windows, illuminating swirls of dust around him like the ghosts of policy-makers past.24Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡvGZoFWisgj
He wasn’t alone.24Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡkKxq6eslwI
Musa sat crouched by a dented cabinet drawer marked “Education—Boundary Acts: 1920–1970”, flipping through yellowing folders. The pages crumbled at the edges but still bore the insignia of the British protectorate: a lion crouching beneath a palm tree.24Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡca8civpAm1
“I’ve found it,” Jabari said quietly, pulling out a single, sealed envelope tied with faded red tape. In ink barely legible, it read:24Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡUSr6FRCcI2
‘Edict 17B – Joint Custody Regulations – Kisumu Educational Districts – Dated: 1925’24Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡrYz1RHqSaq
Musa looked up. “You sure that’s the one?”24Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡbILtVoeCkm
Jabari didn’t answer immediately. He sliced the seal open with the edge of his prefect’s badge. Inside was a sheet of official parchment and a typewritten letter.24Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡjaGhfFfEMz
By decree of the Provincial Office of the Protectorate, any institution found to be in violation of Gendered Custody or Moral Formation Standards will be segregated and bound by enforcement walls. No intermingling of students is to be permitted except during externally authorized national functions. The boundary shall be physical, symbolic, and cultural.24Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡelQV3ElBrZ
Jabari’s grip on the page tightened. “They didn’t just separate the schools. They erased the idea of unity.”24Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ1fCgap5wss
“And enforced silence,” Musa muttered, pulling out a second page. “Listen to this clause: ‘Failure to comply shall result in withdrawal of national funding, erasure from examination boards, and immediate restructuring of administration under colonial discretion.’”24Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡtrfNvCu7vl
It made sense now. Why the two schools had been split. Why the wall had been built. Why even now, decades later, rebellion felt like a sin instead of resistance.
“Under the third stone from the left, by the old bell,24Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ20gmpzfxL7
Names are written that never rang.”
That night, long after lights-out, Jabari walked alone beneath the cloisters. He carried no torch — he knew the angles of this place by heart. Juma had offered to join him, but Jabari waved him off. Some discoveries had to be earned in solitude.24Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡZ3kdGZpHcI
The old bell tower was half-swallowed by creepers now, its spire cracked near the tip. Few students ever came here. There were no schedules to monitor, no records to file. Only silence, wind, and stone.24Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡfo6FoTp205
He stood before the base — a squat square of worn masonry. At the base was a row of foundation stones, uneven and chiseled rough. He counted softly.24Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡG1VM9PuECW
“One... two... three.”24Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡxr4ddCqwTP
The third stone was looser than the others. His fingers, calloused from years of fencing practice, felt for the edge and pried gently. The stone shifted with a reluctant groan, revealing a small cavity beneath.24Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡk8TmJ1mTRO
Inside was a roll of thick paper bound with twin cords — one red, one blue.24Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡWtICGNMjXF
Jabari unrolled it slowly. His breath caught.24Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡJIDgYSL1Ys
It was a map.24Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡohZEVknfye
Faint, but clear enough: the outline of the school compound. Except… it was too broad. It stretched beyond the wall. It showed both schools.24Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡPmztXmFD3e
His pulse quickened.24Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡfYVP918p0g
Drawn in graphite and ink, careful as a surgical diagram, was a narrow channel. It began beneath the Kisumu Boys borehole, ran beneath the bell tower’s foundation, and continued — dotted like a breath held — under the wall.24Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡGddviwRnqW
It reemerged somewhere beyond, marked only with a symbol: a water droplet inside a flame. No labels. No words.24Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡjYUbYulpcX
And then there was the note, in the same hand as before:24Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡiO4ylga59U
“Built before the split. Sealed after the first betrayal. Still dry. Still waiting.”24Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ0ZIV8We04T
Jabari sat back on his heels, mind racing. This wasn’t part of the Order’s archives. It wasn’t even in the protected cipher vault. Whoever had drawn this had known how to vanish — and how to leave only what mattered.24Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡt6dCQJbk2K
He thought of what it would mean for their order — to have a corridor that didn’t just pass messages under the wall, but moved bodies through it.24Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡF67m0WMOsV
“Movement,” he whispered. “Not just contact. Exchange.”24Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡEQ3fRNFLdP
He rolled the map back tightly, tucked it inside the hollow of his jacket, and replaced the stone as best he could. It no longer sat flush. That would have to do.24Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡTrBb4u5Si9
Back in his dorm, Juma was waiting at the window, arms folded.24Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡqg5fryUNwn
“Well?”24Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡCwtANnxEoE
Jabari answered with a look, and a word neither of them had said aloud in months:24Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ53Q2fdAh9t
“It’s real.”24Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡvSjYtEtTnZ
They didn’t speak of it again. Not yet.24Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡGuWWcMrCOc
But that night, for the first time in years, Juma dreamt not of climbing over the wall—but of passing through it.
**********24Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡufcIwULk21
Long before anyone admitted it — before the Order had its map, before Mercy returned with her black ribbons, before the prefects began whispering about breaches — the Shadow Walkers had already crossed.24Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ6i3j3TD7Gu
They did not leave names. Only echoes.24Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡm7HeofsCdK
They did not follow rules. Only shadows.24Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡZqJqnpVkcs
They did not ask permission. They moved.24Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡtTDszU05yh
And on one night, two terms ago, Kim had seen them — though she didn’t yet understand who or what they were.24Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡokUgj3FUJz
She had crouched in the dark near the bougainvillea, and she’d seen the wall bend. Not break. Not fall. Just... give. Slightly. Like a breath held and released.24Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡtDK9YwItkj
She’d seen them — boys — fleeing across the red-dust path behind the dormitory. Moving like shadows cut loose from curfew. Moving with the urgency of those who had risked everything to deliver a message.24Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡOGnOkGlNCY
And they had.24Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡyW2n0PePZu
To her.24Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡRKJd89M0jv
The Shadow Walkers don’t meet in daylight. They don’t record rosters. They don’t kneel to prefects or care for the rituals of the old Orders.24Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡMLSgdzuJ3p
They meet underground, in a forgotten crawlspace beneath the collapsed greenhouse, where mildew clings to concrete and the walls sweat memory.24Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡaJ5kscrARw
Only a few know the way. Fewer still survive it.24Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡpCudLwzPFa
Kwame sat cross-legged on the cracked floor, back to the tunnel hatch, fingers brushing the map that had guided them on that first crossing. Otieno leaned beside him, massaging the knee he’d twisted months ago, the limp still aching from that night on the girls’ side.24Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡWu7IuSnZg4
They didn’t speak often. Shadow Walkers spoke through action.24Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡMaRhP5paY5
When Ayo arrived, breathless and muddy from the drainage slope behind the dorms, he tossed down a folded square of stiff paper.24Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ28kIoV3xuS
A fragment of a science exam from Kisumu Girls. Still warm.24Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡbxXQDYifXq
“Direct,” Kwame murmured. “Clean.”24Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡCgj9NESHd7
Otieno smiled faintly. “The wall’s just paper now.”24Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡBBO80VkSTQ
“No,” Kwame said. “The wall is a myth.”24Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ7w5jbrvN9B
They are not a gang. Not a cult.24Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡEjJU1LJcA4
Not an extension of the Order.24Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡjrwLvC4seI
They do not ask for allegiance.24Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡkxKqn7wYAN
They require only presence.24Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡB2f3VptCaO
Their only law:24Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡq27iuKlMCr
“Never be still.”24Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡYnyEQ3jC5Y
Shadow Walkers are the quiet between bells. The blur behind hallway reflections.24Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡC4PJrim9RP
The glitch in the security feed.24Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡiDuLpgY0Gq
They are protest and prophecy. They are the sharp breath before the truth drops.24Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ6DfZpWptAC
No crests. No salutes. Just movement.
**********24Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡNn5YBkFigZ
Kim stared at the red paper again, its surface soft but deliberate—cut clean, folded once, nothing else. Just the line:24Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡLQ4mdcVXya
“Curiosity is no longer a private habit.”24Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡY6SwitEgsL
It wasn't a threat. It wasn't a joke.24Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡkQdF6UtLZz
It was a signal. But from who?24Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡZuXhUKQhlF
The Order didn't operate like this. They gave warnings in cold whispers or summoned girls under the guise of “guidance.” This—this was precise. Elegant. A response.24Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡYDuQ1Mk0ka
And it meant someone had not just found her test note… but understood it.24Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ6I7AOnK1QW
Stone markings. The first thread that never frayed.24Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡj7NDzz9Hrv
Kim had written those lines as metaphor. A decoy—just cryptic enough to seem meaningless. But someone had read it like a code. And replied.24Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡzgZ4gG4D7E
Not by replying. By returning it—transformed.24Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡvmdFK9YZez
Kim clutched the atlas tighter to her chest.24Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡBMS5UHi6Zb
Someone had mapped her thinking.24Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ0I4peWJ5I0
And not by surveillance. Not by prefect tricks. This wasn’t Mercy. This wasn’t Naomi.24Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡsAoS4nf6AF
This was someone else.24Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡXoxn1aaAwV
Elsewhere, at the same moment — Kisumu Boys, beneath the bleachers, Kwame watched the rain drip through the iron scaffolding, tapping against the aluminum bleacher seats above like impatient fingers.24Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡRZoQRlfbVR
Otieno crouched nearby, watching Kwame unfold the latest page torn from Kim’s original decoy.24Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡN75VuS1U1k
“‘The first thread that never frayed,’” Otieno read aloud, smiling faintly. “She’s poetic.”24Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡfK41Xy3IRu
“She’s calculated,” Kwame corrected. “She placed this for us.”24Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡGvQmrzC5MB
“No. She placed it for herself,” Otieno said. “We just saw it first.”24Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡMYh4XgORis
Kwame folded his hands beneath his chin, eyes distant.24Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ8QCyLJ2xBe
“She wants the truth,” he said finally. “But she wants to control how it arrives. That makes her more dangerous than anyone in the Order.”24Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡUHfBMwbPWn
He pulled a thin strip of crimson paper from his pocket—the one he’d already sent back, tucked into the borrowed atlas. The message, his message, had been written in the penmanship of a prefect.24Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡYjHMtU3n6D
Because fear was best delivered in familiar fonts.24Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡbSkBmA5Qxw
“Do you think she’ll trace it back to us?” Otieno asked.24Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ2lWP4d5Lcm
Kwame shook his head. “She’s too smart to assume. But just uncertain enough to wonder.”24Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡivXtkwkj0r
He tapped his fingers slowly on his knee.24Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ5hoqPiRmtG
“If she follows the pattern, she’ll leave something else. Soon.”24Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡQih6N8U1zh
Otieno glanced up at the bleachers. “And if she doesn’t?”24Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡNIVKAb8WY5
Kwame’s smile was subtle, grim. “Then she’s not the threat we hoped.”24Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡiijyYxglz9
Back at Kisumu Girls. Kim walked slowly down the corridor, Shiko at her side, speaking quietly about missing class notes and cryptic schedules. But Kim wasn’t hearing her anymore.24Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡfTEiULeons
Her eyes drifted to the rain outside. The same rain that fell across the wall. Across the space between schools. Between factions. Between watchers and the watched.24Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡvqrIvhReQj
“Do you think it’s the Order?” Shiko asked again.24Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡjSObGEDXSY
Kim shook her head.24Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡMPSmr78aYz
“No,” she murmured. “I think it’s someone else.”24Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡCTHySjI7g4
From behind the hall’s corner, Seline watched them again. Kim. Shiko. Leaning too close. Whispering too easily. And something inside Seline turned—not with fear, but precision.24Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ5Rw5NJvs63
She’d played these games before.24Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡJbm1BxGTh6
And this time, she’d play them first.
*****24Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡqgEt7zp3I5
Ayo didn’t believe in ghosts.24Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡzXgUZZLGA7
But that didn’t mean he didn’t see them.24Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡYDdBV8NgjM
They appeared in patterns. In broken routines. In marks left behind by people who didn’t want to be seen. And tonight, something was wrong with the air near the borehole — wrong in the way only silence could be when it used to hold secrets.24Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡwK8XKrxP6I
He crouched low behind the shrub line, just beyond the outflow grate. The rusted maintenance hatch hadn’t been touched in years — not officially. But Ayo’s fingers brushed over the soft earth near the metal bolts and paused.24Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ0oou2hO3WT
Prints. Not shoeprints. Barefoot. Deliberate. Light. Whoever had stepped here had done so with practice.24Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡyRInCQGxzx
But what made him freeze wasn’t the shape. It was the color.24Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ3djnDQmtJz
Just beside one of the indentations, smeared into the grainy dust, was a curved smudge of blue ink. The same type of ink the old Order used for encoded warnings. But only one person had ever weaponized it.24Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡSyn8pAFQOf
Mercy. Not as a prefect. Not even as a leader. But as something far older.24Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ5ZSfVyTZsP
Ayo’s breath caught.24Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡr954MO7Jpk
Back when he was still new to the Shadow Walkers — still earning trust, still failing small tests — he’d once followed a trail of blue drops from the chapel rafters to the records room. It had led to a pile of books, all hollowed out, each containing forged Order directives. He’d reported it to Kwame, thinking it was an outside saboteur.24Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡKYE7b5y225
But Kwame had only smiled that small, cold smile he wore when something clicked.24Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ195J0tjUKU
“She was one of us. You just didn’t know it yet.”24Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡqhV5hmqFZx
Mercy hadn’t just corrupted the Order.24Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡFPsD0qAZjM
She’d outgrown it.24Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡNenAsut3Ey
She’d used it like a shell. A decoy.24Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ1pgeWP1Oyp
While underneath, in tunnels and side passages, she had trained with the Walkers.24Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡMGdC4ud49L
Unaligned. Untraceable. Unquestioned. Until she got bored. Until she vanished.24Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡo8ad545YWm
And now— She was back.24Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡvKblhxKorS
Ayo stepped back from the ink. His mind raced. The others wouldn’t believe him — not unless he brought proof. Kwame had always kept his assessments of Mercy quiet, never confirming her role. Otieno hated her. Jabari pretended she didn’t exist.24Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ7Xy9VhRYAO
But Ayo remembered. Mercy’s games hadn’t been about leadership. They’d been about control. And if she was laying ink again…24Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ4xtHLrJQON
She wasn’t just reclaiming a position. She was reactivating a network.
24Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡtWIebFpepf
Mercy moved like she never left. She wasn’t hiding — not in the way the Order expected. She was remembering.24Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡTu4rJo3Zql
Remembering how it felt to slip between the bell tower arches undetected, how blue ink bled better on sandstone, how shadows didn’t ask for loyalty — just silence. She knelt by the stones, dipped her finger in the capped vial, and traced the mark again:24Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡNUWXA5tI7m
A curved wing. Half-finished. Someone would find it. Eventually. And they would understand: Mercy wasn't returning to power. She was returning home.
*****24Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡU20GBUsqb3
The prefects had finished inspection rounds. The paths were swept. The dorms were silent.24Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡB5QnL3Y9bZ
But Kim was already up.24Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡnRwTDXcj7Q
Shiko had left her a note before dawn: “Come alone. Old pump.”24Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡyrOF4OF60k
She pulled on her hoodie, slipped through the science wing’s fire exit, and jogged the narrow path behind the assembly hall. The air smelled of wet leaves and burning trash from the kitchen fires. The light was still violet-blue.24Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ1WvEedJD63
When she arrived at the overgrown edge of the borehole courtyard, Shiko was already waiting, crouched low behind the wall of banana leaves.24Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡabILe39OBo
Her eyes were locked on the concrete slab where the rusted borehole cage sat unused.24Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡaNCXYSRGWc
“Look,” Shiko whispered.24Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡIGt6RE1S40
Kim followed her gaze — and froze. Drawn in four smooth arcs across the surface of the cement was a series of faint, blue ink symbols. Still wet in places. The lines gleamed like veins.24Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ0WFqQY8mQh
Not graffiti. Not words. Symbols.24Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡdJwrngMaBK
Kim knelt beside her, scanning them with an almost instinctive unease. A spiral, a horizontal stroke, a crescent hooked beneath a triangle.24Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ1FM9Ycfsmf
“This wasn’t here yesterday,” Shiko murmured.24Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡPNDSGhlVe9
“No wind or rain overnight,” Kim added. “No footprints.”24Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡxlZ2Rn6Y44
“Not visible ones,” Shiko replied grimly.24Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡGQDrGoe0gP
They stared at the ink as it dried. One mark in particular — a shape like an inverted wing — felt familiar. Kim couldn’t place it.24Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡeW7kLE3paJ
But something in her chest stirred. A memory. Something old.24Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡCHSLWEN5jN
Blue ink. Sandstone. A girl with eyes that didn’t blink.
24Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡJEdT1BFNVk
Mercy had always liked the borehole. It was forgotten, unguarded. The place where so many whispered things had begun when she still a junior in Form One three years ago.24Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ9OThBWaOUp
Now she walked its edge again, dipping her fingertip into a tiny jar of indigo ink and tracing her old mark on the slab — slow, deliberate strokes. Each curve a syllable. Each shape a warning.24Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡRg5NCKubD3
She wasn’t returning to the Order. She was reactivating her passage. The Shadow Walkers — on the girls’ side — would recognize the mark. Even if they didn’t know it was hers. Especially if they didn’t.24Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡVs7vEwVDUG
She knelt, pressed her hand to the cement, and whispered:24Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡLjOcnXRCyh
“Curiosity wakes the tunnels. Let them crawl back to me.”24Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡpEXDMYbbnY
Then she vanished before the sun cleared the dorm rooftops.24Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡLwlpF3oj79
“We should tell Naomi,” Shiko said.24Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡrkCyA8ksdV
Kim didn’t move. “And say what? That someone wrote ancient wall symbols in ink that shouldn’t exist anymore?”24Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡj2YLZjkcUK
She traced one of the crescents with her finger, careful not to touch the wet center.24Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡTMBQNoN7Gm
“I’ve seen this,” she whispered. “Last term. Just not this clear.”24Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡu0nRppW92i
Shiko looked at her sharply. “Where?”24Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡGAwx2vUvRP
Kim’s eyes lifted toward the wall.24Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡGFFDtb2n1I
“On a stone. Right before the night I saw them.”24Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡueeBuIHFkS
“The boys?” Shiko asked.24Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡIqmQYb6GIf
Kim nodded.24Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡD2XkaSIVnD
“And the girls who followed.”24Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡdlH1qIgRac
Shiko’s voice dropped. “You think this is them?”24Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡjxMkZmLJJO
“I think this is her.”24Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡLGAE7do2tV
They didn’t say her name.24Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡQa7NS9nXaf
But in the silence that followed, the ink on the stone dried like breath held too long.24Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡYq0BBAqwQ2
24Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡBZSY9lP3Hv
