CHAPTER ONE29Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡVgocbGpiOz
“Colonial Codes”29Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡEv3AI1wccQ
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.29Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡDQz6ovPcdf
He wasn’t alone.29Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡarn6Ft31H2
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.29Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡnHvIlKtTF2
“I’ve found it,” Jabari said quietly, pulling out a single, sealed envelope tied with faded red tape. In ink barely legible, it read:29Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡlmbScDmbbs
‘Edict 17B – Joint Custody Regulations – Kisumu Educational Districts – Dated: 1925’29Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡqqDlQ5w66e
Musa looked up. “You sure that’s the one?”29Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡfD41gy0qHv
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.29Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡM6yooEYYm5
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.29Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡk9GCiM15kV
Jabari’s grip on the page tightened. “They didn’t just separate the schools. They erased the idea of unity.”29Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡJYn3zgkc5T
“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.’”29Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡtJiLLfFEcg
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,29Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡWKkeiekBxr
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.29Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡOlNb1CigP5
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.29Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡAQ7ajBns0M
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.29Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡbQRI6RClc3
“One... two... three.”29Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡPXyHjaEzCX
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.29Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡYkmD9O6HXX
Inside was a roll of thick paper bound with twin cords — one red, one blue.29Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡWpK2KlAezE
Jabari unrolled it slowly. His breath caught.29Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡq4Vgm86g88
It was a map.29Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡrc7BxmVsXf
Faint, but clear enough: the outline of the school compound. Except… it was too broad. It stretched beyond the wall. It showed both schools.29Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡOVaxrqNkDd
His pulse quickened.29Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ5sFtkvmduq
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.29Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡb5HICgEDTS
It reemerged somewhere beyond, marked only with a symbol: a water droplet inside a flame. No labels. No words.29Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡi2OnxwYBsO
And then there was the note, in the same hand as before:29Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡyzisXYRZiH
“Built before the split. Sealed after the first betrayal. Still dry. Still waiting.”29Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ4OZRlcI4Wr
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.29Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡa5nJ1vLGLF
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.29Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡYV8ElZ4rzs
“Movement,” he whispered. “Not just contact. Exchange.”29Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡwcLbwCv3kK
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.29Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡj2biqQS4NZ
Back in his dorm, Juma was waiting at the window, arms folded.29Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡC9OoWMSeYe
“Well?”29Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡjGEyu607jc
Jabari answered with a look, and a word neither of them had said aloud in months:29Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡLCGIjKVpfT
“It’s real.”29Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡg9wS7lCzR8
They didn’t speak of it again. Not yet.29Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡTYTbFymT7k
But that night, for the first time in years, Juma dreamt not of climbing over the wall—but of passing through it.
**********29Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡhBV9zZjVCm
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.29Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡuo8FQ6CXEE
They did not leave names. Only echoes.29Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡzS8L6swoG4
They did not follow rules. Only shadows.29Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ7mVH80ZYrq
They did not ask permission. They moved.29Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡIHsfIxHcTr
And on one night, two terms ago, Kim had seen them — though she didn’t yet understand who or what they were.29Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡCGecBgM19B
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.29Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡcSSMrBcXwt
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.29Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡLEFYMoDhat
And they had.29Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡSUbBuVMgYW
To her.29Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡYvFgelg8QV
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.29Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡMaEz1VQQaS
They meet underground, in a forgotten crawlspace beneath the collapsed greenhouse, where mildew clings to concrete and the walls sweat memory.29Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡEuZ5YTxhNZ
Only a few know the way. Fewer still survive it.29Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡZWaYagD67y
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.29Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡvOmEjlS4xp
They didn’t speak often. Shadow Walkers spoke through action.29Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡai9dwZOanq
When Ayo arrived, breathless and muddy from the drainage slope behind the dorms, he tossed down a folded square of stiff paper.29Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ5TNIZd8B9Q
A fragment of a science exam from Kisumu Girls. Still warm.29Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ0sC1lqVuhv
“Direct,” Kwame murmured. “Clean.”29Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡrRzrG9dloM
Otieno smiled faintly. “The wall’s just paper now.”29Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡqW7eEKVJva
“No,” Kwame said. “The wall is a myth.”29Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡBp6iaWl8RG
They are not a gang. Not a cult.29Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡqgIvPkBz5x
Not an extension of the Order.29Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡRBU2CF3OyH
They do not ask for allegiance.29Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡeW63lYtTth
They require only presence.29Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡwHrMc4hOjs
Their only law:29Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡGF5Xyde7gs
“Never be still.”29Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ69NUsQPlMm
Shadow Walkers are the quiet between bells. The blur behind hallway reflections.29Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ66932LWS02
The glitch in the security feed.29Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡGI58Kv6ohQ
They are protest and prophecy. They are the sharp breath before the truth drops.29Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡS17mv8MSqx
No crests. No salutes. Just movement.
**********29Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡlfQomI19S2
Kim stared at the red paper again, its surface soft but deliberate—cut clean, folded once, nothing else. Just the line:29Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡEqf81OJ2Ar
“Curiosity is no longer a private habit.”29Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡtDKP9Ow3GP
It wasn't a threat. It wasn't a joke.29Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡaQQkJqyfsO
It was a signal. But from who?29Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡDbqgUJmjB8
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.29Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡGg0LQvwXUq
And it meant someone had not just found her test note… but understood it.29Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡmGZ1tosucv
Stone markings. The first thread that never frayed.29Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡO2QW8FVyRH
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.29Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡUEiWROUo1M
Not by replying. By returning it—transformed.29Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ4FBj5SB8QV
Kim clutched the atlas tighter to her chest.29Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡC8E4EecjYQ
Someone had mapped her thinking.29Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡY1JNZftewL
And not by surveillance. Not by prefect tricks. This wasn’t Mercy. This wasn’t Naomi.29Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡmpYQiRRgHV
This was someone else.29Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡwQjkCbMemq
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.29Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ2VO6by6Qb0
Otieno crouched nearby, watching Kwame unfold the latest page torn from Kim’s original decoy.29Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡYnegISmcSL
“‘The first thread that never frayed,’” Otieno read aloud, smiling faintly. “She’s poetic.”29Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡkOj9uKdKnI
“She’s calculated,” Kwame corrected. “She placed this for us.”29Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡGOxN55mbeG
“No. She placed it for herself,” Otieno said. “We just saw it first.”29Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ6oy9aEVJDK
Kwame folded his hands beneath his chin, eyes distant.29Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ8cA3CE552I
“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.”29Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡAtP2yVdUgR
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.29Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡF4W14AnKxI
Because fear was best delivered in familiar fonts.29Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡiNwiQ3fkNi
“Do you think she’ll trace it back to us?” Otieno asked.29Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡY5PU8qxT53
Kwame shook his head. “She’s too smart to assume. But just uncertain enough to wonder.”29Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡUPXyIPIHg4
He tapped his fingers slowly on his knee.29Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡvp1PZRYS16
“If she follows the pattern, she’ll leave something else. Soon.”29Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡSq6oL1r3Yj
Otieno glanced up at the bleachers. “And if she doesn’t?”29Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡbvMoiJzd7u
Kwame’s smile was subtle, grim. “Then she’s not the threat we hoped.”29Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡEKlZlhQGR7
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.29Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡbmkvfFyVBP
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.29Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡWP8I5f4NZF
“Do you think it’s the Order?” Shiko asked again.29Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡXoyb1klB8X
Kim shook her head.29Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡg589wiYXNL
“No,” she murmured. “I think it’s someone else.”29Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡGjQGxrz9a8
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.29Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ0zzjKL8Rhl
She’d played these games before.29Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡeuucVRhkAU
And this time, she’d play them first.
*****29Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡQAugzaxLHa
Ayo didn’t believe in ghosts.29Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡYAiKCbndul
But that didn’t mean he didn’t see them.29Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡPWyGTzzxKI
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.29Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ5jOSUJ79n9
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.29Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡasYr9gMqXP
Prints. Not shoeprints. Barefoot. Deliberate. Light. Whoever had stepped here had done so with practice.29Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ9RnNkYmQ6S
But what made him freeze wasn’t the shape. It was the color.29Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ5dA1RDLmpX
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.29Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡuTVTMhh5mc
Mercy. Not as a prefect. Not even as a leader. But as something far older.29Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡK0PSAIRfX6
Ayo’s breath caught.29Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡhIHfxZADiW
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.29Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡtfjalx26k0
But Kwame had only smiled that small, cold smile he wore when something clicked.29Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡf7LeBXkz2s
“She was one of us. You just didn’t know it yet.”29Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡV3s6WzCbA9
Mercy hadn’t just corrupted the Order.29Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡOBUKFo5ybF
She’d outgrown it.29Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡfbtOlIkfrm
She’d used it like a shell. A decoy.29Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡBjD09EyjdT
While underneath, in tunnels and side passages, she had trained with the Walkers.29Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡADBYQpVUNw
Unaligned. Untraceable. Unquestioned. Until she got bored. Until she vanished.29Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡMnfIGwqFcq
And now— She was back.29Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡWc07Bf5kcs
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.29Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡgSzCyA4Tbx
But Ayo remembered. Mercy’s games hadn’t been about leadership. They’d been about control. And if she was laying ink again…29Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡU2FcnWrJQd
She wasn’t just reclaiming a position. She was reactivating a network.
29Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡwsvUcV96LI
Mercy moved like she never left. She wasn’t hiding — not in the way the Order expected. She was remembering.29Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡTkzourmjbc
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:29Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡyJ8BXvf0xu
A curved wing. Half-finished. Someone would find it. Eventually. And they would understand: Mercy wasn't returning to power. She was returning home.
*****29Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡsQTUWSJBbT
The prefects had finished inspection rounds. The paths were swept. The dorms were silent.29Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡEcSc08b89z
But Kim was already up.29Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡSDIoFgzm2c
Shiko had left her a note before dawn: “Come alone. Old pump.”29Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡWEqfWSRNhG
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.29Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡQM6PhAy23O
When she arrived at the overgrown edge of the borehole courtyard, Shiko was already waiting, crouched low behind the wall of banana leaves.29Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡwBiwNqsJNH
Her eyes were locked on the concrete slab where the rusted borehole cage sat unused.29Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡsf1xDhHU01
“Look,” Shiko whispered.29Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡhho5i3rHWK
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.29Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡLEy1aOK9Ru
Not graffiti. Not words. Symbols.29Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡr86tyquTUP
Kim knelt beside her, scanning them with an almost instinctive unease. A spiral, a horizontal stroke, a crescent hooked beneath a triangle.29Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡGCKwR3e9Xd
“This wasn’t here yesterday,” Shiko murmured.29Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡO2lDaYsbVl
“No wind or rain overnight,” Kim added. “No footprints.”29Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡd9arYfdNES
“Not visible ones,” Shiko replied grimly.29Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡFQe17VseKU
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.29Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡkA3iozFrKG
But something in her chest stirred. A memory. Something old.29Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡUQFwgTnYLd
Blue ink. Sandstone. A girl with eyes that didn’t blink.
29Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡppjetUULwt
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.29Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡyANyBEeRlY
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.29Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡn2zqJBUUYC
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.29Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡnBccHiA2ut
She knelt, pressed her hand to the cement, and whispered:29Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡtmMG6fvvD7
“Curiosity wakes the tunnels. Let them crawl back to me.”29Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡm4wAM06OFL
Then she vanished before the sun cleared the dorm rooftops.29Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡwwOu23TFSK
“We should tell Naomi,” Shiko said.29Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ4taOtEjA8p
Kim didn’t move. “And say what? That someone wrote ancient wall symbols in ink that shouldn’t exist anymore?”29Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡjdEwdXyRgn
She traced one of the crescents with her finger, careful not to touch the wet center.29Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡdjDt3bK9cA
“I’ve seen this,” she whispered. “Last term. Just not this clear.”29Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡppp8HtQ2Jg
Shiko looked at her sharply. “Where?”29Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡs6IXJyYEWe
Kim’s eyes lifted toward the wall.29Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡupxx2KzA6a
“On a stone. Right before the night I saw them.”29Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡeQURtsrvDA
“The boys?” Shiko asked.29Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡpABYtrTPDK
Kim nodded.29Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡQheXQ9VLSo
“And the girls who followed.”29Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡFOFWvsjEeE
Shiko’s voice dropped. “You think this is them?”29Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡrdd71GhpYY
“I think this is her.”29Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡPjEmFjT5mK
They didn’t say her name.29Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡZfUWsIUB45
But in the silence that followed, the ink on the stone dried like breath held too long.29Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡKiDjda0qqY
29Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡeIYyyiCopB
