The teacher stepped inside with her usual sigh and a stack of scripture notes pressed tight to her chest. A hush followed her like fog, settling over the desks.
Most of the class straightened lazily. A few shuffled parchment around to look busy. Ian stayed still.
Somewhere to his left, a sharp snort cut the silence.
He looked.
Ellion, older, smug, always chewing something sour, had leaned toward the girl next to him. His voice dropped just low enough to pretend it was private, just loud enough not to be.
"Guess ghost boy gets a new face every week."
There was a flicker of laughter. Muted. Not loud enough to be scolded, just enough to sting.
Cala didn't move. She already had her pencil out. Her hand hovered over the margin, copying the day's header with practiced quiet.
Ian's fingers curled against his notebook.
From the front row, Isabelle turned her head slightly, just enough to see. Her eyes tracked the group. Then she turned forward again, jaw tight.
Isaac didn't look up at all.
But his fingers, resting flat on the edge of his desk , began to tap. Once. Then again. Then again.
A slow, steady rhythm.
Tap. Tap. Tap.
Tap. Tap.
Tap.
Tap.
It wasn't loud. But it cut through the murmurs like a bone creaking in a quiet room.
Ellion glanced up.
Isaac still hadn't moved.Still hadn't looked.
But the tapping didn't stop.
Not until the laughter did.
Ian noticed it. So did Cala, though she didn't look up.
The lesson began.
But Ian didn't write. Not yet. He just stared at the folded paper in his notebook, hand resting over it like it might be taken from him. The edge of it stuck out just enough to see the curled boots, the faint smile. He still didn't know if it was supposed to be Leor or someone else.
But somehow, that mattered less than the fact that she gave it to him.
And that someone had tried to make her feel small for it.
The cloister hall was quiet, save for the faint creak of damp stone settling. Faint golden light slipped in through the narrow archways, washing the floor in slow, uneven bands. The afternoon had turned heavy, not quite a storm, but close.
Ian rounded the corner too fast and nearly ran into Tomas.
He was already there, lounging on the bench like he had nothing better to do, chewing on a dried stem like a farmer in a storybook. His eyes flicked up, narrowed slightly, but didn't move. Behind him, near the far end of the hall, Isaac leaned against the wall with his arms folded, spinning a dull coin over his knuckles. Neither of them spoke.
Ian stopped.
"…You waiting for me?"
Tomas shrugged. "Not really. But it's convenient."
Isaac didn't look up. The coin flipped once. Then again. A soft metallic click, over and over.
Ian stepped forward, warier now.
"You've been real friendly with the ghost girl," Tomas said, as if commenting on the weather. "That a new habit, or something long overdue?"
"She doesn't see ghosts," Ian said sharply.
"Could've fooled me." Tomas leaned forward, elbows on his knees, the stem twitching in his teeth. "Talks to someone no one sees. Cries during rituals. Hands out paper dolls like it's currency."
Ian scowled. "You don't know her."
"Don't I?" Tomas sat back and dropped the stem. "I used to walk her home. Sit beside her in class. Ask questions. You're not doing anything new."
The coin flipped again.
Isaac still hadn't spoken. He was watching the wall, like it was more honest than the conversation.
"I care about her," Ian muttered.
"No," Tomas said, and now there was something heavier in his voice. "You care about being right."
Ian opened his mouth to argue, but Tomas raised a hand.
"She told me everything she's telling you. About Leor. About the bell. I tried. I believed her." He paused. "I even wanted to."
Silence.
"I got a week's worth of community service for skipping a lesson to help her look," Tomas went on. "Then a month of everyone acting like I was contagious."
He met Ian's eyes.
"It doesn't end the way you think it does."
Ian swallowed hard. He glanced toward Isaac. "You think she's lying?"
Isaac didn't look over. The coin spun once more, then stilled in his fingers.
"She used to sit alone," he said. "For years. Drew on her hands. Didn't talk much. No brother. No bell."
"You sure?"
Now Isaac turned his head, just slightly. "Would it matter if I wasn't?"
Ian felt something twist in his gut.
"She needs someone," he said.
"She does," Tomas agreed. "But not someone dragging her deeper. The rituals are supposed to help."
"By pretending she's crazy?" Ian snapped. "By replacing her brother with—" He stopped himself. "You think that helps?"
"No," Tomas said quietly. "But it ends things."
That hit differently. Isaac exhaled through his nose and looked back down at the coin.
Ian's voice dropped. "You really think forgetting someone is better than mourning them?"
Tomas didn't answer.
For a long moment, no one said anything.
Then Isaac pushed off the wall.
"Ian."
It wasn't cold. Not quite a warning. But his tone had the weight of something carried too long.
"Be careful," he said.
And that was all.
The coin disappeared into his sleeve, and Isaac walked off down the corridor, boots soft on the stone.
Tomas watched him go, then turned back to Ian.
"You're not a villain," he said. "But you're not a savior either."
Ian didn't reply. The hallway felt colder now, the light a little dimmer.
"You really think she made him up?" he asked.
Tomas didn't smile this time. He looked tired. Older than he was.
"I think… if you tell a story long enough, it doesn't matter if it's true. It'll live anyway. And the people who remember it?" He shook his head. "They forget how to stop."
He walked away, leaving Ian standing alone with that sentence still hanging in the air.
Ian leaned against the wall where Isaac had stood and let his head rest back.
He didn't want to be a hero. He didn't want to be right. He just didn't want her to be alone.
Ian didn't go back inside right away.
He sat under the bent tree near the old toolshed, the one the groundskeeper never opened anymore. The lantern above it was out. Most of them were, this time of year. The wind was starting to feel like breath.
He rubbed his eyes with the sleeve of his coat and leaned back until the bark touched his spine. From here, he could still hear the faint echoes of class, chalk tapping, chairs scraping. Someone laughing too loud.
He sighed. Tried to think of anything else.
That's when he saw it.
Not suddenly. Not dramatically.
Just… there.
At his feet, resting against the root of the tree: a small paper figure. Folded flat. No limbs, no detail. Just a body shape, with the faintest hint of a face scratched in — too low on the head. The smile was crooked. The lines were old, like they'd been redrawn a few times.
It hadn't been there before. He would've noticed. Probably.
He didn't pick it up. Not right away.
Instead, he stared at it for a while. It didn't look like Cala's usual style — no charcoal patterns, no cut-out clothes. Just blank folds and uneven creases, like someone had started making it and forgotten how to finish.
The longer he looked, the more it reminded him of something. Not someone. Some moment.
He blinked.
And when he opened his eyes, the doll was closer.
Only by an inch, maybe less.
Still lying still.
But closer.
His stomach tightened, slow and unsure.
It was probably just the wind.
Probably.
Ian picked it up. It was warm.
Warm like it had been sitting in someone's hand. Not long. Just long enough.
He turned it over. There was nothing on the back. No message. No name. Just a faint smear — like glue, or sap.
He heard a sound.
Or maybe didn't.
The kind of sound that's more a feeling. Like someone standing behind you just long enough for the air to shift.
Ian turned around.
No one.
Only the toolshed. Still locked. Still leaning a little too far to the left.
He looked down at the doll again.
It wasn't scary.
It just… didn't belong to anyone.
And he didn't want to put it down.
He slipped the doll into his pocket.
It didn't feel right to carry it, but it felt worse to leave it behind.
The wind had picked up since he sat down. It made the chapel bell sway slightly overhead — no ring, just the creak of the iron bracket. Ian stood, shook the wet grass from his sleeves, and walked the long way back.
The hallway was half-lit when he got inside. Candles burned low in their sockets. Most students were already seated, the lesson not quite begun again. A few turned as he passed — no one said anything, but he could feel it. A low ripple of attention, like dust rising behind a closed curtain.
He paused outside the classroom.
From where he stood, he could see Cala. She wasn't talking. She rarely was. Just sketching in the corner of a notebook she didn't use for schoolwork. Her shoulders were hunched slightly — not in fear, not in shame. Just smaller than usual.
Then-
He heard it again.
That sound. Behind him.
It wasn't a footstep. Not really.
More like… a chair shifting. Just once.
He turned.
No one in the hallway.
But a chair at the far end, one of the old ones left by the storage closet, had been turned toward the wall. Not pushed in. Just turned.
He stared at it.
His heartbeat picked up, but not out of fear. Out of a kind of quiet confusion, like missing a step on a staircase you've walked a hundred times.
He blinked and stepped into the classroom.
Cala glanced up. Her pencil stopped.
"You okay?" she asked.
Her voice was quiet, casual, but it had that tilt she used sometimes when she wasn't sure what version of Ian she was going to get.
"Yeah," he said.
Then, before he could stop himself:
"Did you… leave something by the tree?"
Cala tilted her head. "What tree?"
He shook his head. "Doesn't matter."
She didn't push. Just turned her notebook so he could see the sketch.
It was a child's drawing. Sort of.
Rough lines. Long legs. A scarf too big for the body. A smile drawn, then erased, then redrawn slightly higher.
She scratched the side of her neck.
"It's not done," she mumbled. "It's- I dunno, it doesn't look right."
Ian studied it. "Is that… me?"
She flushed immediately. "No."
He looked again.
It didn't not look like him.
But it also didn't really look like anyone. The hair was wrong. The jacket wasn't his. The hands had too many lines.
"I mean—maybe," she added, trying to sound annoyed. "You're the only person I've been drawing lately. It's not weird or anything."
He smiled.
"I didn't say it was."
She crumpled the page halfway, then uncrumpled it, sighing.
"I just wanted it to look… I dunno. Better. Like, how I see you."
That sentence landed oddly. He couldn't place why.
Before he could say anything else, the teacher's voice echoed down the hall, calling everyone to settle. The murmuring of other students returned.
Cala tucked the drawing away.
Ian shifted in his seat, pulled out his pen, and tried to ignore the faint, warm shape in his coat pocket.
That night, the sky hung low.
Heavy clouds had rolled in sometime during the late afternoon, and now they settled like wool over the village rooftops. The lanterns lining the walkways had all been lit early, their amber glow catching against the wet stones. Ian walked slower than usual.
He kept thinking about the drawing.
He didn't know why it bothered him. It was just a sketch. A weird one, sure, but Cala was a weird kid. All kids were.
Still-
He took it out again.
She hadn't wanted to throw it away. But she didn't want to keep it either. So she'd handed it off to him when class ended, awkwardly, like passing a secret across a battlefield.
He unfolded it now under one of the street lanterns.
The smile was still too high.
The legs too long.
The scarf was the same one he wore last winter - a detail she shouldn't have known.
He turned the paper over.
It was blank.
No signature. No notes. Just a faint charcoal smudge on the bottom edge, like someone's thumbprint had burned itself into the margin.
He folded it up again.
Walked.
The trees grew thicker near the old stone path that curved toward the chapel. He didn't like walking this way, but it was the fastest route back. The wind whistled through the mossy stones. An owl called out, once, then went silent.
Ian stepped over a crooked root
and stopped.
There was someone standing beneath the arch.
A child.
Not moving.
Back to him. Not facing the chapel. Not facing the trees.
Just standing in the path, where the old roots split.
He couldn't see their face.
Couldn't see much at all. The figure was hunched slightly, shoulders drawn up, arms slack.
Then it tilted its head.
Not slowly.
Not fast.
Just wrong.
Like it hadn't known which way to tilt until halfway through the motion.
Ian's breath caught.
He blinked.
And when he opened his eyes, no one was there.
He stood still for a long time.
The leaves didn't rustle. The wind didn't speak.
He slowly turned his head to look down at his coat pocket.
The doll wasn't there.
He checked again.
Nothing.
His hands were shaking now. Not violently. Just enough to feel real.
And in that moment, he wasn't sure what he was more afraid of:
That the doll had fallen out.
Or that it had never been there at all.