Chapter 3 — The Prisoner and the Gardener (3)

That night, Lila couldn't help herself. She snuck into the room he'd forbidden.

She just wanted one look at the covered painting. She was too curious — what kind of person could make a 2700-year-old monster say "I still remember her voice"?

She lifted one corner of the cloth.

The painting showed a woman. Young, bright, eyes curved like crescents, smile like wildfire. She wore a dress stained with paint, held a sketchboard, standing on the castle terrace — sunlight all over her.

Lila froze. Not because it was beautiful. Because the woman looked seventy percent like her.

Before she could look closer, footsteps sounded behind her.

"I told you not to look at that painting."

She turned. Kael stood in the doorway, moonlight at his back, half his face in light, half in shadow.

"Who is she?" Lila asked.

"Someone I knew." He said. "She's dead. She died a long time ago."

"She looks like me."

"She doesn't." He said. "When she smiled, she wasn't as loud as you."

"…Was that a compliment or an insult?"

He didn't answer. He walked over, took the cloth from her hand, and covered the painting again. Then he looked at her and said, quietly:

"In 2700 years I've seen countless people and forgotten countless more. But I've always remembered the way she smiled — because it was the only time in my life I felt alive."

"What happened?"

"She died." He said. "And I never smiled again."

"…And now?"

He didn't answer. He looked at her for a very, very long time.

So long that Lila thought he'd say the other line. But he only raised his hand and touched her hair, gently — like he was confirming something, and afraid of it at the same time.

"Now." He said. "I'm thinking that if I'm destined to burn my eternity to ashes just to keep one heartbeat of yours—I'd burn my immortality to ash, just to keep one heartbeat of yours."

He said it in English. Lila understood. This time, she understood every word.

She opened her mouth to say something — to mock his pickup line, or call him dramatic — but she couldn't. Because his eyes were too serious. Serious like a vow that could never be fulfilled.

Later, she'd realize this was the exact moment she stopped being an intruder. Somewhere between the sandwich and the candied apple and a dead man promising her his eternity, she'd crossed a line she couldn't see and there was no fence on earth tall enough to climb back over.

That night, she didn't sleep. Not from fear. Because she realized — this 2700-year-old monster was trying, with every clumsy, twisted, nearly sick way he knew, to keep her.

And the scariest part was, she found she didn't want to run.

The next morning, Lila was woken by wings. She opened the window and found a black raven on the sill, a wax-sealed letter tied to its leg.

She didn't touch the letter. She wasn't stupid — a monster who'd lived 2700 years had secrets she shouldn't see.

But the raven didn't leave. It tilted its head at her, like it was waiting.

"…Take this to your master." She said. "I don't accept packages."

The raven tilted its head again, and flew off.

But that night, when Lila got up to use the bathroom and passed Kael's study, she heard the very faint sound of glass breaking inside. She didn't knock. She pressed her ear to the door and heard Kael's voice from within, cold as ice:

"…Understood. Tell them to guard their heartbeats."

Then silence. Then the sound of paper curling in the fire.

There was a second voice, muffled, answering something in a language she didn't recognize. And then Kael again, quieter, almost to himself: "No. She stays."

Lila's heart did something complicated in her chest. She didn't know what was happening, or who he was talking to, or why her name had come up in a conversation that had made glass break. She only knew that the man who'd told her eternity was a life sentence had just said, without hesitation, that she stays.

She went back to her room, lay down, and stared at the ceiling. She thought of the woman in the painting, of "she's dead, she died a long time ago," of the raven that wouldn't leave.

She rolled over and pulled the candied apple stick out from under her pillow, holding it like a weapon.

"Kael Ravencroft." She said to the ceiling, softly. "You'd better not be lying to me. Roses have thorns, and I sting."

Outside, the moon was beautiful. And somewhere high above New York City, a figure looked at the moon and slowly unfolded an identical letter, bearing a single line:

"A beating heart has moved into my brother's castle."

The figure smiled, folded the letter, and tucked it into the breast pocket of their coat.

"A heartbeat," they said. "It's been so long since I heard one."

— End of Chapter 3 —