The snow still lingered in the corners around the school buildings, but the sun was higher than before the break. The icy air smelled of returns—to routine, to walls that hid secrets and unspoken nightmares.
In the spacious recreation room, where club meetings usually took place, Nadia, Alicja, and Natan sat with cups of hot tea, wrapped in warm coats, because the interior hadn't yet had time to heat up after the break.
"Mom pretended to love me as usual," Alicja said with an ironic smile, fiddling with her gloves. "She took me to a gala where all her friends pretended to know me. It was awkward enough to last a whole year. And your mom and dad?" she asked Nadia.
The girl shrugged, hiding a shadow of worry."Fine. They took me to the mountains. Mom asked a lot. Too much."
"Because she worries," Natan added. "That's good. My parents worried too, but in their style. They took me to a spa where they kept telling me to 'relax,' and then they argued for half the trip. I felt like a mediator. The holiday of love, right?"
They all laughed briefly, but the relief didn't last long.
Before they could settle, the doors creaked open.
Leon entered slowly, casually, hands in the pockets of his elegant, new coat. A smirk on his face immediately threw the trio off balance.
"How sweet," he said, approaching. "Back to the fairy tale."
Alicja straightened, Natan fell silent, and Nadia felt the familiar tightening in her stomach.
"The holidays were… intense," Leon continued, ignoring the tension. "Our poor housekeeper dared to serve me cold food. I told my father that if she couldn't follow simple instructions, she didn't deserve a place in our home."
He paused. Alicja paled.
"And then?" she asked quietly.
"She was fired. On Christmas Eve," he added with a smile. "She cried. I love it when they cry. There's something… purifying about it. For me."
"You… are a monster," Natan whispered, but Leon didn't even glance at him.
Instead, he looked at Nadia.
"But the best part?" His eyes gleamed with an unsettling light. "Meeting your mother, Nadia. That moment when our eyes met… ah, I can't even describe it. Her soul—fragile, sensitive—shivered when she saw me. I almost felt it."
He stepped closer. Nadia stiffened.
"You know, I missed you," his voice was soft, overly sweet. "And how you're afraid even when you smile. Hanna… you were always the most beautiful when you broke."
Alicja stood up."Get lost," she said firmly.
Leon chuckled."Fine. We'll enjoy each other's company. The whole semester ahead of us."
He turned slowly, flipping his coat casually, and headed for the door.
"Ah," he called over his shoulder. "I dreamed something beautiful. Snow red with blood. I wonder if it was a sign."
He closed the door behind him, and the silence he left was heavy as stone.
Natan sank into a chair, looking away. Alicja clenched her fists, staring at Nadia, who looked like she'd lost her breath.
"We have to do something," Alicja whispered. "He… he won't stop."
Nadia nodded slowly. In her eyes was something new—not just fear, but determination.
***
The night was quiet. Too quiet. The wind barely stirred the branches of the trees outside the window, and the walls of Nadia's room radiated cold. Alicja was already asleep, her calm breathing the only sound besides the ticking of the clock. Nadia stared at the ceiling for a long time before sleep finally pulled her into its dark embrace.
She was in that building.
But it wasn't the same building—it was harsh, cold, empty, with long stone corridors. The walls were damp with moisture, and the air smelled of metal, blood, and incense.
She sat on the floor. She wore an old outfit—a silk gown in the color of ashes, frayed at the edges. Her heart pounded in her chest. She knew he would appear soon.
And then he did.
The General. Not Leon. The General.
He wore a green, military robe from a time no one remembered. His face was cold, his eyes two empty wells.
"You're still rebelling, Hanna," his voice was calm, but made of terror. "After all these years, you haven't understood one thing. You belong to me."
She tried to stand. To push him away. To run.
But her body wouldn't obey.
"You betrayed them. You let them take them." His words echoed voices from the past—childlike, tearing. The twins. "Do you remember how their souls screamed underwater? Because I do. And so do they."
Suddenly they were there. The twins with black eyes, smeared with mud, hair dripping with water. Their gazes were dead, yet full of hatred.
"Hanna betrayed us," whispered the girl.
"Hanna said she would protect us," added the boy.
"I didn't want to…" whispered Nadia, feeling it was not her voice, but Hanna's.
The General approached. He knelt beside her, lifting her chin. His touch was icy.
"We start anew. You're back. And you will not make a mistake again… because I won't let you leave. I will take care of you the way I should have back then. By day you will be silent. By night you will beg."
He kissed her forehead. Fire shot through her skull.
"It's time to take back what's mine."
And then something inside her broke. Images crashed down on her like an avalanche: Maria crying with a newborn in her arms. Screams. Soldiers. Blood. Closed doors and the blade with which she was threatened in the dark.
A scream tore through the night.
Nadia bolted upright in bed, screaming, soaked in sweat and trembling. Alicja woke in terror.
"Nadia?! What's happening?!"
Nadia couldn't speak. She breathed violently, eyes wide, hands gripping the sheet.
Alicja hugged her tightly, asking nothing for now. She waited for Nadia's breath to calm.
And in Nadia's mind, the General's final words still echoed:"By night, you will beg."
***
Nadia sat on the edge of the bed, wrapped in a blanket, holding a cup of tea that Alicja had handed her a moment ago. The windows were fogged with moisture and cold. Alicja sat beside her, still in pajamas, her eyes sleepy, but completely focused.
"This wasn't an ordinary dream, was it?" Alicja asked quietly.
Nadia was silent for a moment, staring ahead. Then she nodded."No. It was… too real. Too familiar. I felt like… like I was someone else again." She hesitated, then added more quietly: "Like I was really Hanna."
Alicja swallowed."What did you see?"
Nadia lowered her gaze, clutching the cup in her hands."Stone walls. He… the General. He was there. He said I belonged to him. That he remembers what I did to the twins. And then they appeared too. They said I betrayed them." Her voice broke. "Alicja, I… I also saw Maria. She had a child. He… he hit me. I saw it. I remember that feeling."
Alicja grabbed her hand."You're not alone. Not now. And you don't have to go through this without us. If all of this really happened… if these are your memories, it means you have the right to feel this pain. But you also have the right to fight for yourself."
Nadia wiped away her tears."I want to see it. With my own eyes. I want to go to the pond."
Alicja looked at her carefully, then nodded."We'll go together."
***
The path was covered with a thin layer of snow that creaked under their boots. When they reached the pond, mist hovered low over the water. The surface was partially frozen, but not completely.
The water still pulsed with a strange tension—you could feel it under your skin.
Nadia stopped a few steps from the edge. She stared into the water as if expecting something—or someone—to emerge.
"This is where… He dragged me. He returned to this place like it was an altar." Her voice was quiet, as if afraid the pond could hear.
Alicja looked around nervously."Do you feel it? That tension? Like the air has grown heavier?"
Nadia nodded."Yes. This is where they are. The twins. Their souls. They haunt us. They haunted my mother too."
Alicja gripped her hand tightly."You're here. We're together. And if he tries to touch you again… I swear we'll destroy him. Together. You're not Hanna. You're Nadia. And he has no power over you if you don't give it to him."
At that moment, a gentle breeze stirred the water's surface. For a fraction of a second, Nadia could have sworn she saw two figures beneath the surface—a boy and a girl—staring at her with wide, black eyes.
"Let's get out of here," she said, trembling.
Alicja asked no questions. She just held her tightly as they walked back toward the dormitory.
***
Throughout the day, the school gradually quieted—most students had returned to their rooms or wandered between classrooms and the common room. Nadia sat alone at one of the tables in the library, wrapped in a warm sweater. She tried to read, but the letters on the page blurred, unwilling to stay in place.
Suddenly… something shifted. The smell of old paper transformed into a shadow of something familiar—incense. Not the kind used in the library. Something heavier. Something ritualistic.
She drew a sharp breath and closed her eyes.
A memory.
Flickering candlelight. Stone walls. She—kneeling before a low altar. Holding something… metallic. A bowl? Blood? She heard words spoken in a strange, harsh language, yet somehow… she understood.
The General's voice, soft as a whisper:"You will return to me. All this has already happened. And I have the time to repeat it… to the end."
Her hands trembled. The image vanished, but the suffocating weight did not. On the contrary—it intensified.
She looked at her own hands—for a fraction of a second, she saw them as if they were not her own. Longer nails, delicate rings with red stones, like Hanna had worn.
Then she blinked—everything returned to normal.
"Nadia?" Alicja's voice pulled her from the daze. She approached with a book under her arm, but seeing her friend's pale face, she grew concerned."What's happening?"
Nadia swallowed."I… had a flash. Not a dream. Not a vision. It was here, now. As if… as if Hanna opened her eyes through me."
Alicja sat silently beside her, placing a hand over hers."It's happening more often, isn't it?"
Nadia nodded."And worse… I'm starting to feel emotions that aren't mine. Hatred. Fear. Sometimes… longing. As if Hanna isn't just remembering—but returning."
In the distance came a muffled sound—like a heavy door closing. Nadia flinched."I need to find out who I really was. And what happened to that child. To Maria. To me."
Alicja squeezed her hand tighter."And you will. But not alone."
***
Moonlight filtered through the curtains, casting pale streaks of light across the walls. The room was silent, the only sounds the breaths of the two sleeping girls.
Nadia slept restlessly.Alicja did too.
Both dreamed the same dream. Though they could not yet know it, their souls were returning to the past, to a place they knew all too well.
The walls were damp, water dripping from the ceiling. The air smelled of blood and incense. Candles cast flickering shadows, and the silence vibrated with tension.
Nadia was no longer herself. She was Hanna.
She stood against the wall, her lip split, cheek bruised, arms marked by traces of violence. Fear and helplessness flickered in her eyes.
In the center of the room knelt Maria—Alicja from a previous life. Her hands were bound, her gaze proud, though pain lurked in her eyes.
Beside her stood the General—his face dark, inhuman, as if it did not belong to a man.
He grabbed Maria by the hair and forced her to look toward Hanna."Look," he hissed coldly. "See what your betrayal has brought."
Hanna trembled. Tears filled her eyes."I'm sorry… I didn't mean to…" she whispered, her voice shaking.
She remembered everything—beatings, threats, screams, the fear that paralyzed her will. And how—broken, soaked in blood—she confessed to the General that Maria and her sister had planned to use a ritual against him. That they had a hidden dagger. That they intended to sacrifice themselves to destroy him.
"I was scared… I couldn't… anymore…" she sobbed. "I didn't want to betray you, Maria…"
The General smiled coldly, triumphantly."That is precisely why you belong to me. And now I will show you."
He drew an old weapon—a military pistol—and pressed it to Maria's temple.
Maria did not plead. She looked at Hanna with tenderness."I was always ready to die for you. Just don't let him win…"
The shot pierced the air.
Blood splattered the wall. Maria's body collapsed lifelessly. Hanna howled in pain."MARIA!"
The General grabbed her violently by the hair, forcing her to look."Now you know how it ends for those you let into your heart. Never risk it again. Or I will tear that heart from you."
Nadia awoke with a scream. Her heart pounded in her chest. Her pajamas were soaked with sweat, tears streaming down her cheeks.
Alicja also sat up abruptly. Her face was pale, eyes wide, lips trembling.
Both breathed heavily.
"You saw it too…?" Nadia asked quietly.
Alicja nodded. Her hands trembled."I… I died. And you… handed me over. But… now I no longer feel anger, though at first I hated you for that," she whispered. "I only feel that it could happen again. That he wants us to make the same mistake again."
Nadia moved closer."Never again. This time we won't let him win."