The silence still reigned.
Dominic stood in the grand hallway, the shadows of fear still clutched loosely in his heart.
The air tasted metallic now—faint but unmistakable. Like a storm had passed through without wind or rain, only its scent left behind.
He took the stairs back down, slower this time.
The unsettling disarray had evolved from eerie to suffocating. This wasn't a prank. This wasn't a coincidence. Every detail felt chosen—placed with care, like someone wanted him to feel it but not understand it.
His feet carried him toward the dining hall.
At first, he wasn't thinking about it. He moved instinctively, pulled by the weight of routine. Dinner should be underway. Cook would be complaining about the spice shipment delay. Thomlin might be sipping tea from his chipped porcelain cup. Mother and Father would be—
He stopped just outside the dining room doors.
They were shut.
Which was odd.
The House Manon staff always kept the doors open before a meal. It was part of the presentation. Hospitality for a family that rarely needed to pretend it cared.
Dominic hesitated.
Something inside him whispered that he didn't want to open those doors.
But he did.
He always had to know.
The hinges groaned faintly as the doors parted.
At first, nothing seemed wrong.
The room was still and immaculate. The long mahogany table was set for dinner—silver cutlery in perfect alignment, porcelain gleaming under the hanging chandelier, wine decanted and breathing gently in crystal flasks.
But the stillness wasn't peace.
It was paralysis.
Then he saw it.
At the far end of the table sat his father.
Lord Aurelian Manon, face half in shadow, body rigid in his high-backed chair.
Dominic stared.
"Father…?" he croaked, stepping closer.
His father didn't move.
Because he couldn't.
Dominic reached the table's head and the breath caught in his throat.
His father's eyes were open, glassy.
His wrists were tied to the armrests with dark silk cord. Not rope—something more elegant, deliberate. His head lolled slightly to the right, and the corner of his mouth was swollen. Split.
A second later, Dominic noticed the blood.
Thin, dried lines running from beneath the fingernails. His father's hands were raw.
Dominic staggered back.
No.
No.
He turned—and saw more.
Lady Kaelene Manon—his mother—was seated two chairs down. Dressed immaculately, as if for a dinner party, her posture stiffened unnaturally by invisible restraints.
Her eyes were closed.
Her mouth was sewn shut.
Thread. Black. Coarse. Sloppy.
Dominic let out a sound—half gasp, half choke.
The walls of the room began to ripple.
No—not the walls. His vision.
He staggered again and fell to one knee.
That's when he saw the others.
Twenty five bodies.
Three of them head staffs, the two—his sisters. Thomlin. Juna. Malden the cook. Jane and June the twins
All seated along the table. Like dinner guests.
All tied in place.
All… altered.
Thomlin's fingers were shattered. Juna's hair had been cut—roughly, violently—and shoved into her apron pocket. Malden's mouth was stuffed with onions, eyes held open with toothpicks like some horrific joke.
And his sisters.
Their bodies are arranged carefully in matching seated positions at the dining table, beside each other, as if still having dinner. Their heads are tilted toward each other, foreheads nearly touching—yet there's a large, cracked mirror standing at the head of the table, reflecting their corpses in a warped and broken way. Their hands are bound together with ribbon—the same kind they used to wear as kids. But it's been tied too tightly, cutting into the skin, and soaked with dried blood. Both girls have identical throat wounds, long and clean across, clearly inflicted with surgical skill. No signs of struggle—suggesting they were either drugged or forced into compliance. Jane has her eyes open wide, a glassy look of terror. June's eyes are missing—surgically removed, placed neatly on her own plate in front of her, as if served.
On the dining table, a message is carved into the wood between them:
"One soul split in two. Now, united in silence after 13 years."
On closer inspection, their fingernails are broken, and there are scratch marks on the underside of the table—suggesting one of them woke up during the act and struggled silently.
With one of the chairs is pulled slightly back, as if someone had sat with them after killing them.
Dominic trembled.
This—this
This wasn't rage.
This wasn't vengeance.
It was art.
Some twisted artist's attempt at a message.
He crawled toward his mother's chair. Her hand rested palm-up on the tablecloth. He reached out and touched it.
Cold.
Not just cold. Brittle.
The skin was waxy. Too smooth.
Whoever did this had staged the scene long enough for time to set in.
Dominic backed away.
He almost missed it.
On the far wall, half hidden by a curtain—burned into the wood in a faint, careful spiral—was a symbol.
Two concentric circles.
One broken. The other complete.
A vertical line split them both, like a needle or blade.
Dominic stepped closer. The curtain had shielded most of it, but now he saw the pattern had depth. It wasn't just burned—it was carved.
Fresh.
Whatever tool had made it hadn't scarred the outer wood much, meaning the person who etched it had done so… slowly.
Deliberately.
Then—footsteps.
Fast. Heavy.
Dominic turned.
Voices.
Metallic clinks. The hiss of a communicator.
He fled the dining hall just as three uniformed officers entered through the estate's front door, weapons half-drawn.
"Clear the hall!"
"Room by room!"
"Seal off the exits—"
One of them spotted him.
"Boy! You there! Hands up!"
Dominic obeyed numbly, his mind a swarm of static.
Another officer, older, strode in behind them—grey uniform, crisp gloves, a badge polished too clean.
"Name?" the man barked.
"Dominic Manon."
That changed everything.
The officers hesitated. Lowered their weapons.
The older man waved them off. "Secure the premises. I'll handle this."
He stepped forward. "Dominic. I'm Officer Talverin. City Watch. We received an anonymous tip—said there'd been a disturbance."
"A tip?" Dominic rasped. "You didn't… get any alarms? No distress call?"
Talverin's eyes narrowed slightly. "We were told the security system was down for repairs."
"That's a lie," Dominic whispered. "Our system auto-resets every forty-eight hours."
Talverin paused. Just long enough.
"Let's get you out of here. You're in shock."
"No." Dominic stood straighter. "You need to see the dining hall."
"I've already sent someone," Talverin said. "We're documenting everything. No need to put yourself through more than necessary."
Dominic's stare hardened. "They were murdered."
Talverin gave a long, performative sigh. "We'll determine the cause of death, son."
"Don't call me that."
The officer's expression shifted just slightly.
"We'll be in touch."
And just like that, he was being led outside.
The estate was already being cordoned off. Drones buzzed overhead. White tents began to rise along the perimeter.
Dominic stood on the edge of the manicured lawn, watching strangers walk into the ruins of his life with calm, detached professionalism.
That's when he noticed it.
A glint.
In the grass.
He crouched and picked it up.
A locket.
His sister's—Jane
He opened it slowly.
Inside was a photo—Dominic, June and her at the crystal gardens.
But trapped behind it, nearly invisible, was a folded scrap of paper.
He peeled it out with trembling fingers.
Four words.
"They wanted the code."
No signature. No blood. Just graphite lines, half erased, like they were scrawled in the dark.
Dominic's eyes burned.
Not from tears.
From fury.
He looked back at the house. At the officers who pretended to care. At the symbol burned into the wall. At the silence the world was trying to impose over something so loud.
No.
He wouldn't give them what they wanted.
He wouldn't grieve in public.
He would wait.
Learn.
Endure.
Until he knew everything.
And when he did…
He would never let them rest again.
But how did Jane's locket get outside?
[End of Chapter Two]