The Dead and the Unwanted Speaks.
The morning after the veiled thing knelt before her, the world had not returned to normal.The sun rose crooked.
The clocks spun too slow. And none of the children remembered Jessa. Not her laugh. Not her voice. Not her name. They looked confused when Lucy asked. Even Miss Halley tilted her head and said, Jessa There's never been a girl named Jessa here. But Lucy had found her bracelet under the bed Still warm.
Still humming with breath. That night, Lucy returned to the attic. This time, she brought the bracelet and a hammer. She smashed the mirror.It didn't shatter. It screamed.A long, low, endless wail like centuries of caged voices finally released.And then the room filled with them. They came through the cracks.
Boys with hollow ribs. Girls stitched from shadow. Mothers missing mouths. Fathers with no faces. All of them dead. All of them breathing.But they didn't attack. They pleaded. You see us.Don't send us back.
She wants to lock us in again. She forgets we were real. She buried us like mistakes. Lucy backed up, heart racing. The dead were not evil not all of them. But they were angry. Deeply angry.
Not because they were dead. But because they had been forgotten..A girl with no eyes stepped forward.
I was unwanted, she whispered. Born during war. Left in a basket. Buried under a tree. Her hand pointed through the floor. Downward.
All of us. Buried wrong. Buried without names. A boy with his hands sewn to his mouth struggled to speak. The stitches burst as Lucy touched his arm.
I was the seventh child, he rasped. My village only wanted six. I was given to the forest. I never stopped breathing. I just stopped mattering. The attic pulsed with heat.
Lucy could feel her crown burn cold inside her. She shouted, "I didn't ask for this! I didn't mean to wake you all..A voice rose from behind her.
The veiled thing. No one asks for the dead. That is why they're unwanted. It stepped into the room again taller than before. Its veil fluttered in an invisible wind. Its voice cracked like thunder in a sealed coffin. You wear the crown. You kissed the gate open. You called their breath back. Lucy's fists clenched.
You want me to seal them away again, the thing said nothing. And that silence was its answer.You want me to become like you, Lucy hissed. A jailer. A prison of memory.
They are chaos, it replied. Pain that walks. Regret that breathes. Letting them stay is risking everything.
They are everything,Lucy said the air tightened like lungs crushed by grief. and then the spirits began to argue with her. You owe us freedom! You owe us rest!
You owe us names!.They swirled, voices overlapping, cries turning to screams. Anger rising like smoke..Lucy collapsed to her knees. Tears spilled from her eyes. I don't know what to do.
Then one final voice came deep, old, male and it stilled the room. Let the living choose.
All turned. A man stepped through the shattered mirror frame. He was tall. Charred. Wrapped in chains. But his voice was calm.
I am one of the First, he said. Before the gates. Before the silence. I remember when we could speak to the living without fear.
He looked at Lucy..Not all dead want to stay. Not all wish to return. But none.. none want to be forgotten the veiled figure hissed. Memory is dangerous. And forgetting, said the chained man, is worse. Lucy stood.
The crown burned like ice in her spine. And she spoke
Lucy spokes and quote, from now on, I will hear them. The lost. The buried. The dead. But they must not harm the living.
And the living must not pretend the dead were never here..The silence didn't last. The moment Lucy made her vow the one that gave the dead a voice the room exploded into noise
Not physical spiritual. Emotional. As if centuries of grief had suddenly found a mouth.
Voices screamed.
Some shouted her name. Others screamed curses she didn't understand in languages long buried.
I want her dead, No, she freed us! Why do they get to breathe again? We were never finished, Breathe! Breathe for me! I deserve to LIVE
A fight broke out between two spirits. One, a skeletal woman in a nurse's dress soaked with blood. The other, a child wrapped in fire who hadn't stopped burning since the day she died.
They lunged at each other clawing, biting, shrieking.
The attic cracked.
The walls moaned.
Lucy shouted, "Stop it. But they didn't stop. Another spirit a man with no eyes and hands made of broken clocks collapsed to his knees and began whispering a dead
lover's name over and over, louder and louder, until his voice turned into a siren wail.
Chaos.The unwanted dead did not agree. Some wanted to return to the world.
Some wanted vengeance.Some only wanted to be seen, and now they could not bear to be ignored again. One spirit slammed into the floor and screamed:
We bleed in silence..Now let them bleed in memory.
Another roared back: we are curses we are echoes
A third one says: We aren't meant to be here, This is wrong! This is...This is wrong living.
And all around Lucy the attic throbbed like a lung full of smoke.The waking world began to feel it. Outside, down in the orphanage, the mirrors all turned black.
The children began to mutter in their sleep names they didn't know, languages no one had taught them.
Miss Halley screamed when she saw a girl with no jaw standing in the bathroom mirror combing her hair with fingers made of teeth. Down the street, dogs howled. Windows cracked. Church bells rang with no hands pulling.The dead were bleeding through.
And Lucy breath short, heart pounding began to understand.She hadn't just opened the gate..She'd shattered the silence.
A glowing man with a mouth full of stars grabbed Lucy hand.You need to choose again, he rasped. "This won't stop. We were forgotten for a reason.
Lucy stared into his not eyes. No, she said, trembling. You were forgotten because no one cared. Exactly, he snapped. And now that they must care, the world will suffer for it.
Suddenly the attic door burst open. The veiled figure had returned dragging something behind it.
A bag.
Moving. Breathing.
It spilled open on the floor and a body fell out.
Jessa.
Alive. But eyes wide with horror. Skin cold. As if she'd seen something on the other side no child should see..She remembered," the figure said.
It looked at Lucy..And now she's cursed with memory.
Lucy crumpled..Jessa shook in her arms, unable to speak, breath hitching as if her soul were caught on something sharp.
The spirits paused.
Some stepped back.
One whispered.
'This is the cost'
Lucy stood, hands bloody from gripping too hard. Her voice cracked with fury. I gave you freedom, not war.
And one spirit screamed back. There's no freedom without consequences.
They began shouting again.
Fighting again. Some flew through the walls, disappearing into the world.
Others stayed chanting Lucy's name like a prayer. Like a warning..And through it all, Jessa whispered two words.
They are coming. Lucy looked to the sky. It was bleeding.
Not rain. Not clouds.
But faces. Blurred. Twisted. Silent.
Not all spirits wanted peace.
Some had waited centuries to break everything.
And now.
They were free.
The morning after the veiled thing knelt before her, the world had not returned to normal.
The sun rose crooked.
The clocks spun too slow.
And none of the children remembered Jessa.
Not her laugh. Not her voice. Not her name.
They looked confused when Lucy asked.
Even Miss Halley tilted her head and said, jessa? There's never been a girl named Jessa here.
But Lucy had found her bracelet under the bed.
Still warm.
Still humming with breath.
That night, Lucy returned to the attic.
This time, she brought the bracelet and a hammer.
She smashed the mirror.
It didn't shatter.
It screamed.
A long, low, endless wail like centuries of caged voices finally released.
And then the room filled with them.
They came through the cracks.
Boys with hollow ribs. Girls stitched from shadow. Mothers missing mouths. Fathers with no faces.
All of them dead. All of them breathing.
But they didn't attack.
They pleaded.
You see us.
Don't send us back.
She wants to lock us in again.
She forgets we were real.
She buried us like mistakes.
Lucy backed up, heart racing. The dead were not evil not all of them. But they were angry.
Deeply angry.
Not because they were dead.
But because they had been forgotten.
A girl with no eyes stepped forward.
I was unwanted, she whispered. Born during war. Left in a basket. Buried under a tree.
Her hand pointed through the floor. Downward.
All of us. Buried wrong. Buried without names.
A boy with his hands sewn to his mouth struggled to speak. The stitches burst as Lucy touched his arm.
I was the seventh child,he rasped. My village only wanted six. I was given to the forest.
His jaw trembled.
I never stopped breathing. I just stopped mattering.
The attic pulsed with heat.
Lucy could feel her crown burn cold inside her.
She shouted, I didn't ask for this! I didn't mean to wake you all!
A voice rose from behind her.
The veiled thing.
No one asks for the dead. That is why they're unwanted.
It stepped into the room again taller than before. Its veil fluttered in an invisible wind. Its voice cracked like thunder in a sealed coffin.
You wear the crown. You kissed the gate open. You called their breath back.
Lucy's fists clenched.
You want me to seal them away again.
The thing said nothing.
And that silence was its answer.
You want me to become like you, Lucy hissed. A jailer. A prison of memory.
They are chaos, it replied. Pain that walks. Regret that breathes. Letting them stay is risking everything.
They are everything, Lucy said.
The air tightened like lungs crushed by grief.
And then the spirits began to argue with her.
You owe us freedom!
You owe us rest.
You owe us names!
They swirled, voices overlapping, cries turning to screams. Anger rising like smoke.
Lucy collapsed to her knees.
Tears spilled from her eyes.
I don't know what to do.
Then one final voice came deep, old, male and it stilled the room.
Let the living choose.
All turned.
A man stepped through the shattered mirror frame.
He was tall. Charred. Wrapped in chains.
But his voice was calm.
I am one of the First, he said. Before the gates. Before the silence. I remember when we could speak to the living without fear.
He looked at Lucy
Not all dead want to stay. Not all wish to return. But none, none want to be forgotten.
The veiled figure hissed.
Memory is dangerous.
And forgetting, said the chained man, is worse.
Lucy stood.
The crown burned like ice in her spine.
And she spoke:
From now on, I will hear them. The lost. The buried. The dead. But they must not harm the living. And the living must not pretend the dead were never here.
A breath passed through the room warm, bright, endless.
Some spirits wept.
Some vanished.
Some smiled.
And the veiled figure?
It turned without another word.
And disappeared into the dark it came from.
But deep in the ground, something older stirred.
Something that hated memory.
Something that never wanted to be found.
Something that remembered Belladore and wanted her erased.