Eden
She hadn't meant to see it.
But something—maybe the Spiral, maybe instinct—had guided her to the room at the end of the corridor. The door was ajar. No torches lit the walls, but Eden could see well in the dark now. Too well.
There were rows of jars lining the shelves, each filled with some cloudy liquid and something floating within. A tongue. A set of eyes. A tiny, shriveled hand.
She stepped deeper into the room, heart thudding, when she saw the book.
It was bound in cracked red leather, the edges of the pages damp with age. On its cover: the Spiral etched in gold.
She opened it. Names. Bloodlines. Family trees stretching back centuries. There—halfway down a long, black inked branch—she saw the name Holloway.
Her hand trembled.
Holloway.
She didn't know what it meant. But it felt like something inside her did.
Claire
The hospital records were altered.
Claire knew the moment she laid eyes on them. The file on Eden Holloway—her niece, technically, though she'd never met her—was missing entire pages.
Discharge dates rewritten. Visits erased.
She remembered Eden as a baby, held briefly in her mother's arms before being sent away for "safety." Too much family tragedy, they said. Best for the child to be raised elsewhere.
But safety was a lie. Like everything else.
Claire followed the trail deeper into Gracemire's forgotten underbelly—old municipal tunnels once used during wartime, now rotting with mold and secrets.
The graffiti on the tunnel walls was old but familiar. Spirals. Carvings. The phrase "The Blood Remembers" scrawled in black paint.
Claire's breath caught in her throat.
They were rebuilding.
And if Eden was back... she might already be part of it.
Eden
That night, Eden dreamed of fire.
A woman—her own reflection, maybe—stood atop a mound of ash and whispered words Eden couldn't understand. The Spiral burned across the sky like a black sun.
She woke with a scream locked in her throat and the taste of blood on her tongue.
She stared at her hands.
They were shaking again.
The Matron visited her room shortly after, kneeling beside the bed like a mother comforting her sick child.
"The dreams are gifts," she said softly, brushing hair from Eden's face. "They show us what we were... and what you are becoming."
Eden swallowed hard. "Am I... one of you now?"
"No," the Matron whispered, her smile turning colder. "You are more. You were born from ash. But you, Eden, will be the flame."
Claire
Claire returned to her motel just after sunrise and found the door ajar.
Inside, the place was untouched—almost. Except for the journal on the bed.
It had not been there when she left.
A note was tucked inside the pages. Written in perfect cursive:
"Your bloodline is not broken. The Spiral has chosen another. She walks the path now."
Claire sat on the edge of the bed, unable to move, her eyes locked on the page.
Somehow, she knew who it meant.
Eden was alive. Eden was involved.
And the Cleaners hadn't just returned.
They were planning something far worse.