The light doesn't hit her. It crowns her.
Alyra advances backstage like a polished blade gliding through velvet, agitated assistants, and the pungent smell of hairspray. In that narrow corridor leading to the catwalk, everyone talks, moves, trembles, but not her.
She advances as if the world were already at her feet.
"Finishing touches!" someone shouts.
The stylist brushes her with a brush, an assistant adjusts the strap of her sandals, her PR whispers the program to her.
Alyra doesn't listen to anyone. She lives in that split second when she takes a deep breath, and everything falls silent.
The most anticipated show of the entire season.
The opening of the Eklipsis Collection.
The debut that the press has called "the return of the child prodigy."
At twenty-one, Alyra controls a fashion brand as if she were born with an empire already sewn around her. The cameras love her, the magazines seek her out, social media worships her. Every fashion show is a ritual, and she's always at the center of the circle.
"Alyra? Are you there?" asks her assistant, Dalia, her eyes dark and worried.
"Yes."
Her voice is soft, but it holds steel.
Dalia observes her for a moment too long.
"Did you sleep?"
"I'll sleep later."
She smiles. Fake, but convincing.
The voices.
The damned voices.
Thin as threads of ink in her head. In recent months, they've started calling her with an unsettling familiarity. A single voice, low, rough, masculine.
Come home.
Always whispered when she's alone.
Or when she's tired.
Or when she closes her eyes for a moment.
Alyra ignores it. She has to ignore it.
It's stress. Nothing else.
Weeks of preparation, constant jet lag, interviews, fittings, press tours. It's normal for her brain to play tricks on her.
The stage manager approaches with her headset.
"Alyra, get ready. The show closes in thirty seconds."
She raises her chin.
The curtain opens.
The music explodes.
The runway shimmers like a corridor to another reality.
And she enters.
Her first steps are a perfect dance.
The crowd roars, photographers shoot like machine guns.
Alyra feels the fabric of her dress slide over her legs: a mix of liquid silk and mirrored panels that reflect the light like a silver mosaic.
Every step is a statement.
Every movement is studied.
Every breath is measured.
In the front row, she glimpses Vogue journalists, Harper's editors, influencers, famous faces. They all hang on her expressions, and Alyra serves them up on a silver platter.
On the runway, a series of tall screens, installed like modern-day wings, show the models, their outfits, and enlarged details in real time. A trendy gimmick to enrich the experience.
Alyra advances and the screens show her. Perfect.
Then something flickers.
A black line breaks her image for a moment.
A glitch.
A graphic distortion.
Alyra blinks.
Maybe just a light.
One more step.
The screens behind her update with the frame.
Except… that's not her frame.
For a second, tiny and murderous, a figure appears that resembles her but not completely.
A drawn Alyra.
Dark, expressionless eyes, outlined by hatching.
The body formed by flat fields of color, like a character barely sketched.
And next to her head, a balloon… empty.
Just a fraction.
Then her real image returns.
No one reacts.
No one saw.
Alyra continues walking, but her heart explodes in her chest like a silent grenade.
She's tired, yes.
Stressed.
Pressed.
But what was that?
That wasn't normal.
She walks to the back, turns, poses.
A sovereign pose.
The applause overwhelms her.
Yet, for the first time, she feels completely out of place, as if she's standing in the void.
She returns backstage with an expression sculpted in gold.
Everyone surrounds her: congratulations, hugs, euphoria.
She nods, smiles, acting her part.
Dalia takes her arm. "Are you okay? You're pale."
"A lighting effect."
"Are you sure? Because you look..."
"Dalia. Enough."
Her assistant steps back, biting her lip.
Alyra takes a breath.
She can't have really seen something.
She can't.
But aren't voices fantasies?
Aren't dreams just dreams?
And the flashes of impossible memories?
Faceless children, a castle of flickering lines, a lavender sky that doesn't exist in the world?
No. Not now.
The phone vibrates in her hand.
MOM
How did it go, my love? I watched the whole thing on streaming. You're magnificent.
Alyra closes her eyes.
Her mother is her anchor.
The only person in the world who can make her feel… real.
She replies: Good. I'll call you later.
Immediately, a message arrives from her grandmother:
You're running too long. You have to stop, little one. Come to the island for a few days. It'll do you good.
Alyra holds back a sigh.
The island.
The place where she grew up until she was thirteen.
Scattered memories, beautiful and restless at the same time.
A friend she no longer remembers.
A summer that seems like a fairytale.
And a pain she doesn't want to focus on.
The backstage lights flicker.
The music fades.
For a moment, Alyra feels everything spinning around her.
Come home.
The voice.
That voice.
An electric shock runs down her spine.
And this time it's not just a whisper.
It's close.
Sharp.
Direct.
Almost human.
Alyra grabs a table to keep from falling.
Dalia runs over to her.
"Alyra! Hey! Breathe!"
"Nothing's… nothing's happening."
But her voice trembles.
"You need to rest. We're going back to the hotel now."
Alyra wants to say no.
She wants to maintain control.
But her body feels empty, as if someone had cut the power.
She accepts.
She lets them escort her out.
She meets fans, photographers, cameras. Everyone shouts her name.
She smiles mechanically, waves, signs an autograph.
In the black car that takes her away, she finally breathes.
She looks outside.
The city streets flow by bright, alive, frenetic.
And then she sees him.
In a building reflected in the car window: a silhouette, still, in the center of a dark window.
A male figure.
Tall.
Broad-shouldered.
It seems made of broken lines, like a drawing traced and then abandoned.
And his eyes…
Two white slits glowing in the darkness.
Alyra turns toward the real window.
The room is empty.
No one at the window of the royal palace.
But in the reflection… the figure is still there.
And his mouth moves.
Even without hearing, Alyra understands exactly what he is saying.
You are mine.
Her heart stops.
The figure raises an arm, as if to grab her.
And suddenly, for a few eternal seconds, Alyra feels the world pulling.
As if another reality is grasping her edges and trying to suck her in.
A vortex.
A flash.
A sensation of falling.
Then everything vanishes.
Dalia shakes her.
"Alyra! Alyra! What's happening? You're white as a sheet!"
The car has stopped at the traffic light.
The reflection is gone.
The voice too.
The vortex is gone.
Alyra remains still, staring at the window as if it might open and swallow her up.
The assistant looks at her in terror.
"Let's go to the hotel. And tomorrow you're leaving for the island. Don't make any plans. I've already spoken to your grandmother."
She wants to say no, she wants to rebel.
But inside she feels something fading, like a resistance giving way.
"Okay."
Her voice is a whisper.
Dalia picks up her phone and sends a message to someone, she doesn't care who.
She doesn't care.
She closes her eyes.
She tries to calm down.
And then, in the silence, the voice returns for the last time.
Light as a touch.
Sharp as fate.
I finally found you.
Alyra's skin crawls.
And without understanding why, a single sentence flashes through her mind like a bolt of lightning:
I don't belong here.
The light turns green.
The car starts moving again.
And her life, masterfully constructed and perfectly real, begins to crack.
One crack after another.