Chapter Text
The grand halls of the manor were suffocatingly dark that evening. Darkness hung heavy in the air, not only the kind drawn by nightfall, but a thicker, more oppressive kind born of storm clouds choking the sky. No moonlight spilled through the ornate stained-glass windows. Instead, flickers of lightning danced faintly across their surfaces, casting brief, distorted glimpses of color on the cold marble floor.
In the heart of the vast but now desolate living room, three silhouettes stood in the middle of it in grim silence. The fireplace at the far end remained unlit, its hearth cold, the logs untouched. Even the candles scattered across the room dared not burn. It was as if light itself had abandoned this place. Of the three figures, two paced and fidgeted, visibly frayed with worry, while the third remained still and composed, calm as humanely possible, Arms at his sides and a clipboard in one hand, his white coat fluttering slightly with every draft that slithered through the cracked windowpanes.
"Doctor..." One of the three figures, the female one, broke the silence first, her voice tight with desperation and worry. "Please... Have you found anything? Anything at all? What’s happening to her?"
"Her condition just keeps worsening by each day since it first started. This is no mere illness. This is like a sickness of the soul, and I suspect that some sort of magic is behind this." And older male voice stated, wearing a weary expression earned from too many sleepless nights, raising his arm to rub his chin thoughtfully.
The third voice lets out a sigh, letting go of the clipboard on his hands and letting it rest on the side of his body. "I'm afraid medical science alone would be insufficient to determine what is causing this alone." He said as a matter-of-factly. "I've run every test. Her vitals are stable, yet unexplainable anomalies persist. Her heart beats too slowly at times, then races without cause. Her sleep are filled with visions of places, names, and places that we do not know if they even exist. It's like her own mind is drifting farther from this world each day." The doctor adjusted the collar of his shirt, his eyes met theirs, expression grave. "These ailments aren't just some sort of diseases or physical and mental disabilities. They were unnatural, almost supernatural, and perhaps that might be just the case."
The woman gasped softly, her hands flying to her mouth. while the older man narrowed his eyes in thoughtful silence.
"You... You mean... Are you implying that she is possibly..." The woman struggled to make the question asked.
"...Cursed?" The older man finished grimly, his voice a quiet growl beneath the weight of that single word.
The doctor sighed and gave a reluctant nod.
"That is the best explanation I've got. Every symptom is irregular. Every sign contradicts what we understand. Her soul itself seems... strained. As though something is gnawing at it from within."
A silence fell between them once more, broken only by a distant rumble of thunder. The woman sat slowly on the edge of a nearby chaise, her hands trembling in her lap like she's struggling to keep her tears at bay. The older man didn't say anything, but his fist clenched, and his teeth gritted under his lips.
"Why her...? She’s just a girl..." She whispered. "What kind of cruel power would do this?"
"Something ancient or perhaps something personal. Curses rarely strike at random. They're often... targeted." The doctor murmured.
"Then... What do we need to do?" The woman asked again.
"Until we are remotely close to identifying the source of this "curse," and what exactly the problems it causes her in order to create the proper hypothetical "medicine," I'm afraid there will be nothing we can do about it in the moment. We need time." The doctor explained, reluctantly taking what might be a very risky decision.
“Time?” The older man spat, turning to face him. “She doesn’t have time! Do you really suggest that we just stand still and let her suffer with every single passing of seconds?!" The older man snapped, though he tried to keep his composure and not raise his voice very much.
"I'm sorry, but perhaps letting this curse to progress would be the best course of actions we could take now for the sake of identifying the problem." The doctor lets out another sigh for the dozens of time that day. "We need to monitor her to document the patterns and understand the rhythm of this thing. Only then can I begin to form a treatment. if one even exists.”
The storm outside groaned louder, as if echoing their despair.
"Stars blessed us all. Let's just pray that even a medicine is possible to be made to release her of this torment. And if fate is on our side... then may this God-forsaken curse to leave her alone in peace."
The other two bowed their heads, seemingly in silent prayer for the well-being of the subject of their conversation.
However, unknown to the three who were deep in their conversation, eavesdropping on their words from the very start is another shadow, this time much smaller and younger than the three.
Having listening in on the grim conversation unfolding in the drawing room, the small shadow bit his lip before he ran off down the hallway of the manor, heart pounding and breath tight in his throat, into the place where she is being held up. His frantic footsteps echoed through the shady empty corridors like a heartbeat against the stone floor, bouncing between the empty walls, laced with his ragged breathing.
The boy’s feet carried him with urgency—urgency that came from fear, guilt, and a desperate need to be there, to be near her.
Eventually, he arrived at the destination in mind and skidded to a halt before a tall double door at the far end of the hallway. The small boy stood before the tightly shut closed doors that led into a room, her room, one that is made specifically for her ever since that happened. The door was sealed tight, an ornate barrier of oak and iron that hadn’t been opened by anyone but the doctor and the caretakers in weeks. Not even him. Not anymore.
They used to share the same room to sleep in together, sharing the same dreams, same treassures, and same secrets. For they were two halves of one whole, inseparable since the cradle. But now, there are a whole lot of walls built between them, both metaphorically and physically, like this door right here.
Taking a deep breath, he muster up the courage, raised one hand, and then softly knocked on the door in front of him.
"Sis? Are you there? It's me, please open the door for me." He asked the person he knew was still in the room.
No one answered.
He raised his hand to knock again a bit more insistently.
"Sister, please open the door. Don't keep me out like this." The boy begged softly.
Still no answer.
He sighed heavily. Reaching into his pocket, he pulls out the spare key to this room, one he managed to grab when no one was looking. He held it tightly for a second, as though asking it permission.
"I'm going to open the door, okay?" He declared when nobody still not answered him yet, which more or less a permission for him.
He inserted the key to the key hole, gently turning the inserted key to the side with a "click." Taking a deep long breath to brace himself, he turned the handle and gently pushed open the door with an audible creak.
The scent of blood and decay hit him first, sharp and metallic, mixed with the bitter scent of sweat and something fouler, like sickness wrought from sorrow. He froze, his breath hitched on his throat the moment he laid his eyes upon the interior of this room.
The room was an absolute mess. Some furniture was overturned, chairs broken, the bookshelf toppled with its contents strewn across the floor, some were torn with pieces of crumbled papers littering the floor, the curtains were half-ripped from their rails, dragging along the ground like pale ghosts, the bed was ruined as well, the mattress and the pillows are torn with what looks like to be claw marks, sending pieces of the sheets and feathers to join the torn books on the floor. No mirror stays intact within the room, They're all shattered into pieces, sharp shards of glass dangerously laid like land mines, with someone had stepped on it at some point, evident from the bloodied footprints on the floor, dried in some places and fresh in others, visible from the light in the hallway pouring into the very dark room.
The bloody footprints led from the entrance to the very corner of the room towards where she was.
There, sitting in the corner with her back pressed against the wall, the lightless window stood overhead, head bowing down pressed against the knees she hugged closely to her chest, hair falling over her face in long tangled strands, someone who curled in upon herself like a cocoon refusing to let the world to see her, is his sister.
In the darkness, he could see her writhing and shivering even though the room was warm. Her back rose and fell in shallow, ragged, hoarse, and heavy breaths, must've from the amount of time she has spent crying and sobbings for a few weeks straight. She was trying to make a sound, perhaps to cry some more, but only some strangled sounds came out from her lips.
Gulping down the lump in his throat, the boy carefully approaches, tiptoeing around the broken glass and torn papers, placing his feet deliberately between the cracks. As he drew nearer, his heart ached at what he saw. He takes a good look at her: his sister, though they were twins of the same age and stature, while she's huddled up on herself like this, she looks even smaller than him. Her arms and legs, one that used to be capable of wielding swords and took her running through the fields easily without breaking a sweat, are now uncontrollably shaking as if a phantom weights were placed upon each of her limbs, and perhaps that is the case. And then her hair... her hair, once the color of gold just like his, soft golden glow like the radiant first ray of the morning sun, all of that colors has been drained from them, in a span of just a few days, all that is left of her sister's hair are dull grayish-white strands like that of and old woman's, the color of ash, the color of death.
Taking a deep breath, the brother reaches out.
"Hey..." He placed a hand on her shoulder.
She flinched hard at the touch, yanking herself further into the corner, disgusted. But it wasn't him she felt disgusted at. It was for herself, seeing herself unworthy to his touch and care.
"G-Go... Go away, onii-chan." She rasped. Her voice was dry, cracked, and hoarse, barely more than a whisper. "Please... just leave me alone."
He lightly sighed and knelt down in front of her. "You know I'm not gonna do that. I'm not leaving you alone." He keeps his hands away from her for now, content to just sit there and be with her, as he used to be, just to make sure that she wouldn't feel alone, and there are people who cared for her.
She didn’t answer, but her body continued to tremble, a wounded tremor that betrayed more than fear. It was despair, total, and absolute. For a while, they stayed like that in complete silence. Only the muffled sounds of the night winds breezing outside the window filled their ears. After minutes, the sister spoke up.
"I-It... it hurts... it hurts so much... onii-chan..." The sister muttered, hugging herself just a bit more tightly.
The brother bit his lip before asking. "What is it? What hurts?" He asked, probably already know the answer for that, but he asked anyway, just as a form of concern.
She pressed her forehead further against her knees, her fingers dug deep into her skin as if trying to create pain to distract herself from the more unbearable ones.
"Everything..." She answered simply, but it's more than enough for an answer. "My body... my mind... a-and... my heart." She listed them. "I-It feels like... my head is being pried open... m-my heart... like there's knives on my chest... a-and, my body... is being carved open."
The brother visibly winced upon his sister's explanations. Those were no exaggeration, he has seen it himself of how much pain she went through for the last couple of weeks. And all because of one bad day.
"Do you know why this happened? Why are you... like this?" He hesitantly asked, eyes lowered slightly. "Is it... because of what I-"
"No." Her response was immediate. Not opening a room for her brother to blame himself. "It's not your fault onii-chan... it's not... it's..." She whimpered in defeat. "I just don't know anything anymore... I don't think I even remember who I am anymore..."
The brother clenched his fist. Is it really that bad?
"Then..." Taking a breath, he decided to change the question. "...Do you know what caused you the pain?"
The sister's breath hitched. She paused for a moment, as if considering what to say to him as an answer. But then she eventually spoke one single word.
"...You."
The silence that followed was louder than thunder. The world paused for a moment. The brother's eyes widened, his lips parted agape in shock and slight disbelief.
"Me?" He repeated in confusion.
She shook her head. "Not just you... buth the maids, the butlers, and even the animals in the garden outside... they are... hurting."
He stared at her in silence as she continued.
"I... I can... I can feel them all, onii-chan." She confessed with a broken voice. "Y-Your sorrows for my pain... your worries for me... your pain of seeing me like this..." The fingers on her arms dug deeper, nearly drawing blood. "I... I can feel them all... I can feel them like they were my own..."
And it was at this moment, after hours have passed, the storm clouds finally parted. The pale light of the round and pale moon shone upon the dark night once more, the silver rays spilled through the windows of that room across the ruined floor and the broken girl.
Her body, once shrouded in shadows, is revealed by the light completely, revealing all the horrid freshly bleeding scars that covered her milky white skin all the way from head to toe, the slashes and welts, some old, some new, and some still bleeding. Blood wept from wounds that refused to close, dripping onto the floor to join countless others, scars that won't close no matter how many times they tend it, blood that won't stop flowing even when they wiped it away.
The sister finally raised her head, her once radiant face that is similar to her brother was now covered in the similar bleeding scars from across her body, her eyes once bright like the color of molten gold, the color the brother shared for his own eyes, are now darkened with haunting emptiness and shrouds of pain of... something, peeking from behind the curtains of her long now ashen hair. And then her lips, once spoken of words that only smoothly flowed out like honey, are now trembling as they open once more to speak in a broken voice.
"Your feelings... they're hurting me...