The shoreline was sharper than it had looked from the lighthouse window, jagged stones jutting out of the sand like broken teeth. Isabelle's boots slipped more than once as she and Théo made their way down, the cliff's path narrow and treacherous. By the time they reached the base, the sun had fallen low, bruising the sky with deep purples and heavy golds.
But the woman was gone.
Where Vivienne—or her echo—had stood, there was nothing but a single black feather pinned into the sand, its quill stabbed into the ground like a warning.
Théo bent to retrieve it, but Isabelle stopped him. "Don't," she whispered. "It feels wrong."
They didn't speak after that.
Instead, they turned back toward the lighthouse, their pace quickening as the air grew colder, as the heavy pull of dread closed in tighter around them.
When they reached the lighthouse, another figure was waiting at the open door—leaning casually, hands in his coat pockets.
Jean-Baptiste.
Isabelle's stomach twisted painfully.
"You shouldn't be here," she said, voice sharper than she meant.
He lifted one shoulder in a lazy shrug, but there was something tight behind his smile. "Théo called me. Said you might need help."
Isabelle shot Théo a quick glance, but the younger man just nodded grimly.
"We're going inside," she said.
Jean-Baptiste fell into step beside her without hesitation.
Inside, the lighthouse's ground floor had changed.
Someone—or something—had been here since they'd left it.
A wide metal door had appeared along the far wall, pried open by force. Beyond it, a narrow stone passage spiraled downward, lit by faint electric lanterns strung along the walls like a grotesque carnival display.
The smell hit them immediately—stronger now. Coppery. Fermented.
Like blood and wine.
Jean-Baptiste pulled a flashlight from his coat and took the lead.
The passage twisted and narrowed until it opened into a cavernous underground chamber. High, arched ceilings wept moisture; the stone floor was slick and uneven.
Rows of old wine racks stretched into the darkness.
Dusty green bottles filled the shelves, though many had been shattered, their contents staining the floor like spilled blood.
But it wasn't the wine that made Isabelle's breath catch in her throat.
It was the tables.
Lined up between the racks, the metal tables bore old restraints—leather straps, corroded by time and salt. Beside each table were trays of medical tools: scalpels, bone saws, syringes filled with congealed liquids.
Not torture.
No.
Maintenance.
Keeping something—or someone—alive.
Jean-Baptiste picked up one of the wine bottles, turning it slowly in his hands. It was sealed with red wax, but something sloshed inside that was too thick, too heavy.
He set it down carefully.
"This isn't a cellar," he said. "It's a sanctuary. A prison."
For the victims.
Or for something else.
Isabelle moved further into the gloom, her flashlight catching flashes of movement: rats scattering into holes, water dripping from the ceiling in slow, fat drops.
Then she saw it.
A trail of blood.
Not old.
Fresh.
Thin smears of red leading between the broken racks and deeper into the cellar.
Without waiting, she followed it, the others on her heels.
The trail twisted, pooling in places where the ground dipped. Her heart hammered harder with every step. She could almost hear Vivienne's voice—soft, insistent—guiding her forward.
Past the ruined wine racks, at the farthest corner of the cellar, the blood trail ended.
At a trapdoor set into the stone floor.
Its edges were crusted with old salt and fresh blood, the hinges rusted but not broken.
Someone had used it recently.
Isabelle knelt beside it, her hand hovering above the iron ring handle.
Jean-Baptiste crouched next to her, his voice low. "Whatever's down there... it's alive."
"Or worse," Théo muttered.
Isabelle swallowed thickly.
The memory of Vivienne's recorded voice echoed in her mind:
"He wears your faces."
She hesitated only a second longer before gripping the handle and heaving the trapdoor open.
It groaned like a dying animal, revealing a set of stairs descending into absolute blackness.
A smell rolled up from the depths: rot, salt, old wine, and something metallic and sharp.
Jean-Baptiste clicked on a second flashlight and shined it down.
The beam caught on something halfway down the stairs.
A smear of pale fabric.
A handprint.
Small.
Delicate.
Vivienne's?
Or another victim's?
"We have to go," Isabelle said, and despite the terror beating inside her chest, she started down first.
The stairs were steep, uneven, carved directly from the stone. Water dripped from the ceiling in thin, steady streams, slicking the steps. Jean-Baptiste followed close behind her, his hand steady at her back without touching.
At the bottom of the stairs, the space opened up again—but differently this time.
It wasn't a cellar.
It was a chapel.
Or at least, it had been, long ago.
The altar at the center was broken, its marble slabs shattered. Surrounding it were crude paintings on the stone walls—depictions of people with hollowed-out faces kneeling before a monstrous figure crowned in bleeding thorns.
And laid out before the altar, bound in strips of stained linen—
Bodies.
At least three of them.
Isabelle gasped and stumbled back, her flashlight shaking.
One of the bodies twitched.
Jean-Baptiste cursed under his breath, stepping protectively in front of her.
Théo's voice trembled. "They're... they're still alive."
From the darkness beyond the altar, a low hum began—almost like chanting.
Faint at first, but growing louder, filling the stone chamber like a living thing.
Isabelle swung her light wildly across the walls.
More figures moved in the shadows—masked, cloaked, dozens of them.
Waiting.
Watching.
Trapped in the silent hunger of the forgotten chapel.
And above it all, painted in dripping crimson letters:
Witness. Silence. Feed.
Something moved at the edge of her vision—fast, impossibly fast—and a voice hissed in her ear:
"You were always meant to be next."
To be continued...