Rain fell lightly on the windows, a steady whisper against the glass. Elara hadn't slept. The black envelope lay on her desk like a curse, its message burned into her mind: Three down. Four to go.
She sat in her chair, hunched over the yearbook page, the four circled faces staring back at her—Juliet, Liora, Corvin, and herself.
Juliet was gone.
Liora vanished.
Corvin? Missing.
And now, Elara was marked.
But something else gnawed at her: the photo from the chapel. There were seven people. So why did the killer circle only four? Were the others just background noise—or worse, the ones pulling the strings?
She reached into her bag and pulled out the old chapel photo again. Seven students, arms slung casually, uniforms crisp. Some smiled, others didn't.
From left to right: Juliet, Corvin, Liora, a tall girl with glasses, a boy with a scar on his chin, another girl with long black braids, and finally, Elara herself—caught in the edge of the frame like an afterthought.
Her hands froze.
She didn't remember being part of this photo.
Her eyes narrowed. Her hair was tied back. She wore her uniform. Her body language—tense.
This wasn't a group photo. It was a candid.
She'd been following Liora that day. Juliet had called them to the chapel. Elara hadn't gone inside—but someone had snapped this just before she walked away.
Who took the picture?
And why was she in it?
She flipped the photo over.
In faint pencil writing, there was a single line: "The circle remembers everyone."
Chills climbed her spine.
She turned back to the image and stared at the faces of the three unidentified students.
She'd seen the boy with the scar before—Vin Nolan. A drama student with a reputation for vanishing during class and reappearing with bruised knuckles. Quiet. Odd.
The girl with glasses—Elara dug through the student directory and found a name: Mae Li, one of the top students in mathematics. Barely spoke. Rumored to suffer from selective mutism.
And the girl with the braids…
Elara blinked.
She remembered her.
Karis Hollow.
The girl who used to sit beside Juliet in choir. Always humming. Always staring at the stained-glass windows like she saw things no one else could.
Three more names.
That made seven.
She scribbled them down next to Juliet's roles:
1. Truth-Teller — Liora
2. Knife-Bearer — Corvin
3. Witness — Mae Li?
4. Liar — Vin Nolan?
5. Sacrifice — Juliet
6. Mistake — Karis?
7. Survivor — Elara
Each role still felt like a guess, but with every new thread, the pattern emerged.
Elara didn't have answers yet, but she had something just as powerful:
Names.
And names could lead to truth.
---
She left her room just before lunch, heading to the school's abandoned west wing—the old theatre building where Vin was rumored to hang out.
The halls here were colder. Dustier. Lights flickered overhead like dying stars.
She stepped past the rusted double doors and entered the backstage area. Torn curtains hung like dead skin from the rafters.
"Elara."
She spun around.
Vin stood at the far wall, half in shadow, arms crossed.
"You shouldn't be here," he said, voice rough like gravel.
"I need to ask you about the photo," she said calmly. "The chapel. The circle."
His jaw twitched. "You don't know what you're messing with."
"I know enough. I know Juliet died because of it. Liora's missing. Corvin's gone. And someone sent me a letter with all of our faces circled."
His eyes flicked to the envelope in her hand. "You got one?"
"I did."
He walked slowly toward her.
"You think this is just a game, Elara? It's not. It never was. It's a ritual. It's a punishment. For breaking rules that none of us understood until it was too late."
"What rules?"
He smiled darkly.
"No one tells the truth. No one plays fair. No one walks away."
Elara narrowed her eyes. "You're the liar, aren't you?"
He didn't answer.
Instead, he reached into his coat pocket and pulled out a small, folded piece of paper. He held it out to her.
"This is what Juliet gave me the night before she died."
Elara took it and opened it slowly.
It was a drawing.
A circle, divided into seven parts. In the center, an eye. Around it, handwritten words:
> "Only when the roles are reversed can the truth be seen."
"What does it mean?" Elara whispered.
"It means we were wrong," Vin muttered. "Juliet thought she figured it out, but the roles can change. They do change. And now… they're changing again."
He looked directly at her.
"You're not the survivor anymore."
---
Later that night, Elara stared at the drawing in her room.
She laid out all her materials in a circle on the floor—the journal, the letters, the yearbook page, the envelope. In the center, she placed the drawing.
She finally understood.
The killer wasn't just picking people off.
They were reassigning roles.
Juliet had been the Sacrifice.
But maybe she wasn't meant to be.
Maybe she was supposed to be something else.
Maybe Elara was never the Survivor.
Maybe… she was the Mistake.
And someone was correcting that.
Her phone buzzed.
Another unknown message.
> "You're not the seventh anymore. The circle spins again."
She stared at the words, heart pounding.
If she wasn't the seventh...
Then who was?
Elara's hands trembled as she clutched the phone. The message felt colder than the night wind seeping through her window.
She wasn't the seventh?
Then who had taken her place?
She stared at the circle again—seven roles, seven fates. If someone was replacing her, then that meant the game wasn't over. It was just evolving.
Her mind spun with possibilities.
Mae Li? Karis? Vin?
Or someone completely new?
The door to her room creaked.
She jolted upright, grabbing the nearest object—a metal ruler.
No one entered.
She tiptoed to the door and opened it a crack.
A folded piece of paper lay on the floor.
No footsteps. No shadows in the hall.
She bent down and picked it up.
This one wasn't typed.
It was handwritten—shaky, frantic.
> "You're close. Too close. Be careful. The one who watches… was never meant to play."
Elara swallowed hard.
The watcher?
There was someone outside the circle.
Someone controlling it.
And maybe… just maybe…
That person had been there from the very beginning.