Elara Dorne had experienced plenty of unreasonable things in life.
Being ghosted by her own therapist.
Losing a job over a semicolon.
Falling asleep in one apartment and waking up in another that reeked of roses, rot, and colonial regret.
But standing in the grand foyer of Valeblood Manor — barefoot, mildly damp, and being stared down by a cat in a cravat — was officially the moment she gave up on logic.
"You're taking this well," the cat observed, licking one paw.
"I'm hallucinating," Elara replied. "Possibly dying. Could be carbon monoxide poisoning."
"You're not dying."
"Then you're a talking cat."
"I am," it said, sitting primly. "My name is Balthazar. Former familiar to Lady Sybelle Dorne, seventeenth High Witch of the Hollow. Your great-great—"
Elara held up a hand.
"Nope. You don't get to info-dump me with bloodlines and witches. Start simple. What is this place?"
The cat blinked, then gave a slow, almost pitying smile. "This, dear girl, is your ancestral prison."
She rubbed her temples. "Of course it is."
---
The manor groaned.
Not metaphorically. Audibly.
Like a whale exhaling after centuries underwater, the house released a long, aching sigh that echoed through the wallpaper. The chandeliers flickered. The wallpaper peeled. Somewhere, a piano played itself.
Elara turned a slow circle, taking in the room. It was vast, with a high vaulted ceiling, twin staircases curling up like devil's horns, and portraits along the walls that moved when she wasn't looking at them. Candles lit themselves one by one as she passed. Her boots sank slightly into an absurdly expensive blood-red carpet.
There were no windows.
Just stone and wood and secrets.
"Balthazar," she said, following the cat as it padded toward the main hall, "how do I leave?"
"You don't."
"Not helping."
"You can't leave," he said, pausing on the steps and turning. "Valeblood Manor is bonded to your blood. It summoned you, claimed you, and now it breathes through you. If you try to leave, it will... rearrange."
"Rearrange?"
"Yes. In the sense that the front door may become a swamp. Or your bathroom might open into 1847. It's best not to resist."
Elara stared.
"...You're enjoying this."
"Immensely," he purred.
---
She followed the cat deeper into the manor. They passed a ballroom filled with fog, a library with a ghost weeping softly into a dictionary, and a corridor where every mirror showed her with different colored eyes.
Her reflection in one wore a bridal gown.
Blood dripped down the lace.
She stopped walking.
"Who was Lord Eryx Valeblood?" she asked quietly.
The cat hesitated.
"Elara…"
"Tell me."
"He was your betrothed. In your first life."
Her mouth went dry. "I don't remember a first life."
"You will."
"How did he die?"
"Which time?"
---
They reached a parlor where the fireplace burned with violet flames. A table was set for two: silverware, bone china, and what looked suspiciously like a live rose slowly wilting in reverse.
A tall man stood by the hearth, silhouetted in firelight.
He did not turn.
But she felt his presence like a shift in gravity. Like her ribs remembered how to ache. Like something half-forgotten sat up inside her and whispered: him.
"You," she said, without knowing why.
He faced her.
And she forgot what breathing was.
---
Eryx Valeblood was beautiful in the way all tragedies are. Too sharp. Too pale. Too still. He wore a long black coat, gloves, and a pendant over his throat that pulsed faintly like a heartbeat. His hair was dark and wild, like shadows made flesh, and his eyes—
His eyes were wrong.
One was silver.
The other was black.
"Elara," he said, and her name became a funeral hymn.
She stepped back.
He followed.
"You remember me," he said, softly.
"No," she said.
"Yes. You do." His voice was low, broken-glass velvet. "You came back. You always do."
"I don't know you."
"But I know you. Every version. Every life. Every death."
He stepped closer, and she flinched—but it wasn't fear. Not really.
It was familiarity.
"I remember the way you screamed my name the night I was taken. I remember your fingers breaking as you clawed through the coffin wood."
"Stop—"
"You lit the fire that burned me alive."
Elara stared at him.
"You're insane."
He smiled, but there was no joy in it.
"So are you. You just haven't remembered yet."
---
The cat leapt onto the table.
"Elara," Balthazar said with exaggerated cheer, "meet your not-quite-dead fiancé. Murdered in 1761. Exhumed in 1804. Resurrected during a séance that involved goat blood, moonlight, and a debutante named Agatha who never recovered."
"I preferred Agatha," Eryx muttered.
"I preferred Agatha's wine," Balthazar shot back.
Elara pinched the bridge of her nose.
"I don't believe in reincarnation. Or ghosts. Or cursed weddings. Or talking cats."
"You didn't believe in talking letters either," Eryx said gently. "But they believed in you."
She backed away.
"I need air."
"There is no air," Balthazar called after her. "We're between dimensions! At best you'll find metaphysical fog!"
---
She ran.
Down hallways that shifted.
Past doors that whispered.
Into rooms that blinked.
Until she reached a garden—if you could call it that. Thorned roses burst through cracked stone. The moon hung frozen in a sky that didn't feel quite real. Fog coiled like smoke around her feet. Statues watched her with judgment in their chipped marble faces.
She sank onto a stone bench, shaking.
A memory—uninvited and sharp—stabbed through her.
A girl.
A boy.
A wedding gown soaked in blood.
And fire.
So much fire.
---
"Elara?"
She looked up.
Eryx stood at the edge of the garden, arms at his sides, not daring to come closer.
"I'm not here to hurt you," he said.
"You already did."
"I know."
"How many times?"
He didn't answer.
The silence said everything.
---
"I don't love you," she said.
"You will."
"No," she whispered. "I think I already did. And I think it killed me."
She turned away.
And the manor groaned again—louder this time.
As if mourning.
Or remembering.