“So your birthday is coming up.. I'm sorry I can't be there for it." Shiro says.

“No it’s ok Shiro, trust me I cant wait to see you in the tournament, that is a birthday present enough for me.” I say

“Oh then you wouldn't mind me taking this back?” He says with a cocky grin on his face as he pulled out a small package from his pocket, wrapped in blue.. 

My eyes went wide, reaching out and I squealed. “You got me something? What is it?”

The package was smaller than my palm, wrapped in crinkling blue paper the exact shade of the summer sky just before dusk. I fumbled with it, my fingers clumsy against the precise folds, the world narrowing to the weight in my hands and the steady rhythm of Shiro’s gait beneath me. The paper gave way with a soft tear.

Nestled inside was a pendant, a rose wrought in silver so thin it seemed to breathe. Its petals were a frozen cascade, each one layered over the next in intricate, impossible detail, and at its heart, set deep within the sculpted curve, was a single aquamarine. The gem caught the harsh afternoon light and did something miraculous: it drank the glare and gave back a calm, oceanic glow, a pocket of deep, still water held against my skin.

“Is this Aquamarine?” The question came out as a whisper. It felt like holding a secret, something ancient and whispering that didn’t belong on a crowded city street.

“Yes it is,” Shiro said, and I could hear the pride in his voice, a rare, unguarded note beneath his usual bravado. “It took forever to find one that color. Had to get it fitted just right.” He adjusted his grip on my legs, his hands sure and warm. “They say it brings serenity. Courage. Protection during travel.”

“Thank you, thank you big bro.” The words were automatic, tumbling out, but the feeling behind them was a swelling, aching thing in my throat. I didn’t just see the necklace; I saw the months of searching, the saved-up credits, the quiet intent behind his cocky grin. My fingers trembled as I worked the delicate clasp, the chain cool as a whisper against the back of my neck. The rose settled just below my collarbone, the aquamarine a cold, perfect weight over my heartbeat. I wrapped my arms around him again, squeezing tight, my face buried in the coarse fabric of his jacket. I held on, trying to press the gratitude directly into his bones.

He just chuckled, a low rumble I felt through my chest, and hitched me higher on his back. “Don’t choke me out before the tournament, dummy.” But his hands came up to pat my forearm, a quick, awkward beat of affection, before he secured my legs again and carried on walking, as if my world hadn’t just crystallized around a single, beautiful, blue point of light.

I clung to Shiro’s back, my arms locked around his shoulders, chin hooked over the ridge of his collarbone. The aquamarine rose was a cool, foreign weight against my sternum, the metal chain still holding the day’s chill. Shiro walked with an easy, rolling strength through the river of bodies on the sidewalk, his voice vibrating through his back and into my bones as he talked about tomorrow.

“The first gate is always a qualifier,” he said, his tone bright with certainty. “Probably a footrace through the eastern sector ruins. Or a puzzle-lock on the old bridge. Something to weed out the slow thinkers.”

I nodded into his shoulder, breathing in the scent of him—clean cotton, the faint tang of tram station metal, the warm, sun-baked smell of his skin. His confidence was a solid thing, a wall I could lean against. focusing on the solidity of it, trying to smother the faint, persistent prickle at the nape of my neck. It had started when I had clasped the necklace. It had nothing to do with the gem.

“You’ll ace it,” I said, my voice muffled by his shirt.

“Damn right I will.” He hitched me higher, his hands secure under my knees. “Then it’s on to the real challenges. The ones they broadcast on the big screens. You’ll be watching, right? Front row at the public viewing plaza.”

“I’ll be the one screaming your name so loud you’ll hear it through the walls.”

He laughed, and the sound was deep and full, cutting through the din of the crowd. It was favorite sound. I closed my eyes, memorizing the rhythm of his walk, the way he navigated the press of people without breaking stride. This was their last ordinary walk. Tomorrow, he would step through a competitor’s gate, and the city’s chaotic, sparkling normalcy would peel back to reveal whatever lurked beneath the tournament’s glossy, nonsensical surface.

The crowd thickened as they neared the central tram exchange, a multi-level hive of steel and rushing sound. Bodies jostled, a wave of perfumes and sweat and impatient energy. I tightened my grip instinctively.

“Hang on, bug,” Shiro said, his voice dropping into a focused murmur as he carved a path toward the descending staircase that led to their homeward line.

Opening my eyes. The world was a blur of color and motion—vivid shop signs, flashing tram schedules, a kaleidoscope of strangers’ faces. Shiro dodged a man arguing with a public screen, sidestepped a group of tourists huddled around a map. My braid swung over my shoulder, the red of it bright against the grey of Shiro’s school jacket. My laughter bubbled up again at something he muttered about the tourists, a quick, easy sound.

And then I felt it.

The eyes.

It was a physical pressure, a cold spot on the warmth of my back. Laughter dying in my throat, unspent.

The world did not slow so much as it drained. The bustling noise didn’t fade, but it became a distant, meaningless roar. The vibrant colors of the district leached into shades of grey and muted blue, as if I were looking through a fogged lens. The crowd became a ghostly procession, indistinct and silent.

Only one point of clarity remained.

On the staircase leading down to the lower tram platform, three steps from the top, stood a boy.

He was looking directly at me.

He was maybe Shiro’s age, perhaps a little younger. His clothes were simple, dark, unremarkable. But his eyes were a pale, piercing silver, like chips of moonstone. He was not moving with the flow of foot traffic. He was just standing there, still as a post, one hand resting on the railing.

And he was singing.

The tune was a low, discordant hum, a melody that didn’t resolve, threading through the deadened air straight to me. I couldn’t make out words, only a feeling—a deep, resonant sorrow, and beneath it, a chilling certainty. His lips barely moved.

Shiro, unaware, continued walking, carrying me past the top of the stairs. The boy’s head turned slowly, tracking, those silver eyes pinning me in place. His song didn’t stop. It followed, a cold ribbon winding around my spine.

As he receded from direct view, the grey world snapped back with a violent, sensory rush. Color and sound flooded in—a blinding neon sign, the screech of tram brakes, a vendor shouting about spiced buns. The physical pressure of the crowd returned, hot and oppressive.

And a new sound layered over the chaos. A woman’s voice, sharp and clear, emanating from a public address speaker I couldn’t see. “—reminder that spectator gates for the preliminary rounds open at dawn. Contestants, report to your designated holding sectors one hour prior. Good luck.”

The announcement sliced through my disorientation. I twisted on Shiro’s back, looking back toward the staircase. The flow of people was constant, a river of hats and shoulders and bags. The boy was gone. Vanished into the current, or never there at all.

“You okay?” Shiro’s voice was close to my ear now, a note of real concern cutting through his earlier bravado. He’d felt me stiffen.

“Yeah,” I breathed, turning my face back into the shelter of his shoulder. My heart was a frantic bird against my ribs. “Just… a lot of people.”

“Almost to our line,” he said, his pace not faltering. “Then it’s just a straight shot home.”

I nodded, fingers finding the aquamarine rose at my throat. Pressing the cool gem into my palm, the facets biting into skin. *Serenity and courage.* The stone felt inert now, just a piece of pretty glass. It hadn’t protected her from that… whatever it was. That seeing.

“Shiro?” My voice was small.

“Hmm?”

“The tournament… the people who go in. They all come out, right?”

He was quiet for a few steps. The crowd began to thin as they moved into the quieter corridor leading to their local line. The air cooled, smelling of damp concrete and distant electricity.

“They come out,” he said, his tone careful. Softer than before. “They come out winners, or they come out losers. But they come out.”

He shifted his weight, the muscles of his back tensing under my arms. The quiet stretched, filled only by the distant hum of the tram line and the echo of our footsteps. When he finally spoke, his voice had lost all its teasing edge. It was flat. Official. "I have heard of other contestants coming out. Some people can die but they do their best to keep it family friendly."

The words landed like stones in my gut. *Some people can die.* He said it like he was reciting a tram schedule, but the pause before it was a canyon. I felt his breathing change, a subtle hitch he tried to mask by adjusting his grip on my legs. My own breath caught, sticking in my throat alongside the sudden, metallic taste of fear.

My forehead was pressed against the back of his neck. I didn't need to see his face. I felt the lie in the rigid set of his shoulders, in the way he'd chosen each word with surgical care. *Keep it family friendly.* A clean, bloodless phrase for something messy and final. The aquamarine pendant felt suddenly cold against my sternum, a useless charm against the truth settling over me like a shroud.

He’d heard. Of course he’d heard. He’d just never let it touch him before. Now, in the hollow of his pause and the careful neutrality of his tone, I heard it touching him. Brushing against that wall of confidence like a cold finger. He believed he would come home, yes. But for the first time, walking there in that concrete corridor, I understood that belief wasn’t a fact. It was just a choice he was making, a story he was telling himself. And stories can be wrong.

“You’re sure?”

He stopped walking. Gently, he let my legs slide down until my feet found the gritty floor. He turned to face me, his brown eyes searching my green ones. The cocky grin was gone. In its place was the solemnity I’d seen only in glimpses—the same look he’d worn when he gave me the necklace.

He put his hands on my shoulders, his grip firm and warm. “Listen to me, Nyx. I am coming home. I am coming back to annoy you, and eat all the food, and tell you exaggerated stories about my incredible victories. Okay?”

I looked up at him, at the spikes of his dark red hair against the fluorescent light, at the absolute conviction in his face. He believed it. Every word.

The image of the boy on the stairs, his silent song, was a shard of ice in my chest. But Shiro’s hands on my shoulders were real. His promise was a warm, solid thing in the cool, echoing corridor.

“Okay,” I whispered.

“Okay,” he echoed. He pulled me into a quick, hard hug, crushing the aquamarine rose between them. Then he slung an arm around my shoulders, pulling me close to his side as they walked the last stretch to their platform. “Now, let’s get home. I need to pack my glory kit.”

I managed a weak laugh, leaning into his side. The ordinary walk was over. The last of it had slipped away on a discordant hum and a pair of silver eyes. But his arm was around me, and the tram was arriving with a familiar hiss of air, and for these few minutes more, I could pretend the future was just another of his stories, bright and bold and safe.

Shiro’s arm is a solid weight around my shoulders as we shuffle onto the tram, the doors sighing shut behind us, sealing us in the sterile, fluorescent-lit capsule. I am silent. My brain is a hive, buzzing with a frantic, formless terror I can’t shape into words. *What was that? A seizure? A hallucination?* The world had not just gone quiet—it had gone dead. And that boy… his eyes weren’t just looking. They were *knowing*.

“Window seat for the lady,” Shiro says, his voice deliberately light, guiding me to a pair of cracked vinyl seats by the grimy glass. I sink into mine, my body moving on autopilot. He drops beside me, the tram lurching into motion with a metallic groan.

I press my forehead against the cool window. Outside, the city blurs—a smear of neon and shadow, of people becoming streaks of color. My reflection ghosts over it all: pale face, wide green eyes, the braid of fire-red hair over my shoulder. And at my throat, the silver rose, a cold blue eye against my skin.

*Serenity and courage.* The words feel like a taunt. I had neither. I had a hum, stuck in my teeth. A song with no sound.

“Hey.” Shiro’s knee nudges mine. “You’re thinking too loud. I can hear it from here.”

“Sorry,” I murmur, not looking away from the window. The tram picks up speed, the platform receding. My gaze sweeps the disappearing station, the forest of steel support pillars, the last few stragglers hurrying for other lines.

And then I see him.

He stands perfectly still beside a grimy pillar, one hand resting against the painted steel. The silver-eyed boy. He is not a blur. He is a puncture in the moving world. His head is tilted, just as it was on the stairs, and he is looking directly at our tram. Directly at me.

His mouth isn’t moving now. No silent song. Just that look. It isn’t malice. It isn’t curiosity. It’s a profound, bone-deep sadness, a sorrow so heavy it seems to bow the air around him. It’s the look you give something already lost.

Our eyes lock through the dirty glass, through the gathering distance. A current passes between us—a recognition that has nothing to do with names or faces. He sees the fear he planted in me. He sees me seeing him. He sees that I am the only one who does.

Then the tram rounds a curve, and the pillar, the boy, the weighted stare, are snatched away.

I don’t move. My breath fogs the window where his image was. The hum in my teeth sharpens into a single, clear note of dread.

“Nyx?” Shiro’s voice is closer now, wary. “You’re white as a sheet.”

“I’m fine,” I say, the lie automatic and thin. “Just tired.”

I close my eyes, but all I see is that sadness. It wasn’t for himself. It was for me. Or for Shiro. Or for all of us, barreling forward on this tram, in this city, toward a tournament that appeared out of nothing seven years ago. A tournament with no rules, no architects, and no promise that everyone comes out.

Shiro’s hand finds mine on the seat between us. His fingers are warm, his grip calloused from training. He doesn’t say anything else. He just holds on as the tram carries us home, as the ordinary walk truly, irrevocably ends.

“Nyx, wake up!”

The whisper cuts through a dream of grey silence and silver eyes. I swim up from it, disoriented, the sheets tangled around my legs.

“Nyx, Nyx wake up.” The voice is louder, impatient. I recognize it. Mom.

A hand shakes my shoulder, firm and familiar. “Nyx, wake up, it’s time to see your brother off.”

With a groan, I roll onto my back. The ceiling of my small bedroom comes into focus, the faint cracks in the plaster like a map of nowhere. My mom’s face appears above me, my own red hair—a darker, richer shade than mine—pulled into a messy bun, her green eyes sharp with morning urgency.

“Come on, Nyx, we don’t have all day.” She says it with a frayed edge of frustration and is gone, her footsteps retreating down the hall toward the kitchen clatter.

I sit up. My body feels heavy, leaden with a sleep that wasn’t restful. I stretch, feeling muscles and tendons pull tight along my spine, a series of small, satisfying pops in my shoulders. The events of yesterday settle over me like a fine ash—the gift, the laughter, the crushing crowd, the boy. The sadness.

Was it real? Did I imagine him? The question is a hollow drumbeat in my skull as I push back the covers. The aquamarine rose is cool against my chest. I touch it. *Protection during travel.* Shiro is traveling today. Into the unknown.

I grab a towel and a clean set of clothes from the drawer: my favorite jeans, the dark denim soft and worn, hugging my legs perfectly, and my favorite shirt, black with the faded, grinning logo of Tricksters and Spice. The fabric smells like lavender detergent and home. I can’t go a day without their music; it’s the soundtrack to my normal life, a life that feels paper-thin this morning.

Opening my door, I’m greeted by the squealing cyclone of my younger siblings. The twins, Kael and Lira, nine years old and a mirror of chaotic energy, nearly collide with me in the narrow hallway. They share the same cocoa-brown hair, the same smattering of freckles across their slim faces, but their eyes are the give-away. Kael has our mother’s and my green, bright and mischievous. Lira has Shiro’s and our father’s warm brown, serious and deep.

“Shiro’s going to fight a monster!” Kael yells, brandishing a spoon like a sword.

“He’s going to solve a puzzle!” Lira counters, her hands already twisting as if working an invisible lock.

I sidestep them with a practiced ease, a smile tugging at my lips despite the dread in my gut. “He’s going to do both, and then he’s going to come home and tell you all about it.”

The bathroom is steamy from someone’s earlier use. I lock the door and lean against it, the cool wood against my back. For a moment, I just breathe in the humid, soap-scented air. Our four-bedroom apartment housing six people means this single bathroom is a coveted, contested space. The quiet in here is temporary, sacred.

Under the hot spray of the shower, my mind wanders back to the pillar. The boy’s hand on the steel. His stillness. That look. It wasn’t imagination. The clarity of it was too sharp, too cold. It was a warning written in a language I don’t understand. I scrub my skin until it’s pink, as if I can wash the feeling of being seen, known, and pitied off of me.

Once out, I dress quickly, the jeans and soft shirt a comforting armor. At the small, fogged mirror, I braid my still-damp hair, the red rope of it heavy and familiar down my back, almost to my hips. My own green eyes stare back at me from a face dotted with freckles. I look ordinary. I feel like a secret.

Stepping out, the aroma of frying eggs and toasted bread pulls me toward the kitchen. The heart of our home is warm and crowded. Dad stands at the stove, his broad back to me, humming a tuneless song, hyper focused on cooking, I could tell he was avoiding eye contact from everyone. Mom is setting the table, her movements efficient, the kitchen looked cleaner than normal, the smell of deep cleaners still fresh in the air. She only does this when stressed. The twins are already in their seats, kicking their feet. And at the head of the table, dressed in simple, durable training clothes, is Shiro.

He looks different in the morning light streaming through the kitchen window. The cocky grin is there, but it’s quieter. His spiked dark red hair is damp, too. His brown eyes track me as I enter, and he gives me a slow, deliberate wink.

“Sleep well, almost birthday girl?” he asks, his voice a rumble.

“Like a rock,” I lie, sliding into the chair beside him.

Before anyone can take a bite, the twins spring their trap. Kael, the bolder of the two, lets out a dramatic, fake cough, clutching his throat. Lira, playing her part, gasps. “Shiro! Your water! It smells funny!”

My brother, ever the performer, raises a skeptical eyebrow. “Funny how?” He picks up the glass of clear water beside his plate, giving it a swirl. The morning light catches it. It looks normal. It always looks normal. My own water is just water.

“Just taste it!” Lira insists, her eyes wide with manufactured concern. Kael is vibrating in his seat, barely containing his grin.

Shiro shrugs, playing along for their sake. He brings the glass to his lips, takes a healthy swallow—and his eyes fly open. A shudder runs through his broad shoulders. He slams the glass down, water sloshing over the rim. “Salt!” he sputters, laughing even as he grimaces. “You little terrors salted my water!”

The kitchen erupts. The twins howl with laughter, falling against each other. Mom tries and fails to hide a smile behind her hand. Dad’s tuneless humming stops, replaced by a deep, rumbling chuckle. The sound is warm, normal, a blanket trying to smother the cold dread in my gut. I force a laugh out, but it’s thin. I watch the spilled water bead on the table, tracing a path toward the edge. The salt was in the shaker, right there on the table. A simple, stupid prank. So why does my skin feel tight?

Shiro reaches over and ruffles Kael’s hair, then Lira’s, his grin back in full force. “Good one. But save your tactics for your own matches, yeah?” The threat is empty, fond. This is the last normal morning. They all feel it. So they fill it with noise, with saltwater, with anything but silence. I watch him, the damp spikes of his hair, the easy way he absorbs their chaos. For a second, he’s just my brother, not a contestant. The boy on the stairs feels very far away. Then Mom claps her hands, and the moment fractures.

Breakfast is a loud, messy affair. The twins chatter nonstop about the tournament, their theories growing more outrageous with each bite. Dad tells a story about his first day at the fabricator’s guild, a familiar tale meant to calm nerves. Mom fusses over Shiro’s plate, adding an extra egg, a second slice of toast. “You need your strength,” she says, and her voice doesn’t waver, but her hand on his shoulder lingers a second too long.

I pick at my food. Every laugh from Shiro, every confident answer he gives the twins, feels like a precious, fragile thing I’m memorizing. The aquamarine rose lies against my collarbone. I think of the boy’s sadness. I look at my brother’s bright, believing face.

“Time,” Mom says softly, looking at the clock on the wall.

A sudden, absolute silence falls over the table. Even the twins go still.

Shiro pushes his chair back, the scrape against the tile floor unbearably loud. He stands. He looks at each of us in turn—Dad, Mom, Kael, Lira, me. His gaze lasts longest on me. “Okay,” he says, the single word full of a finality that makes my throat tighten. “Let’s go see me off.”

The world outside the kitchen window is a smear of gray morning and moving shapes. I stare at the glass, at the ghost of our kitchen reflected in its surface—the table, my family frozen in their goodbyes, the stark white of the ceiling light. And there, just at the edge of the reflection, standing in the ghost of our hallway where no one is, is him. Silver eyes fixed on my reflection’s eyes. A stillness that eats the noise.

My breath stops. The cold of the aquamarine rose against my skin sharpens, a needle-point of reality. I turn my head, a quick jerk, my heart a frantic animal against my ribs. The real hallway is empty. Just the coat rack, Dad’s worn jacket. Nothing. No one. But the feeling lingers—a pressure in the air, a frequency of pure, regret that vibrates in my teeth. It’s the same sadness I felt on the tram stairs, but closer now. Inside my home.

“Nyx?” Shiro’s voice cuts through the static in my head. He’s watching me, his brown eyes sharp, his playful grin gone. “You okay?”

I force my face to move. A smile. It feels brittle, a thing that might crack and cut me. “Yeah. Just… thought I saw a bird hit the window.” The lie is ash in my mouth. My attenuation prickles, a wave of goosebumps sweeping down my arms. It’s screaming at me. He was here. He is here, in some way I can’t see or touch but can feel deep in the marrow of my bones, a cold shadow the morning light won’t dispel.

I look back at the window. Just our reflection now. My own green eyes wide, my freckles standing out like dark specks on pale skin. I touch the necklace. Protection during travel, he’d said. But what if the thing you need protection from is already standing in your house? What if it’s not following Shiro to the tournament gates, but watching from the shadows as we walk him there?