The scent of blood hadn't faded from the hall.
Not even the academy's cleansing wards could scrub it entirely — not after a death like Ravyn's. Her explosion had soaked the altar, the walls, even the ceiling tiles. Too violent. Too personal. Something deeper had been violated that night, something ancient and watching.
Students whispered behind locked doors, voices hushed and trembling.
"Exploded from the inside."
"No — she was possessed."
"She screamed something before she died… didn't she?"
No one could agree on what they'd heard.
But Cid had.
Just before her body ruptured and sprayed the stone with gore, she'd managed to choke out a single word.
"Veil."
In the dorm courtyard, beneath a canopy of rotting autumn leaves, Cid stood alone. The trees above him were skeletal, their branches scraping the moonlight like claws. His white hair glowed faintly in the dark, catching every silver glint of night. He leaned against the iron railing with his hands in his pockets, his gaze distant.
He wasn't thinking about Ravyn.
Not exactly.
Not the way others did.
Behind him, boots crunched gravel.
"Funny," Kael's voice drawled. "Your fucktoy gets blown to bits, and you don't even blink. Cold bastard."
Cid didn't turn. "You got a problem, Kael?"
"Yeah," Kael said, stepping into range. "I think you're all talk. You act mysterious, brood in corners, scare the girls. But in a real fight?" He laughed softly. "You'd fold."
Cid smiled — but it was empty.
He turned.
One punch — fast, brutal — cracked Kael across the jaw. The sound echoed across the courtyard like a bone snapping under pressure. Kael staggered, then Cid swept his leg out and dropped him flat. His skull smacked the stone hard enough to daze him.
Students nearby gasped.
Cid crouched low and grabbed Kael by the hair, yanking his head up before smashing his face back into the gravel. Blood painted the ground in thick droplets.
"Still think I'm nothing?" Cid hissed into his ear, his voice calm, cold.
Kael coughed, choking on blood and teeth. He tried to lift himself, but Cid pressed a boot to the back of his neck, grinding him down.
"You speak my name again," Cid murmured, "you'll do it on your knees."
Then he turned and walked away, leaving Kael bleeding under the pale light.
Later that night, Cid sat alone in the abandoned library wing — the part sealed off after the fire two years ago. The air was thick with the scent of old smoke and forgotten parchment. Shelves loomed like dead trees, most of them half-collapsed. Blackened books lay scattered across the floor, their spines warped.
Cid traced a finger across a scorched tome: Rites of the Abyss.
Most of the pages had been lost — torn, burned, destroyed.
But one remained intact.
The Veil was meant to hold them.But hunger does not forget.It waits.It learns.
Something shifted behind the wall. Not loud. A faint scrape. A rustle, like fabric against stone. Then a low moan — long and dragging, inhuman.
Cid didn't flinch.
He just listened.
Iris found him minutes later.
"You're always hiding," she said, stepping into the ruined wing. Her voice was soft, careful — like approaching a dangerous animal.
"I wasn't hiding," Cid replied, not looking at her. "Just reading."
She walked closer, her fingers brushing the dusty edge of a broken table. "You read the kind of books that make people go missing."
"That's the only kind worth reading."
She smiled at that — a strange, crooked smile. Her hands tugged at the hem of her skirt, fidgeting. "I saw what you did to Kael."
"He bored me."
Her cheeks darkened — not from shame, but something deeper, warmer. "He deserved it."
Cid looked up, finally meeting her eyes. "You like seeing me like that?"
She swallowed. "Yes."
"You get off on watching me break people?"
"I get off on you," she whispered.
Cid stood.
Stepped forward.
His presence was immediate — heat, hunger, control. She didn't resist when he pinned her back against the desk, his mouth claiming hers in a kiss that left no room for breath.
Within moments, Iris lay sprawled on the crumbling surface, her blouse open, bra tossed aside, her breath coming in needy little gasps. Her skin flushed beneath his mouth, his tongue dragging slow lines down her throat and across her breasts.
"You're wet already," he muttered, his fingers sliding between her thighs. "Pathetic."
She whimpered, hips grinding against his hand. "Please…"
He pushed her skirt up, yanked her panties down in one rough motion, and slid into her slowly — inch by inch, dragging it out until she cried out, her legs wrapping around him like a vise.
"Say it," he growled, fucking her deep.
"I'm yours," she moaned.
"Louder."
"I'm yours, Cid!"
His rhythm was brutal — no tenderness, just raw possession. He slammed into her again and again until she was sobbing beneath him, clutching at him, drowning in it. Her moans bounced off the stone walls like music — desperate, filthy, worshipful.
She came hard, trembling around him as he fucked her through it, not stopping until she was limp beneath him, gasping his name like a mantra.
Later, she slept curled up in his coat, her cheeks still flushed, her thighs still trembling. The candle beside the desk had burned low.
Cid stood in the doorway for a moment, watching her.
Then he left.
He didn't know why he returned to the altar.
The hall was dark, quiet. The candles had been replaced, but the air still carried a charge — something under the skin. The bloodstain was faint now, barely visible. But it was still there.
He stepped forward.
The silence felt alive.
Then, a whisper — but not in his ears.
Inside.
"She was just the first."
Cid didn't speak.
He didn't need to.
He simply stared at the altar — and smiled.
That night, two more students disappeared.
A boy and a girl.
No signs of struggle. Their rooms untouched. Their beds still made. But outside, just beneath the garden gate, someone found something odd.
A faint trail of muddy footprints.
Leading toward the old well.
And ending at its edge.
The headmaster said nothing.
The prefects filed no reports.
And though no one dared speak it aloud, the truth settled like dust over the academy:
Veilborne was feeding again.