A leather-bound notebook, sitting quietly on the edge of the table - worn, creased, edges dog-eared, like it had lived in too many hotel rooms, too many briefcases. It didn't look forgotten at first glance, more like it had always belonged to the table - until the assistant began sweeping away papers and flyers and nearly tossed it into a tote bag.
"Wait!"
Elena's voice cracked slightly as she darted forward.
The assistant glanced at her, annoyed. "What?"
"That's... that's Mr. Blake's. His notebook."
The woman frowned. "He didn't-"
But Elena had already snatched it up. It was warm, somehow. Like it had just been in his hands. Like it remembered being written in.
She bolted.
The assistant yelled something behind her - a rule, a protest - but it was already swallowed by the noise of the crowd. Elena pushed through the bookstore's double doors, nearly knocking over a stack of glossy hardbacks, and stumbled into the afternoon heat.
She squinted.
There. A sleek black car idling at the curb, its door just closing.
"Elena!"
The assistant's voice was behind her now, sharper. She didn't look back.
"Wait!" she called out, weaving between people with far too many tote bags and not enough urgency. "Mr. Blake!"
The car began to pull away.
No, no, no-
She sprinted, one shoe half-loose, the notebook thudding awkwardly against her side. She reached the curb just as the back window rolled down.
Adrian Blake's face appeared again - startled, then amused. "Well. You're persistent."
"You forgot this." She held up the notebook, gasping slightly.
He took it gently, flipping through with a speed that suggested he already knew every page.
Then, oddly, he stopped.
Tore one page out.
Folded it in half, carefully. Precisely.
And handed it to her.
"You had questions," he said. "This should answer them."
She blinked. "But-"
The assistant leaned forward from the front seat. "We're late."
Adrian gave a small, regretful smile. "Take care, Elena."
The window rolled up. The car pulled away.
She stared after it, the folded page in her hand. Confused. Unsettled.
Opened it.
Blank.
No words. Not a single inked line.
Just silence.
And the sudden, strange weight of something beginning.
By the time Elena returned, the sun had begun its slow descent behind the Manila skyline, casting gold against the marble as though trying to make amends for what the day had done.
The De Vera mansion loomed ahead - stately, glinting, all too pristine. The iron gates parted with a soft groan as the car inched in, silent as judgment.
She stepped out barefoot.
Her heels had given up somewhere between the bookstore and the sprint. Her blouse clung to her back, sweat-lined. One strand of hair curled defiantly in the middle of her forehead. Her book bag sagged off one shoulder, the folded page still tucked, slightly crumpled, in her grip.
And waiting for her - like a portrait sprung to life - were her parents.
Aurora Constancia De Vera, Mama, stood tall in dove-grey silk, her hair sculpted into submission, lips a slash of carmine. Her arms were crossed. Not tightly. Just enough to suggest a tribunal.
Beside her, Don Roberto De Vera, Papa, paced with one hand behind his back, the other cradling a tumbler of whisky that hadn't been touched. His linen suit was immaculate. His jawline - clenched.
A few members of the household staff lingered nearby, pretending not to listen while doing very little else.
No one spoke.
Until the driver did - nervously, voice brittle.
"She said she needed to see a friend, ma'am. Near Taft. I thought-"
Mama cut him a look that could've frozen rivers. "You may go inside."
He didn't walk so much as dissolve into the shadows of the house.
Then Papa turned.
"Elena."
Just her name. Nothing else.
No question. No embrace. Not even disappointment - that would have been too warm.
She met his gaze, chin high. "I went to a book signing."
"A book signing," Mama repeated, as though she'd just said I robbed a cathedral.
"Yes."
"You were meant to attend the Rivera tea. We received word from the hosts that you were seen leaving in a car by yourself. Unescorted. In begger shades"
"Scandalous," Elena muttered, brushing past them.
"Elena."
Papa's voice this time. Iron under velvet.
She paused. Turned.
"You want me to wear the dresses. Smile at strangers. Attend these dull, orchestrated encounters as if I were being auctioned off."
"Elena," Mama said softly, warningly. "That's not-"
"I just wanted a moment that belonged to me. That's all."
Papa looked at her. For a moment, something shifted. A flicker. But it passed.
"We are De Veras," he said, as if that explained everything.
She nodded once. Not in agreement - in understanding. Then she turned, climbed the grand staircase, two at a time.
The gold of the sun had fully left the marble now.
All that remained was shadow.
The silence of her room was loud.
Elena had peeled off her blouse, swapped it for an old cotton shirt with a cracked Hogwarts logo. Her damp hair was in a loose bun. She sat cross-legged on her bed, surrounded by the comforting clutter of youth - a stack of notebooks, a crooked lava lamp, a dried flower pressed between book pages.
She stared at the page.
Still blank.
Still crinkled from her palm.
It lay flat on her desk, like it was daring her to make something of it. She'd tried shining her phone's flashlight on it. Nada. No codes. No watermark. Just expensive paper and disappointment.
With a sigh, she tossed her phone onto the bed and flopped backward. For a long moment, she let the ceiling be her only distraction.
Then the phone buzzed.
Twice.
Then again.
She glanced over.
Group chat: LitChix
Mina: omg have u seen???
Kat: elena are u ok???
Mina: girl he just DIED??
She frowned. Sat up. Clicked the link Mina had sent.
The headline blinked at her from the screen, surreal and bright.
"Bestselling Author Adrian Blake Found Dead in Hotel Room."
She read it again.
Then a third time.
Her lips parted, but no sound came.
The article was vague - "suspected cardiac event," "found by assistant shortly after public appearance," "no foul play suspected at this time."
The world slowed.
She looked toward the desk.
The page.
Still blank.
Still real.
She reached out, her fingers brushing it like it might burn her.
"He just... handed me this," she whispered. "That was hours ago."
Her heart beat louder in her ears.
There'd been something in his voice, hadn't there? That knowing look. That flicker of recognition. "You had questions," he'd said. "This should answer them."
And then - nothing. A single tear drop rolling down her cheek
No time. No explanation.
Just the page.
She clutched it now with both hands, holding it like it might vanish if she blinked.
Later that night, Elena climbed the attic stairs barefoot, the creaking wood under her steps louder than she remembered. She held a flashlight between her teeth, one hand gripping the book, the other still clutching the page.
Her parents hadn't come looking. Maybe they were too busy blaming the driver, or each other. Maybe they hadn't even noticed she was home.
All the better.
The attic welcomed her like an old friend. It smelled of forgotten paper, mothballs, and lemon polish. A string of fairy lights still clung desperately to the beams, some flickering, others giving up altogether. Her sanctuary - untouched since before the cotillion talk began suffocating her life.
There, in the far corner, was her reading nook: a battered armchair with stuffing poking through the seams, an old green quilt, and a side table covered in stacked books, mismatched mugs, and wax drips from a candle she'd once lit to feel poetic.
She curled into the chair and pulled Scoundrel onto her lap.
Her fingers trembled a little as she flipped through the pages, each one soft with rereading. Adrian's prose always felt like it knew her - like it had seen straight through the silk and silver spoons to the girl underneath, craving something more.
And then... there it was.
Page 341.
She stopped.
The spread was intact, but she stared at it with certainty. Something here - the way the chapter leapt, the rhythm interrupted - felt wrong. Like a breath missing between sentences.
The blank page trembled in her hand.
She slipped it between the pages, right where that silence had lived.
And suddenly... it fit.
Perfectly.
No number. No title. Just... the page.
She sat back.
The room was quiet, but it wasn't the same kind of quiet as before. It felt thicker somehow, like the air was waiting for her to notice something.
She gave a half-laugh. "Of course," she said to no one. "Just a souvenir."
She leaned back, let her head thump softly against the chair.
Then paused.
The air was different.
Cooler.
She looked up.
Her breath caught.
The candle wick, long dead, gave a little flicker.
Not of flame.
Of frost.
A tiny gust of cold rushed across her bare toes.
Then another.
She stood, slowly, the hairs on her arms rising.
From the corner of her eye, she thought she saw something shimmer - a soft glow between the pages of the book.
She turned toward it.
The page wasn't blank anymore.
The letters bled into existence like rising steam on glass.
First, just a curl - an elegant L, then another - flowing, strange script, delicate and deliberate. Elena blinked. Rubbed her eyes. The page hadn't moved. The letters shimmered like ink made of moonlight.
She leaned closer.
Each word seemed to write itself, like a hand she couldn't see was dragging a quill slowly across the paper.
She read aloud, her voice cracking.
> "To find the truth, begin in frost,
Where time is still and paths are lost.
The page you hold, a key, not map,
To wake what sleeps within the gap."
The attic suddenly groaned.
She looked up, startled - the glow from the book now bathing the room in pale blue. The fairy lights blinked out. Silence closed in like snow-fall: thick, weightless, and absolute.
Then-
Wind.
A low moan pushed through the floorboards. A tremble in the beams. Cold fingers slipped through every crack, sweeping the attic in a chill that wasn't just air - it felt... ancient.
Elena gasped.
Her breath came out white.
She looked down at the book again. The poem had stopped. The letters were no longer forming. But the page was glowing - faintly pulsing - like it had a heartbeat.
The candle, long dead, lit. Not with fire - with frost. Ice crusted over the bookshelves. Dust turned to silver.
A flake floated past her nose.
She stared at it, transfixed.
Another drifted down. Then another.
It was snowing.
Elena turned slowly, heart hammering. The window - old and latched with rust - now stood open. The wind had flung the curtains wide. Outside, the city should have glittered with light and traffic.
But there was no Manila.
Only white.
Endless, silent white.
A forest stretched where rooftops should be. Pines laden with snow. A village in the distance - warm yellow lights blinking through the fog. Like something out of the kind of fairytales she'd long outgrown.
She stepped toward the window, quilt still wrapped around her shoulders like armor.
Below, there was no ledge. No street.
Only snow.
The breath caught in her throat.
"Papa?" she whispered.
No answer.
"Mama?"
Nothing.
Only the wind.
She turned, cast one last glance around the attic. The armchair. The candle. The book still glowing on the table.
Then back to the snow.
And stepped out the window.
The snow swallowed the sound of her landing.
She looked around, wide-eyed. Her slippers sank into the frost. The forest stood silent and watchful. The wind curled around her ankles like a curious cat.
She turned her face to the sky, blinking against the flurry.
> "What in the world..."