prolouge
Rain distorted London in blurred silver outside the car windows.
The city passed streaks of neon and headlights while water crawled lazily down the glass beside Clara Nightingale’s face. She sat curled against the backseat door with one knee tucked beneath her, absentmindedly twisting strands of her braid around her fingers while music played quietly through the speakers.
October always made the world feel colder than it should have.
The heater fogged the edges of the windows. Warm air smelled faintly like coffee, rainwater, and the cigarettes Alex thought nobody noticed him smoking.
Clara noticed everything.
“You’re staring again,” Esmai said lightly from the passenger seat.
Clara blinked. “Hm?”
“At people.”
“I’m observing.”
“You’re judging.”
“There’s a difference.”
Esmai laughed softly.
The sound filled the car so naturally it almost hurt to hear.
Clara liked Esmai’s laugh. It was warm in a way most things weren’t anymore.
Streetlights flashed gold against the dashboard as Alex drove through the rain-slick streets, one hand loose on the steering wheel while the other rested on Esmai’s thigh. Clara watched the movement through half-lidded eyes before looking back out the window again.
“You know,” she muttered, “normal people would be disgusted by how obsessed you two are with each other.”
Alex scoffed. “You’re fourteen. You think love is illegal.”
“It should be.”
Esmai twisted around in her seat enough to grin at her. Dark curls framed her face messily, softened by the low amber glow inside the car.
“You’ll understand eventually.”
“I absolutely won’t.”
“You say that now.”
Clara rolled her eyes dramatically.
But secretly-
She liked nights like this, The three of them together,Alex smiling again.
Because before Esmai, her brother had been angry all the time. Tired. Sharp-edged in ways that made the apartment feel too small. But Esmai had softened him somehow. Like she’d reached inside his ribs and stitched something back together nobody else realised was broken.
Clara didn’t trust happiness enough not to notice it.
Rain hammered harder against the roof.
Alex slowed slightly at the next junction, squinting through the windshield as the wipers dragged water away in uneven streaks.
“You should stay over tonight,” Esmai said suddenly.
Alex glanced at her. “At your mum’s?”
“She likes you now.”
“She tolerates me.”
“That’s basically love.”
Clara snorted quietly.
Then Esmai looked back at her again, softer this time.
“And Clara can have the spare room.”
“I’m not interrupting your weird romance sleepover.”
“You practically live at our house already.”
“Because your fridge has actual food.”
Alex laughed under his breath.
Esmai smiled again.
And for one strange second Clara noticed her hand resting protectively against the slight curve beneath her coat.
The baby.
eight months.
The thought still felt unreal, Alex kept acting like if he spoke too loudly something terrible would happen.
Clara understood the feeling.
“You still haven’t picked a name,” she pointed out.
Alex groaned immediately. “Don’t start.”
“We need opinions,” Esmai defended.
“You suggested Orion,” Alex said flatly.
“Orion is cool.”
“Orion sounds like a deodorant brand.”
“It does not.”
“It absolutely does.”
Clara smirked faintly to herself and turned back toward the rain-covered window.
Outside, London blurred endlessly onward.
Cars, Shops, Neon signs, People hidden beneath umbrellas.
Everything normal.
Everything alive.
The traffic light ahead turned green.
Alex accelerated through the intersection.
Then Clara saw headlights.
They were bright flashing orage too close way to close.
Her stomach dropped instantly.
The black car appeared out of nowhere, tearing through the red light far too fast.
For one impossible heartbeat everything slowed.
Esmai inhaled sharply.
Alex swore.
Tyres screamed against wet asphalt.
Then metal slammed into them hard enough to split the world apart.
The impact crushed into Clara’s side of the car with a deafening shriek of twisting steel. Glass exploded across her skin. Her head cracked violently against the window.
The car spun.
Once.
Twice.
Weightlessness hit.
Then another impact.
The scream that ripped from Clara’s throat vanished beneath the sound of the car rolling again and again across soaked concrete.
Everything became noise.
Pain.
Smoke.
Shattering glass.
Then—
Silence.
Not real silence.
The horrible ringing kind.
Clara blinked slowly.
Upside down.
The car was upside down.
Blood dripped across broken glass beside her face.
Her seatbelt dug painfully into her ribs, keeping her suspended awkwardly against the crushed roof. Her left leg burned with blinding agony beneath twisted metal.
She tried to breathe.
The air tasted like smoke.
“Alex?” she croaked weakly.
No response.
Rain hissed faintly outside.
Something crackled nearby.
Smoke curled through the ruined car interior in slow grey waves.
Panic slammed into her chest.
“Alex—?”
A broken sound answered her.
Not Alex.
Esmai.
Clara turned her head sharply.
Esmai was still conscious.
Blood soaked the front of her coat in horrifying amounts, dark against the fabric. One side of her face was streaked crimson from shattered glass. Her breathing came unevenly — wet and shallow and wrong.
Very wrong.
Alex hung unconscious against the steering wheel.
“Alex,” Esmai whispered weakly.
Clara’s heartbeat began to stutter violently.
“No no no—”
She tried to move.
Pain tore through her leg hard enough to make her vision blur white.
She screamed.
The metal pinning her leg didn’t budge.
Esmai made a small sound at the noise.
“Clara…”
Her voice shook.
Clara looked at her.
And immediately understood.
Not fully.
Not logically.
But some terrified part of her understood anyway.
Esmai knew she was dying.
“No,” Clara whispered instantly. “No. No, you’re okay— people are coming—”
Outside, distant shouting echoed through the rain.
Esmai’s trembling hand moved weakly toward her stomach.
Toward the baby.
Tears mixed with rainwater and blood on her face.
“Clara,” she said again softly, “listen to me.”
“No.”
“You need to listen.”
“No!”
Her voice cracked apart violently.
Smoke thickened around them.
Somewhere nearby, something hissed with sparks.
Esmai’s breathing hitched painfully.
“Tell Alex…” She swallowed hard. “Tell him I didn’t regret anything.”
Clara felt hysteria rising inside her chest.
“No no no no— stop talking like that—”
“Tell him I loved him.”
“Esmai—”
“And tell him…” Her voice broke. “Tell him it was a girl.”
Clara froze.
The world tilted sickeningly.
A girl.
The baby was a girl.
Esmai let out a shaking breath that sounded dangerously fragile.
“She was kicking earlier,” she whispered, almost smiling through the pain. “Alex cried about it for ten minutes.”
Clara started crying then.
Silent at first.
Then violently.
Because she still couldn’t move.
Because Alex wouldn’t wake up.
Because there was too much blood.
Because Esmai was going to die.
Smoke crawled thicker through the overturned car.
The smell of petrol hit next.
Sharp.
Dangerous.
Esmai noticed it too.
Fear flickered across her face for the first time.
“Clara.”
Clara looked at her desperately.
“You need to get out if it catches fire.”
“I can’t move my leg.”
“Try.”
“I DID.”
Her scream echoed harshly inside the wreckage.
Esmai flinched weakly.
Then—
For one horrifying moment—
Clara saw headlights reflecting across rainwater outside the shattered windshield.
A figure stood across the road.
Tall.
Still.
Dressed entirely in black.
Watching.
The ringing in her ears grew louder.
She blinked.
The figure was gone.
Maybe they had never been there at all.
Esmai began coughing suddenly, blood staining her lips.
“Esmai—”
“It hurts,” she whispered.
Clara had never heard fear in her voice before.
Not once.
Sirens screamed somewhere in the distance now.
Too far away.
Too far.
Too slow.
Esmai’s eyes drifted toward Alex again.
Then back to Clara.
“Don’t let him blame himself.”
Clara broke completely.
Because they both knew he would.
And because some small terrible part of her already blamed herself too.
Esmai’s breathing became shallower.
Slower.
Smoke thickened around them.
Rain hammered endlessly outside.
Then Esmai looked at Clara one final time and whispered softly:
“You have his eyes.”
Clara frowned weakly through tears.
“What?”
But Esmai never answered.
Her head tilted slightly against the shattered seat.
And she stopped breathing.
Clara screamed.
—
Clara woke violently in darkness.
A gasp tore from her lungs as she bolted upright in bed, tangled sheets twisting around her legs. Her heart slammed painfully against her ribs.
Rain tapped softly against the apartment windows.
For one terrible second she still smelled smoke.
Still heard twisting metal.
Still saw blood.
Her hands shook violently.
Spike lifted his head sleepily from the end of the bed, half an ear twitching.
The tiny apartment slowly came back into focus around her.
Cold walls.
Dim streetlights beyond the curtains.
The familiar ache in her left leg.
Clara pressed trembling fingers against her mouth.
The dream was already fading at the edges again.
Like it always did.
Only three things never disappeared.
The blood.
Esmai’s voice.
And the feeling that something about the crash was wrong.
it was a dream as per usual it was always a dream .
