Snow couldn't sleep. She laid in bed, staring at the ceiling. The house was too quiet. Every creak of the floorboards felt wrong. Her door creaked open. "You awake?" Raya's whisper cut through the darkness. Snow sat up. "Yeah." Raya slipped inside, closing the door behind her. Even in the dim light from the window, Snow could see the tension in her sister's shoulders, the way her yellow eyes darted around the room. "Can't sleep either?" Snow asked. "Something's wrong." Raya wrapped her arms around herself. "I don't know what, but - I don't know." The door opened again. Nyx stepped through without knocking, her red eyes gleaming in the shadows. She looked at them both, then slid to the bed frame and sat. "So it's not just me," Nyx said flatly. "You feel it too?" Snow crossed her arms. "Like I'm forgetting something important." Nyx's voice had lost its usual aggressive edge. She sounded almost... uncertain. "Like there's something I'm supposed to remember, but every time I try to grab it, it slips away." "Yes." Raya moved to sit on the edge of Snow's bed, but faced the opposite wall. "Exactly like that." Snow looked between them—her sisters. Raya with her black hair and yellow eyes. Nyx with her identical hair and red eyes. They'd always been together. The three of them. Sisters. But the word felt like it didn't quite fit. Like wearing someone else's jacket. "How long have we lived here?" Snow asked quietly. Raya opened her mouth, then closed it. Her brow furrowed. "I... we've always..." "I don't know," Nyx said, and the admission seemed to cost her something. "I can't remember." The silence stretched between them, heavy and suffocating. "We're sisters," Snow said, trying to make it sound certain. "We've always been sisters." "Right." Raya nodded, but her hands were shaking slightly. "Always." Nyx pushed off from the floor and moved to the window, staring out at the darkened street below. "Then why does it feel like a lie?" Nobody answered. Snow caught a glimpse of her reflection in the dark window glass—just for a moment, she thought she saw a fourth figure standing behind them. Small, green robe with a hood. But when she blinked, there was nothing there. Just the three of them. Sisters. "Maybe we should try to sleep," Raya suggested, though she made no move to leave. "Yeah," Snow said.
