The silence that followed was worse than the laughter before it.
Adrian Vale pushed through the frozen crowd, his breathing uneven, his eyes locked on the child at the piano.
“That song…” his voice cracked. “Where did you learn that song?”
The girl looked up, confused but calm.
“My mother taught me,” she said softly. “She said my father wrote it before he disappeared.”
The world seemed to tilt.
Adrian staggered back as if struck.
Twenty years ago, he had loved a woman he was forced to leave behind. Before she vanished, he had written that exact melody for her—something no one else had ever heard.
Except her.
Except them.
His gaze dropped to the girl’s neck.
A silver necklace.
A broken heart pendant.
He touched his own chest instinctively.
The other half hung there.
The ballroom erupted into whispers, but Adrian couldn’t hear them anymore.
His entire past had just walked into the room barefoot.
“Who is your mother?” he asked, barely able to speak.
The girl opened her mouth to answer—
But before she could—
The chandeliers flickered violently.
The lights died.
Total darkness swallowed the ballroom.
Then a voice echoed from the blackness:
“Take her. She is not supposed to be found.”
Screams erupted.
Glass shattered.
And Adrian Vale shouted into the darkness—
“No! Don’t touch her!”
But she was already gone.
