The alarm went off.

  She rose from bed without thinking. Set the coffee machine. Stepped into the shower. Once awake, she pulled on the clothes she had laid out the night before, poured the coffee into a thermal mug, and left the apartment.

  As usual, she was in a hurry. The strange half-darkness and stale air in the stairwell barely registered.

  She was already running down the stairs when a familiar scent hit her.

  Her stomach clenched.

  She stopped, grabbed the railing, fighting the urge to vomit. The smell tugged at something deep in her memory, but she couldn’t place it. She glanced at her watch. If she hesitated even a moment longer, she would be late.

  Late for what?

  She took another step—and froze.

  Blood, her mind supplied.

  That was what it smelled like.

  Within seconds the odor thickened, so intense she could almost taste it. A cold shiver ran down her spine. She leaned over the railing.

  She lived on the thirteenth floor. There were still at least six levels below her.

  Logic told her that something terrible must have happened downstairs—no few drops of blood could produce a stench like this. But the clock kept ticking.

  She forced herself onward.

  Lower and lower, her steps slowed while her heart raced. The air grew heavier, harder to breathe. The lights dimmed, no longer cutting through the darkness. Floor by floor, dread tightened its grip.

  She reached the ground level, disoriented.

  The smell was overwhelming. Yet there was no trace of blood anywhere.

  She leaned over the railing again. Above her, the stairwell seemed brighter. Below—toward the garage—it was almost pitch-black.

  And that was where she was headed.

  She took the last steps trembling, fear bordering on something feral. Her heart thundered. She felt close to fainting.

  She turned the corner.

  And stopped.

  As every night, beside the door leading to the garage stood a man.

  Impossibly tall. Powerfully built. His head bowed. Long dark hair spilled over his shoulders, clad in a long black leather coat that brushed the floor. Heavy boots reinforced with silver buckles. One foot braced against the wall.

  His hands were clasped behind his back beneath the coat, emphasizing the muscles beneath a thin graphite T-shirt.

  The air around him rippled, like heat rising from asphalt.

  And impossibly—it glowed.

  Not with light.

  With darkness.

  Though his posture hid his face, he felt disturbingly familiar. The thought emboldened her, just a little. Somewhere in the back of her mind pulsed the urgency of an appointment she had to keep.

  She moved forward slowly, hoping he wouldn’t notice her.

  The lights flickered.

  The silence was unbearable. Even the hum of electricity echoed like sound through an empty forest. Still, she didn’t stop, clinging to the hope that he was waiting for someone else.

  Then her foot reached the last step.

  The man moved.

  From beneath the curtain of his hair emerged a face both beautiful and terrifying. If not for his eyes, it would have been the most beautiful face she had ever seen.

  This content has been misappropriated from Royal Road; report any instances of this story if found elsewhere.

  But his eyes—

  They were abyssal. Two black voids set into pale skin, rimmed with a thin, shimmering membrane. Amelia couldn’t even swallow. Her heart stalled, as if afraid that another beat would trigger an attack.

  She stared without blinking.

  Then something older than reason, deeper than fear, understood.

  Those eyes were not empty.

  They were galaxies—swirling with longing, love, hatred, disgust, joy, rage, and desire.

  She exhaled sharply, flushing at the last.

  She tore her gaze away—only to find she couldn’t stop looking.

  The man smiled, as if her presence pleased him.

  Only then did she notice the contradiction in his features: hard, masculine lines softened by something almost childlike. And his mouth—

  God.

  Parted in a faint smile that stirred an unbearable hunger in her.

  Another shiver tore through her.

  It was too much.

  Too much for someone who had lived for years with trauma, anxiety, depression. Old wounds—silent witnesses to her self-destruction—began to burn, as if freshly reopened. She scratched at her arms, panic rising.

  She wanted to run. To go back upstairs.

  Something wouldn’t let her.

  The man stepped aside.

  The simplicity of the motion carried a strange magic that nearly made her collapse. And then—

  From his back unfurled enormous wings, barely contained by the space. Bat-like. Vast.

  So that was the source of the smell.

  The wings were drenched in blood.

  It clung, flowed, shimmered.

  The sight drove the last breath from her lungs. She tried to scream—only choked. Tried to turn—collapsed instead, tumbling down the steps.

  The man’s expression never changed.

  He smiled, as though she were someone else entirely.

  Casually, he opened the garage door and stepped inside. Then he stopped, turned back, and looked at her in mild surprise.

  “Coming?” he asked, as if they did this every morning. As if they were simply leaving for work together.

  His voice crushed her.

  It vibrated inside her, freezing and igniting her at once, then slammed into her mind.

  Something broke.

  Her mouth opened, but no sound came—only a strangled breath. One eyelid fluttered uncontrollably. Her body convulsed, striking the stairs.

  And somehow—she saw another.

  A second Amelia. Identical, yet utterly different.

  Horrified, she felt that other self reaching for him.

  Her body rose against her will.

  She fought.

  Pulled back.

  They dragged in opposite directions.

  Her heart accelerated beyond reason, slamming against already bruised ribs. The struggle lasted only moments—but felt endless.

  She weakened.

  The other surged forward.

  Pain exploded. Her eyes squeezed shut—then snapped open in shock, as if something essential had been torn away.

  “No,” she screamed.

  She watched her body split.

  Watched the other her step free—effortless, radiant, blood-slicked—moving toward her… lover?

  With the last of her strength, Amelia tried to hold on.

  Failed.

  A final wrench—and there were two women on the stairs.

  One barely alive.

  The other glowing.

  She forced her eyes open.

  The sight was unreal.

  The radiant woman stood wrapped in the monster’s wings—now beautiful for the first time—his darkness answering her blinding light. Together, they were whole.

  Jealousy pierced her like poison.

  She wanted that transformation. That healing. That impossible love.

  Then something changed.

  The creature looked at her broken body and smiled in triumph.

  See, his eyes seemed to say as he kissed the woman in his arms.

  Grief closed her eyes.

  The pain was too much.

  She surrendered.

  When she opened them again, she expected the white ceiling of the stairwell.

  Instead—

  She was in his arms.

  The wings bled around her.

  She shared his breath.

  Her body screamed in pain.

  Her soul overflowed with a joy too vast to contain.

  “Let’s go,” he whispered as she drew her first breath in this new form.

  As they passed through the door, she caught her reflection in the glass.

  It was her.

  The same woman who had dried her hair that morning.

  But her eyes—

  They were hollow.

  And something moved inside them.

  She woke screaming.

  Souls.

  Millions.

  Billions of souls.