---
Julian couldn't sleep anymore.
It wasn't insomnia. It wasn't nightmares.
It was something far worse:
Every time he closed his eyes, he saw the place he came from.
Not the afterlife—not exactly.
A space between worlds. A gray, formless plane where time didn't pass and memories replayed like broken film reels. He saw faces he didn't know. Voices he didn't recognize. And something else—
A presence, watching him.
Waiting.
---
Lena woke up one night to find Julian sitting outside, barefoot in the cold, staring at the woods behind Hollow Pines.
She rushed out, wrapping a blanket around him. "Julian, what are you doing?"
He didn't blink. "It's calling me."
"What is?"
He looked at her then, his voice hollow.
> "The thing that let me go."
---
They returned to Rae's law office the next day. The fake identity was finalized. Julian Lennox had a social security number, a driver's license, even a bank account.
"You're officially human now," Rae smiled.
Julian managed a weak laugh, but Lena saw how his hands trembled as he held the ID.
He didn't feel official.
He felt haunted.
---
That evening, Julian confessed something.
"I think I left something behind. Or… maybe I brought something with me."
He described the figure from his dreams—faceless, shifting, with a voice like rust and thunder. It didn't chase him. It didn't scream.
It simply whispered:
> "You were not the only one."
Lena tried to reason with him. "You broke free. The house is clean. You survived."
But deep down, she knew too well—magic never leaves a door open for free.
And if Julian was allowed to return…
What else came with him?
---
One day, they found the mirror.
The one Lena had smashed back in Chapter One.
It was whole again.
Sitting in the attic. Reflecting nothing.
No light. No room. No people.
Just void.
Julian stared at it and whispered, "It's not a mirror. It's a gate."
They smashed it again.
But the shards didn't shatter.
They bled.
---
The town changed too.
Neighbors started reporting strange dreams.
People saw shadows clinging to trees.
A child went missing—only to be found the next day in a graveyard, shivering, eyes wide, whispering:
> "He didn't want to stay alone anymore."
Julian's hands shook as he read the report.
"They're looking for me. Whatever I escaped… it's looking for me."
---
They visited a spiritual medium—a woman in her sixties named Miriam, who lived above a candle shop.
Julian sat in front of her, silent, tense.
Miriam lit incense, closed her eyes, and placed a hand on his chest.
She recoiled instantly.
Her hands were burning.
Her voice cracked.
> "You're not tethered to life."
"You're tethered to something else."
Lena asked, voice trembling, "What does that mean?"
Miriam answered with a whisper:
> "If it takes him back… it might take you too."
---
Julian made a decision that night.
He wrote Lena a letter.
Packed a bag.
And disappeared.
Not because he didn't love her.
But because he did.
Because whatever had followed him out of death wasn't done with him.
And he would rather vanish than let it touch her again.
---
Lena woke to silence.
No footprints. No note by the bed.
Just the attic mirror, whole again.
And her reflection…
missing.
---
Author's Thought:
This chapter changes everything. Until now, Lena and Julian believed they had broken free. But some doors, once opened, never truly close. The mirror—once a symbol of connection—has become a portal. Julian's survival wasn't a rescue. It was a bargain. And someone—or something—is here to collect.
In Chapter Eleven, Lena must journey not into the house, but into the very veil between life and death to bring him back. If she dares.