Dorm 13 Is Already Watching

The scratching started soft.

Like nails on the underside of my mattress.

Slow. Deliberate.

Then it got louder.

*Scritch… scritch… scritch.*

I froze mid-step, heart slamming so hard it felt like it was trying to claw its way out of my chest.

Sera was already on her feet, feathers bristling at her collar like a pissed-off cat. “Not tonight,” she hissed. “I just did my nails.”

Eli pressed both palms to the wall, eyes wide behind his glasses. “It’s not the walls this time. It’s… under the bed. And it knows your name.”

The mirror across the room flickered again. Mira’s face flashed—pale, terrified, mouth forming words I couldn’t hear. She pointed harder at the floor.

I dropped to my knees before I could think. The black silk sheets smelled like dust and old blood. I yanked the bed skirt up.

Nothing but darkness.

Then two glowing red eyes blinked open right under where my pillow had been.

A hand shot out—gray skin, too many fingers, nails like broken glass. It grabbed my wrist.

Cold. So cold it burned.

“Liora…” it whispered in Mira’s voice. “Don’t let them take your blood. Don’t—”

I screamed and jerked back. The thing’s grip was iron. My ankle from earlier throbbed in sync, like it was calling to whatever this was.

Sera’s feathers exploded into blades. One sliced down, severing the wrist with a wet crunch. Black ichor sprayed across the floor.

The hand let go. It twitched once, then melted into shadow, leaving only a smear that spelled my name in dripping letters.

Eli was hyperventilating. “The Entity… it’s testing you. Dorm 13 isn’t a room. It’s a mouth.”

I scrambled up, breathing hard. My wrist had five perfect puncture marks that were already turning silver. Echo Blood. It was reacting.

The lights in the room dimmed to a sick purple glow. The scratching didn’t stop. It moved now—circling under all four beds, under the floorboards, under my skin.

Sera wiped ichor off her blade with a silk handkerchief like this was Tuesday. “Rule number one of Wing 13: never look under the bed on your first night. You just broke it, newbie.”

I laughed, but it came out shaky. “Yeah? Well rule number two should be ‘don’t room with the girl who’s apparently Satan’s favorite snack.’”

Eli slid down the wall, muttering to the ghosts only he could hear. “They say she’s the key. They say Kael already marked her. They say—”

The door banged open.

Kael Voss stood there, uniform jacket unbuttoned, silver eyes blazing. Shadows poured off him like smoke from a wildfire.

His gaze locked on the silver marks on my wrist. Then on the ichor on the floor. Then on me.

“You bled again,” he growled. Not a question. A accusation. Like I’d done it on purpose just to piss him off.

I lifted my chin even though my legs were jelly. “Congrats, detective. Want a medal or are you here to finish what the thing under the bed started?”

He crossed the room in three strides. The air got thicker, heavier, like the whole dorm was holding its breath. He grabbed my wrist—not gently—and ran his thumb over the punctures.

Heat exploded up my arm. Not pain. Something darker. Something that made my stomach flip and my breath catch.

“Mine,” he muttered, so low I almost missed it. “They don’t get to mark you first.”

Sera whistled. “Possessive much? Down, boy. She’s not your chew toy yet.”

Kael didn’t look away from me. “Get out. Both of you. Now.”

Eli squeaked and bolted. Sera rolled her eyes but followed, pausing at the door. “Don’t die, scholarship girl. I kind of like your attitude.”

The door clicked shut.

We were alone.

Kael’s shadows coiled around us, blocking the mirror, silencing the scratching for one blessed second.

“You shouldn’t be in here,” I said, voice breathier than I wanted. “Professor Nyx said—”

“I don’t care what Nyx said.” He backed me against the wall, one hand braced beside my head. The other still held my wrist like a lifeline. Or a chain. “The Entity wants you. The Headmaster wants you. Even the damn walls want you.”

His silver eyes dropped to my mouth for half a heartbeat. “But they’re going to have to go through me.”

My pulse roared in my ears. “And what do *you* want, Voss?”

He leaned in until his forehead almost touched mine. Cedar and grave-rain and pure danger. “I want to watch you burn this place down. Then I want to keep the ashes.”

The scratching exploded back to life—louder, right beneath our feet. The floorboards cracked.

Kael’s shadows surged, but something huge slammed against the underside of the wood. The entire room shook.

Mira’s face reappeared in the mirror, clearer now. She was crying.

*“He’s lying, Liora. He’s the cage.”*

Kael’s head snapped toward the mirror. His grip tightened.

The floor gave way with a scream of splintering wood.

A massive black maw opened beneath us—rows of teeth made of broken mirrors and student bones.

And it was rising.

Straight for me.

Kael shoved me behind him, shadows whipping into blades. “Run, little echo!”

But the maw was faster.

It swallowed the floor whole.