Chapter 3: Chapter 3

IRIS

My gaze met his, and at that moment, I felt myself return to reality. The sounds around me came rushing back.

I was sure he was the most beautiful man I had ever seen. But I was also sure he must have noticed me watching, judging by the smirk on his face.

“I’m Avery,” he said with a smile. “You don’t have to be afraid of us. We came to help you, Iris,” he added calmly.

~How does he know my name? I don’t remember introducing myself.~

“He knows your name because you’re one of us,” continued the red-haired girl.

“What? How do you know what I was thinking about?!” I replied in shock.

“Iris… you’re one of us… we have some special ~gifts~ just like you. Let me show you,” Avery explained.

I looked into his eyes and tried to figure out what he was trying to tell me. Then I watched him create a small purple cloud with his hands that was a reflection of my face.

Out of instinct, I flinched away, startled by the sudden change and what I saw before me. The cloud that looked like me was smiling and seemed happy.

With one movement, it vanished. I watched his expression and studied his eyes.

He had the same purple glow that I had seen in Grandfather’s eyes.

“It’s okay, darling. You can trust me, we won’t hurt you,” he said quietly as he held out his hand to me.

Although I was still in doubt, I reached out my hand toward his. As if a stronger power took possession of my body, I felt no fear in giving it to him.

No doubt, just the pull of something deeper, an intuition I couldn’t ignore.

As our hands touched, I felt like a breeze was passing over my body. His fingers brushed over my skin, leaving a trail of tickles as if a thousand butterfly wings were brushing against me at once.

Each touch was electric yet tender, a play between tension and devotion. I felt the warmth of his palms spreading through me like a gentle bonfire, sinking deep into my muscles and releasing every knot of tension.

It was as if he was wrapping me in a protective bubble—all my burdens and fears melted into nothing.

At that moment, there was only him, his breath, the comforting weight of his body at my side, and this overwhelming feeling of… home.

His closeness was more than just comfort. It was as if I had spent my whole life searching for that one touch without realizing it.

“Really? He came and just said a sentence and she lowered her shield?! While we tried not to be creepy and not to scare her… Girl, what the hell?” the black-haired girl said with a laugh.

“This is my sister Ava. She’s a little weird and loud, but don’t worry, she’s here to protect you,” Avery explained.

“And this is Noah and Jade.” He pointed to the blonde guy and the red-haired girl, who were holding hands while smiling kindly at me.

Avery was still holding my hand while I got up from the floor and introduced myself. But apparently, they already knew who I was.

At least Ava interrupted me after my “I’m Iris,” continuing to list all the details about me, from my date of birth and on.

“Ava, shut up!” Avery said, rubbing his forehead.

“Sorry, Iris, she is just excited. But we don’t have time for this now. The people who are after you are very dangerous and we have to go to a safe place right away. Jade, can you—” But Avery was cut off mid-sentence by Noah.

“They’ve arrived,” Noah exclaimed.

I could hear the strain in his voice. It wasn’t fear, it was a lot more than that.

With a huge slam of the warehouse door, the same three men who were in my home stood in front of us.

I screamed, terrified, while I held Avery’s hand even tighter, staring into the eyes of the monster that killed my dearest.

Avery stood protectively in front of me. His body covered me as he shoved me behind him.

“Jade, open the portal immediately,” he shouted.

While Jade whispered some strange words, she raised her hands and a strange yellow glow embraced her.

“Do you think you can take her away or hide her from ~us~? Don’t be ridiculous! The energy she released was so easy to follow. This is like a reward after all the years of searching,” the man I saw in my dreams shouted angrily and awakened unimaginable fear in me.

I finally had a chance to look at my attackers. The darkness that was around them seemed evil.

All three looked fearless as they stood tall and strong, watching us. Their faces were emotionless; they seemed youthful, but their eyes looked as if they had seen the worst things for decades.

One of them had a huge scar on his face, making him even scarier. All three had dark hair that fit perfectly with their outfits.

Like three evil knights—strong and powerful—they looked at me like prey.

Noah was standing right next to us, protecting me and Jade. Ava was standing in a fighting position, a purple glow around her body.

“Get out of the way or we’ll have to kill you all,” their leader threatened, looking at my protectors.

“Then so be it,” Avery told him.

With an evil smile, my nightmare looked at the other two men who came with him and nodded.

“Then let it be so,” he repeated with an evil smile.

The black fog began to rise from the floor and surrounded our attackers, which made them look even more terrible.

Their eyes were completely black, and their already huge bodies seemed even bigger.

“Avery, let’s go,” Jade shouted.

“We can’t fight them, we have to get her to safety,” she said.

I looked in her direction and saw a huge shimmering circle of rainbow colors surrounded by yellow mist.

The huge circle of shimmering light hung in the air around her, as though the sun had burst into a thousand rainbows.

Every color pulsated with life: purple that dripped like liquid amethyst, turquoise that lambented in neon waves, and red that ate through the other colors like glowing coal.

But the strangest thing was the yellow mist that enveloped the entire circle—not an ordinary mist, but something breathing, almost animalistic.

It crept around the colors in pale waves, as if it were guarding them. Sometimes it thickened into unformed outlines that immediately dissipated again.

It shivered like a thin layer separating our world from… something else.

The air smelled like burning sugar and ozone, and every time the circle turned, I felt the hairs on the back of my neck stand up.

“She’s got a point, we can’t risk it,” Noah yelled.

“OK, let’s go,” Avery sighed.

He wanted us to retreat toward the circle, but the black fog started toward us at great speed.

Avery was surrounded by his purple glow and raised his hand in an apparent attempt to stop the black mist from reaching us.

But as if he didn’t have enough power, he was surrounded by blackness and fell to his knees. Ava tried to help her brother, but the fog wrapped around her body and she froze with a painful scream.

“Avery…Ava!” Jade screamed in horror.

Noah pulled me back, hoping to help keep the fog from getting to me.

~You can help them~, the voice in my head said. ~You just have to order it…Iris!…Order it! Say what you want me to do. Say it!~

~

The same voice that I’d heard since I was a child spoke again in my head. I watched Avery and Ava lose their fight against the Mist.

“Stop it, you’ll kill them. Stop…Stop them!” I screamed. “Stop the fog!”

That was all it took…a single moment—and suddenly, I felt it. Power surged through me, raw and limitless, like a storm contained within flesh.

The energy around me thickened, humming against my skin, as if the air itself had become charged with something ancient, something alive.

Then, without thought or command, the crimson glow around me moved—streaking toward the black mist like a sentient wildfire. It crashed between the darkness and my protectors, forming a towering wall of searing, scarlet light.

The barrier pulsated, alive with embers and veins of deeper ruby, holding back the void like a blade against a throat. Avery and Ava gasped in unison, their breath snatched back as the mist recoiled.

The air turned sharp, metallic…stolen.

And when their wide, disbelieving eyes locked onto mine, I saw ~it…~fear. Not of the darkness. Of ~me~.

“How is that possible!” shouted the man with the scar.

“Hurry up, this is our chance,” Noah yelled.

And that was enough to call them back to reality.

Noah and Jade moved first, a synchronized leap into the swirling maw of the portal, their silhouettes swallowed by the kaleidoscope of shimmering hues. Ava hesitated only a heartbeat, her eyes locking onto mine with unspoken urgency, before she too vanished into the radiant abyss.

Avery’s hand clamped around my wrist, his grip iron-tight. “Now!” he hissed, and then we were airborne, hurling ourselves forward as the air behind us erupted with the snarls of our pursuers.

A blade grazed the space where my shoulder had been a second earlier, its edge sinking with lethal intent…but too late. The portal embraced us like a living thing.

I felt it shift, the rainbow vortex collapsing inward as we passed through, its luminescent tendrils licking at my skin like static-charged water.

For a breathless moment, there was nothing but chaos: fractured visions of distant skies, fragmented landscapes, the scent of ocean and something sweet, like crushed juniper.

Then…Silence.

The gateway sealed behind us with a sound like a sigh, cutting off the snarls of our attackers mid-roar. The remains of its glow faded, leaving us in strange, suffocating darkness.

My pulse hammered in my throat. These strangers—Noah with his calculating stare, Jade’s quiet ferocity, Ava’s reckless loyalty, and Avery’s bravery—had just risked everything to pull me from the jaws of death.

The same death that had taken grandma’s laughter, grandpa’s stories…~everything~.

I didn’t know them. But the enemy of my enemy…

Avery exhaled sharply beside me.

Where the hell were we?

The question hung, unanswered.

Around us, shadows pooled thicker, alive with something worse than absence. Something was waiting.

And then a whisper. Not from any of us.

From the evil man we had fled from: “You can’t hide anymore.”