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But then something flickers at the edge of my memory. Not a clear recollection, just a fragment. Like trying to remember a dream that's already fading.

I'm small. Maybe five or six years old, running through the hallways of the Rostova estate, my footsteps echoing on the marble floors.

Someone is shouting. A man's voice, urgent and frightened.

Hands grab my shoulders, rough and desperate. I look up and see a face I can't quite remember. My father's cousin, maybe? One of the family members who used to visit when I was young? His face is pale, his eyes wide with terror.

"Close your eyes," he tells me frantically, his fingers digging into my shoulders hard enough to hurt. "Don't look. Whatever you do, don't look."

But I'm a child and children never listen when they're told not to look. Just before everything goes dark, just before someone covers my eyes with their hand, I catch a glimpse of something on the wall.

That symbol. The same one painted on my father's vehicle.

The memory vanishes as quickly as it came, leaving me with nothing but a pounding heart and the certainty that whatever I saw that day was buried deep in my memories. No one ever talked about it. The incident was buried and forgotten.

"Ana?" Samuil's voice pulls me back to the present. "Do you recognize it?"

"I think so." My voice sounds distant even to my own ears. "I think I've seen it before. When I was very young. But I can't remember the details. Just fragments."

"What kind of fragments?"

"Someone telling me not to look at something. Being frightened. That symbol on a wall somewhere in the estate." I hand the photograph back to him, my hand trembling slightly. "Whatever it was, no one ever explained it to me. I don't even know if the memory is real or if I'm imagining things."

Samuil studies me for a long moment, his expression unreadable. "If you remember anything else, tell me immediately."

"I will."

He turns to leave but pauses in the doorway. "About this morning. I was out of line. You have every right to make changes to the estate. It's your home now too."

The apology surprises me, but it also humbles me. I should have been the one to apologize, not him.

"I should have asked you first," I admit quietly.

"We'll figure it out." He offers something that might almost be a smile.

Then he's gone, leaving me alone with the photograph and the fragmented memory I can't quite piece together.

That night, I lie in bed staring at the ceiling, unable to sleep. My mind keeps returning to that symbol. To the frightened voice telling me to close my eyes and the certainty that something terrible happened that day, something I was too young to understand.

The bedroom is dark except for moonlight filtering through the curtains, casting strange shadows across the walls. Every creak of the house settling makes me jump. I finally drift off sometime after midnight, exhausted from the emotional weight of the day.

The nightmare comes without warning.

I'm a child again, running through dark hallways. But this time, I'm not in the Rostova estate. I'm somewhere else. Somewhere cold and ancient, with stone walls and flickering torchlight.

The air is damp and heavy, smelling of earth and decay. The stones beneath my bare feet are rough and freezing cold. The torches cast dancing shadows that seem alive, reaching for me with dark fingers.

Screaming echoes through the corridors. Not my screams. Someone else's, multiple voices raised in terror and agony. The sounds bounce off the stone walls, amplifying and distorting until I can't tell where they're coming from.

I run faster, my small legs pumping, my heart pounding with fear. I don't understand what's going on. My breath comes in short gasps that fog in the cold air.

Then I see the symbol painted on a cold stone wall. Not in red paint this time.

In blood.

Fresh blood that drips slowly down the ancient stone, pooling on the floor beneath it. The metallic smell fills my nostrils, making me gag. The blood is still warm and wet, dripping with a steady rhythm that sounds impossibly loud in the echoing corridor.

The screaming grows louder and closer. I try to run but my feet won't move. I'm frozen in place, forced to watch as the blood continues to drip and spread across the ancient stones.