Candle wax dripped stalactite-like down silver holders. Ayla's needle trembled over the iris embroidery frame. The threads weren't silk—they shimmered like congealed moonlight and dried blood, phosphorescing blue at the slightest touch.
(The needle pricked her fingertip. Blood beaded not downward but crawled along threads like living things)
"Must we resort to medieval witchcraft?" Lucas leaned against carved chairback, prosthetic fingers worrying ceramic angel wing shards on his cuff. Candlelight cast gear-shaped shadows across his face. "Odile's surveillance feeds cover this room."
Ayla ignored him. The second stitch pierced satin, and the entire embroidery convulsed. Threads squirmed like scorched snakes, blood spreading warp-and-weft to form Morse code along petal edges—"Forgive me" from the cemetery roses. Lucas' breathing hitched, cerulean steam from his spinal vents blackening wicks.
"Stop." He seized her wrist, palm heat melting threads. "This thing's reading your bioelectricity."
The third stitch plunged anyway. Blood misted the fabric, threads autonomously weaving dungeon bars. Ayla's earlobe throbbed—Lucas' prosthetic grip on her sakura-pendant earring threatened to embed metal in flesh.
"Playing savior?" His lubricant-stained thumb smeared her bloody fingertip. "You think needlework can undo what Odile couldn't..."
The kiss stole his words. Ayla froze—Lucas licking blood from her finger, lashes grazing her wrist pulse. Threads erupted mid-air, weaving twenty-year-old Odile: chained to dungeon walls amidst shredded love letters, Eric's watch gears carved everywhere.
(The frame splintered. Threads lashed Lucas' prosthetic wrist, branding inverse irises)
Hologram-Odile turned bisected pupils: "Finally see? My dears...emotional bonds make perfect curse vessels."
Lucas shredded neck threads, cerulean blood snaking under his collar. Shirt torn open, old wounds oozed thread-matched fluorescence: "Happy now? You woke the memory worms in my spine."
Ayla grabbed frame shards. The iris heart revealed a face both strange and familiar—Eric twenty years prior, still human-warm, decades younger than his waxwork present self.
"I'll be your blade." Lucas snapped off his prosthetic pinkie, stabbing the ceramic shard into embroidered Eric. "But first, learn to pierce truth's throat."
Candles exploded cerulean flames, devouring the embroidery. Ash swirled into Odile's wedding ring hologram—inner band engraved with Lucas' mechanical heart ID matching his birthdate. Outside, a music box rewound into Odile's confinement requiem variation.