Some stories don't end when the body burns.
They linger — in ink, in guilt, in the eyes of those who spoke the lie first and hardest.
The smell of books and rain lingered in the air, a quiet perfume of the forgotten.
Jalen Thorn wiped the mist from the inside of the display window at Ash & Bramble Books, watching the city pulse behind the glass. Rain fell in slow, melancholic sheets, turning the pavement into mirrors that twisted passing umbrellas into specters of color.
Somewhere in the back, a kettle whistled. Someone laughed on the sidewalk — that jarring, effortless sound of people who didn't know what it meant to fall.
Jalen stiffened.
He never laughed like that anymore.
"Jay, you okay out there?" called Marcie from behind the register.
"Yeah," he said, voice low. "Just... zoning out."
He turned back to the donation bin, knelt beside it, and pulled out a hardcover that made his fingers go cold.
Crimson Winter.
Edric Vale's debut novel.
His novel.
He stared at the cover, at the title swirling in silver ink across a field of snow and blood. The anniversary edition — the one his publisher had insisted on releasing just months before it all fell apart.
Before the accusations.
Before the fire.
Before the name "Edric Vale" became synonymous with betrayal and scandal.
Jalen's breath hitched. He ran his thumb along the spine, half-expecting it to bite him. But instead, it opened — and there it was.
"To Liora. Every word I write is yours. —E."
His stomach turned.
It was like touching a ghost.
His ghost.
Because Edric Vale had died. Publicly. Burned in the very house that once protected his stories. Police said it was suicide. That the shame broke him. That guilt ignites easier than gasoline.
The world mourned for exactly one week.
Then they moved on.
Only... he hadn't died. Not exactly.
When the fire claimed his body, something had refused to go quietly. Maybe it was pride. Or regret. Or unfinished stories. But when he opened his eyes again, he wasn't Edric anymore.
He was Jalen Thorn — born in a hospital six towns away, raised by a woman who died before he turned seventeen. No siblings. No roots. No past.
Except for the one he couldn't forget.
He took the book upstairs after closing. His apartment above the shop was small — one room, two windows, a creaking bed, and stacks of notebooks filling every drawer.
He placed the novel on his desk and stared at it as if it might speak.
"To Liora."
The name curled in his mind like smoke. He hadn't spoken it aloud in three years. Not since she stood in front of the press — eyes tearful, voice trembling — and told the world what a monster Edric Vale really was.
He stole other writers' drafts. Used me. Abused his power. Lied about everything.
She'd looked so convincing.
The worst part? She used his own gift against him — words.
Words had always been his sword, his shield, his compass. But in her mouth, they became poison.
And everyone believed her.
Friends. Readers. His editor. His agent. The very people who once toasted champagne to his brilliance didn't even ask for an explanation.
He was erased in a week.
Not even Liora came to the funeral. Of course, why would she? She gave the eulogy from a television studio. Wore black. Cried. Sold a million copies of Petals Beneath Ash, her first novel — and most of it taken from his abandoned drafts.
The betrayal had a rhythm now. Like a heartbeat.
He opened his notebook. Blank page.
But the words came anyway.
"The dead do not rest when the truth is unspoken.
The lie becomes their shroud.
And the body is buried beneath someone else's story."
He paused. Scribbled faster.
"But the fire that burns the name cannot reach the soul.
The soul remembers.
And one day, so will the world."
That night, sleep came in fragments.
In one dream, he stood in the ruins of his old study — the smell of charred wood and lavender thick in the air. Manuscripts turned to ash at his feet. Liora stood in the corner, her back to him, reading from a burning page.
She turned.
Her smile was lined with flame.
"You should've thanked me," she whispered. "Now the world knows your story."
He screamed.
But only paper came out of his mouth.
Jalen woke just before dawn, drenched in sweat, heart pounding. The rain had stopped, but thunder still murmured across the sky like a conversation that wouldn't end.
He stumbled to his desk.
And found the book open.
Not where he left it.
A page near the end, marked with a torn slip of newspaper.
He froze.
There was no way the wind had done this.
The slip was an obituary — clipped cleanly, pressed between pages.
VALE, EDRIC (36)
Celebrated novelist and poet, remembered for his emotionally raw style and tragic legacy. Died in a fire believed to be self-inflicted after multiple allegations surfaced last year. Survived by no immediate family. His ashes were scattered at the cliffside estate in Eiren's Hollow.
Jalen sat down slowly. The back of his neck prickled.
The book whispered beneath his fingers.
Not words. Just... presence.
He spent the next few days moving like a man made of fog.
Customers came and went. Marcie chatted endlessly. The city bloomed with the early signs of spring — crocuses, the slow greening of branches. But Jalen felt disconnected, like he was watching a stage play and couldn't remember his lines.
At night, he wrote.
Not for money. Not for readers.
For himself.
For Edric.
The stories poured out of him. A tale about a man who wakes in another life, haunted by a truth only he remembers. Another about a poet who fakes his death to escape a lie too heavy to carry. They weren't subtle. But he didn't care.
He submitted one anonymously to a quiet little e-journal called The Wren's Quill.
They published it in two days.
The editor's email read:
"Your story struck something deep. This reminded me of Edric Vale — the real one, before everything fell apart."
Jalen stared at the screen for a long time.
Someone remembered.
He clicked on the article. There were already comments.
"This felt like Edric Vale rose from the grave."
"Beautiful. Painful. Familiar."
"Does anyone know who the author is?"
Jalen sat back. Heart racing.
The fire hadn't taken everything.
His voice was still alive.
And maybe — just maybe — it was time the world heard him again.
But first… he had to see her.
Liora.
He looked up her name that night. She was on a book tour. Speaking at Strathmoor Library in four days — just two towns over.
His breath caught.
He wasn't ready. He wasn't prepared.
But the words in his chest wouldn't wait anymore.
🌑 To Be Continued…