Cold morning light filtered through the cracked blinds of her bedroom. Dust motes hung suspended in the chilly air, frozen like tiny, dead stars. Zora sat on the edge of her mattress, staring at her bare feet. Her toes were cold. Every joint in her twelve-year-old body held a stiffness that belonged to a much older soul. Six times before this year, her heart had stopped beating. Sometimes it was quick, a sudden flash of steel or a heavy impact. Other times, it was agonizingly slow, her lungs filling with fluid or smoke. Each resurrection left her a little more detached, a little more brutal. She stood up, her floorboards groaning beneath her light weight. Shoving her arms into a faded black hoodie, she headed down the stairs. Cold milk splashed against the ceramic bowl. Spoons clinked in the quiet kitchen. Zora stared at the soggy cornflakes, her stomach twisting into a tight, hard knot. "Eat up, sweetie," her mother said from the stove, her eyes glued to her phone screen. Her voice sounded hollow, like she was speaking through a thick pane of glass. Everything felt distant these days. Seven times she had died before this year. Or was it eight? Memory was a slippery thing when it kept getting wiped by the cold embrace of resurrection. Each time she came back, she felt less like Zora and more like a weapon waiting to be drawn. Chewing tasted like cardboard. She forced the food down her throat, feeling a phantom burn in her chest. That particular ache belonged to her fifth death, when smoke had filled her lungs. "I'm going," Zora muttered, pushing her chair back with a harsh scrape. Her mother didn't even look up to say goodbye. Nobody ever really looked at her. Perhaps they sensed the rot inside her. Or maybe they just saw a quiet twelve-year-old girl with dark eyes and too many scars. --- Damp air clung to her skin as she stepped outside. Grey clouds hung low over the neighborhood, threatening a downpour that refused to fall. Zora kept her hands shoved deep into her hoodie pockets, her fingers curled into tight, defensive fists. Her knuckles bore thin white scars. Some were from schoolyard fights she had initiated just to feel alive. Others were leftovers from violent ends she wasn't supposed to remember. Walking into the school building felt like stepping into a cage. Rowdy teenagers shoved past her in the narrow hallways, their loud laughter grating on her raw nerves. Inside the biology classroom, the air smelled of formaldehyde and cheap floor wax. People in her neighborhood usually avoided her, turning their gazes away whenever she passed. They couldn't possibly know about her deaths, but instincts were powerful things. They felt the wrongness radiating from her, the chill that clung to her like winter frost. Students gossiped about trivial things, their voices a chaotic blend of teenage drama and laughter. Zora slipped into her back-row seat, trying to blend into the shadows. Mr. Harrison stood by his desk, a strange, tarnished bronze container resting on the wooden surface. It looked incredibly old, covered in intricate, swirling patterns that seemed to vibrate if she stared too long. No one else seemed to notice the quiet hum vibrating from the metal. Marcus was joking with some friends, tossing a crumpled piece of paper back and forth. Everything seemed so mind-numbingly normal before the latch clicked. "Today, class, we are looking at cellular degradation," Mr. Harrison announced, his voice unusually strained. He tapped the metallic box with a trembling finger. "But first, a local university lent us this artifact for a brief demonstration on historical preservation." Whispers rippled through the room. Zora leaned forward, her heart hammering against her ribs. Metal shouldn't hum, but this did. It was a low, vibrating frequency that made her molars ache. "Is it locked?" a boy named Marcus asked, leaning over his desk to get a closer look. "It shouldn't be," Mr. Harrison murmured. His fingers shook as he reached for the latch. With a sharp click, the lid popped open. Nothing came out. Yet, the air instantly turned freezing cold. A heavy, suffocating pressure settled over the classroom. Suddenly, Marcus screamed. It wasn't a scream of fear. Pure, unadulterated rage twisted his features as he turned and slammed his fist directly into the face of the girl sitting next to him. Blood splattered across the biology lab table. Chaos erupted in a split second. Girls began tearing at each other's hair, shrieking like wild animals. Boys threw heavy chairs, glass beakers shattering against the cinderblock walls. Mr. Harrison fell to the floor, clawing at his own throat, his eyes rolled back in his head. Infectious madness gripped the room. Zora felt a hot surge of adrenaline spike through her veins. Her vision narrowed, turning a sharp, dangerous crimson at the edges. A girl lunged at her, fingers clawed like talons. Without thinking, Zora grabbed the girl's wrist, twisting it until a sickening pop echoed through the noise. She kicked another boy in the kneecap, watching him collapse with a satisfying crunch. Brutality was easy. It was the only thing that felt real anymore. She dodged a flying textbook, her movements fluid and terrifyingly fast. Every instinct screamed at her to rip, tear, and destroy. This was the darkness she kept hidden inside, the rot that grew stronger with every resurrection. Marcus grabbed a broken piece of glass, lunging toward Zora with wild eyes. She sidestepped his clumsy attack with effortless grace, her senses hyper-attuned to every shift in the room. With a swift strike, her elbow connected with his jaw. He went down hard, sliding across the blood-slicked floor tiles. Around her, the classroom had dissolved into a miniature warzone. No one was spared from the sudden, inexplicable bloodlust. Students who had been best friends moments ago were now throttling each other with homicidal intent. Screams echoed down the hallway as the madness spread outside the classroom. Somehow, amid the screaming and the blood, the bronze box sat open on the teacher's desk, completely empty. Zora backed out of the room, her hands covered in someone else's blood. Nobody tried to stop her. Everyone was too busy tearing each other apart. --- Rain finally began to fall, washing the red stains from her knuckles as she walked. She didn't go home. Home felt like a graveyard. Instead, she wandered toward the busy transit hub near the edge of town. Her breath came in ragged gasps. Water droplets clung to her eyelashes, blurring her vision of the grey streets. She walked past shop windows, her reflection appearing fractured in the wet glass. Each step felt heavier than the last, her muscles screaming with exhaustion from the sudden burst of violence. Violence always left a bitter taste in her mouth, yet it was the only thing that felt completely genuine. A sharp, agonizing pain flared in her left lung, so intense she nearly doubled over. It was the exact spot where a bullet had torn through her in her seventh life. She remembered the feeling of drowning in her own blood, the cold concrete beneath her cheek. "Why now?" she whispered, clutching her side. Pain of this magnitude always preceded something terrible. Stumbling down the wet pavement, she tried to steady her breathing. Every inhalation felt like swallowing ground glass. Memories of her seventh death clawed at the edges of her mind. She had been cornered in a dark alley, a man with a scarred face holding a gun to her chest. He had whispered something she couldn't remember before pulling the trigger. Resurrection had brought her back, but it had left her with a permanent crack in her soul. Now, that old wound was burning like a hot coal. Standing at the curb of the busy intersection, she watched the midday traffic splash through the puddles. An elderly man stood a few feet away, wrapped in a thick trench coat, staring blankly at the street. Tires screeched. A massive city bus lost traction on the slick asphalt, veering wildly out of control. It swerved directly toward the sidewalk where they stood. Time slowed to a crawl. Zora's heart gave one massive, thudding beat. Supernatural speed took over her limbs, a power she didn't fully understand but knew was paid for in blood. She lunged forward. With a heavy shove, she launched the stranger across the concrete, sending him rolling into a patch of wet grass. Metal screeched as the bus roared past, missing her by mere inches before slamming into a light pole with a deafening crunch. Gas fumes filled the air. Zora fell to her knees, her chest heaving as the memory of her seventh death flashed behind her eyes—the burning of her lungs, the desperate gasp for air that never came. Death was here. It was always following her, snapping at her heels like a hungry shadow. Sirens began to wail in the distance, a familiar, mocking soundtrack to her chaotic existence. She forced herself to stand, her legs shaking. Groaning on the wet grass, the stranger she had pushed tried to sit up, his sleeve torn open to his elbow. As the siren wails in the distance, Zora notices a faint, shimmering glyph branded onto the stranger's arm - the same one she saw on the man who killed her in her 'seventh' life.

Chapter 1: The Eighth Death