The air between them was razor-thin.
The file lay open on the rooftop, wind flipping the pages like fate had a cruel sense of humor.
Yan Xiyan didn't move. Neither did Qiao Zeyan.
"You've been following me," she said, voice calm. Too calm. Like the still before a sniper pulls the trigger.
"I should be the one saying that," Zeyan replied, eyes scanning her, not for beauty, not for flirtation this time, but for answers. Real ones.
"That man, who was he?" he nodded toward the Shadow, now gone like a ghost into the wind.
"You wouldn't believe me even if I told you."
"Try me." His voice wasn't angry. It was hurt. And somehow, that was worse.
She hesitated.
Her past clawed at her throat. The smell of gunpowder. The sound of bodies hitting dirt. Screams behind glass.
"His name doesn't matter," she said finally, closing the file and shoving it into her jacket. "What matters is you shouldn't have followed me up here."
"I didn't follow you," Zeyan said, stepping closer. "I ran here."
She blinked.
That wasn't part of the script.
He leaned in, not threatening, searching. "Who are you running from, Xiyan?"
For a moment, her lips trembled. The truth almost broke free.
Then she smiled, a slow, sly thing. "Maybe I'm running from the school's fashion police. Did you see Mrs. Wu's skirt today? That thing had more pleats than sense."
Zeyan blinked. Laughed despite himself. "You're dodging the question."
She shrugged. "You're dodging the answer."
He looked at her a second longer. "I'm not your enemy, you know."
"I know," she said. "But that doesn't mean you're my ally either."
Later in the Classroom.
"Where were you during free period?" Mei hissed at her as the teacher droned on about world politics.
Xiyan scribbled nonsense in her notebook. "Extra credit project. You know me. Overachiever."
"You lie too easily," Mei said, shaking her head. "You're gonna be one of those moms who tricks her kids into eating broccoli by calling it dinosaur food."
Xiyan snorted, caught off guard. "Only if I survive teenage drama first."
From across the classroom, Qiao Zeyan was watching her again.
But this time, his stare held something new, something dangerous. Not suspicion.
Curiosity.
Attraction.
And something deeper.
Later That Night at the Yan Estate, Training Hall
Grandpa Yan tossed her a combat knife.
She caught it without looking.
"You're off," he grunted.
"Too many distractions," she said, adjusting her grip.
"Then cut them loose."
She was silent.
Her mind wasn't on the blade. It was on Zeyan. On the Shadow's file. On the whisper of you killed his brother.
Could that be true?
Could Zeyan be the boy from the mission she buried deep, deep in her memory?
"Don't get soft, Xiyan," Grandpa Yan said, stepping into her range.
She swung.
He blocked.
Again.
Harder.
Faster.
She moved like fury wrapped in flesh. But behind every strike, her heart trembled.
She didn't know it yet but something had shifted.
The next mission wouldn't be just a test of skill.
It would be a test of loyalty. And love.