Morning arrived in Coldridge like a reluctant guest slow, gray, and without warmth. Light seeped into the hallway in thin stripes, slipping between metal bars like timid fingers afraid to touch. Lila Harper sat on her cot, knees drawn to her chest, her mind still tangled in the shadows of her first night. Sleep had hovered above her like a ghost but never embraced her. Every distant shout, every echo of footsteps, every clang of doors had jolted her awake.
She felt as though she had been dropped into the belly of a steel beast. Each sound was a heartbeat, each breath of cold air a reminder that this place was alive in ways that made her skin crawl.
Mira stretched in her bunk above, the metal frame groaning like an old man rising from bed. "You look worse than you did last night," Mira muttered, brushing hair from her eyes.
"I didn't sleep," Lila whispered. Her voice cracked like dry paper.
"Welcome to day one," Mira said with a half-smirk one that wasn't cruel, just resigned. "You'll adjust. Or you'll break. Usually depends on who notices you first."
Lila swallowed hard, remembering the dark silhouette from yesterday the woman who carried danger like a cloak. Raven. Even the name felt like a shadow spreading its wings across her thoughts. She tried to push the memory aside, but Raven's stare lingered like smoke that refused to dissipate.
A loud buzz jolted the halls, and Mira stood. "Move. Breakfast is compulsory unless you want the guards dragging you."
Lila followed her into the corridor. Women poured out of their cells, each one shaped by a different kind of sorrow. Some walked with the swagger of wolves who had learned the rules of the hunt; others shuffled like ghosts who had long forgotten the taste of sunlight.
The cafeteria was a cavern of noise, voices colliding like waves crashing against jagged cliffs. The smell of stale bread and burnt coffee clung to the air, thick and unwelcome. Lila hesitated at the entrance, her body rigid with uncertainty.
She scanned the room, and her breath caught. Raven was already there, sitting alone at a corner table, her posture relaxed yet alert, like a panther resting before the next leap. No one dared sit near her. The empty space around her was a silent warning carved into the air.
And then Raven's eyes met hers.
Just for a second.
Enough to send a shiver racing down Lila's spine.
Raven's gaze was unreadable dark, steady, sharp enough to slice through nerves. Lila quickly looked away, cheeks burning. She felt like a moth that had flown too close to a flame. Something about that woman pulled at her curiosity, like gravity tugging at the moon, yet terrified her at the same time.
"Don't stare," Mira said under her breath. "Raven Cross isn't someone you look at too long unless she lets you."
"Who is she?" Lila whispered, almost afraid of hearing the answer.
Mira exhaled slowly, eyes flicking toward the corner. "Someone you don't want to anger. Someone who's survived things that would crush most of us. She's the sort of storm that doesn't warn you before it hits."
A chill trickled down Lila's spine.
Before she could ask more, a figure stepped in front of her, Vexa, the tall, sharp-featured woman from the Sable Gang. Her grin curved like a knife's edge. "Morning, sweetheart."
Lila froze.
Vexa tapped her tray against Lila's shoulder, tilting her head like a lion studying a trembling deer. "New girl should sit with us today. We like getting to know our visitors."
The gang behind her laughed softly, like hyenas preparing for the feast.
Mira muttered, "Ignore them. Keep walking."
But Lila couldn't move. Vexa's presence pressed on her like a thick fog, suffocating and heavy.
"What's wrong?" Vexa crooned. "Cat got your tongue? Or did you leave it with your lawyer?"
Heat rushed to Lila's cheeks as humiliation clawed up her throat. Before she could form a reply, Vexa stepped closer, her breath warm and foul against Lila's ear. "You don't belong here. And that makes you very… interesting."
Lila felt her pulse hammering fast, frantic, like a bird trapped under glass.
Then something shifted in the room.
Silence rippled through the cafeteria like a cold wind brushing across skin.
Vexa pulled back, her eyes darting over Lila's shoulder. Fear flickered there brief but unmistakable.
Lila turned.
Raven stood just a few steps away. Her presence was a blade sliding quietly from its sheath controlled, silent, but deadly. Her eyes locked onto Vexa with an expression colder than steel left in winter.
"What are you doing?" Raven asked, her voice low, unhurried, yet carrying the weight of a threat coiled tightly beneath the words.
Vexa lifted her chin, but her voice trembled. "Just welcoming the new girl."
Raven didn't blink. Didn't move. But the space around her seemed to constrict, as if the room itself were holding its breath.
"Walk away," Raven said. Not loud. Not angry. Simply certain.
Vexa stepped back. One step. Then another.
Her gang followed, heads down.
When they were gone, Raven looked at Lila. Her eyes softened just a fraction not gentleness, but something close to consideration.
"You need to learn where to walk," she said. "And who to avoid."
Lila managed a small nod. "Thank you."
Raven's gaze lingered, deep and unreadable, like a midnight sky that hid both stars and secrets.
"Don't thank me yet," Raven murmured. "This place is a chessboard, Harper. And you don't even know which piece you are."
She turned and walked away, her steps silent but powerful, leaving Lila rooted to the spot shaken, but strangely… safer than she had felt since entering Coldridge.
As Mira tugged at Lila's sleeve and led her to a table, Lila's thoughts swirled chaotically. She felt Raven's words settle in her chest like a prophecy.
This prison was a storm.
But somehow, in the center of it, stood a woman who walked through thunder as if it were mist.
And Lila wasn't sure if that terrified her
or fascinated her.