The moment my phone rang in the Beaumont guest house, everything stopped. Arthur had barely finished speaking when I answered.
"Hello?"
There was a pause.
"You need to come to the hospital now."
That was it. That was all it took to make me feel nauseous.
Adrien grabbed his jacket before I even finished the call.
"What happened?"
"It's Dmitri," I said quickly. "They said we need to come now."
Arthur was already standing. Madame Genevieve stepped forward.
"You should go," she said quietly.
We didn't waste another second.
We got to the hospital too fast and not fast enough at the same time.
Adrien pushed through the glass doors first. I followed right behind him, half running, half stumbling because my legs felt wrong as if they belonged to someone else.
The nurse at the desk looked up.
"Family?" she asked.
"Yes," Adrien said immediately. "Dmitri Volkov."
She nodded and picked up the phone. Those few seconds felt longer than the drive over.
I kept staring at the floor tiles. White squares. Gray lines between them. If I looked anywhere else I knew I'd start imagining the worst.
A door opened. The doctor stepped out. We both stood.
"Is he—" I started.
The doctor lifted a hand gently.
"His condition has changed."
My stomach dropped. Adrien stiffened beside me.
"Changed how?" he asked.
The doctor glanced at the chart in his hand.
"The swelling in his spinal cord has gone down. That's a good sign."
Okay. A good sign. The words floated in the air for a moment.
"And?" Adrien said quietly.
The doctor nodded.
"But he hasn't regained consciousness."
The hallway felt colder.
"We took him out of the medically induced coma early this morning," the doctor continued. "However… his body hasn't responded the way we hoped."
I swallowed.
"What does that mean?"
"It means he's now in a natural coma."
The words hit harder than I expected. Natural. Like it was something normal. Something that just happened.
"We can't predict when—or if—he'll wake up," the doctor said carefully. "It could be days. Weeks. Sometimes longer."
Silence stretched between us. Machines beeped faintly somewhere down the corridor.
"So he survived surgery," Adrien said slowly. "He survived the night. The swelling went down…"
The doctor nodded.
"Correct."
"And now he's just… asleep."
The doctor didn't answer that. Because there wasn't a better word for it. I stared at the wall behind him.
He survived a bullet. He survived losing blood. He survived everything that should have killed him. And now he just… refused to wake up. My throat tightened.
"Can we see him?" I asked.
"Yes but only for a few minutes," the doctor replied.
The ICU room looked the same. But somehow it felt worse. Dmitri lay in the bed, completely still. His chest rose slowly under the blanket.
I stepped closer. My hands felt useless hanging at my sides.
A few days back, there had been blood everywhere. Now everything looked clean like nothing had happened. Except he wasn't awake.
Adrien stayed near the door. For a long time, I didn't say anything. I just looked at him. The bruises on his jaw. The faint cut above his eyebrow.
His hair was pushed back, exposing the pale line of stitches near his neck.
He looked… younger. Not like the terrifying guy everyone at St. Aurelia avoided.
Just a person. Just Dmitri.
My chest tightened.
"You're unbelievable," I muttered softly.
"You take a bullet and then decide to sleep through the consequences."
The machine kept breathing for him. I rubbed my eyes.
"You told me not to come to St. Aurelia," I said quietly.
"You said I should stay invisible."
I laughed under my breath.
"That worked out great, didn't it?"
The silence in the room pressed down harder.
I reached out and then stopped halfway. My hand hovered above his arm. Then I pulled it back.
Coward.
"Adrien knows," my voice came out shaking. That felt strange to say out loud.
"He knows we're twins."
Adrien shifted slightly near the door but didn't interrupt.
"I didn't know how to tell him at first," I continued. "Still don't."
"You'd probably make some sarcastic comment about it."
I waited for movement from him but I got nothing. Of course. Because he was unconscious. I felt stupid talking to someone who couldn't hear me. But I kept talking anyway.
"Wake up," I whispered. "Please wake up… because I really don't feel like dealing with all of this alone."
I didn't remember leaving the room or sitting down in the hallway. Adrien handed me a cup of coffee at some point.
It was cold. I drank it anyway.
"Go home," he said after a while.
I shook my head.
"You go."
"I'm not leaving you here all night again."
"I'm not leaving."
Adrien sighed. Neither of us moved. At some point, the sky outside the windows turned gray.
Morning came. The police station looked smaller than I expected.
They made us wait twenty minutes before letting me in. Adrien stayed in the hallway.
"I'll be right here," he said.
I nodded. A guard opened the door.
"Five minutes."
Viktor Volkov sat on the other side of the glass. For the first time since I'd met him, he looked old. And tired.
His hands rested on the metal table. He looked up when I entered. For a moment neither of us spoke.
"You came," he said finally. His voice sounded rough.
"I had questions."
He nodded slowly.
"That's fair."
I sat down across from him. The silence stretched. Then I said the first thing that came to mind.
"He saved me."
Viktor's jaw tightened.
"Yes."
"They removed the sedation," I said. "The swelling in his back has gone down, but he still hasn't woken up. The doctors say his body isn't responding."
Viktor's eyes flickered.
"He's stubborn," he murmured. "Nothing like me."
We sat there for a moment.
"You built this," I said eventually. "All of it. The violence. The enemies. The mess."
"And now your son is lying in a hospital bed because of it."
His hands curled slightly.
"I know."
I leaned forward.
"Are you happy now?"
His head dropped. Finally, Viktor Volkov looked like a man who had lost everything.
"No," he said quietly.
I watched him for a long moment.
"That's not enough," I said.
And I left.
Seraphina looked the same. She still had that perfect posture. Even in a holding cell.
She smiled when she saw me.
"Well," she said. "If it isn't the miracle child."
"If it isn't the murderer. You shot him."
Her smile widened slightly.
"He stepped in the way."
"You aimed at me!" I said, slightly raising my voice.
"Yes. I did."
She said it so calmly that it made my skin crawl.
"Do you even feel remorseful about it?" I asked.
Seraphina tilted her head.
"No."
The honesty hit harder than an apology would have.
"You destroyed everything," I said quietly.
She laughed softly.
"So what? You think this is the end?"
Seraphina leaned closer to the glass.
"Families like ours don't end, Isabelle."
Her eyes glinted.
"They just… evolve."
A guard tapped the door.
"Time."
I turned without replying.
Her laugh followed me down the hallway.
The courtyard at St. Aurelia looked the same. Students walked between buildings. Classes continued. As if nothing had happened.
For a second we just stood there, staring at each other like two strangers who used to know everything about the other.
"I heard about Dmitri," he said quietly.
"He's still unconscious."
Julien looked down at the stone ground and rubbed the back of his neck. Then he said it.
"I'm leaving."
The words hit harder than I expected.
"Leaving?" I repeated. "What do you mean leaving?"
"Leaving St. Aurelia. Tonight."
I blinked.
"What?"
For a moment I thought he was joking.
"Why?" I asked.
Julien gave a short, humorless laugh.
"Seriously? Look around, Isabelle. Everything is falling apart."
He gestured vaguely toward the buildings around us.
"Seraphina's been arrested. Viktor Volkov too. My father's in custody." His jaw tightened. "Dmitri's lying in a hospital bed because of all this."
He paused.
"And Emmeline…" he muttered. "God knows what's going to happen to her now."
He shoved his hands into his pockets.
"I can't stay here," he said. "This place was built for people like me."
I frowned.
"What does that mean?"
"It means I've been walking around this school my whole life pretending everything was normal while people like my father were pulling the strings behind the scenes."
His voice was calm, but there was something ugly underneath it.
"I kept winning scholarships, competitions, and awards. Everyone clapped. Everyone acted as if I earned it."
He laughed again.
"But now I find out my father was working with criminals. I can't sit in those classrooms pretending I deserve to be here."
He shook his head slowly.
"You do deserve to be here," I said automatically.
Julien looked at me.
"Do I?"
I couldn't answer. Because honestly, I didn't know. He sighed and looked away.
We stood there in silence for a moment.
"I'm sorry," he said again.
This time the words sounded heavier.
"It's done," I shrugged.
"That's the problem," Julien muttered. "It is done."
"Where are you going?"
"Anywhere that isn't here."
His eyes lifted back to mine.
"I need to figure out what the hell I'm supposed to do next."
"You're not running away," I said.
He shook his head.
"No."
"Then what is this?"
Julien thought for a moment.
"A reset," he said.
"That sounds suspiciously like running away."
"Maybe a little."
Despite everything, a small smile tugged at the corner of my mouth. Julien noticed.
"That's the first time I've seen you almost smile in days," he said.
"Don't get used to it."
He nodded toward the gate.
"I'll come back. I don't know how long it will take."
"That's not very reassuring."
He hesitated, then added quietly,
"But I will."
The wind rustled the trees around the courtyard. Julien stepped backward.
"You're not going to try to stop me?" he asked.
"If I tried," I said, "you'd still leave."
He considered that.
"Yeah."
Another small silence.
"Take care of yourself, Isabelle."
"You too."
He turned and started walking toward the gate. Halfway there he stopped. Without turning around he said, "Tell Dmitri something for me."
"If he wakes up?"
"When he wakes up."
I waited.
Julien glanced back over his shoulder.
"Tell him he was right."
Then he left. I stood there for a long time after he disappeared through the gates of St. Aurelia. And for the first time since everything started falling apart, the courtyard felt empty.
That night I went back to the hospital.
"You're causing a lot of trouble for someone who isn't even conscious," I muttered.
"I dragged you into my war. Which means you don't get to sleep through the ending."
Silence filled the room again.
I reached out this time. My fingers brushed his hand. Cold. Still.
"Wake up, Dmitri," I whispered.
Because the story wasn't finished yet.