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ੈ✩‧₊˚ CHAPTER ONE
fragments of home
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FIVE YEARS AGO

The scent of warm bread drifted through the home, wrapping around the walls like a blanket. It was comforting — familiar, even — but it didn't reach the sharp tension at the heart of the room.

Marisol was at the stove, hands dusted with flour as she carefully slid a loaf from the clay oven. Her quiet hums blended with the low crackle of firewood. It was peaceful. Or at least, it was trying to be.

Across the room, Luna sat at the table, eyes narrowed in focus as she studied the broken pieces of the dimensional gun. The metal was charred in places, edges jagged. It had once glowed with energy; now, it was just a pile of uncooperative scrap. Her tools were laid out in neat rows, precision and patience guiding every movement, even if frustration lingered in her every breath.

Celina sat nearby, her shoulder and abdomen wrapped tightly in fresh bandages, a dull ache reminding her with every breath that she was still recovering. Still grounded. Her leg bounced, not from pain, but restlessness.

The walls were closing in, and every second she stayed here, she felt the universe slipping further and further away from where she was supposed to be.

From who she was supposed to be with.

Mateo leaned against the far wall, arms crossed, jaw tight. His dark eyes never left her. He watched her the way one might watch a loaded weapon — quietly, cautiously. Ready to move if she shifted too fast.

She felt it. Every second.

"Do you ever blink?" Celina muttered without looking at him.

Mateo narrowed his eyes. "Do you ever shut up?"

"Oh, very original," she shot back, rolling her eyes. "You've had weeks, and that's the best you've come up with?"

"You're literally La Muerte," he snapped, pushing off the wall. "Excuse me for keeping an eye on the world's deadliest teenage assassin while she lounges in our living room."

"I'm healing," she said, raising an eyebrow. "What do you expect me to do in this condition? Knock you into a tree?"

"Please," he scoffed. "You couldn't land a punch right now if I stood still."

Celina leaned forward just slightly. "Try me."

"Don't tempt me," Mateo muttered. "I'll poke your wound just to prove a point."

"Oh, real brave," Celina shot back with a glare. "Threaten the injured girl. What a man."

"¡Por favor!" Marisol called from the stove, exasperated but not truly angry. "Will you two stop bickering for five minutes? Mateo, get Celina a water and sit down. And Celina, querida, maybe don't provoke him."

"She started it," Mateo said immediately.

Celina snorted. "With what, my existence?"

"If the shoe fits —"

"You little b —"

Luna sighed and pushed her goggles up onto her forehead. "If you two are gonna kill each other, at least do it outside. Away from the dimensional gun, preferably."

"She's impossible," Mateo muttered, pointing at Celina like she was an unsolvable math equation. "She breathes, and it's irritating."

"Wow," Celina deadpanned. "You should put that on a t-shirt. 'My name is Mateo and I'm threatened by a fifteen-year-old girl half-conscious with stab wounds.'"