The warning flickered on Owen’s phone, a low buzz against his palm, just as he rounded the corner from the East Wing stairwell. Not a campus alert, nothing official, just a cryptic message from a burner account – ‘They’re asking about the quarry again.’ His breath hitched, a phantom chill tracing the sweat at his hairline, and the carefully constructed wall around his last summer crumbled. He blinked, the harsh fluorescent lights of the corridor suddenly too bright, the cacophony of student chatter too loud.
He wasn't watching where he was going. He just wasn’t. One moment, he was navigating the river of bodies flowing towards the lecture halls, shoulder pressed to backpack, the next he was stumbling, a solid force hitting his chest, sending his laptop bag swinging wildly. Papers fanned out from a loose clasp, fluttering to the polished linoleum floor like startled doves. A low grunt escaped him, more air than sound, as he braced for impact, but strong hands shot out, catching his elbows, steadying him before he could hit the ground.
His eyes, wide and disoriented, snapped up. And then everything else in the hallway—the indifferent faces, the echoes of laughter, the scent of cheap coffee and old textbooks—went utterly silent. Like someone had hit the mute button on the world. It was Edmund.
Edmund. Taller, somehow, than he remembered, though that was impossible. Broader through the shoulders, too, under a dark, fitted t-shirt that stretched across him. His hair, dark as rich soil, was a little longer, falling just over the collar of his shirt. But it was the eyes. The same intense, dark eyes that had always seen too much, missed nothing. They were fixed on Owen, unblinking, analytical, and for a terrifying second, completely unreadable. No, not unreadable. Just *reading* him. Peeling back the layers he’d meticulously constructed over the last three years.
“Owen,” Edmund’s voice was a low murmur, a sound he hadn’t realized he’d been holding his breath for. It was still the same voice, a deep register, carrying an undercurrent of something solid, unflappable. He still held Owen’s arms, thumbs pressing into the sensitive skin just above his elbows. The contact was electric, a jolt that went straight through Owen’s spine, making his skin prickle. He felt a blush creep up his neck, hot and sudden, even as he tried to pull away, to break the charged connection.
“Oh, uh… Edmund,” Owen stammered, his own voice sounding thin and Rinardy compared to the bass of Edmund’s. He cleared his throat, trying to find some semblance of composure. His eyes darted past Edmund’s shoulder, to the papers scattered on the floor. It was a pathetic escape. A flash of memory: *Edmund, leaning over a pile of microfiche in the local library, the projector humming, his brow furrowed in concentration. The dusty smell of old paper, the shared secret of a town that didn’t want its truths uncovered.*
Edmund, without releasing him, glanced down at the mess. “Let me get that.” He bent, still holding Owen with one hand, his grip firm. Owen found himself oddly unbalanced, tethered, leaning slightly into Edmund’s space as the other man scooped up the pages. His fingers brushed Owen’s when he handed them back, and that small touch felt like a live wire. Owen’s heart hammered against his ribs, a frantic drum against the silence of his own panic. He couldn’t look at Edmund properly, couldn’t meet those all-seeing eyes.
Three years. Three summers since they’d spent every waking hour piecing together the hushed-up disappearance of a local historian from the summer before, three years since they’d almost gotten themselves in deep, deep trouble. Three years since… since that night by the quarry, when the summer air was thick with the scent of damp earth and blooming night jasmine, and the only light came from the scattered stars and the pale glow of Owen’s phone as Edmund read off a cryptic journal entry. *‘The stones know more than the living.’*
“You okay?” Edmund asked, his voice softer this time, closer. Too close. Owen could feel the warmth radiating from him, the faint, clean scent of something woodsy and sharp. He flinched back, taking an awkward step away, finally breaking the physical contact. He clutched his laptop bag, the papers rustling. “Yeah. Yeah, fine. Just… in a hurry.” He gestured vaguely down the corridor, towards the lecture hall he was definitely late for. He needed to be anywhere but here, anywhere but with Edmund staring at him like he was a puzzle that hadn’t been solved yet.
Edmund didn’t move. He simply watched Owen, his expression unreadable, but the intensity in his gaze was a physical weight. “Heard you were back,” Edmund said, a statement, not a question. Owen’s stomach dropped. He hadn’t been expecting this. Not here. Not like this. He’d gone out of his way to avoid familiar faces, to bury that summer deep under layers of academic ambition and a meticulously crafted new persona. But Edmund had always had a way of cutting through the pretense.
Another memory, sharp and unwelcome: *Owen, thirteen and gangly, trying to impress his older brother’s friends at the skate park, only to wipe out spectacularly. Edmund, already tall and self-possessed at fifteen, had been the one to offer him a hand, a quiet smirk on his face. ‘You’re trying too hard, kid.’ The blunt honesty, even then, had stung and resonated in equal measure.*
“Yeah, classes started,” Owen managed, trying for nonchalance, failing spectacularly. He could feel the pulse thrumming at his temples. The hallway traffic was a blur around them, but Edmund was a still point in the chaos, utterly focused on Owen. It made Owen feel like every nervous twitch, every flicker in his eyes, was being cataloged, analyzed.
“I know,” Edmund said, a faint, almost imperceptible curve of his lips. “I saw your name on the departmental roster. Journalism, right?” Owen just nodded, a tight, jerky motion. Of course, Edmund would know. Edmund, who had always been two steps ahead, finding connections no one else saw. He’d been the one to suggest Owen go into journalism, after that summer. *‘You have a good eye for truth, Owen. Even if you try to hide from it.’*
“Look, I gotta go. Lecture starts in five,” Owen mumbled, taking another step back. His hands felt clammy against the worn fabric of his backpack strap. He was already spiraling, the burner message on his phone burning a hole in his pocket. The quarry. Someone was asking about it. And now Edmund was here. It couldn’t be a coincidence. Nothing ever was with Edmund.
Edmund finally shifted, a slow, deliberate movement that somehow managed to convey both a concession and an unspoken promise to remain. He pulled a small, folded piece of paper from his pocket, pressing it into Owen’s hand. The paper felt thick, substantial. Not a number, Owen realized as his fingers brushed the texture, but a photograph. A faded, black-and-white photograph.
Owen glanced down at it, heart pounding. It was a picture of a stone marker, moss-covered, half-buried in what looked like overgrown woods. Familiar. Too familiar. The stone that marked the entrance to the old quarry, the one they’d spent weeks poring over maps to find. The one that, according to the town’s oldest residents, led to a forgotten burial ground.
He looked up, meeting Edmund’s eyes for the first time. The intensity was still there, but now there was something else too. A glint of challenge. An expectation. “Someone’s digging it up,” Edmund said, his voice dropping, almost a whisper, but it cut through the hallway’s ambient noise like a knife. “The old story. The missing archaeologist.”
Owen’s throat felt dry. The missing archaeologist. Dr. Evelyn Rinard. That was the cold case they had stumbled upon three summers ago while trying to track down a simpler story about local folklore. Their youthful curiosity had inadvertently unearthed a far more sinister disappearance, one the local authorities had conveniently swept under the rug. Edmund, ever the relentless pursuer of facts, had been obsessed. Owen, initially reluctant, had been drawn in by Edmund’s quiet conviction, and by the sheer injustice of it.
“What… what are you talking about?” Owen tried to sound casual, but his voice cracked on the last word. His hand, clutching the photo, trembled. He remembered the feeling of that summer: the humid air, the scent of pine needles and damp soil as they navigated the dense woods, Edmund always a few paces ahead, clearing the path, leading the way. Owen, clumsy and a little scared, but following, always following.
“They found something,” Edmund continued, ignoring Owen’s weak attempt at denial. “Out near the old quarry. Not just rumors this time. Physical evidence.” His gaze locked onto Owen’s, daring him to look away. “And it’s connected to Rinard. To what we found.”
The implications hit Owen with the force of a physical blow. All the careful distance he’d put between himself and that summer, all the academic pursuits he’d used as a shield, shattered. He remembered the frantic research, the hushed conversations, the sense of being constantly watched. They had been close, too close, to something dangerous.
“You’re telling me… after three years… they’re finally looking?” Owen whispered, his mind racing. The photograph in his hand felt like it weighed a ton. He recalled the sweltering heat of those July afternoons, the dust motes dancing in the shafts of sunlight filtering through the library windows, Edmund’s voice, calm and steady, outlining their next lead. He'd found a pattern, a series of seemingly unrelated disappearances over decades, all linked to the same patch of woods, the same stone marker. Edmund had traced the local legends, found the old newspaper reports, the inconsistencies in police files. And Owen, with his quiet way of observing, had found the subtle emotional cues, the fear in the townspeople’s eyes, the unspoken warnings.
“Something compelled them to look again,” Edmund said, his gaze unwavering. “A new development. And a local journalist, apparently, has taken an interest. Asked some specific questions. Questions that only we… only *you* and I knew the answers to.” Edmund’s eyes narrowed slightly, a subtle shift that sent a fresh wave of unease through Owen. Was he accusing him? No, not accusing. Just stating a fact, a dangerous fact.
Owen felt a cold dread settle in his stomach. He hadn't talked about it to anyone. Not a soul. He'd tried to forget it, to put the whole terrifying, exhilarating summer behind him. He looked at Edmund, really looked at him, and saw the same determined set to his jaw, the same unyielding focus. Edmund hadn't forgotten a single detail, not a single wrong note in the melody of that cold case.
“But… I didn’t… I haven’t said anything,” Owen said, his voice barely audible above the rising hum of the hallway. Students were starting to thin out now, heading into their classes, leaving them in a small, isolated bubble. The light from a nearby window caught the subtle sheen on Edmund’s dark hair, the sharp line of his jaw. He was a force, an anchor, and a relentless current all at once.
“I know,” Edmund replied, his voice still low, almost a comfort, but the words themselves were anything but. “Which means someone else is pulling on the same thread we were. Someone who has access to information they shouldn’t.” He took a step closer, not aggressively, but with an inevitability that made Owen’s breath hitch again. Owen instinctively leaned back, hitting the cool, hard surface of a locker. He was trapped. By the locker, by the past, by Edmund.
“Look, I’m not… I can’t get involved again, Edmund,” Owen said, pushing the words out, trying to inject a firmness he didn’t feel. He thought of the warnings, the veiled threats they had received back then, the way the local sheriff had politely but firmly told them to drop it. He thought of the cold fear that had settled in his chest, the knowledge that some truths were better left buried.
Edmund’s gaze didn’t soften, but something flickered in its depths. A shared memory, perhaps, of the fear, the thrill. “We were close, Owen. We were closer than anyone. We had the last known photograph of Rinard, the strange symbols in her journal, the oral histories. The local police closed the case, but we knew they were wrong. And now… it seems like someone else is about to find out how wrong.”
He paused, letting the words hang in the air, weighty and undeniable. Owen could feel the ghost of those symbols in his mind, the intricate, almost ritualistic carvings Edmund had painstakingly sketched from Rinard’s journal, symbols that matched the vague markings on that stone marker by the quarry. It had felt ancient, powerful, terrifying.
“Think about it,” Edmund urged, his voice a low rumble now, barely above a whisper. His eyes were magnetic, pulling Owen in, stripping away his defenses. “A new lead. After all this time. What if it’s what we were missing? What if we finally get answers?” He leaned in slightly, his proximity overwhelming Owen. The subtle scent of him, the sheer physical presence, the unshakeable certainty in his eyes. It was all too much, too familiar, too dangerous.
Owen swallowed, his mouth suddenly parched. His hand tightened around the photograph, crinkling the faded paper. He remembered the adrenaline of those summer nights, poring over clues by flashlight, the thrill of discovery mixed with genuine fear. He remembered Edmund’s hand, steady and warm, on his arm, pulling him out of the path of a falling rock near the quarry edge. He remembered Edmund’s quiet commendation when Owen deciphered a particularly obscure local dialect in an old newspaper clipping. They had been a team. Edmund, the relentless logic. Owen, the intuitive observer.
“I… I have classes,” Owen mumbled, but even to his own ears, it sounded weak, a desperate plea for normalcy that was rapidly slipping away. He couldn't ignore the message on his phone, the photograph in his hand, or the blazing intensity in Edmund’s eyes. He couldn't ignore the way his heart was racing, a mix of apprehension and a strange, unwelcome excitement. Edmund had always pulled him into the deep end, and Owen had always, eventually, let himself be pulled.
“The professor for the Journalism Investigations elective just announced a new project,” Edmund said, a faint, knowing smirk playing on his lips, barely visible. He knew. He always knew how to hook him. “A cold case. To be chosen from a pool of local unsolved mysteries. They’re looking for something with ‘local flavor,’ something with ‘untapped potential for a good story.’ Sounds like something you’d be good at, Owen. Getting to the heart of things.”
Owen stared, speechless. Edmund had just laid out a path, a justification, a way back into the very thing Owen had run from, framed as an academic opportunity. It was clever, manipulative, and utterly Edmund. And it appealed to the part of Owen that, despite his fear, still craved the truth, still felt the gnawing injustice of what had happened to Dr. Rinard. The mystery, the thrill of the chase, the shared purpose. All of it, tangled up with Edmund.
“So?” Edmund pressed, his eyes still fixed on Owen’s. The hallway was almost empty now, just the two of them, the echoes of a bell marking the start of a new lecture. The silence stretched, thick and heavy, punctuated only by Owen’s ragged breathing. Edmund was still there, unwavering, waiting. He wasn’t going anywhere until Owen gave him an answer. He never did. He was the anchor, and Owen, the drift wood, was being pulled back to shore.
“So, you’re suggesting… we work together?” Owen finally managed, the words tasting foreign on his tongue. The idea felt both terrifying and exhilarating. The past, the summer, the quarry, the archaeologist – it was all rushing back, a tidal wave of suppressed memories and unresolved feelings. And Edmund, standing right there, the architect of it all, waiting to pull him under again. He could feel the familiar pull, the strange gravity Edmund exerted, the way his quiet intensity always seemed to draw Owen into his orbit. And for all his resistance, he found himself leaning, just barely, imperceptibly, towards the pull.
Edmund simply held his gaze, a challenge in his eyes, a silent question. The smirk faded, replaced by that familiar, unwavering determination. It wasn’t a question of if they would, but when. It was a promise, and a threat. And Owen, looking at the stone marker in his hand, and then back at Edmund, knew deep down he had no choice. The game, whatever it was, was starting again, and he was already on the board.