Chapter 3 - Shadows in the SnowMiles to the north, tucked inside an abandoned rail yard where decommissioned locomotives rusted beneath heaps of snow, Leo sat on an upturned wooden crate. His hands were bound loosely with zip ties, his oversized canvas jacket smeared with dirt. His sneakers were scuffed, the left sole peeling away from the toe.
Across from him, Marcus Thorne paced beneath the flickering fluorescent light of an old depot office. Marcus looked like Julian’s distorted reflection: the same piercing eyes and heavy brow, but his posture was jagged, his beard untamed, his coat scarred with salt and grime.
"Drink," Marcus grunted, sliding a styrofoam cup of lukewarm tap water toward the boy.
Leo didn't touch it. His eight-year-old face was pale, his hazel eyes wide with fear, yet beneath the fear lay a stubborn defiance inherited from his mother.
"Where is my mom?" Leo asked, his voice trembling slightly.
"Safe enough," Marcus answered curtly, tossing a knife onto the wooden table between them. "Safer than you are if you keep glaring at me like that."
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"You smell like bad smoke," Leo said quietly, curling his knees toward his chest. "My mom told me about you. She said you forgot how to be a brother, and that's why you became a ghost."
Marcus stopped pacing. He stared at the child, the muscles in his jaw clenching. He opened his mouth to snap, but something in the boy’s unblinking gaze made the words turn to ash in his throat. For a fleeting second, Marcus saw his own youth reflected back at him—two boys in a grand house, waiting for a father who never returned.
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