Chapter 3 - THE STRANGER AT THE OPEN GATES ISN'T A REFUGEE
Before Ethan could demand an answer, thunder cracked outside, shaking the massive iron gates pinned open to the storm. A silhouette stumbled through the pouring rain, collapse-bound toward the porch. Aria screamed as she opened the front door to help what she thought was a stranded traveler. But as the blinding lightning lit up the threshold, the man lifted his face. Scared, disfigured, and missing his left eye, Derek stood on the doorway of the mansion he had been banished from decades ago. He didn’t look menacing; he looked terrified. "Ethan... hide her," Derek wheezed, collapsing onto the threshold, coughing up blood. "She didn't come to save you thirty years ago. She came to erase us."
