How

  foolish you’ve been, Lyudmila Sidorova, she scolded herself while

  staring at her reflection in the bathroom mirror.

  Her eyes, reddened by rage and impotence, could no longer find

  that blue sky which for years had defined her gaze. Something had

  been slowly drained from her, as if an invisible essence had seeped

  out of her body, drop by drop, leaving no visible wound behind.

  She discovered herself to be old.

  Wrinkles clustered at the corners of her eyes, on her forehead,

  along her chin. Her lips were cracked, her hands bony, her blond hair

  reduced to dull, lifeless straw. It wasn’t only her body: it was

  her soul that seemed to have withdrawn into a dark, deep, silent

  place.

  Ekaterina Smirnova, meanwhile, advanced intact and powerful,

  waiting for the precise moment to seize the throne of the Institute.

  The current director and his partner, Pavel, were nothing more than

  instruments—pieces necessary for an ambition calculated with cold

  precision.

  She thought of being honest with herself. She thought of speaking

  to Pavel.

  But for what?

  Perhaps not for her own sake.

  But what would happen now to

  Ksenia?

  She would be pushed aside. Reduced to an academic ornament,

  tolerated only until someone younger, more manageable, replaced her

  at the whim of the new holders of power.

  She left the bathroom, wiping away her tears.

  Valentina, the professors’ assistant, crossed paths with her in

  the long corridor of black-and-white tiles, like a board where others

  decided the moves.

  —Are you all right, Lyudmila?

  —Yes… fine, fine, thank you —she replied without stopping.

  She refused to show weakness and quickened her pace. Her heels

  echoed against the ceramic with an urgency she seemed to be fleeing

  from herself.

  Uncontrolled, unable to master her emotions, she began to choke on

  the agony of her own nightmares, which tightened around her throat

  and made it hard to breathe. She went outside. She needed air.

  Suffocating, she looked around and saw only structures that had

  once promised excellence. Now they were nothing but cages of ambition

  and personal advancement.

  Fate had betrayed her innocence, cornering her at the edge of an

  invisible precipice.

  She lifted her gaze to the building’s windows, checking whether

  anyone was watching her. Then she looked up at the sky, which—like

  her eyes before the mirror—seemed to demand vengeance. She realized

  she was alone and unprotected, yet even so, from the deepest part of

  her soul, she began to feel something knitting itself back together.

  She returned to the building.

  This content has been misappropriated from Royal Road; report any instances of this story if found elsewhere.

  She climbed the theatrical, imposing balustraded staircase with

  long strides. She reached the second floor. She crossed the

  administrative corridor and confronted Pavel’s secretary, who tried

  to stop her.

  She was not intimidated.

  She crossed the threshold of the office as the director stood up,

  awkwardly apologizing for the professor’s rash behavior.

  —Don’t make the situation worse, Lyudmila —Pavel said,

  trying to calm her.

  —Now you want peace —she replied, pointing a finger at him.

  —I want what’s best for everyone —he answered, cutting off

  any hint of doubt about his management.

  He waited for the secretary to leave and close the door.

  Then he embraced Lyudmila to soothe her. He felt her moan and cry

  against his chest. It broke his heart.

  —I shouldn’t do this —he went on when Lyudmila, calmer now,

  took one of the chairs opposite the desk, staring at the polished

  wooden floor, anywhere rather than into those eyes that had once

  broken his heart and later betrayed him.

  —What do you mean?

  —I can help you carry out your excavation. Isn’t that what you

  want?

  She had underestimated Pavel. The Siberian fox knew how to detect

  the weakness of his prey from afar. How did he know her so well? The

  bourgeois woman wounded in her pride…

  The devil corrupts from hell, turning poison into medicine. Too

  sweet for desperate ears, too tempting for a defenseless state of

  mind.

  —Can I take your statement seriously?

  —Just trust me —he said, half-opening the door—. I need to

  make some calls and I’ll keep you informed. But remember: this

  stays between you and me. For old times’ sake.

  —For old times’ sake —Lyudmila repeated.

  She left the office with a hangover-like sensation: strange,

  shaken, defenseless, clinging to the hope of turning that odd promise

  into reality.

  She had not yet left the corridor when she recognized familiar

  footsteps. Ekaterina’s heels cut through the hallway with the

  confidence of someone who believes everything around her belongs to

  her.

  They passed each other without looking.

  The air crackled in her wake, contaminated by a dense, almost

  radioactive chemistry.

  —What did my friend want? —Ekaterina asked.

  Pavel sprang up from his leather chair like a coiled spring.

  —She’s very nervous. Right now, it wouldn’t suit us for

  certain eyes to start looking at this Institute. Do you understand?

  —Don’t try your juggling tricks with me, Pavel —she said,

  stepping within inches of his face.

  She grabbed his tie, preventing him from retreating, forcing him

  to breathe in her scent and meet her lascivious stare.

  —Don’t you dare deceive me.

  —You know I’d kill if you asked me to —he whispered,

  uttering the exact phrase that always managed to disarm her

  aggression.

  —You’ve never met anyone like me. I’m very good… until

  someone betrays me. Then I’ll become your worst nightmare. Now tell

  me —she said, releasing his tie and pushing him into the armchair—.

  Leave out nothing.

  She slowly lifted her skirt and brought her panties close to his

  face so he could smell them.

  That was her true power.

  Pavel ceased to perceive Lyudmila’s faint scent.

  Lyudmila, restless and unable to organize her thoughts, opened

  Ksenia’s latest report. She didn’t finish reading it. She stood

  and looked out through the windows at the students crossing the

  courtyard, unaware of the invisible well that contained them.

  Ksenia wrote of the wandering souls of the high steppes, wrapping

  themselves around horses and riders. Earth and air roaming an endless

  cycle of death and birth, of peace and wars, of loves and betrayals

  deposited in the great burial mounds of the princes of the steppes.

  The well of souls—the earth—where we, the tormented, wander

  while awaiting a glorious eternity to compensate us for so much

  turbulence.

  And her dream of air travels to those fields where the sun yields

  its dominion to the stars, which melt into hundreds of laments and

  vanish into the immensity of the night, lit by rays pressing in from

  the east.

  Then, a presence made itself known.

  It rescued Ksenia from those elevated horizons.

  —Ksenia, I have to tell you something —Pavel said as he picked

  up the phone.

  —So do I —she replied, still breathless, unsure of what had

  just happened.

  —Pavel has promised to help me with the excavation.

  —That’s wonderful news!

  The

  “Well of Souls” is not just a place; it is the earth itself,

  holding memories, pain, and the restless spirits of those who have

  passed.

  In shamanic traditions, the soul may rise into the air, wandering

  between worlds, yet it always returns, drawn by duty, pain, or the

  call of another.

  Shamans guide and observe, but they do not intervene in destiny.

  The choices —and the consequences— remain with the living.