My heart stutters in my chest. I scan the alleyway, the doorways, the shadows between buildings. Nothing. They're gone.
I did tell her to run, but I didn't think she'd get too far. Away from the house, yes, but to hide. To come out when I was ready.
But I don't see them anywhere as I slip through the alleys, toward the market. I don't know where they've gone.
"Esalyn?" My voice echoes against stone walls, unanswered. "Erisen?"
The boy's name catches in my throat. I remember his small hand in mine, the way his golden eyes—so like my own—had widened with wonder when I showed him how to carve wood. The trust in his gaze whenever I lifted him to see farther, higher.
She fled. Of course she fled.
She must have grabbed Erisen and disappeared into the labyrinth of Velzaroth's winding streets while Kareth and I werelocked in combat. Smart. Practical. Exactly what she should've done.
But knowing this doesn't stop the gnawing emptiness that spreads through my chest like poison.
I stagger back toward their home—what's left of it. The place looks even more pitiful now, the door hanging crooked on its hinges, the table I carved for them splintered beyond repair. My blood and Kareth's stain the floor like an accusation.
They're gone. Both of them. And with them, the only light I've known in years.
"Dammit!" I slam my fist against the wall, sending a tremor through the rickety structure. Pain lances up my arm, but it's nothing compared to the hollowness consuming me from within.
I hadn't realized until this moment how much they'd become a part of me. How Esalyn's wary smile when I brought food had become the benchmark of my day. How Erisen's quiet excitement when I appeared was like sunlight after an eternity of darkness.
And how could she know any different? All she saw was another demon—another betrayal—another hunter coming to collect.
In her place, I'd have done the same. Run. Hide. Trust no one. Especially not the bounty hunter who'd been pretending to care.
Except I wasn't pretending.
Stalking back to their home, I sink to my knees in the wrecked room that made up their entire space, my fingers brushing over one of Erisen's colored stones, abandoned in their flight. The smooth surface is cool against my blood-warmed skin. Next to it lies the batlaz I carved for him, but the bird is missing. He must have taken it with him.
The sight of it all splits something open inside me—a wound deeper than anything Kareth's blade could inflict.
"I wasn't pretending," I whisper to the empty room.
For the first time since Zevan died, I had found something worth living for. Something that made the endless years stretching before me seem like more than just an exercise in survival. And now they're gone, thinking me another monster sent to drag them back to Vorrak's cruelty.
The thought of Esalyn and Erisen alone, hunted, afraid—perhaps thinking I'd led Kareth to their door—claws at me with talons sharper than grief.
Blood drips from my wounds, pattering onto the floor in a rhythm that matches the throbbing in my chest. My failures pile up like corpses: Zevan, who trusted me to keep him safe. And now Esalyn and Erisen, who never knew they could.
I can't lose them too. Not like this.
I push myself to my feet, ignoring the protest of torn muscles and cracked ribs. The hunt that brought me to them ends here, with Kareth's cooling corpse in the alley and my heart torn open on this splintered floor.
But a new hunt begins—one not for bounty or salvation, but for the chance to prove what I couldn't say when it mattered: that I choose them. That they are mine to protect, not capture. That whatever future I have left belongs with them, if they'll have me.
19
ESALYN
Irun like the hunted animal I am.
Erisen's small body bounces against my chest with each frantic step, his face buried against my neck. My lungs burn. My legs scream. But I don't slow down. Can't slow down. The revelation of Domno's betrayal drives me forward like a blade between my shoulder blades.
"Mama, wait!" Erisen's voice is muffled against my skin, his breath hot with confusion and fear. "Where's Domno? Why did we leave him?"
His question slices deeper than any knife could reach. I tighten my grip on him, ducking beneath a low archway where sulfur-crusted pipes hiss with escaping steam. The heat sticks to my skin like guilt.
