The capital breathed like a beast.
Its streets wound steep through the mountain, each one alive with banners, silver lanterns, and the press of claws, hooves, and wings. Guards patrolled in steady lines, armor black and gleaming, their spears pulsing with faint wards. Merchants shouted through the noise, their stalls heavy with smoked meats, blacksteel trinkets, and talismans etched in runes. Refugees filled the gaps, their voices cracking with desperation, offering heirlooms, tusks, or even their own labor for a corner of shelter.
Karl drifted through it all, hood low, his grin absent for once. His claws twitched at his sides, but he kept them still. He had grown up in these streets. He knew every bend, every step, every echo of stone against his boots. Yet the city did not look the same anymore.
It had changed. Or maybe he had.
His steps slowed without meaning to. Ahead stood a narrow lane, shadowed by the taller spires. He knew it instantly, though it had been years since his feet last carried him down its slope. His chest tightened as he walked, the din of the market fading behind him.
At the end of the lane, the house still stood.
Small, crooked at the corners, its walls patched in stone and timber. The door hung lopsided, but the frame was familiar, carved with a scratch mark he himself had made as a cub when he tried to sharpen his claws for the first time. He had laughed then, thinking it meant something.
The memories struck quick, like claws sinking into his chest.
His foster family—an old wolf couple who had taken him in when the palace spat him out. They weren’t strong, not in aura, not in power, but their hands had been warm, their eyes patient. They fed him when he was hungry, even when food was thin. They gave him a place that wasn’t made of stone and orders.
And then there was her.
The girl. Sharp-eyed, quick-footed, always daring him into trouble. Her laugh used to ring through this very street, light and reckless. She had been his balance, his anchor when the weight of being the king’s failure threatened to choke him.
Karl’s claws curled tighter.
He remembered the night it ended. The night Kael came. His younger brother—father’s favorite flame, always perfect, always untouchable. Kael had brought soldiers. The house had burned, smoke twisting into the sky, and his foster family’s cries had been drowned in flame. Karl had fought, screamed, begged, but he was dragged into the dirt and beaten until his ribs snapped.
Karl’s jaw tightened, his fangs cutting into his lip until he tasted blood. Kael had taken her. Carried her away like a prize, his golden eyes full of victory. She hadn’t even looked back. Or maybe she had. Karl didn’t know anymore. All he remembered was the heat of rage, the sound of everything he loved collapsing in fire.
The crooked house before him blurred in his vision. His breath grew heavy, shoulders trembling. His aura flickered, red-gold fire leaking from his claws. The stone beneath his feet cracked faint, the air rippling under the weight of the fury clawing up his throat.
He wanted to burn it all.
Burn the house, burn the street, burn the entire mountain until Kael’s name turned to ash.
A hand touched his shoulder.
The heat faltered. His claws froze mid-twitch. The flames guttered like a candle pressed by wind.
Lucy stood beside him, her cloak draped loose, her eyes calm as always. Her hand rested light on him, but it felt heavier than chains, pulling him back from the fire boiling in his chest.
She didn’t ask. She didn’t need to.
Her gaze lingered on his face, sharp but soft at the edges, and for once Karl realized he wasn’t smirking. His expression must have been twisted enough for her to notice.
"You’re shaking," she said quietly.
Karl barked a laugh, though it cracked in his throat. "What gave me away? The fire?"
Her hand didn’t move. "You don’t need to burn here."
He looked away, back to the crooked house. His jaw clenched again, his claws curling, but he forced the fire down. The street was quiet. No one else lingered. Only the ghosts of his memory stood there.
"They took everything," he muttered, voice low, almost swallowed by the wind.
Lucy tilted her head faintly. "Who?"
Karl smirked again, but it was hollow. "Doesn’t matter."
Her fingers tightened just slightly on his shoulder. Not pushing. Just steady. "It matters to you."
Karl laughed again, rougher this time, shaking his head. "You wouldn’t understand."
"Maybe not," Lucy said. Her tone didn’t change, steady as stone. "But I can stand here with you."
The words cut deeper than he expected.
He glanced at her, at the way her cloak moved in the breeze, the way her eyes never left his. Calm, sharp, but not prying. Not judging. Just there.
The fire in his chest still burned, but it wasn’t out of control anymore. It was contained, coiled tight, waiting for the right moment.
Karl exhaled slowly, his shoulders dropping. He lifted his hand and rubbed at the corner of his mouth, smearing the blood from his bitten lip. "You know, you’re annoying when you’re ."
Lucy’s lips curved faint, almost a smile. "Good. Means it worked."
Karl huffed, shaking his head, the hollow smirk easing into something closer to real. "You really don’t know what you’re doing, do you?"
"Probably not," Lucy admitted. Her hand finally slipped from his shoulder, the weight gone but the steadiness still lingering in the air. "But you’re calmer now."
Karl stared at her for a long moment, then looked back to the crooked house one last time. The scratch mark on the door, the smoke-stained stone, the ghosts.
"Let’s go," he said, voice lighter, though his eyes still burned. "Nothing here worth wasting fire on."
Lucy fell into step beside him, silent but close.
As they walked back toward the crowded streets, the noise of the capital returned—shouts, clatter, the hum of wards. But Karl didn’t hear it the same. His rage still simmered, but it was focused now, sharpened. Not blind.
Kael’s name sat heavy on his tongue.
And when the time came, he would spit it back in blood.
For now, though, Lucy’s presence kept him steady.
He let the smirk return to his lips, faint but real, as the two of them vanished into the press of the capital. ʀᴇᴀᴅ ʟᴀᴛᴇsᴛ ᴄʜᴀᴘᴛᴇʀs ᴀᴛ novelFɪre.net