The sky bled copper as the sun sank behind the slums. Crooked rooftops caught the dying light, bent like broken spines. Knife-thin shadows stretched across cracked stone. Smoke crept from leaning chimneys, sour with rust, sweat, and old rain.
Mercy didn't live here.
Hunger did.
Mal moved through the lanes with his head down. His boots struck uneven cobblestones, soles worn thin enough that he felt every ridge. His coat hung in tatters, seams stitched so often the thread had faded to gray. Dirt clung to his skin. His hands—split, bandaged, half-numb—trembled despite his effort to still them.
Another shift. Another coin. Still short.
He cut into a narrow alley. The air dropped cold between the walls, damp and reeking of rot and oil. His shoulders burned from hours hunched at the forge, spine stretched too long beneath iron and heat. He rolled one shoulder. Then the other. The ache stayed.
A scream tore through the alley.
High. Thin. Breaking.
Mal stopped.
Three figures stood ahead, their shadows stretched long by the dying sun. They crowded a fourth shape pressed against brick—a woman folded in on herself, basket shattered at her feet.
Rotten fruit lay crushed in the mud.
One man twisted her wrist.
She screamed again. The sound faltered, as if her lungs couldn't afford it.
Mal's jaw locked.
'Not my problem,' he told himself.
He turned away.
One step.
Her eyes met his.
They weren't pleading.
They were resigned.
Memory surfaced, sharp and unwanted.
His grandmother, coughing blood into her sleeve. Her body light beneath a blanket that never warmed her. Her eyes still kind.
The woman screamed again.
He swore and ran.
"Hey!"
His voice cracked against the walls. The men turned. Surprise curdled into smiles.
Mal stopped between them and the woman. His hands shook. He hated that they could see it.
"Let her go."
The largest man laughed. "Or what?"
Mal swallowed. His ribs still ached from yesterday's work. His hands mattered. No hands meant no work.
"Back off," he said anyway.
The punch came fast.
His head snapped sideways. Light burst behind his eyes. Blood flooded his mouth. His knees folded and stone slammed into his spine.
A boot crushed into his ribs.
Something gave.
His scream tore loose before he could stop it.
They didn't rush it.
A fist drove into his jaw. Another struck his shoulder wrong, fire ripping down his arm. He curled, instinct pulling him inward.
A kick landed low.
Pain detonated through his hand. Fingers bent where they shouldn't. He felt them break. The sound he made wasn't human.
Still, he crawled.
Stone shredded his palms. Blood slicked the ground. He dragged himself over the woman, back arched, arms spread—not to fight.
To shield.
A boot hovered above his head.
Stopped.
"Not worth it," someone muttered.
Footsteps retreated. A curse. Spit struck the ground near his cheek.
Mal lay gasping. His chest refused to rise properly. Each breath scraped. His right hand throbbed, fingers swelling into wrong shapes.
Then—
A touch.
Light. Careful.
He flinched and forced his eyes open.
The woman knelt beside him. She wasn't crying. Her expression held something heavier than fear.
"You should have walked away," she said.
"I tried," Mal rasped. Blood bubbled at his lips.
Her gaze lingered on his hand.
"That will never heal straight."
Cold slid through him.
She reached into her cloak.
Slow. Deliberate.
She drew out a book. Thick. Heavy. Bound in dark red leather scarred by deep claw marks. Its surface caught the light wrong—like scales beneath skin.
She pressed it into his unbroken hand.
"Take it."
"I don't want—"
"This is not payment," she said. "It's a gift."
The book was warm.
"It will remember you," she said. "And you will remember it."
Every instinct screamed wrong.
He opened it.
Blank.
Relief flickered—
Then the pages burned.
Crimson symbols tore across the paper, searing into his eyes. Ash burst upward, choking the air. The alley warped, brick bending inward, listening.
The book vanished.
Pain slammed into his skull.
Mal screamed, clutching his head as the ground pitched. Light fractured. Color bled into black.
His legs gave out.
As darkness swallowed him, one thought burned through the pain:
He had stood.
And the world had answered.