The alley narrowed behind him like a throat closing.
The market's roar was gone, replaced by a heavy quiet broken only by the steady drip of water from a cracked pipe above. The air was damp, heavy with the sour tang of mildew and something sharper—old metal, rusting and forgotten.
His boots scuffed against the cobblestones. The sound seemed too loud in the silence.
Bootsteps followed. Three sets. Evenly spaced. Not rushing. Not hesitating.
Predators didn't hurry when they knew their prey had nowhere to run.
Caelen's fingers brushed the hilt of his sword. The second heartbeat inside him began to stir, each thud sending a faint vibration through his bones. It was faster than before, like it sensed the danger before his mind had fully caught up.
A voice came from ahead, calm and low.
"You've been marked, boy."
From the gloom, a hooded figure stepped into a shaft of light filtering through a broken balcony. The lower half of his face was exposed—skin pale as frost, marbled with thin black cracks that pulsed faintly, like veins feeding something that wasn't entirely human.
Behind him, another figure spoke, this time a woman's voice with a faint rasp.
"Outlanders shouldn't carry what you carry."
Caelen's eyes narrowed. "And what exactly do I carry?"
The third stepped closer from the rear, his hood shifting to reveal eyes like twin embers burning low and steady. His words were almost reverent.
"A debt. One that isn't yours to hold."
They moved at once.
Three shapes flowing forward in silence, steel glinting in the thin light.
The first attacker came from the front, knife held low, body crouched. Caelen stepped into the attack, swinging his blade in a rising arc aimed for the gut. The strike hit cloth, then something solid beneath—bone? armor?—before his wrist was caught in a grip like iron.
Pain jolted up his arm as the attacker wrenched it back, trying to disarm him.
The second came from the right, blade darting toward his ribs. Caelen twisted his body just enough for the steel to graze his coat instead of flesh.
The third was behind him, arms hooking toward his throat in a chokehold.
The second heartbeat roared in his ears.
Heat poured into his muscles, the world around him sharpening into perfect clarity. He could see the twitch in the second attacker's fingers before a stab. The shifting of the first attacker's weight to his back foot. The shallow breath of the one behind him just before her arms closed in.
He moved.
Caelen drove his boot down hard on the front attacker's foot, feeling the crunch through the sole. As the man hissed, Caelen twisted his captured wrist violently—there was a loud snap followed by a grunt of pain.
Without thinking, Caelen slammed his forehead into the man's face. Cartilage broke. The grip loosened.
The second attacker lunged again, but Caelen caught his wrist mid-swing, twisting until the blade clattered to the cobblestones. His other hand shot up and clamped around the man's throat.
Something inside him burst open.
A black shimmer bled from his palm into the man's neck, crawling like cracks across glass. The attacker's eyes went wide as the color drained from his face, lips turning the same cold gray as the cracks.
Caelen felt it—the pull. It was like drawing in smoke, cold and heavy, but instead of filling his lungs it sank into his bones. The man's struggles weakened. His pulse stuttered against Caelen's grip.
When he let go, the man crumpled in a boneless heap.
The woman behind him hissed sharply, lunging with her knife in a downward arc aimed to split his skull.
Caelen ducked low, feeling the rush of steel pass over his head, and pivoted hard on his heel. His blade came up in a brutal diagonal slash. The edge bit into her side, cutting through leather and flesh.
She staggered back, blood soaking her cloak. Her teeth bared in something between a snarl and a grimace, but she didn't fall.
The first attacker—now nursing a broken nose and a throbbing foot—took in the scene. His gaze lingered on the black shimmer still fading from Caelen's palm.
He gave a slow, deliberate smile.
"Noted."
Then he stepped backward into the alley's deeper shadows, disappearing as though swallowed by the walls themselves.
The wounded woman spat blood at Caelen's boots.
"You'll regret that, boy," she rasped.
But when she tried to lunge again, her knees gave out and she hit the cobblestones beside her fallen comrade.
Caelen stood in the quiet that followed, his breath misting in the cold air. The second heartbeat slowed but didn't fade entirely. His hands still tingled, warm from the pull.
He stared at his palm, flexing the fingers slowly. The sensation of drawing life away was still there, echoing in his bones.
It wasn't just killing.
It was feeding.
And some part of him—some part that wasn't entirely his—liked it.
A faint shift of cloth made him snap his head up.
At the alley's far end, a man in layered gray robes leaned against the wall, arms folded. His face was half-hidden by a scarf, but his eyes were sharp, watching.
"Interesting trick," the man said, voice carrying easily in the still air. "But in Hollowreach, tricks like that get you noticed. And noticed…" He tilted his head slightly. "…is dangerous."
Before Caelen could speak, the man turned and slipped into the crowd beyond the alley, gone in seconds.
Caelen stepped over the bodies, out into a narrower street. The skeletal hand loomed above the rooftops in the gray sky, faintly glowing, like it had been watching the entire fight.
Somewhere deep inside, the hunger purred.
And Caelen knew—this city had just caught his scent.