The night after the battle was one of silence broken only by breath.
Ahayue and Alusya sat by the stream, too weary even to light a fire. The cave—their refuge, their inheritance from Andalusia—was behind them now, nothing more than smoke on the horizon. Both of them were carrying more than wounds; they carried the weight of leaving the only safe place they had known.
Ahayue pressed one hand against his ribs where the arrow had grazed him. The curse had sealed some of the damage, but not cleanly; it burned faintly in his veins, and each breath sent pain lancing through his chest. He refused to let it slow him. Weakness was dangerous now.
Alusya knelt at his side, clutching a poultice of herbs she had gathered earlier in the day. She crushed them between two stones, her small hands steady despite the dark rings beneath her eyes.
"Hold still," she whispered.
Ahayue obeyed. He did not flinch when she pressed the damp paste to his wound, though his jaw locked tight.
"You don't have to hide it from me," she said quietly, her eyes flicking up to meet his.
For a moment he almost told her he was fine, as he always did. But the truth was raw in him, sharpened by exhaustion. "It hurts," he admitted at last.
Alusya gave the faintest smile. "Good. That means you'll live."
Her words were like Andalusia's—practical, but carrying a kind of warmth. She bound the cloth tight around his chest, then sat back heavily, her shoulders sagging. The fire in her eyes had not gone out, but it burned dimmer tonight.
He looked at her, this girl who had been cast aside by her people, who had seen her family slain, and still she stayed upright beside him. For all her youth, there was steel in her spirit.
"We leave at dawn," he said after a long silence. "The stream will not hide us for long. They will follow the water."
Her gaze darted toward the dark forest. "Where will we go?"
He looked up at the stars, cold and bright above the canopy. "Away. Always away."
They set out at first light.
Ahayue moved stiffly at first, his ribs aching with every step, but his legs did not falter. He carried the satchel on one shoulder, leaving his free hand near his weapon. Alusya followed close behind, her own small pack light but precious—inside it were herbs, a few strips of dried meat, and the faintest scraps of parchment salvaged from Andalusia's cave.
The forest was heavy with mist. Branches dripped with dew, each droplet falling like a footstep. Every sound was suspicious. Every bird cry made Ahayue's hand twitch toward his blade.
They traveled in silence, conserving energy. Ahayue moved with care, stepping where moss muffled his weight, avoiding dry leaves that could crack. Alusya imitated him as best she could, her brow furrowed with concentration.
After some time, she asked softly, "Did Andalusia teach you all this?"
Ahayue nodded. "She said the forest is always listening. Step wrong, and it will tell your enemies where you are."
Alusya chewed her lip. Then, after a pause, she asked, "Did she… truly think of you as her son?"
The question cut deep. He walked several more paces before answering. "Yes. And no. She called me student, sometimes child. But near the end…" He swallowed hard. "Near the end, she said she wished she hadn't learned to love me. Because it made leaving harder."
Alusya's eyes glistened, though she blinked quickly, forcing the tears back. "That sounds like something a mother would say."
Ahayue didn't reply. The ache in his chest was heavier than his wound.
By midday, the forest began to thin.
The trees gave way to ridges of pale stone, streaked with veins of quartz that glittered in the sun. Gnarled shrubs clung to cracks in the rock, their roots twisting like claws.
From the highest ridge, they saw the horizon open before them. Rolling hills stretched outward, cut by deep ravines, scattered with the bones of ruins—watchtowers and walls, long collapsed, their stone blackened with moss and age. Crows circled overhead, their cries carrying far.
Alusya stared wide-eyed. "It's so big… I never thought the world was this wide."
Ahayue's gaze lingered on the ruins. "It's wide. And it's broken."
They descended into the ravines. The air grew damp, the shadows long and chill. Strange symbols marked some of the stones, half-worn by centuries of rain. Alusya traced them with her fingers, her lips moving as if to sound them out.
"What do they mean?" she asked.
Ahayue shook his head. "I don't know. Andalusia might have."
Her voice dropped lower. "Do you think… the curse came from places like this?"
He paused, listening to the silence in the air, the faint heaviness pressing down on them. "Maybe." His voice was rough. "Or maybe it came from something deeper still."
That night, they made camp in a hollow between broken stones. No fire—they couldn't risk the light. They ate cold meat and drank from a trickle of water running down the rocks.
Alusya pulled her knees to her chest, shivering against the cold. Ahayue offered her his cloak. She shook her head stubbornly at first, but when the wind cut sharp she accepted it, wrapping herself in silence.
After a while, she asked softly, "Do you ever think about what comes next? Not just surviving. But after. When we're safe."
He looked at her, the memory of Andalusia's smile haunting him. "I think about it. But the world doesn't leave much room for dreams."
Alusya hugged the cloak tighter. "Maybe that's why we need them. To give us something the world can't take."
Her words lingered long after they fell asleep.
The days blurred into a rhythm of survival.
They climbed ridges where the wind howled like voices of the dead. They crossed rivers that numbed their skin, carrying driftwood that spun and crashed. They hunted rabbits with snares, caught fish with spears carved from branches, chewed bitter roots when hunger grew too sharp.
Ahayue taught Alusya how to move through wild places—how to recognize safe water by the color of moss, how to twist branches into a shelter, how to tell which berries would heal and which would burn the throat. She learned quickly, her hands steady, her eyes sharper each day.
Sometimes she laughed when she stumbled, and the sound startled Ahayue, so rare was laughter in his life. In those moments, he almost forgot the shadows trailing them. Almost.
But reminders came.
An arrow struck a tree they had passed only hours earlier, its black fletching familiar and hateful.
They found pawprints in the mud—too large, too heavy for any natural wolf.
And once, on a ridge at night, Ahayue glimpsed torches moving in the distance, flickering like fireflies carried by hands.
The tribe had not abandoned the hunt. They had only widened their net.
On the tenth night, Ahayue woke suddenly.
The world was wrong. The crickets had gone silent. The forest's breath was gone.
He sat up slowly, hand on his blade. The curse stirred in his veins, whispering of danger.
Beside him, Alusya stirred. "What is it?"
Ahayue raised a hand for silence. He closed his eyes, listening.
And then he heard it—a faint whistle, high and shrill, carried by the wind. Not an animal. A signal.
His jaw tightened.
"They've found us," he murmured.
Alusya's eyes went wide. "What do we do?"
"We move."
They packed nothing, left everything but blade and satchel. The stars burned cold overhead as they slipped into the night. Behind them, the forest waited, and within it, the hunters came.
The chase had begun again.