Draven didn't let go of Sael until the city–forest stopped resisting him.
Stone reluctantly settled. The air thinned, like a lung forced to exhale. The paths slid back into place with visible displeasure, corners grinding as if memorizing the intrusion for later punishment.
Sael noticed every detail.
Draven dragged him forward, grip locked around his arm. Not tight enough to injure. Tight enough to remind.
Sael adjusted his pace to match, just slow enough to irritate.
"You know," Sael said casually, "this would be less humiliating if you at least pretended I'd agreed."
Draven said nothing.
Sael continued anyway. "Is this how wolves solve everything? Grab first, think later?"
Draven stopped.
The suddenness of it pulled Sael half a step off balance. Draven turned, looming, shadow swallowing the fox whole.
"You will conserve your breath," Draven said. "You're going to need it."
Sael looked up at him, unflinching.
"For what?"
Draven leaned closer. Not touching. Never touching if he could help it.
"Explaining yourself," he said. "Repeatedly."
Sael smiled. A small, sharp thing.
"You assume I owe you anything."
Draven released him.
Not gently.
Sael stumbled back a step, boots scraping stone. Still, he didn't run. That alone made Draven's teeth itch.
They moved again, this time with space between them. A deliberate choice. Draven could feel it. The wrongness eased when there was distance. Not gone. Just quieter.
Sael felt it too.
His ears twitched, tail flicking in irritation.
"Oh," he muttered. "That's inconvenient."
Draven's gaze snapped to him.
"What is."
Sael hesitated. Just long enough to be noticeable.
"You," he said finally. "Standing that close makes things… unstable."
Draven almost laughed.
"You're blaming me."
Sael shrugged. "I blame patterns."
They passed beneath a half-collapsed archway, stone etched with old sigils meant to mark neutral ground. As Draven crossed, the markings held. As Sael followed, the lines warped, curling inward like they were being erased mid-thought.
Draven stopped again.
"Do not move," he ordered.
Sael froze, annoyance flaring.
"I'm standing still."
The sigils flickered, then cracked. A thin fracture spiderwebbed across the stone.
Draven felt something deep and unpleasant tighten in his chest.
"This place reacts to you," he said.
Sael's jaw clenched. "It reacts to us."
Draven grabbed Sael by the front of his coat and shoved him back two full steps. The moment distance opened between them, the fracture halted.
They stared at it.
Then at each other.
Sael swallowed. Once.
"Well," he said quietly. "That's new."
Draven released him immediately, stepping back like Sael had burned him.
"You're not just trespassing," Draven said. "You're destabilizing controlled territory."
Sael laughed. Short. Bitter.
"I don't destabilize things. I reveal weaknesses."
Draven advanced again, stopping just short of contact.
"You are a weakness."
Sael's eyes hardened.
"And you're afraid of what happens if I'm not."
The accusation hit closer than Draven liked.
They moved again, tension stretching between them like a wire pulled too tight. The city–forest responded in small, angry ways. Walls leaned. Shadows deepened. A staircase rearranged itself behind them, cutting off retreat.
"You planned this," Draven said.
Sael scoffed. "You think I wanted to run into an alpha wolf with a territory complex?"
"You wanted something."
Sael's smile faded. "So did you."
They reached a narrow bridge of stone spanning a dark drop where the ground had given up pretending to be solid. Draven stepped onto it first. The structure held.
Sael followed.
The bridge groaned.
Draven felt the shift instantly. He spun, grabbing Sael's wrist and yanking him back. The bridge cracked where Sael had stepped, stone crumbling into the void below.
Sael stared at the damage, breath sharp.
"That would've killed me," he said.
Draven didn't release him.
"Yes," he said flatly.
Sael looked up at him then. Not amused. Not taunting. Just sharp and furious.
"You didn't hesitate," Sael said.
"No," Draven agreed.
The air around them warped again, pressure building, like the city was offended on Sael's behalf.
Draven cursed under his breath and shoved Sael away, hard.
"Stay behind me," he snapped. "And stop provoking it."
Sael steadied himself, eyes burning.
"You don't get to order me."
Draven turned on him, full alpha presence unleashed now, not as dominance, but as warning.
"You are alive because I am allowing it."
Sael stepped forward anyway.
The ground buckled.
Both of them staggered as the stone beneath their feet cracked, splitting the bridge down the center.
Draven grabbed Sael again, hauling him back just as the edge collapsed.
They ended up too close. Chest to chest. Breath tangled. The world screamed.
Not audibly. Internally.
Reality shuddered, the void beneath them pulsing like it was trying to swallow both.
Sael went still.
Draven felt it. The surge. The wrongness peaking.
They locked eyes.
For one suspended second, neither of them hated the other.
They feared.
Draven shoved Sael away.
Hard.
The pressure snapped. The bridge stabilized. The city–forest exhaled, irritated but appeased.
They stood apart, both breathing harder than they should have been.
"That," Draven said slowly, "does not happen again."
Sael wiped blood from his lip where he'd bitten it, eyes dark.
"You don't control that," he said. "And that's what terrifies you."
Draven didn't deny it.
They moved on in silence, the hatred between them sharpened into something more dangerous.
Awareness.
Behind them, the bridge quietly erased itself.