Chapter 2: Selene Pryce
Kairo didn't stop moving until the star-noise in his skin eased from a scream to a hum.
They slipped into a narrow service corridor behind a row of closed shops, the kind of place that smelled like wet cardboard and old oil. A rusted fire door sat at the end, half ajar, like the city had left it open on purpose.
Selene followed so close Kairo could hear her breathing.
Good, he thought. Close means she's listening.
The boots and voices outside drifted past the alley entrance, then faded.
For a moment, there was only quiet.
Kairo leaned his head back against the wall and exhaled slowly. His hands were steady, but the cold static under his skin was still there, vibrating like it wanted instructions.
Selene watched him like she didn't trust him to stay real.
"You're not normal," she said.
Kairo glanced at her. "Neither are you."
Selene's eyes narrowed. "I'm normal enough to know you shouldn't have made it out of that alley."
Kairo didn't argue. He knew what she meant.
He shouldn't have.
Not with three men, a dead end, and no weapon.
He looked up at the thin strip of sky visible between buildings. The star was gone now, swallowed by rooftop angles.
But the feeling remained.
A path that existed only if you moved like you believed in it.
Selene followed his gaze. "You were looking at the sky."
Kairo's jaw tightened. He didn't want to talk about it yet. Talking made things real, and real things got stolen.
Instead, he asked, "What were you doing out here."
Selene hesitated.
Then she lifted her chin like a person who hated begging but did it anyway. "Waiting."
"For who."
"For a ride that wasn't coming," she said flatly. "I'm not from this side of town."
Kairo's eyes flicked to her shoes. Worn, but clean. Her jacket was dirty, but not careless. She had that look: someone who'd learned how to keep dignity even when life didn't offer it.
"You were hiding," Kairo said.
Selene's mouth tightened. "I was surviving."
Kairo nodded once. Fair.
He glanced toward the corridor exit. The pressure under his skin tugged faintly, like a compass needle trying to settle.
The path was still there, dim but present.
He didn't like it.
It meant the world wasn't done with him yet.
Selene shifted her weight. "Who were those guys."
Kairo's fingers tightened around his bag strap. "People who think they can take."
Selene's eyes sharpened. "What did you have."
Kairo's gaze went cold. "A letter."
Selene blinked. "A letter?"
He didn't answer. He didn't owe her the contents.
Selene looked at him for a long beat, then snorted softly. "You almost got killed for a letter. That's either stupid or important."
Kairo's mouth barely moved. "It's both."
Silence.
Selene's voice lowered. "Why did you ask if I trusted you."
Kairo glanced at her. "Because I couldn't guide you if you fought me."
Selene froze. "Guide me."
Kairo didn't want to say the word. It felt too close to admitting something. But he'd said it anyway with his actions, and Selene wasn't stupid.
"You knew where to step," she said slowly. "It wasn't luck."
Kairo exhaled once. "No."
Selene's eyes widened a fraction, then narrowed. "How."
Kairo looked down at his hands. He couldn't see anything different. No glowing veins. No aura.
Just cold static, and the memory of a single star like a nail in the sky.
"I don't know," he lied.
The static under his skin tightened sharply, like it disliked being used for lies.
Kairo flinched.
Selene noticed instantly. "You felt that."
Kairo's jaw clenched.
Selene leaned closer, voice sharp. "Say it."
Kairo held her gaze.
Then, carefully, he said, "I saw a path."
Selene's breath caught. "Like… you saw the future?"
"No," Kairo said quickly. "Not like that."
He chose his words the way you chose a lockpick: small, precise.
"Like the world," he said, "has safe routes hidden inside timing. And for a second, I could see them."
Selene stared at him like she wanted to call him crazy.
But her eyes didn't have mockery in them.
They had recognition.
"You're Veil-touched," she whispered.
Kairo's throat tightened. "What."
Selene swallowed. "My brother used to talk about it. People who feel the Veil. People who can do… things."
Kairo kept his face blank. "Where is your brother."
Selene's mouth tightened hard. "Dead."
The word hit the corridor like a dropped coin.
Kairo didn't soften. Not because he didn't care. Because he knew grief was a door predators used.
Selene looked away quickly, blinking hard. "Don't."
Kairo nodded once. "Okay."
Outside, a laugh drifted in from the street. The men again. Still hunting.
Selene's shoulders tensed. "They're not leaving."
Kairo listened to the static under his skin. The needle tugged again, stronger now, pointing not toward safety exactly, but toward a route that would keep them unseen.
He stood. "We move."
Selene stared. "Where."
Kairo looked down the corridor, then toward the fire door.
"North," he said quietly.
The static flared. For a second, the corridor's lines sharpened, and the world offered him a thin ribbon of choices.
Turn left now.
Wait two breaths.
Cross when the truck passes.
Don't look at the security light.
A path.
Kairo's mouth went dry. "Follow my steps."
Selene hesitated.
He felt it immediately, like her doubt dimmed something in the air.
The ribbon thinned.
Kairo looked at her. "Selene," he said, using her name without knowing if it was her real one. "If you don't follow, you die alone."
Selene's eyes flashed. Anger, fear, pride.
Then she swallowed it.
"Fine," she whispered. "I'll follow."
The ribbon brightened.
Not much.
But enough.
Kairo moved.
Selene stayed close.
They slipped through service lanes and shadowed corners, timing their movement with passing vehicles and flickering lights. Twice, Kairo's heart lurched when the path forced them to step into open space for a half-second.
Both times, they made it through.
By the time they reached a small stairwell door behind a convenience store, Selene was breathing hard, not from running, but from holding her fear inside her ribs.
Kairo pressed the stairwell door open and guided her inside.
The moment the door shut, the static under his skin relaxed slightly, like it had completed a job.
Selene stared at him in the dim stairwell light.
"That thing you did," she said, voice shaking. "What is it called."
Kairo didn't know.
But the name from deep inside him surfaced again, stubborn and clear.
"Northbind," he said.
Selene swallowed. "Is it… yours?"
Kairo looked at his hands.
Then at the darkness above the stairwell, where no stars were visible, yet the feeling remained.
He nodded once. "I think so."
Selene took a shaky breath.
Then, quietly, like admitting something she hated admitting, she said, "Then you need to learn the rules before someone else finds you."
Kairo's eyes narrowed. "Someone else."
Selene nodded. "People who hunt Veil-touched."
Kairo felt the static tighten again.
Not guiding this time.
Warning.
He looked at Selene, and for the first time since the alley, he understood the real shape of his new life.
The men in the alley were small.
The Veil was the real underworld.
And he had just lit his first Star.
Kairo Nox had become something useful.
Which meant he had become something targetable.
Astral Pathmaker.