I feel like I'm attempting to outrun the darkness. By the time my bare feet pound the packed dirt of a path, I'm stumbling through thick black sheets of it, squinting as I feel my way blindly towards the washed-out spheres of light the torches latched sparsely underneath windows cast. My fingers find rough-hewn brickwork and claw me upright before my rubber legs can fold. I shove a shoulder up against the wall and double over, wheezing, my throat dry as bone and limbs wracked with uncontrollable trembles, like I'm a stick-thin winter tree one gust of wind from toppling. I give my head a hard shake, clearing out the muzzy blur that strangles my vision and my thoughts as one.

Fearful impatience rattles in the pit of my stomach, leaving me little time to force air back into my lungs before I'm moving again. My heart pounds loudly enough to shatter every one of my thoughts before they can fully form, drowning out common sense and filling my head with tangled, torn ribbon.

All I need is a person. Someone, anyone, who is willing to help, wherever they might be. Do I bang on doors? Do I keep wandering until someone shows themself? Will I be here all night? I can't afford to leave Fiesi there all night. Too much time has passed already.

Is Cody still here?

A soft gasp sounds behind me. Desperation latching onto that tiny human sound, I spin around, voice pouncing before my gaze has the chance to identify the figure before me as a woman, small and brunette, swaddled in a woollen coat, tense as straightened wire.

"Excuse me." My words break apart, loose and breathless. "Hello. I, uh, I was wondering if you could--"

She jerks a step back, and I realise the glint of her eyes snatched by the torchlight is bright with terror. Her hand fumbles for the sharp corner of the wall behind her, the one that curves into a small alley.

"--help," I finish, word dropping as if it plummets into a pit, unheard. She's already running. Before I can blink, she's gone into the alley's gloom.

My fingers tap an anxious dance at my side. I spare a glance down at them and withhold a sigh. Violet flames adorn the back of my hand, woven over my knuckles and twirling in sparks between my fingertips, their glow wild and blatantly obvious. I mutter a curse under my breath, then startle. I didn't think I knew how to curse.

The frustration of the harsh phrase grates through me all the same, ridden with ever-present nervous energy. Fists curling to crush the fire, I rock back on my heels, even more lost. I'm nothing to fear any longer, but the Cormé don't know that. I'm just as strange to them as I was when my touch was poison, and I doubt I look particularly easy to trust.

I catch a hazy glimpse of my faze reflected back in a window as I pass: eyes frantic and bloodshot, highlighted by their concentrated purple hue, and a tired face framed by a long, untamed black bush of curls, thrown in windswept arcs that make me look like some kind of feral animal. I still don't look human.

My shoulders hunch, drawn in by the small, squeezed feeling strung amid my ribs. To be ordinary was always a useless desire, and this so-called untainted fire in my core does nothing to blank out the terrible things I've done. I have no right to feel disappointed.

Nor do I have the time; the night wears on as one of scrubbed-at panic, a rope knotted in my stomach that frays another thread with every minute that passes. Whistling gales kick up chinks of dust and ice, cold, rolling waves that drag through the empty streets and rustle my short cloak. I finger its silver edge, tugging on it, though it isn't the kind designed to be wrapped around and clung to for warmth. I'm still in Shaula's clothes, dressed as someone else. Maybe that's why the dark remains helpless and barren, absent of anyone else.

Enough time scrapes by that I'm eventually forced to begin knocking on doors, though even that proves fruitless. Most don't answer, deaf to the soft, nervous rap of my knuckles. Those that do are eager to shut me out the moment their doors crack open. Fear casts grey, dismal shadows over this town, etched into the monotone nighttime shades that stick to every nook and cranny, hung as chattering ghosts in corners and swaying with the cobwebs. I see it in every face that turns me away. If trust were a thread stringing Lo Dasi together, it has snapped so harshly its haunting twang shivers in the wind. All these people want is to hide.

"Did something happen here?" I ask all on one breath, voice pitched with a hard-to-shake pleading note, as I catch one door before it shuts. The man on the other end of it gives it a shove, but I fight back, determined, meeting his gaze through the sliver of a gap that remains.

His brow furrows, face coloured in by stark shadows. "Go home, kid."

"But I--"

The words don't trip out fast enough. He pushes the door again, firmer this time, and my strength falters. I hear the thump of a hefty latch being slid into place.

"I just need help," I whisper. My voice curls up, small and fragile, and I bite down on my tongue. Fiesi needs help.

I wish we hadn't left Sarielle behind. If he was in such an unstable state already, we should never have left at all. He should've stayed with someone, anyone but me. He should've taken care of himself. I'd curse him if my worry and my guilt weren't so thick, choking clouds that ache in my temples and clog my throat.

Swallowing hard, I venture to the last door on the street. My hope is thin, but I dare not stop now, and so I knock.

The silence has claws. It chews at the back of my neck, wriggles down my spine, until I huff out a broken sigh and slump to the floor, back pressed to the unmoving doorway that won't open. My knees curl to my chest. The tears grow harder and harder to fight, welling up as a heavy, sore ache, painful in themselves. I bury my face in my hands.

I'm free.

The thought is a single ray of sunlight, chipped at endlessly by a rumbling storm until I could laugh at its pitiful glow. There's little use in freedom if I have nowhere to go and no understanding of the world around me. Freedom is listless in this way, unordered, and I don't know what to do with it. Freedom was supposed to allow me to fix everything. Am I doomed to be either dangerous or useless, without hope of anything in between?

Exhaustion burns my eyes, weighing on my blink. I scrub at them, inhaling slowly. I need to rise, but I manage little more than a halfhearted shift of my shoulders when I'm sure my ears pick up the sounds of movement.

Heart racing, I twist around, scrambling back from the door just in time to see it creak open. A young girl peers out from behind it.

My shock is blunt, sending the name tumbling from my lips before I register it. "Everly?"

Everly gasps. Her mousy curls bounce as she rocks back, a sheepish grin winding up her face. A thin scratch marks her chin. "You know my name?"

I nod, mind still treading water, thoughts liquid. I should probably get up off the ground but can't seem to move. "Is Cody..."

"Everly!"

There's a clatter from somewhere deeper within the house, a squeak of skidding boots, and then Cody's lanky frame topples into view. He snatches Everly's arm, harshly yanking her out of the porch's shadow. His gaze is sharp and stern. "We don't talk to strangers, okay? Do you want to get yourself in danger again?"

Her lower lip quivers. "No," she whispers, sniffling.

He sighs, then wraps her in a tight embrace, hand resting on the top of her head, gently shifting a few strands of her hair. "It's okay. Don't worry about it." Weary creases dig into the lines of his face, making him appear older than he should. Dark circles smudge beneath his eyes. The shadowy complexion they grant chills his formerly warm gaze as it finally cuts to me. "I'm sorry, we--"

Like the sight of me flicks a switch, recognition trickles across his expression. He pales, his grip on Everly tightening. "Nathan."

If I felt any relief at finally finding him, it's swept away within the instant. Standing is suddenly a chore, like my legs don't wish to hold me, like the earth would prefer to fold in two, dig a pit, thrust me into the darkness beneath the surface rather than leave me here to be looked at. Certainty wrapped my tongue when I told Fiesi that Cody would help us, but now I see the full extent of how foolish that was. I was clutching for any semblance of a plan, still riding the high of Shaula's defeat and my own survival. Shame burrows into my gut, a weight that roots my reluctant feet to the spot, ties me stiff and silent until the onward tick of the seconds begins to twist uncomfortably.

"Cody," I force myself to say eventually, the tremor in my voice shredding his name. "I... I need your help."

I've said those words enough times in this past hour that they only sink in once I've let them loose, delaying my wince. What reason does he have to help me? His lack of response suggests he's thinking the same. His stony expression is impossible to read.

I should bite my tongue and leave him alone. It's what he deserves, but I can't bring myself to walk away from him, not a second time. The memory of Fiesi's stillness lingers at the forefront of my mind. I lunge a step forward, sticking my foot in the way of the door lest Cody decide to shut me out before I have the chance to finish. "You don't have to forgive me," I say. "I don't wish you to. I've been terrible to you and to a lot of people, but my friend... He's dying, and I can't help him, and he doesn't deserve to be a victim of my failures. Please." I don't know when I started crying, but that word is what shatters me, shoving up as a sob. "Please. I'll disappear and you nor anyone else will ever have to look at me again, but I just... I need to know--"

Whatever the end of that sentence might have been is smothered by the thick woollen folds of his shirt.

His arms wrestle me in, locking me so swiftly and so tightly into the embrace that I find myself winded. My skin prickles in all the places he touches, warm and sticky and strange. Tense, I stare up at him, struggling to gather the breath to voice my confusion.

His soft smile lights up the amber flecks mixed in with his gentle brown eyes. "You're so dramatic. First you wander out of some cursed forest and convince me to let you set everything on fire. Then I bump into you with this creepy magic girlfriend who apparently possessed you?" He arches an eyebrow. "And now I get tears and a monologue in the middle of the night. I dread to think how I'll find you next time."

I blink, thoughts stirred in so many directions I struggle to keep up. "P-possessed?"

One corner of his smile drops, pressed more grimly. "The Shaula thing, right? I... I think I know what happened. Vaguely. Your friends were bad at explaining." His eyes glisten, growing wet, and he squeezes me so fiercely my ribs creak. "I'm just glad to see you're okay."

My chest feels as if it's full of water, compressed tight like ocean depths and trickling in warm rivulets through my veins. Biting down on the inside of my cheek, I suppress a shiver. I don't know what to do with this. I'm lost in that sea, hardly daring to breathe, declining this as reality and waiting for it to drown in a mess of bubbled mirages. This can't be right. My heart squirms, pushed at by anxious fingers.

"It wasn't all Shaula, though," I try to say, voice tight as I shove it out breathlessly. "I still--"

"I don't care." He huffs out a short, drifting laugh. "I don't really want to know." His grip finally loosens enough to allow me to scoop in a lungful of air. He takes hold of my shoulders, a certain earnest in his gaze, a pointed edge to his stare that seems to drill deep into the centre of my panic -- an arrow, primed, sinking into its centre, sucking the life from that nonsensical fear. "You're good, Nathan. Why'd you think I let you do all those things back in Katamen? I trusted you, and I will again. Whatever you think you've done, I forgive you."

Maybe all those words are weapons. Blunt weapons, kind yet merciless in the pain they inflict: the flat of a blade knocked into my forehead; a sword's hilt jabbed at my stomach; a simple, hearty slap to the face. Absent-mindedly, I touch my cheek, then let my fingers trail back into my hair, smoothing out unruly tangles as if that physical action will tease apart my shock.

I forgive you.

A serpent slithers from the recesses of my mind. Its hiss has shape; it whispers again of cost, of the weight of forgiveness, of give and take and all that I've failed to provide. I haven't earned those words.

Yet it would be hard to know it from the look on Cody's face. His smile curves with the ease of a lake's languid ripples, eyes sparking like embers buried in a hearth, dampened by the rain of his faint tears. He's nervous, still, and he's tired. The dark of what I've done sticks to him, but he smiles anyway.

And, despite myself, I smile back. If someone is willing to give forgiveness, why shouldn't I take it, in the end? It can be a burden to me if I wish it, or it can be a ray of light. Let go, Shaula said, in the guise of Edita. She wasn't correct, but she wasn't wrong either. I will not let go of my guilt -- I never can, never want to -- but I can loosen my grip, let the kinder side of life trickle in. Freedom can have something to offer only if I let it.

If someone like Cody, someone ordinary and kind-hearted, is content to forgive me, then it can be a start. Not a way up yet, but a first step.

And there'll be time for that, but it isn't right now. I yank at my smile, blink away any lingering tears, hardening my expression into one of sure determination as my spine straightens. I have a mission. "Thank you," I say, then flick my tongue over my dry lips. "I'm sorry to have to ask a favour right away, but..."

"Right." He drops his hands to his sides, offering a swift nod. Understanding is quick to pinch his features. "Your friend."

He spins on his heel to bid his sister a hurried goodbye and to lay out a few instructions, and I step back, hands clasping before me as my thoughts form a breeze that carries me away yet again. In truth, I've no way of knowing what is about to happen. My fear still drums, laced with twisting worry, bitter with flecked recollections of Shaula's presence coiled in my core. I don't know if Fiesi will survive and I know it will be my fault if he doesn't.

My flame simmers at my fingertips, warm and anchoring, and I breathe out a slow, plumeing exhale. But whatever comes next, I'll face it. I'll find a way.

At least this time, I suppose I can call myself whole.

───── ⋆⋅♛⋅⋆ ─────

Hooray, we found Cody!! He's such a good boy. Love him T^T

- Pup