Noctis woke to voices he couldn’t understand.

  His eyes stayed shut.

  Waking up meant the nightmare was real—the fire, the soldiers, her body dragged across broken glass.

  If he kept them closed, maybe it would dissolve like a bad dream.

  But the voices kept talking.

  “Yelai fu yga mukfhnyo mukfu?” Young. Impatient.

  “Vu mgaesnuka velga umai!” Older. Angry.

  The words scraped against his ears, all wrong, shaped like nothing he’d ever heard.

  He tried to open his eyes.

  Darkness.

  Panic spiked through his chest. He jerked his arms—couldn’t move them.

  His wrists were bound behind his back, rope biting into skin.

  His ankles too, tied tight.

  Cloth pressed against his eyelids, wrapped around his head.

  Another gag filled his mouth, dry fabric pushing against his tongue.

  He couldn’t see. Couldn’t speak. Couldn’t move.

  His breath came fast through his nose—short, shallow gasps that made his head swim.

  Where am I?

  Something shifted beside him. A small sound—a hiccup, then a sob. Then another. And another.

  Children crying. Lots of them.

  The voices overhead continued their argument, sharp and guttural.

  Footsteps moved around him—heavy boots on wood. The creak of a wagon bed.

  He was in a cart. With other children. All of them bound and blindfolded and—

  “Ngavelgamu! Ngavelgamu!” A young voice screamed.

  The wagon jolted hard.

  Noctis was thrown sideways, his shoulder smashing into another small body. The child whimpered—sharp, breathless—before curling tighter against him. Ropes creaked. Wood groaned.

  Shouts erupted outside the cart—too close. Too many.

  Steel rang against steel.

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  Not once, but again—faster now. Clashing. Scraping. A sound that made his teeth ache. Something heavy struck wood nearby, the impact shuddering through the wagon bed.

  Then a blast—wet, wrong. Thick. Close.

  A man screamed.

  The sound was cut short, snatched away mid?breath, leaving only the echo of it rattling inside Noctis’s skull.

  The wagon lurched again, violently this time. Children cried out as one—sharp, raw sobs tearing loose all around him. Someone retched. Someone else prayed in a language he didn’t know.

  Boots pounded against the earth. Orders were barked—fast, clipped, furious—then drowned out by another clash of metal.

  Noctis squeezed his eyes shut behind the blindfold, heart slamming so hard it hurt.

  He couldn’t see them.

  He couldn’t see where the sounds were coming from.

  He couldn’t see what was happening to the people screaming.

  The not?knowing clawed at him, sharper than the ropes, sharper than the fear.

  I need to see.

  The thought burned through the panic, hotter and louder than everything else.

  I need to see.

  Noctis pressed himself against the wooden boards, trying to make sense of what was happening.

  He clenched his eyes tighter behind the blindfold, straining to understand, desperate to see—

  And something shifted.

  It started as pressure behind his eyes—a strange pulling sensation, like fingers pressing outward from the inside of his skull.

  He squeezed his eyes tighter, teeth clenched.

  It hurt.

  Not like a cut or a bruise—more like the ache that came from staring too long at the sun, except there was no sun.

  Only darkness.

  Only cloth.

  The pressure didn’t fade.

  It pushed back.

  His breath hitched. His vision prickled, sparks flaring behind his lids. For a moment he thought he was going blind—that this was what blindness felt like before it swallowed everything.

  Then something slipped.

  Not the blindfold.

  Not his eyes.

  The darkness thinned.

  Light bloomed behind the fabric—not light as he knew it, but outlines. Weight. Shape. The cloth still pressed against his skin, but it no longer mattered. It was there and not there at the same time, like fog you could see through if you didn’t think about it.

  It hurt to focus. A deep throb split his skull, and instinct warned him that if he pushed too hard, something inside would tear.

  But he could see.

  The wagon bed beneath him glowed faintly blue. The rope around his wrists pulsed with a dull gray.

  The child beside him—a boy, younger than Noctis, curled into a ball—had a tiny flicker of blue essence trembling at his chest, barely visible, choked with fear.

  And beyond the wagon—

  Noctis’s breath caught.

  Five figures cut through the trees, tall and precise.

  Massive coils of blue essence wrapped around their chests like living armor, pulsing bright enough to hurt.

  The shouting changed—harsh, broken words snapping into a clean, clipped cadence.

  “They escaped!” A man’s voice, rough with frustration.

  “As always—elusive as smoke.” Younger, sharper.

  Boots thudded closer. The wagon creaked as someone climbed up.

  “Found the kids! No point chasing. Let’s get them out of here.”

  Hands gripped Noctis under the arms, lifting him. He kicked weakly, but his legs were useless, numb from being tied too long. Around him, children whimpered and sobbed.

  “Bring them with us?” one man asked.

  “Shouldn’t we return them to their villages?”

  “Our mission was capturing those filth. We’ll drop the children at the nearest city and let the Lumarch sort it out.”

  A pause.

  “He won’t like it.”

  “He never does.”

  “City like that doesn’t like loose ends.”

  “Not our problem.”

  “We’re the Phalanx.” The voice was cold, final. “Move out.”

  The man holding Noctis shifted his grip.

  Then the world dropped—no, lifted.

  His stomach lurched as the ground fell away.

  Wind screamed past his ears.

  The man carrying him moved fast—faster than running, faster than anything Noctis had ever felt.

  The air whipped at his face, tore at his clothes. It felt like flying. Like falling and never hitting the ground.

  He was so tired.

  So hungry.

  The motion rocked him like a cradle, and despite the fear clawing at his throat, his eyes slid shut.

  Darkness took him.

  Thank you for reading!

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