“Hah—”

  Christ burst through the canopy like something fleeing a fire.

  Branches tore at his clothes, leaves whipped across his face, thorns scoring shallow lines along his arms and neck. He ducked low without thinking, twisted sideways through a gap between two trees, and vaulted a fallen trunk with a grunt — all while carrying another human being slung over his shoulder.

  “Hah—hah—”

  His breath came in jagged, tearing pulls, lungs burning like they were scraping raw air instead of oxygen. Every step jarred his spine. Every impact sent a spike of pain through his knees.

  He should not have been able to do this.

  Christ knew that.

  He had never been big. Never been strong. Even at sixteen, he was barely average height, narrow through the shoulders, more sharp angles than muscle. Carrying another sixteen-year-old — Kael wasn’t light — for this long, at this speed, through uneven ground?

  Impossible.

  Except it wasn’t.

  Cursed energy flooded his body in a way that felt wrong — not controlled, not clean. It rushed through him like a broken dam, reinforcing muscle and bone without finesse, without restraint. His legs hit the ground harder than they should have. His joints screamed, but they held.

  It was ugly strength.

  Borrowed strength.

  And it was running out.

  Christ didn’t slow.

  He ran like there was a predator at his back.

  Because for all he knew, there was.

  The forest blurred into streaks of green and brown. Roots lunged at his feet. Stones rolled under his boots. Somewhere behind him, something crashed through undergrowth with a sound too heavy to be wind.

  “Hah—!”

  His foot caught.

  The world tilted.

  Christ staggered, barely catching himself before momentum carried him forward. He stumbled another step, then another — and finally collapsed, dumping Kael unceremoniously onto the dirt like a sack of grain.

  They hit the ground hard.

  Christ rolled onto his side, chest heaving, vision tunneling.

  “H—hurll—”

  His stomach clenched violently.

  He barely managed to turn his head before everything inside him came up.

  It wasn’t gentle.

  It was a violent torrent — bile, half-digested scraps, sour liquid burning his throat as it poured out. His body convulsed with it, ribs spasming, throat raw. He gagged again even when there was nothing left, retching dryly until tears streamed from the corners of his eyes.

  A shiver ripped through him.

  Not cold.

  A case of content theft: this narrative is not rightfully on Amazon; if you spot it, report the violation.

  Wrong.

  Christ collapsed flat on his back with a groan, every muscle suddenly leaden. The shiver came again, stronger — his body seizing as if plunged into ice.

  And then he felt it.

  The river inside him — that rushing, instinctive presence he hadn’t even had words for yet — ran dry.

  Not gradually.

  Instantly.

  One second it was there, roaring and careless, and the next it was gone, leaving behind a hollow so sharp it made him gasp.

  Christ’s skin went clammy.

  His vision pulsed.

  Pain bloomed behind his eyes, a crushing pressure that made it feel like his skull was being squeezed from the inside. He clawed at his head, fingers digging into his scalp as if he could physically hold himself together.

  “A—AAAGH—!”

  The scream tore out of him raw and hoarse, echoing weakly through the trees. It wasn’t fear. It wasn’t panic.

  It was agony.

  Pure, blinding, all-consuming.

  “So this is it,” he gasped between spasms, teeth chattering uncontrollably. “This is what running dry feels like—”

  His thoughts came jagged, disordered, but sharp.

  “I used it on guards,” he rasped. “On dozens of them. Easy. Nothing. But the moment I expanded it—just brushed it over Aurelian—”

  His body convulsed again, pain spiking.

  “It was like something latched onto me. Like a leech. Like my energy wasn’t mine anymore.”

  Realization cut through the haze.

  “He’s… stronger. Way stronger. There are levels to this. There have to be.”

  Christ squeezed his eyes shut, breathing through clenched teeth.

  “I never want to feel this again.”

  Darkness crept in at the edges of his vision, thick and merciful.

  He didn’t fight it.

  When Christ woke, the first thing he thought was that it had all been a dream.

  The dungeon.

  The cages.

  The screaming.

  His body felt heavy, wrong, like he’d been trampled — but familiar. Safe, almost.

  He opened his eyes.

  Stone ceiling.

  No — wait.

  Sky.

  Blue.

  Bright.

  Endless.

  Christ sucked in a sharp breath and sat up too fast, dizziness slamming into him. He blinked hard, vision swimming, then focused again.

  It was real.

  Above him stretched a vast, open expanse of color — not the grey smear that passed for sky in the Gutter March, but something alive. A deep, impossible blue with soft white shapes drifting lazily across it.

  He stared.

  “…clouds,” he whispered.

  The word felt strange in his mouth.

  Sunlight pressed down on his skin, warm and solid. Not filtered through layers of grime and smoke and stone — direct. Honest. He could feel it.

  Christ turned his head slowly, taking in the world around him.

  Green.

  So much green it almost hurt to look at.

  Leaves in a hundred shades, bark dark and pale and cracked, undergrowth thick and tangled. Yellow flowers he didn’t know the names of. Brown earth scattered with fallen needles and moss.

  Color everywhere.

  He laughed.

  A wild, unrestrained sound burst out of him before he could stop it.

  “I did it,” he breathed. “I’m— I’m out.”

  The laugh tipped into something manic, half-hysterical.

  “I’m really out—!”

  Then reality snapped back into place.

  The wilds.

  His chest tightened.

  Freedom didn’t mean safety.

  It meant exposure.

  The emptiness inside him made itself known again — a dull, aching absence. Christ closed his eyes, focusing inward, and felt it clearly now: a reservoir he hadn’t known existed until it emptied.

  “My energy,” he murmured. “That’s what it is.”

  Understanding slid into place without effort.

  Not learned.

  Known.

  “I can… blur myself. Make people not notice. I can feel it.”

  The sensation was strange — like knowing exactly what a hand was for without knowing how muscles worked. He didn’t understand the mechanism, only the outcome.

  “I could do it to normal people,” he said quietly. “For a while.”

  His jaw tightened.

  “But someone like Aurelian? I wouldn’t last a second.”

  Panic flared suddenly, sharp and cold.

  Christ’s head snapped to the side.

  Kael.

  He scrambled to his feet and dropped to his knees beside him.

  Kael lay on his side in the dirt, face pale, chest rising and falling steadily. No blood. No visible wounds beyond bruises and scrapes.

  Alive.

  “Okay,” Christ breathed. “Okay.”

  He exhaled shakily.

  “If you tried to block that spear—if you used your ability like I think you did—then yeah. You’re just empty.”

  Christ swallowed.

  “So am I.”

  He looked around again, slower this time.

  Trees. No landmarks. No walls.

  “I ran maybe a minute,” he muttered. “Maybe less.”

  A bitter smile tugged at his mouth.

  “Good news is, I doubt they saw where we went. Bad news is…”

  His gaze swept the forest.

  “…we’re in the wilds. No food. No water. No idea where the nearest town is.”

  He scrubbed a hand over his face.

  “They probably think we’ll just die out here.”

  His jaw clenched.

  “We might.”

  The ground trembled.

  Not violently.

  But unmistakably.

  Christ froze.

  The tremor came again — rhythmic, heavy.

  Something large was moving.

  Closer.

  Christ stared down at Kael, then back into the trees.

  “…you’re going to owe me forever when you wake up,” he muttered.

  He bent, sliding an arm under Kael’s shoulders, gritting his teeth as he lifted him again.

  The cursed energy inside him barely stirred.

  “Pick a direction,” he whispered.

  And ran.