Pain bloomed across Kael's vision in crimson starbursts as his body hit the stream bank. The vagrant's knife had missed its mark, but the man's fist had not. Copper flooded his mouth, mixing with the mineral taste of stream water he'd been drinking moments before.
The vagrant advanced with the unhurried confidence of a predator who'd cornered prey countless times before. His boots squelched in the muddy shallows, each step calculated to cut off escape routes. The morning sun caught the knife's edge, transforming it into a sliver of liquid silver.
"Should've minded your own water, boy," the man growled, voice rough as gravel. "This here's my territory."
Territory. The concept seemed absurd when applied to a public stream, but Kael understood the vagrant's logic. Resources were finite. Competition was lethal. The strong claimed what they could defend.
His fingers closed around a smooth stone, its weight negligible but its potential significant. The analytical part of his mind ran calculations even as his heart hammered against his ribs. Throwing accuracy decreased with panic. He needed to control his breathing, steady his aim.
The vagrant lunged.
Kael's response was pure instinct married to desperation. He flung the stone not at the man's head but at his knee, the joint already weakened by whatever old injury caused his limp. The projectile struck true, eliciting a grunt of pain and causing the vagrant to stumble.
Water. Mud. Desperation.
Kael grabbed a handful of silt from the stream bed and hurled it at the man's face. The wet earth splattered across weathered features, temporarily blinding him.
He scrambled backward, feet sliding on moss-slicked stones. His heel caught on a submerged root, sending him sprawling. The fall saved his life. The vagrant's knife whistled through the space where his throat had been, momentum carrying the man forward.
Think. Survive.
The stream's geography offered limited options. Upstream led to deeper water but slower movement. Downstream meant shallows but better footing. Neither direction promised escape from a man who knew this terrain intimately.
So Kael chose neither.
He rolled sideways into the thornbushes lining the bank, accepting the price of torn skin for the barrier they provided. Thorns raked across his arms and face, each puncture a small agony that sharpened his focus. The vagrant cursed, unwilling to follow through the natural barricade.
"Come out, you little rat!" The voice carried equal parts rage and amusement. "You're only making it worse for yourself."
Worse. The word held different meanings now than it had three days ago. Worse than watching his family die? Worse than hiding beneath his bed while monsters wore his sister's face? Physical pain paled against those memories.
Kael wormed deeper into the undergrowth, ignoring the thorns that caught and held. Behind him, the vagrant circled, looking for an easier path. The man's breathing was labored now, the morning's exertion taxing his aged body.
Time became elastic, measured in heartbeats and held breaths. The vagrant's footsteps grew distant, then stopped entirely. Either he'd given up or he was waiting, patient as a spider.
Minutes passed. An hour. The sun climbed higher, its warmth failing to penetrate the cold that had settled in Kael's bones.
Finally, cautiously, he extracted himself from the thorns. Each movement was deliberate, calculated to minimize noise. His clothes hung in tatters, and dozens of scratches wept crimson against pale skin. But he was alive.
The stream ran empty of threats, though Kael knew better than to trust appearances. He cupped water in trembling hands, rinsing blood from his mouth. His reflection wavered in the disturbed surface: a stranger's face, all sharp angles and hollow eyes.
Wound assessment began with precision. Split lip, Bruised ribs breathing hurt. Numerous shallow cuts. Nothing that would kill him immediately. But would make survival harder.
The encounter had been brief but in that short span, he'd learned volumes about vagrant life.
His stomach cramped, reminding him of needs beyond immediate survival. The bread in his pocket had dissolved into paste during the stream fight, but he forced himself to eat it anyway. food was food, regardless of texture or taste.
Movement caught his eye. Not the vagrant returning, but a crow picking at something among the roots of a gnarled oak. Kael approached cautiously, hope and hunger warring in his chest.
Bitter roots. He'd seen vagrants gnawing them during when he traveled with his dad to neighboring villages, their faces twisted in disgust but jaws working steadily. The crow fled as he knelt, revealing its prize: pale tubers growing in the earth's embrace.
He dug with bloodied fingers, accumulating a small pile of the roots. They smelled of earth and decay. His knife was back at the hollow where he'd slept, so he used a sharp stone to scrape away the worst of the dirt.
The first bite made him gag. Bitter was an inadequate descriptor. The taste was medicinal, astringent, coating his mouth with a film that no amount of stream water could wash away. But he was hungry and it was food, and that was all that mattered.
As he chewed, Kael surveyed his surroundings with new understanding.
He needed shelter. Not just the temporary kind he'd found the previous night, but something more secure. Somewhere he could defend if necessary, or at least escape from easily.
The sun tracked across the sky as he searched, each potential site evaluated and discarded. Too visible. Too confined. Too close to other vagrant territories. The perfect shelter might not exist, but adequate would suffice.
He found it as afternoon shadows lengthened, a partially collapsed shepherd's hut, forgotten among overgrowth. The roof had caved in on one side, but the remaining portion offered protection from rain. More importantly, it had two exits and clear sightlines in multiple directions.
Inside, previous occupants had left traces of their passage. Charred wood from old fires. Gnawed bones that might have been rabbit or rat. Scraps of cloth too deteriorated to serve any purpose. Kael cleared a corner for himself, using branches to sweep away the worst of the debris.
But as twilight painted the world in shades of grey and purple, something else rose. It started as pressure behind his eyes, a tightness in his throat that had nothing to do with his physical injuries
The bitter roots sat heavy in his stomach. His "shelter" was a ruin that barely kept out the wind. His clothes were torn, his body battered, his future bound to be a series of similar days stretching endlessly forward.
And he was alone.
The word echoed in the growing darkness, bouncing off mental walls he'd erected against grief. Alone. No mother to tend his wounds. No father to offer guidance. No sister to make him laugh despite everything.
Mira. Her name escaped as a whisper, barely audible even to himself.
The dam broke.
Tears came in a flood that would have shamed the boy he'd been three days ago. But that boy had parents. That boy had a home. That boy had never hidden under a bed while his family was murdered by something wearing his sister's face.
He pressed his fist against his mouth, muffling sobs that wanted to tear free. Some part of him maintained enough awareness to know that sound carried at night, that grief was a vulnerability.
But knowing didn't stop the tears. They flowed endlessly.
Logic couldn't maintain its grip. He was thirteen years old, and everyone he'd ever loved was dead.
Hours passed before exhaustion finally stemmed the flow. Kael lay curled in his corner, face swollen and throat raw. The moon had risen, casting silver light through gaps in the broken roof. Somewhere in the distance, an owl called, its voice a lonely sound in the darkness.
He should set watches. Should prepare defenses. Should do a dozen things that survival demanded.
Instead, he pulled the cloak tighter around himself and closed his burning eyes. Tomorrow he would be strong. But tonight, in the ruins that was his new 'home', Kael allowed himself to be what he truly was.
A child, grieving and afraid, learning the cruelest lesson of all. Survival and living were two very different things.