"If you don't lose your fear, you lose the chance."The phrase echoed in his mind with an almost warm nostalgia, just before he woke upon inhaling. For a fleeting instant, he felt no pain; for a moment, he believed the wounds weren't there. But when he tried to exhale, all the suffering barely muffled by that brief rest returned at once, like icy water crashing down on him. He shuddered.
It was obvious now that the sky was quite dark.
Mielchor slept curled up on Eden's legs, clinging to him like a small cat.
How long? he thought as he grabbed a few leaves with his good arm. Is the wolf still prowling around? He squeezed the leaves until they formed a small sphere the size of his palm.
He threw it toward a hollow trunk; it made barely any sound upon impact.Eden let out a sigh of disappointment.
I don't want to sacrifice the backpack.He glanced at Mielchor, still curled up.
He pushed the backpack forward. It had stains of dried blood on it.I don't want to look. He clenched his teeth, with an expression caught between irony and fear, while trying to picture the state of his left forearm. The sharp pain was still there, though dulled… and he wasn't sure if he could move his fingers.
He looked for a steadier position to keep from falling as he threw with force. He did.The backpack went through the hollow trunk. It gave way without resistance: old, dry, and eaten away by time and termites.The thud made Mielchor jolt; not understanding what was happening, he jumped to his feet abruptly and puffed out his cheeks with a faint cloud of smoke.
"Shhh." Eden brought a finger to his lips, firm and upright. "I want to see if the wolf is still there," he whispered.
Mielchor swallowed and sat back down on his legs. He put his little paws together and rested his hands on his short knees, staring intently at the remains of the trunk.
"Seems like it got bored," he murmured. "Can you hear it?"
Mielchor shook his head.
"Should we go down?" he asked, uncertain; as if expecting the answer to be no.
Mielchor shrugged, not knowing what to say.
"I know! Throw a smoke screen. Maybe, if it thinks we escaped, the wolf will attack." Eden slid his injured arm, clenched his fist, and struck it against his right palm. He barely managed to stifle the groan. "I don't have stones to make it think they're our footsteps," he muttered through his teeth, gripping his forearm by the elbow.
Mielchor hesitated for barely a heartbeat... then obeyed.He spat not one, but several curtains of smoke, one after another, leaving no space between their expansion. The first touched the ground and burst, forming a gray stain in the middle of the forest.
The wolf, which had been waiting for them to come down, reacted immediately: it lunged with a swipe, cutting through much of the haze. Seeing the cloud still spreading, it followed the trail, moving away dozens of meters.
"Good, let's go." Eden stood up and pressed his wounded arm against his chest before jumping.
Mielchor followed, throwing himself into some bushes and curling up.
The backpack. He saw it stuck in the hollow trunk. For a moment, he thought about just leaving it there.
His gaze turned toward the direction the wolf had run.
The coins!He remembered how much it had cost to gather them... months of taking risks.
He clenched his teeth and took a stride, landing on his heel.He grabbed the backpack by one of its torn straps and, with a sharp twist, hurled himself in the opposite direction of the wolf. He started running with everything he had left.
"Let's go," he motioned to Mielchor to follow him, trying to say it with a tone only he could hear.
Mielchor darted after him.Neither slow nor hesitant—and despite the pain—he spat a ball of fire toward the dry trunk behind them. The wood ignited instantly, flaring up into a blaze over two meters high. As he caught up with his short legs, Mielchor kept glancing back every so often to spit another fireball, leaving behind them a growing barrier of flames and smoke.
They both slipped through the forest trees, barely lit by the reflection of the moon. The trees seemed endless; each step took them deeper into a forest with no end. They jumped over roots, dodged branches, and looked to the sides for any familiar point that could tell them where to go.
Eden was the first to tire; his pace began to falter.
"Look," he gasped between short breaths, "throw about three fire bursts to one side."
He tried to leap over a thick root jutting from the ground but tripped and fell flat on his back with a dull thud.
"Ahg…" he groaned, slowly sitting up. The fall, besides covering him in mud, had torn part of the scab across his back. He held his side, took a deep breath, and repeated in a broken voice, "Throw them all to one side." He pointed left. "If we go straight, we'd leave a trail."
He struck his chest with his fist, trying to free the trapped air. He inhaled deeply. Cold sweat clung to his forehead; the fear was still there—persistent, but different. It wasn't the terror of being alone. Now, at least, he had a chance to flee.
He looked at Mielchor. The corners of the creature's scaly lips were cracked, on the verge of bleeding, as if sandpaper had scraped them.
"Sorry for asking so much," he said, guilt threading through his voice. He motioned for him to keep running.
I can't do anything. I'm so useless! he screamed to himself in silence, clenching his teeth until it hurt.
Mielchor shook his head hard. He jumped, puffed his cheeks, and the air around them suddenly grew hot. Flames seeped through his teeth until a single roar of fire exploded into the night: four blazing spheres shot out and, upon impact, made the forest rumble. The blast left their ears ringing, wrapped in the echo of fire.
Eden looked down: his legs, his torso, part of his right arm—everything was covered in mud."Let's hide," he whispered, pulling Mielchor by the arm.
Without wasting time, both of them dropped beside a thick puddle, rolling around until they became unrecognizable. The mud covered their skin, their clothes, even their breath. Eden felt the cold sinking into his bones, but kept going, rubbing his face with his muddy hands. His hair, once dark, now hung heavy, flattened and dyed a reddish brown.
Fearing infection, he tore off some leaves with thick stems, squeezed them between his fingers until they bled a sharp-smelling liquid, almost stinging. He let it drip in circles around the wounds, avoiding direct contact, trusting the stench to confuse their trail.
Beside him, Mielchor looked like a poorly molded clay statue made by a child; only his green eyes, fixed and alert, emerged like two fragments of jade from within the mud.
"That should be enough…" Eden murmured, though he wasn't sure he believed it.
They kept moving forward. The forest seemed to press in on them, each step quieter than the last, as if the trees themselves were holding their breath. Their eyes searched for any crack, a shadow where they could vanish, until Mielchor stopped. There was something between the roots: a deep hollow, covered with rotting leaves and old moss. It wasn't a hollow trunk at first glance, but the fallen body of a tree, split in two and swallowed by the earth.
Eden approached and carefully brushed away the leaf litter. Inside, the darkness smelled of damp and dead wood—but also of shelter."Here," he said, and nothing more was needed.
They slid inside, one after the other. The entrance was narrow, and the interior uneven, almost like a natural tunnel. Mielchor had to twist himself to fit. Eden pressed against the inner bark.
Silence wrapped around them. Only the dripping of mud breaking off interrupted the stillness. Outside, the forest seemed to be listening.
They hesitated.They kept their eyes fixed on the path they had come from, tense, motionless, as if the very air were holding its breath. Then, like the sound of a lake breaking its stillness, the wolf Tharn emerged from the flames.
For a moment, it seemed ready to follow the false trail Mielchor had left, but it stopped halfway down the path and raised its snout.Eden and Mielchor watched as its nose twitched—it had caught something.
The wolf began to move, sniffing the ground carefully, oblivious to the fire surrounding it and to the decoy. It walked slowly, inhaling the air, until it stopped beside the root Eden had tripped over. It stayed there for what felt like an eternity, sniffing, trying to decipher where the scent continued.
Both held their breath.The air burned in their lungs, thick with smoke and fear, while they waited in silence, praying to whatever might listen that the beast would take the wrong path. Neither dared to move. Not even to look at each other. Only the distant sound of fire devouring the forest accompanied their waiting.
The wolf, however, was not so easily deceived. It stopped a few steps ahead, turned its snout toward the wind, and sniffed hard. Then it retraced its steps. Both saw it turn—and understood, with that clarity that only fear can bring—that the false trail had failed.
Tharn began to advance again, this time with a heavy, determined trot, heading straight toward where they were hiding. Embers scattered from the ground with every stride, and the smoke wrapped around it like a living shadow. The sound of its paws against the damp earth became a drum counting down their fate.
Eden wanted to run, but there was nowhere to go—only a cliff covered in roots. Mielchor searched for something, anything to defend himself with, but his hands found only dust and wet leaves.
The wolf kept coming closer.They could hear it snort, inhaling the air as if tasting it. At that distance, they knew it could already smell them.
And then, by pure instinct—that ancient reflex that comes before thought—they closed their eyes. Like someone who waits for the blow, knowing it will hurt.The sound of the gallop drew near, grew louder, roared beside them… and then, passed by.
It took them a while to open their eyes.The silence that followed the wolf's passing was so deep it hurt.For now, they seemed to be safe.
Eden ran a hand over his face, trying to wipe away the sweat. All he managed was to smear the mud, leaving dark streaks that he rubbed again clumsily, as if insisting would be enough to erase his exhaustion.
"Do you hear it close?" he asked, his voice barely a whisper, as they both leaned against the hollow trunk.
Mielchor shook his head and opened his mouth."Gahh," he groaned, pointing inside it.
Eden leaned closer and saw the wounds: the blisters shone like small pink moons amid the raw flesh; the lacerations mixed with fresh burns that throbbed with his breathing. Some of his fangs, blackened, looked like hardened ash. He couldn't tell if it was from smoke or real fire—but just looking at it hurt.
Both crawled out of the trunk, their movements clumsy with exhaustion. They brushed off the mud as best they could when a cold drop fell on their necks. Then another.A moment later, they heard the murmur of water kissing the stones, the air changing its texture, the smell of dust fading. And then, the storm broke.
Eden looked up.He let the rain strike him. Wash him. Sink under his skin and dissolve everything that burned. He closed his eyes and spread his arms, feeling how each drop erased a piece of the weight that crushed him.For a moment, he was not mud, nor fear, nor pain. Only water. Only life.The distant thunder sounded like an ancient song, and his body responded.
"How beautiful!" he exclaimed, with a broken laugh that mixed with the roar of the sky. "My friend, we're going to get through this… no—we will get through this!" he said, clenching his fist.Without realizing it, he spoke what he thought and felt in that moment, as if the words overflowed.
Mielchor looked at him, and what he saw wasn't entirely natural—not like he had always seen his friend. He saw… something new.Eden's eyes burned—one red, deep as molten metal. His white hair moved under the rain, but not like hair—like liquid fire, like primordial flames, a pure white dancing with the wind and the storm, consuming nothing, burning nothing.
For an instant, Eden's breathing and the rain beat in the same rhythm. that sensation of lightness had returned, but now it vibrated in sync with him.If Eden were the earth, it was as if the earth, the water, and the wind had joined in his pulse, sharing a single intention.His presence became calm and strength—a pure note held in the midst of the storm's roar.