Auros Veskerel's Arc

Chapter 2 of 2

The girl at the flower stall had smiled at Auros. That smile taught them one hard lesson. To break more mortals, they needed to stand among them without sending them running. But gold skin and bone wings emptied every street they entered. So Auros returned to the dark tower with a new problem. They needed a disguise. Auros searched the tower's forgotten rooms. In a cracked chest they found a charm on a chain. The stone glowed soft pink, ringed with strange marks. When Auros closed their fist around it, the glow spread up their arm. Gold skin turned pale. Bone wings folded flat and vanished under plain cloth. Auros looked at their hands and saw a stranger's hands. Human ones. They walked into the town wearing the charm. No one fled. A woman passed close and only nodded. Auros nodded back and felt the trap tighten in their chest. Now they could stand at any door and knock. They chose a stone house with a red roof and worn steps. Auros knocked. The door opened, and a small brown creature bolted out, half dog and half rabbit, ears flopping. Behind it stood a girl in a cream sweater. She grabbed the creature before it reached the road. "He does that," the girl said. She smiled up at Auros. "Are you new here?" This was Louanna. Auros could see the house behind her, warm and full. A family that stayed close. Exactly the kind of smile worth breaking. Auros crouched and let the creature sniff their hand. "I am new," they said, in the borrowed soft voice. "Your pet likes strangers." Louanna laughed. She invited Auros to sit on the steps. They talked. Auros gave her small kindnesses, one after another, the way the baker had. Louanna trusted easily. The door to her smile stood open. Auros only had to wait for the right moment to turn the handle wrong. Then a shadow fell over the steps. An old man in a purple cloak stopped on the path. A gold crown sat on his white hair. He held a staff topped with a glowing stone. His eyes were tired, the eyes of a man who had not slept in months. "You," the king said. His voice was flat and short. He did not smile. "Your charm is bright. Too bright for a townsman." Auros felt the pink glow flicker against their skin. Louanna looked between them, confused. "I have seen wrongness lately," Aldric Whitebane said. "Water that climbs up walls. Dogs that howl at nothing." He pointed the staff at Auros. "You carry the same wrongness. I name it plainly." He did not run. That was the problem. The disguise had won Auros a place among the townsfolk. But it had also brought them under the eye of a king who could see through it.