Shroudbearer

Chapters

III: Life Once Before
IV: Dark Path
I: Awaken
II: Beautiful World

III: Life Once Before

The little changeling was poised like a cat, inching as silently as he could along the sandstone floor towards an unsuspecting scorpion that was sunning itself in the thin strip of morning light that was coming over the rim of the canyon walls high above. The changeling, too, wanted to go and sit in the sun to chase the chill of the long night away, but catching his breakfast came first. After all, the gnawing hunger had been present long before the cold.

It was a smallish scorpion, and certainly not what anyone would call a trophy. For him, though, it was the perfect size: just enough to eat, with a stinger that was probably too short to punch through his hide. Probably, but such were the risks he ran if he wanted to eat.

The scorpion, still lethargic from the long, freezing desert night, was the perfect target.

The child lunged suddenly, his outer lenses flicking into place to protect his eyes as he opened his mouth wide, tiny fangs as sharp as needles at the ready. It was over in mere seconds as he caught the scorpion in his mouth and crunched down, sliding along the ground to stop his momentum. The scorpion, still not quite dead, did its best to defend itself. The incessant clicking of its tail against the young changeling’s hide was punctuated suddenly by another loud crunch as the hunter bit down again.

The taste of the… whatever it was on the inside of scorpions was bitter through the newly-made holes in its shell, but it was sweetened slightly with the subtle flavor of victory.

The young changeling picked himself back up, the scorpion in his mouth flopping weirdly with his motions, legs and tail swinging at odd angles as it dangled limply. Every step its killer took set its limbs to bouncing almost comically, though there was no one about to find it so.

The child looked around as he walked, a destination clearly in mind but not at the forefront of it. Judging by the sunlight visible in this portion of the canyon, morning would be over soon. Even though he was hardly more than seven years old he had to be aware of time. The complete intricacies of the concept of it were lost on him, the adult notion beyond his simple, uneducated mind. Still, he knew enough to know he needed to hurry, if by nothing more than experience alone.

It would be all the harder to get where he was going once ‘They’ were awake.

‘They’ were odd changelings, compared to all the others he had ever known. They wore strange things, made strange sounds, and went strange places. Some wore red strips of cloth, and others wore metal and crystal shells and carried big sticks. Whatever ‘They’ were, they usually caused him no end of trouble if they happened to see him and were near enough to do anything about it.

They did not like him, he knew. They did not like anyone like him, for all of the other changelings he had ever known were treated exactly the same.

He trotted a little faster, subconsciously eager to dodge the guards. Too many times he had been chased, or had stones thrown at him with the force of some strange, green energy, hard enough to crack his still-growing hide and leave bruises and gashes. After his success that morning in hunting, a rare thing indeed at his age, he simply wanted to enjoy the morning meal in peace.

The edge of the city came into sight soon enough, the guards already out at their posts. The guards were always out, but these soldiers were different from the ones that had been there when he had left earlier in the morning. When he left, the old guards had already been there all night, and were tired. When he came back, the new guards had only been awake for a couple of hours, and were tired. Though he didn’t understand the mechanics of a shift-change, he certainly understood how to exploit one.

He was careful to keep away from the main streets, and though he could feel the eyes of the guards on him, he knew that he was too far away for them to bother with him. If they tried to chase him this early in the morning even his short legs could get him to the alleyways before they reached him, and then they’d have no hope of catching him.

He watched them cautiously all the same, meeting the eyes of several of them. Two of the ones who wore metal shells simply watched him idly, as if they were only looking at him because he was in motion, and less boring than the empty sandstone canyon. The red-sash-wearing one, though, looked at him with disdain, his nose turned up and his eyes narrowed with distaste.

“Houseless,” he muttered, spitting in the young changeling’s direction, but doing nothing more than that.

The young changeling didn’t react, for that sort of treatment was pretty tame considering everything else he had experienced in his short life at the hooves of red-sash-wearing changelings. He didn’t understand the word ‘houseless’, nor any words, really. To him it was just a sound, a noise that the changelings who wore the armor or the sashes, or lived in the buildings, all seemed to say a lot when they saw him.

As far as he knew, it was his name.

Houseless finally tore his attention away from the guards, passing between two buildings very close to the canyon walls. On the edge of the great city the canyon was fairly narrow, the west and east walls pressing the buildings in. However, the further one went into it, the wider the canyon grew, and the larger the city became. Vemn Enox was a veritable maze before long, the city so wide that Houseless could hardly hope to travel from one side of it to the other before sundown, using such out-of-the-way alleys.

He wound between the buildings, keeping west and away from the major streets that dominated the center of town. From his place between the buildings he could see other changelings that walked the streets openly, and he had always quietly wondered at that. What did it take for the guards to treat them nicely that Houseless did not have? What was different about other changelings as small as he was that would let them walk around freely with the big changelings?

He had tried, of course: tried to be a part of it, to imitate what he saw out there. Somehow, though, he was always seen as different. Perhaps it was the bags under his eyes from nights shivering in the cold, unable to sleep, or perhaps it was his mane, long and unkempt, filled with sand.

Perhaps it was the raw scorpion, dangling from his mouth, that he considered a fortunate meal.

He had no way of knowing, or of even voicing such things in his own head. They were just feelings, just silent questions. Just childhood curiosity. He hadn’t even the presence of mind to be jealous, because he truly could not understand the distinction between himself and the other changelings out there, nor comprehend his exclusion. He just wanted the same sort of life they led, and couldn’t help but wonder what it must be like sometimes. To see the inside of one of the buildings he lived between, to have water delivered to him every day, or to have a big changeling pick him up and hold him and smile, instead of scowling or throwing rocks and shouting.

It must have been great, not to be spit at.

Despite the darkness those thoughts would have brought on a more selfish or self-aware changeling, Houseless just smiled to himself as he envisioned having all of it in his imagination. The very idea of living that life made him happier, even if it had been proven he never would get it. It was a pleasant dream, one he was happy to wander in, even during daylight hours.

He drew his attention back to his tasks for the morning eventually, though. He had his meal, but one thing in his world was more important than food, more important even than his dreams: water. Stealing water in the city required a certain level of bravery. Houseless was fortunate to have developed the skill required for the task early. He had found many young changelings, younger even than himself, dead from dehydration on his endless travels through the alleys of Vemn Enox.

He didn’t feel bad when he found them, except maybe a little sad. After all, finding dead bodies in strange places had been a pretty common occurrence for his entire life. All it had really served to do for him was to place a fear in him that someday he would be one of those dead bodies, unless he could take care of himself.

Houseless reached his destination, cautiously making his way between two houses to the side of the street. He simply stood, waiting patiently, for he had come to this place many times before. Every day, just after the sun was up, big changelings would come down the streets with carts full of boxes, and put the boxes on the doorsteps of houses. The boxes, Houseless had quickly learned, were filled with glass bottles of water, usually ten or so. If one ended up empty, normally nobody noticed, and so he often had to resort to stealing one, drinking it quickly, and putting the empty bottle back before anyone saw him.

On this morning it was different, though. On this particular morning, one that happened every seven days precisely, he did not have to steal a water bottle.

The cart came by at the same time as usual, and Houseless waited patiently as the boxes were set on doorsteps, watching the young adult changeling who did all the work pulling the cart and moving the boxes around. At last the big changeling passed by Houseless' alleyway, looking down it expectantly. His lips showed the first little twitch of a smile as he caught sight of Houseless, and he stopped his cart.

“Right on time, as usual” he said with a sigh, his smile fading slightly.

Houseless just looked at him expectantly, the scorpion still dangling stupidly from his mouth, his dusty tail twitching back and forth in anticipation.

The water-delivery changeling looked around quickly, scanning for guards. There weren’t any about in this part of town, and wouldn’t be until noon, but he always checked just to be safe.

“One of these days I’m going to lose my job over you,” he sighed, unhitching himself and reaching into the cart, pulling out a bottle, heading over to the waiting boy.

Houseless sat down and held his little front hooves up and out, lacking any sense of courtesy or gratitude.

“Oh no you don’t,” he grumbled, holding the bottle just out of reach. “Today we’re doing this different.”

Houseless just cocked his head, pouting, and continued to hold his hooves out.

“Ugh, not the face…” the older changeling boy groaned, closing his eyes for a minute and taking a deep breath. “I can’t deal with those eyes, kid,” he muttered, opening his eyes after regaining his composure. “Today you have to say ‘please’, okay? Say ‘please’,” he urged slowly, repeating it several times until Houseless started to catch on that unless he started imitating, he wasn’t getting his water bottle.

"Peaf...?” he asked, the word as mangled as the scorpion still clutched in his mouth.

“Close enough,” the water-delivery changeling sighed in defeat, giving him the water bottle. “The Kerks didn’t tip me last week, so this is what they get, I guess,” he muttered, trying to justify his breach of code. “It just doesn’t seem right, though… A kid your age, having to beg or steal just to drink? I like to think I do what I can, but I’m just a water-boy,” he sighed dejectedly.

Houseless completely ignored all of the words he didn’t understand as usual, since the water-delivery changeling always seemed to talk like this on the days he came by. Houseless just dropped his scorpion and popped the top off the bottle with his teeth, throwing it back and drinking greedily.

“Wish I could do more for you, kid, but one bottle’s all I can spare... I don’t want to lose my job,” he said apologetically, even though he knew Houseless would never complain, or understand him. Without another word, knowing they would be meaningless, he turned and headed back to his cart. If he wasted much more time, he would certainly be written up. He’d have to pick up the pace on his route today to make up for the lost time, same as always.

Houseless sighed contentedly and licked his lips as he watched him go, the bottle already half-empty. He would drink the rest of it while he ate his scorpion, and then he'd set the empty bottle on a doorstep somewhere; didn’t matter much to him, so long as the bottle went back where it came from. As far as he knew, the water-boy always brought him the exact same bottle, so it made sense to him to always put it back, otherwise he ran the risk of getting nothing.

It was easier to beg than to steal, after all.

Normally the water and the food came at separate times, and the goal became to drink the water as fast as possible. Getting caught stealing water was one of the worst things that could happen, so drinking quickly and running away was key. Houseless had seen plenty of changelings, even the older ones, get a severe beating, and sometimes even die if they fought back. Drinking leisurely was like begging the owner of the house they were stealing from to come and notice, and then the guards were sure to show up.

Drinking too fast was dangerous, though, because many changelings, especially the little ones like him, overdid it. If they drank too fast they would almost always vomit, wasting the precious water. Stealing twice in one day from the same house was a sure way to get guards to come around, so it was generally accepted that you could only get one bottle of water a day, unless you were willing to walk quite a ways to find a doorstep that hadn't already been stolen from.

So having the bottle given to him was a bit of a blessing, for reasons less obvious than the fact that it saved him the effort of timing a dash to someone's doorstep, pacing his drinking, and escaping before someone caught him. He was the only one who knew that the water-boy would stop to give him a drink, so he was the only one who got such treatment, as near as he could tell.

He was several weeks practiced by now at carrying both some food and the bottle, so he went on his way with his head angled down and eyes angled up, looking out from under his eyebrows as he walked with the scorpion crammed as far in his mouth as it would go, and the bottle dangling from his mouth, just barely held by his fangs.

He was quietly reflecting on how good it was that he could wash the disgusting taste of the raw scorpion out of his mouth when he was done with some water, maybe even in a shady spot, when a sudden crash from a nearby alleyway startled him, causing him to jump out of the alley he was currently in and take cover underneath the eaves of a nearby house. Too many times before one crash had become plenty more, and before Houseless knew it some of the bigger homeless changelings came barreling through, fighting one another.

It was best not to get involved, in those cases.

However, after many moments of waiting, no other crashes sounded. A single crash was, generally, a completely different issue. Many times Houseless had gone to investigate a solitary crash to find a big changeling asleep in the alleyway. Sometimes the sleeping changelings were carrying bags of little golden discs, and almost always their breath reeked of something foul that stung Houseless' nose.

In that case it was always best to be first on the scene. The golden discs could solve a lot of problems, if one had a few. Twice Houseless had given them to a big changeling and avoided being beaten badly, though he rarely had more than one or two to himself.

With the thoughts of a whole bag full of them dancing in his head, Houseless left his hiding place and headed cautiously for the direction the sound had come from. He peeked around the corner he suspected to be the origin, and nearly dropped his precious water-bottle from what he saw.

There were two changelings fighting, which in and of itself was not unusual. However, one of the changelings was a girl, one who was obviously a few years older than Houseless and her opponent. The little changeling squaring off against her was even smaller than Houseless was, but what was most astounding of all was that he somehow seemed to have the older, larger female on the defensive.

Her ears were down as she backed away from the changeling who was pawing the ground and buzzing his wings, outer-lenses in place to show he was ready for a fight, hissing angrily. The girl looked incredibly worried, and she cried out as her tiny opponent lunged at her, jumping backwards.

"Stop!" she shouted at the little changeling, her voice higher-pitched than usual from her distress. "I... I don't want to hurt you, okay?" she pleaded, a strained smile on her face as she tried to play the fight away from happening. "You can have the water! I'll just look somewhere else..." she trailed off as her assailant jumped at her again, backing her against a building.

Despite the fact that she was dirty and disheveled like he was, this female changeling could make sounds just like the big changelings in the armor, or the ones in the houses. It wasn't uncommon for the oldest homeless changelings to learn how to make the sounds, but a girl her age that could was a rare thing as far as he knew. Houseless set his items down gently, intrigued enough to continue watching. He recognized the words for 'stop' and 'water', having heard them many times, though he had no idea what they meant.

It wasn't looking good for her. No doubt she could stomp all over her tiny enemy, but for some reason she didn't seem like she was going to. If she didn't just give up and run away, the little changeling would eventually actually try to attack, and from what he had seen Houseless expected he would somehow win. The look on the girl's face, one of sincere distress, bothered him. He didn't like it.

He couldn't just let her stand there and get beaten up, especially if he knew he could stop that one little changeling.

Checking to make sure no one could see him, his water, or his scorpion, Houseless put his outer lenses into place, and warmed himself up, bouncing on his tiny legs, quietly setting a rhythm. He'd fought all kinds of changelings his own size over food, water, and gold discs in the past, so he knew that he could likely take the small changeling down the alleyway. With one last deep breath, Houseless rounded the corner and broke into a sprint, as fast as his tiny legs could carry him.

The female changeling had her back to him by now, slowly backing away from the little changeling, who was just as slowly making up the ground she lost. At the sound of Houseless' advance she looked over her shoulder, eyes wide with fear, thinking she was under attack now from two sides. She hardly had time enough to gasp and leap aside as Houseless dashed past her.

The other little changeling, his view obscured by the girl, reacted too late as Houseless barreled into him, the two of them going down in a heap. The alleyway was suddenly alive with the sounds of hissing and buzzing wings, the two young males twisting and punching, their tiny fangs clicking on hide as they gnawed. Neither were old enough or strong enough to do any permanent damage to one another, but it did nothing to diminish the intensity of the brawl.

It was over as fast as it had begun, with Houseless managing to pin his smaller opponent, his fangs to the little changeling's throat. Even his longest teeth weren't long enough to do more than poke painfully through the shell, but the threat was enough to end the fight over. The little changeling stopped his struggling, flicking his outer lenses out of his eyes and signaling that he had given up.

Houseless took his fangs away slowly, his eyes on his opponent the whole time. The little changeling watched him just as warily as he got to his hooves, backing away slowly with his head low. He didn't want any more bruises or cuts than he'd already gotten that day, for if he ran into a bigger homeless changeling while injured he might be in serious trouble. Such were the ways of the streets. Once he was what he felt to be a safe distance from Houseless he turned and bolted, rounding a corner and vanishing from sight.

Houseless removed his outer lenses as well, his job done. He knew he probably should have stayed out of it, but there was just something about the girl in trouble that had bothered him deeply. He knew that had her enemy been bigger he certainly would have left her to her fate. He considered these things as he turned back to face her, a scowl on his face, as if scolding her for making him do something stupid.

She looked shocked to say the least, her mouth hanging open and her green eyes wide with surprise. She shook her head and came back to reality suddenly, taking a cautious step towards Houseless. "Are you okay?" she asked, her voice thick with concern. She mistook his scowl for a pained grimace, reaching out to him on instinct with a hoof. "Here, let me see..."

Houseless, not sure what she was trying to do, took a few steps back and let out a short, low hiss in warning.

She withdrew her hoof immediately, a worried look on her face. "S-sorry! Sorry!" she apologized quickly, taking a couple steps away from him. "Is that better?" she asked, giving him a weak smile.

Houseless let the tension in his shoulders fade a little, the distance between them giving him some confidence that nothing was likely to happen that he couldn't get away from. Whoever this girl was, she was nothing like anyone else Houseless had met before. She was timid, fragile almost, and something about that was strangely alluring.

"I, um..." she muttered, kneading her front hooves as Houseless stared at her curiously. "I hope you didn't get hurt. I didn't expect that little one to act like that... normally if I give them a little bit of water they'll leave me alone, but he tried to take the whole bottle! And then you came in, and... everything just got out of hoof," she trailed off quietly, noting Houseless' blank expression.

"You can't speak, can you?" she asked, and her tone carried a note of pity. Hardly any homeless changelings learned to speak on their own, and only the older ones who could survive closer to the main streets ever seemed to bother.

Houseless' ultimate silence and curious expression were answer enough.

The girl sighed, and nodded. "Well then, you won't understand this, but... thank you," she said with a warm smile.

Houseless felt his entire body suddenly go warm, his eyes going wide with surprise. He took in an alarmed gasp of air as his chest felt strangely tighter, his heart leaping into his throat and beating faster. He put a hoof to his chest on instinct, trying to feel for the source of the strange reaction his body was going through. Whatever it was, it was new. Never in his seven years of life had he ever felt anything like it.

It was ecstasy.

Somehow Houseless could tell that the feeling wasn't normal. It felt as if, somehow, it was coming from the female changeling, and not from himself. Her warm smile, the look of gratitude in her eyes, and the powerfully warm, pleasant feeling kept him rooted on the spot, and drove all thoughts of going back for his scorpion away.

"Well... I suppose I should go," she whispered suddenly, the feeling lessening abruptly.

The sudden decrease in magnitude of the feeling sobered Houseless somewhat, and he shook his head vigorously, coming back to reality. His heart was still pounding, and he was still short of breath. His nerves itched and he felt... alive. Alert and energized, as if he had gotten a long night of sleep without waking up shivering, and had eaten a full meal. As the girl moved to take a step away, he found himself moving closer, and reaching out to her.

"What is it?" she asked, surprised by his approach. She watched as Houseless, having no way to convey it any other way, rubbed a hoof on his chest, a pleading look on his face. He wanted the feeling back, badly so. It was the best thing he had ever felt in his entire life: the feeling of gratitude.

"Oh! The feeling," she exclaimed, understanding suddenly what must have happened. She smiled warmly at Houseless and turned back to face him. "I know what you want, but I can't just... give it to you," she said sadly. "It just sort of happens. I don't know how the feeling works. But I really am grateful," she finished politely.

Houseless just scowled at her as the feeling continued to fade in intensity, tapping his chest greedily.

She sighed, understanding the selfish notion for what it was. "I can't just make it happen," she said quietly, her tone pleading with him to understand, even though she knew he couldn't. "But maybe I can be your friend. Would that make you happy?" she asked.

Houseless just stared at her curiously once more, for the start of a new feeling was budding up under the last bits of the gratitude. If it was anything like the other feeling, he wanted to feel it, too.

"How did this work?" she asked herself quietly. "First we have to make a bond, right? Um... yeah, the bond," she declared suddenly, recalling the lesson that was years old now. "My name is Meika," she said, pointing to herself.

Houseless continued to look at her expectantly, his tail twitching.

"Meika," she reiterated again, saying it more slowly. She repeated it several times, and then Houseless suddenly scowled at her, understanding what was going on.

This had already happened once today. Why was everyone trying to get him to make the stupid sounds? First the water-boy and now this? But, just like he had wanted the water, Houseless wanted the feeling. Bearing his annoyance for the sake of getting what he wanted, he decided to at least try.

"Mik," he declared firmly, as if that was all she was going to get, and she would have to accept that. It had worked with the water-boy, and so Houseless tapped his chest as if to say 'now give me what I want.'

"Close, but no," Meika replied with a chuckle, the subtly positive wave of her amusement doing something to take the edge off of Houseless' growing irritation. "Meika," she urged again, pointing to herself all the while.

After several more attempts, Houseless finally managed it. "Meika," he replied at long last, pointing to her when he said it.

"See? I knew you could do it!" she congratulated with a wide smile, and Houseless was again at the mercy of a wave of pure emotional ecstasy, being praised for his efforts. Maybe this whole sound-making thing had something to it.

"So, what's my name?" she asked, pointing to herself, but not saying it this time.

"Meika!" Houseless replied excitedly, eager for more of the feeling.

"Good!" she congratulated again. "Sounds like you get it. Now then, what is your name?" she asked suddenly, pointing at him.

"Meika!" Houseless declared happily, certain that this was what she wanted. After all, anytime she had said 'name' before now, it was supposed to be followed by 'Meika.'

"No," she said with a shake of her head and a weary smile, having expected this to happen. Her mild disappointment in his reply took the high off of the feeling Houseless was getting, drawing his focus back to the lesson.

"Yours. Your name," she said again, pointing at him.

After a few more times repeating the gesture, Houseless thought he knew what she wanted. "Houseless," he said happily, having heard that sound so many times in his life that repeating it was easy.

The girl reeled back like she had been slapped. The feeling coming from her now was strange suddenly. Cold, and empty somehow. "You poor thing... that's not a name," she said sadly, looking at Houseless with deep pity. "You shouldn't call yourself that..."

Houseless just looked at her curiously. The feeling didn't feel good, not like the other ones had. It itched and felt strangely cold... Had he done something wrong? She looked hurt and confused. Perhaps the sound meant something more than just his name.

Perhaps it was not his name after all.

"You don't even have a name, do you?" she asked quietly. Houseless' puzzled and slightly-pained look spoke volumes. Meika's sad look brightened suddenly, though, a smile coming to her face. "Then I'll give you one! That's not how the bond usually works, but you can't go the rest of your life calling yourself Houseless."

Whatever she was excited about, Houseless didn't mind. It seemed like she was happy about something, whatever it was, and that was a step up from the bad feeling a moment ago.

"Now, what to call you? Um... Maybe Lucal? It means 'little warrior,'" she said pleasantly. Her smile shrank shortly afterwards though. "No, maybe not... you're definitely a fighter, but I don't like fighting... something nicer. Like Sinnak. Hmm, no, that doesn't suit you either..." she muttered, closing her eyes tightly and putting her hooves to the sides of her head, as if it hurt.

Her eyes popped open suddenly and she smiled widely. "I've got it! I'll call you Malik," she declared happily. She pointed to him and said it again. "Malik."

It was not long before Houseless was repeating it. It was not long after that that Houseless was Malik.

"Malik! Malik, Malik, Malik!" the young changeling declared happily, delighted to have succeeded at sound-making once again, and to have been rewarded with the good feeling.

Meika just chuckled as she watched him bounce around, too full of energy from the emotions he had experienced flowing from her. "Yes, that's a beautiful name. It suits you very well," she said happily, putting a hoof gently atop Malik's head, for he had drawn near and stayed there long enough for her to dare to touch him. He didn't pull away, and even seemed to enjoy the contact as he rubbed back, saying his name over and over.

Meika just smiled, glad to have brought him such joy. "It means... 'my hero.'"

Malik chuckled as the last words of the memory faded slowly, along with the last rays of the sun outside. In the city below, lamps were springing to life, their green glows rivaling the stars for beauty. It was a memory he had nearly forgotten, he realized, and such was the cause for his tired laugh. For so long his dreams had been only of the terrors he had survived, and those he had caused.

Such a fond memory was buried too deep to dream of anymore. Yet, somehow, it was where his tale had begun.

Aurus didn't interrupt that silence as Malik recovered his thoughts, bringing them into line. "The days before that aren't worth remembering. Just an endless cycle of freezing, starving, stealing... One day was hardly different from another without her. She was just as her name would make her out to be... 'Sunrise.' The dawn of my life," he said with a fond, yet somehow aching, sigh.

"It is a beautiful name," Aurus replied with a small, bittersweet smile of his own.

"She was a beautiful girl," Malik replied without a moment's hesitation. He chuckled suddenly, though, unable to stop a mild bout of laughter. "Her own name was the only one she had gotten right, though," he admitted.

"I thought something was strange in your tale," Aurus replied with a small laugh of his own. "To say 'my hero' is not 'Malik', but 'Ma'Loc'. Little warrior is not 'Lucal', but 'Luc'cayel'." He gave Malik a knowing smile, which the ex-assassin returned with one of his own.

"She spoke changeling better than all of us in those streets, but she was certainly no master," he chuckled. "She was not born houseless, like the rest of us. No, her family fell to ruin much later in her life. She had elementary lessons in magic, speech, reading and writing. In the trash-strewn alleyways, she was like a goddess with even that limited knowledge," he admitted.

"But it made her fragile, growing up in a house that loved her. Her life in the streets was bound to be cruel, for she had learned the lessons of society, not the lessons of survival," he finished quietly.

"When I learned later that my name did not mean what she had thought, it did not matter to me," Malik said quietly, reflecting on it. "In a way... I was glad. To the rest of the world, Malik means nothing. It is just a sound, to them. It was just a sound to me, once. But to Meika it was my name, and to her it held meaning. She made it unique, made it hers, and then made it mine. It has been my greatest treasure."

"She visited me every day, for a time. Not long after, she began to wander with me. We grew... attached. She was so delicate, so naive. She didn't understand many things, and I did not understand many more. She taught me what little she had learned in her life. To speak, to barely read and write... And I protected her. I gave my everything to live up to the meaning she had given my name." Malik put a hoof to the window gently, as if touching the glass would take him back again to those days.

Aurus nodded in understanding, his face now strangely serious as he looked back out the window to the city below. "I was right after all," he said simply. "You once knew a world of beauty. A perfect beauty that only you could see," he clarified. The world he saw, and the world Malik had seen, were not the same, yet neither was more worthy than another.

"That may be so," Malik replied with a tired sigh. It was already evening, but there was still so much to tell. "I hope, for all our sakes, that the beauty you see never fades. For me, it already had," he whispered, readying himself for the next, more painful memories.

"I have three dreams which plague me even still," he began quietly. "One of failure, one of sorrow... and one of innocence lost."

IV: Dark Path

Malik yawned widely as he extracted himself gently from Meika's embrace. The older, taller girl had him wrapped in a tight hug, the two of them sharing their body warmth as they had for the last three years together through the cold desert nights. The morning light overhead was dim yet, promising that dawn had only just begun. He turned his gaze downward to his dear friend, who was already subconsciously curling up tighter because of his absence.

The way her short, cute muzzle scrunched up as she huddled into herself made Malik's smile bittersweet. He hated leaving her like this every morning, but he knew it was necessary. Even so, with her long mane and tail fanned out around her on the alley floor, he couldn't help but pause and admire her beauty. It would have been all the more so, he knew, if her stunning emerald eyes had been open. Even the well-kept girls of the highest houses that he had sometimes seen on the main streets were not her equal in beauty: not to Malik.

He shook his head to clear his thoughts, sighing to himself. He had much to do that morning, as it was with all mornings, and so he had to go. The quiet whining sound she made in her sleep was the most painful part of it all to him.

"Sorry, Meika... but breakfast will not find itself," he muttered a quick apology to the sleeping girl, before trotting off down an alleyway. As always he would do his best to return before she woke up, and as always he went on a short but thorough patrol, checking the alleyways surrounding her to ensure no one would find her, or bother her, while he was gone. Though few, if any, of the older changelings who woke as early as he did would have time to spare looking for the girl, he always found the time to spare to ensure they would not find her if they tried.

He was more her caretaker than she was his these days. Meika had no desire to steal, nor a knack for it. She had no desire to fight, nor a knack for that, either. Despite their burdensome results, Malik found these traits to be endearing, somehow, though for a very long time he had been frustrated with her for her unyielding morality. He hadn't understood why they weren't spending their days stockpiling food, or using their combined strength in numbers to set up a semi-permanent home, a place where little and big changelings alike would leave them alone.

Instead she had insisted on dragging him to very strange places, always talking. Sometimes they would spend their afternoons underneath the eaves of a school building, Meika listening to the lessons through the open windows and teaching Malik as quietly as she could to prevent being discovered and chased away. Other times they would go to see another young changeling girl her own age who was not houseless. She would often give Meika various papers, and sometimes even a few of the golden discs changelings with houses were so fond of.

The papers contained ever more lessons, and over time Malik had given up on being frustrated with such things. Before long the continual learning was just a part of his daily routine with Meika. It had seemed normal after months of doing so. Now, after three years, to do anything different would have felt very strange indeed. He had learned a great many things from Meika and her efforts, and now that he understood the value of that knowledge he was grateful. It would have taken him an entire lifetime to learn on his own what Meika had taught him already, and he was learning more every day.

He quietly laughed at a time not so long ago when he had thought that 'Houseless' was a name, and not a state of being.

Being able to read was one of the greatest assets he now had, for it had given him a deeper insight into things he had previously done simply on instinct. He could now decipher the delivery schedules of the water carts that were posted around town, and position himself accordingly. He could record, albeit roughly, and memorize guard patrols to make getting through the city simpler. With words he was able to think more things, and act on them more deeply.

He was content with that, for a time, but eventually his studies had branched away from just language. Meika had taught him some very basic magic, too, but he had found that using it often or needlessly was tantamount to suicide, for it left him feeling weak and helpless if he used too much. She was by far the better mage of the two, and so Malik left most of that sort of thing to her, if the need ever arose. She was quite adept at snaring scorpions with her magic, which allowed Malik to blast them with rocks using some magic of his own. Using this method he was able to kill larger and larger scorpions, feeding the two of them more and more.

At first it had just been for the sake of the feeling. He wanted it, needed it. Without it he felt tired and empty, and every night that Meika was not with him was much the same: colder, harsher, and restless. In the beginning she had visited Malik only once a day, to teach him something and spend some small amount of time with him. Then she would depart again, and he would have to wait another day to see her.

However, one day she had simply stopped leaving, and had started traveling with the young boy. Malik had not known how to speak many words then, so he hadn't been able to ask her in the past. Something must have happened to her that had brought her back to him to stay, but though he had asked many times, since learning how, she would never say. He had long since given up on trying to unravel the history in it, choosing instead to relish in the present.

His days after she joined him were full of new feelings from Meika, or because of her. It was not long before there was another feeling he did not recognize and did not understand blossoming in his heart. This one was solely his, not a gift from Meika. He felt it only when he looked at her, or when she laughed and hugged him tightly. Though the emotions he felt from Meika gave him energy, it was this new and mysterious emotion that had given him life and purpose in the last two years. It was this emotion that had driven him to learn, to grow smarter and stronger, and to protect her.

He cleared his head of the memories, having reached his destination. The baker was just putting up his open sign when Malik arrived, as he always was. Once he had learned to speak, Malik had found that there were more rare individuals like the water-boy he had known for so long: the sort that would associate, at least in secrecy, with a houseless street-urchin like him.

Malik didn't say anything to the baker, nor the baker to him. The young changeling simply reached into a pouch he wore around his neck, and pulled out one of the golden coins, passing it to the store owner. This exchange was many months practiced now.

In return, the store owner passed Malik a heavy sigh, and a much lighter bag of day-old bread. "How many are you feeding now?" the baker asked suddenly. He didn't speak much when Malik came to purchase from him, for fear of drawing attention to the common meetings, but today something was clearly on his mind.

Malik quietly pondered. He knew that after he and Meika had eaten the two of them would go in search of younger changelings and give them the leftover bread. Malik hated wasting the food, thinking they would be better off saving it, but Meika insisted, and with Malik she always got her way.

"Seven. Or nine," Malik said concisely, shrugging his shoulders. "Hard to say how many we will find today. Six last time. Three dead."

The baker looked taken aback at Malik's calm, simple delivery of the news that he had found dead changelings in the back streets.

"We buried them," Malik said simply, thinking that perhaps this might set the baker at ease. The last thing he needed was for the baker to refuse to do business with him anymore. "Can't burn them. Guards will come if we do. Bury them is all we can do," he explained simply.

Softhearted Meika had said so many times as she and Malik strained to dig graves in the ever-shifting desert sand, side-by-side.

The baker closed his eyes and let out a shaky sigh, clearly composing himself. "At least you give them that much," he whispered quietly. With a sudden, determined nod he tossed another bag of old bread to Malik. "Find as many as you can, and feed 'em... I don't want to hear you say you buried more just because I didn't give away a few slices of bread," he muttered.

Malik looked at the second bag in his hooves with clear surprise. He fished around hurriedly in the pouch around his neck for another coin, but the baker just growled and shook his head.

"Don't bother, just take the bag and go," he muttered, clearly still conflicted over the matter.

Malik took his muzzle out of the pouch, looking at the baker curiously. Being given something for free was not uncommon from some of the establishments he frequented, but it was rarely so much. Nor was this baker particularly prone to such generosity.

Malik realized the guilt for what it was. Anything else said about dead changelings or the extra bread would not help him in the least with the baker now, he knew, and so he dropped the questions that were on the tip of his tongue.

"Thank you," Malik said quietly, before clutching the bags in his fangs and trotting off, leaving the distraught baker to himself, like he had wanted. He had never understood why seeing or hearing of dead changelings disturbed people with houses so badly. Meika had been much the same at first. The sight of a dead, younger changeling would set her to tears in those days. Now even she seemed to bear it with the same sort of stoicism that Malik did; not nearly as detached, but detaching herself all the same.

Three long years of wandering the streets could do that to even the most fragile girl.

Malik abandoned his reflections on the memories as he made his way back to where he had hidden Meika. He knew before he even got there that she would not likely be alone when he arrived, despite his best efforts patrolling. The youngest houseless children seemed drawn to her as if by some otherworldly force, and always managed to find her no matter how well-hidden Malik tried to make her be. Still, better that it should be the young ones finding her, for they were almost entirely harmless.

They also provided a slight sense of security by simply being around, as well, for if they felt safe enough to visit Meika, then it meant none of the more violent or powerful older changelings were nearby.

There were two such young changelings with her when he arrived, and though he was quietly jealous and mildly upset, he did his best to ignore such feelings as Meika talked to them happily and petted their manes. Three years ago he had been just the same as them: voiceless, wordless, nameless, and hopeless. Meika, and only Meika, could give these things to changelings like them.

He allowed the sight of her happy face, and the small, knowing smile she gave him to calm his nerves. Her eyes apologized silently for dividing her attention, which Malik had craved since the two had met. Malik let it go at that, a smile of his own coming to his face as he instantly forgave her. He even allowed himself a small laugh as the two younger changelings began to push and shove one another, the beginnings of a fight for Meika's affections, which she quickly stopped with a scolding tone and a directed feeling of disappointment.

"Was the baker there?" she asked quietly, her voice far too melodic for the setting it was in. She had one of the two younger changelings under each foreleg now, keeping them apart but holding them close to her to warm them and make them happy.

"Is he not always?" Malik replied with a small smile, unable to deny that the sight of Meika holding the young boys was nostalgic.

"You mean, 'Isn't he always,'" Meika clarified politely, correcting his speech, which was needlessly formal and wordy.

"I suppose," Malik sighed, having found it was better to admit he was wrong than to try and defend his meager knowledge of whatever subject he was being corrected on. "He gave more than I paid," he admitted, tossing one bag of bread to Meika, while holding the other up for her to see.

Meika's eyes went wide with surprise as she caught the bag with her magic for only a brief moment, her hooves otherwise occupied. "Why did he give us so much?" she asked skeptically, though her tone remained more astounded than suspicious.

It pained Malik to know that, despite her pure and noble heart, his cynicism and paranoia were slowly starting to rub off on her, as much as her righteousness and kindness were on him.

"Guilt," Malik explained quietly. "He asked how many we needed to feed today. I told him perhaps as many as nine, us counted."

"Ourselves included," Meika corrected automatically, looking over the bag once more.

"And I told him about the three we buried," he continued, ignoring her correction. "This bothered him. He gave me the extra bread saying to feed as many as we can. Perhaps he feels it is his fault little changelings die," he mused idly.

"Children, not little changelings," Meika corrected again. She let out a heavy sigh as she held the bag tightly, reflecting on his story. "You shouldn't tell people things like that, Malik. Normal people don't understand what it's like," she whispered, though she hardly needed to explain that much to him. "If the deaths were the fault of one simple baker, then our lives would not be so hard," she said with a sad smile. "You shouldn't make people feel guilty, especially when they are so helpless."

"I did not mean to," Malik replied with a tired sigh, having been lectured similarly many times. "I do not know what else to say to people like them. Why keep the truth a secret, except... especially if they will give us more food?" he asked gruffly, correcting himself along the way.

"Because it isn't right," Meika replied simply, opening the bag and giving each of the little changelings clinging to her a piece of bread, which they voraciously consumed, looking entirely content as the munched away, still cradled by Meika's loving embrace.

Malik just sighed, knowing that he was defeated, and that to argue against her idealism would be pointless. "How is it that you always know what is right?" he asked grumpily, more to himself than to her, plopping down on the alleyway floor. "Why am I always wrong?"

"You're not always wrong, Malik," she said, taking a scolding tone with him for thinking so negatively.

"Even when I say I am wrong I am wrong!" he declared snidely, unable to stop himself from doing so. Despite the maturity he had been made to shoulder, he could not help feeling every bit the immature child when Meika scolded him, and the urge to retaliate was sometimes too great.

Meika looked at him as if she had something to say about his attitude, but simply dropped it at that. She didn't like fighting, so she would let it go. She sighed, turning her attention away from him for a moment, and tending the two younger changelings, who had finished their bread and were asking for more by gesturing to the bag, and their mouths. Meika gently told them no, in the simplest way she could, though it pained her to do so.

"I don't always know what's right," she admitted quietly, and her tone seemed somewhat sad. "It's more a feeling I get than something I know. Haven't you ever felt that something was wrong, so you did what you thought was right?" she asked, giving him a sidelong glance. Her beautiful eyes held his own mercilessly, and there was no escape from her question.

"You ask a silly question," Malik replied at length, ending his words with a chuckle. "Three years ago I saved you from a bad thing, yes?" he asked, giving her a cocky smile as he opened his own bag of bread, popping a piece into his mouth. "And now for three years I have kept you out of more bad things. Is this not the right thing, like you say?"

"A bad situation," Meika corrected gently, but the smile on her face and the slight flush of embarrassment tingeing her hide signaled her imminent apology. "I'm sorry," she said with a gentle sigh, eating a piece of her bread. "I never meant to be such a burden when I started staying with you, and-" she began, but Malik cut her off with a raised hoof.

"You are not a burden," he replied quietly, taking a bite of bread as he mulled over the next thing he wanted to say. The wording was confusing, and perhaps it did not mean what he wanted, but he would try. "The most burden you are is when you say you are a burden," he said slowly, rethinking each word just before he said it. "It is all that bothers me, because I do not think the same thing."

Meika blushed deeply as Malik promised, as eloquently as he could, that she was no burden to him at all. "Thank you, Malik," she whispered quietly.

"You, of all people, thank me for nothing," he replied simply, his small, almost loving smile all the more reply she needed.

A loud bell sounded further into the city, the tolling echoing through the alleyways and back. The rings totaled seven in all, and so Malik got back to his hooves, his piece of bread finished. "It is time to gather water," he said by way of dismissal, though it was most certainly true.

Meika sighed, the moment having passed between them in silence. "Alright. Be careful," she called warmly, Malik already making his way back towards the streets. He would need many bottles of water to go with the pieces of bread. Feed many mouths, quench many thirsts, as the saying he had made up himself went.

"I am careful always," he chuckled, leaving before she could correct him once more.

"We fed the hungry, warmed the cold, and when we were too tired to move after our labors of the day, we would collapse together in some nameless alleyway," Malik said quietly, his eyes closed in remembrance. "I struggled against her ideals, at first, but she was... overwhelming," he murmured. "Like the desert sun she had been named after. It burned at times, being close to her," he admitted.

"I did what I could to be a part of her world. She saw things I could not see, knew things I could not know. She hungered to teach me, and so I hungered to learn. I had never been so hungry in all my life as then." He grew silent, collecting his thoughts once again, attempting to steel himself. "She was like a fire in my heart..." he whispered, but all of his moments of preparation could not save the sound of sorrow from his words as he choked on them.

"Malik..." Aurus whispered consolingly, his face wrought with something familiar to the ex-assassin... it was the same look he knew he was wearing himself. The sorrow reflected there only stung all the more.

"I lost her. I could not save her, and all the hells take me when I go for that one sin alone," he said breathlessly, his throat clenched with tears. "I loved her so..."

Aurus placed a hoof on his friend's shoulder, letting out a shaking sigh, but unable, for once, to find words that would be right. Malik braced himself for the pity he was certain would come; that cold and unforgiving emotion that made him feel hollow. A feeling he had felt for so long in his houseless life, and was all too familiar with.

It did not come, nor did it seem to be buried or hidden within Aurus, for not a hint of it showed in his eyes. Malik instead felt a warming feeling, one that he had not felt in a lifetime: the feeling of sincere sympathy, of someone who understood him, and could share his feelings. Aurus was not trying to imagine what Malik was feeling, or simply wishing him well; he was feeling it wholly, as evident by the tears starting to form at the corners of the king's own eyes.

He had never felt so helpless, so broken, in all his life. Not even on the day that Aurus had shown him the truth. Not even on the days where he had been starving, dehydrated, or freezing. For the first time ever, his guard was gone completely as he placed a hoof across to Aurus shoulder, returning the gesture, tears streaming fully now.

"Let it go," Aurus urged him quietly.

"Would that I could," Malik replied with a shuddering sigh, trying to reign in his tears for now. "But this, too, is something you must know. Even through my sorrow, I will tell you everything," he said, closing his eyes and readying more memories. The most painful ones he had, the ones that nothing could cleanse from his mind.

"You have to know how I was broken, before you can understand how it is you fixed me," he whispered.

Five long years. He had known Meika for so long, it seemed. She was sixteen now, and even more beautiful than ever. Her long fangs were delicately curved, and as white as the glare from the sands themselves. Her deep green eyes were dangerous in a way, a labyrinth of beauty from which only Malik could return, and even then not unscathed. Her smile was more valuable to him than a thousand-thousand golden coins. Her laughter filled him more than a king's feast, and warmed him more than even the unrelenting sun. Her beauty burned, but he could not look away.

Nor could he ever tell her such things, though he had often tried to convince himself to do so. The older, more mature Meika would likely have laughed at his boyish enthrallment. It mattered hardly at all to Malik, though, that she did not know. No doubt she could feel his adoration, for it was too strong a thing to have never been felt by her. Even so, even with such a ready excuse for him to tell her as the ever-present feeling, he would never tell her that he had come to love her in five short years.

She must never hear him say so.

He had become her guardian instead, not her lover, as much to protect himself as her. When he embraced her it was to warm her. When he held her hoof it was to pull her down a different alleyway, keeping her safe from harm.

When he kissed her cheek it was in secret, before she was awake and the sun was up.

It was something he knew he should not do, but he could not help himself. She was so delicate even still, and every morning he had to touch her, just to prove that she was real.

"Malik?" Meika asked, giving him a curious smile as she felt everything clearly. Malik could not hope to hide it, but she, like him, said nothing. "You are staring again," she said with a light laugh, stopping her turn around the next corner just ahead of him.

"My apologies," he replied with a tired sigh, not the least bit surprised at the admonishment. He did not even bother to pretend he had not been staring at her anymore, for it was far out of his control.

Meika just gave him a sad smile, one far too understanding. "Where should we go from here?" she asked, trying to change the subject as much as get her bearings.

"Five east, and two north," Malik replied simply, knowing the area intimately. "Old Hodden doesn't like visitors, except for the young children he teaches, and this is his territory," he said simply. "Not that the old man can do much, but respecting elder territories is-" he continued, but Meika interrupted him with her soft voice.

"One of the rules," she finished for him. "I know better than to break your rules, Malik." She fixed him with a fond smile, letting out a gentle sigh. Malik had many rules that Meika was to follow, and all of them had helped her stay alive in the past five years at some point.

He was not the little boy she had grown up with anymore, not really. Gone were his days of only scrapping against changelings his size or smaller. He was well-built for his age. His hide was thick, and though he was short his muscles were powerful. His size often lent him the advantage, for he was eternally underestimated. Beyond that, because of Meika's companionship, he could use magic, and still be able to fight afterward. Rumors had spread among the changelings who could speak that he was not to be trifled with, and that approaching Meika was impossible. The female changeling could see whoever she wanted, but the opposite was not true.

Malik was not fond of asking questions so much as he was of fighting.

On the occasions that she hadn't followed the rules, Malik had intervened to save her. Malik had fought ferociously for her sake against opponents much larger than himself, and much older besides, many times. However, no matter his zeal, he almost always lost to such changelings and would be beaten badly. Even though he knew he could not win, he would always fight them for her sake if there was no other way.

At first, Meika had tried to stay when he fought, but soon enough running and leaving him to fight had become one of the rules. When he fought, she would hide. No matter how battered he was, Malik would come to find her eventually. It had never failed. Whenever he returned, bleeding and bruised, but smiling at her, her guilt had been overwhelming. When she broke the rules, Malik suffered for it, not her. This realization had instilled a deeper respect for those rules, out of fear for her young and fiercely loyal guardian.

More than that, it instilled in her the desire to help him. She knew she was no fighter, though, and so she found another way.

She had been spending her afternoons for the past summer hiding beneath the eaves of a clinic in the southern portion of the city, listening and learning, as was her way. She had slowly begun to teach herself basic healing magic while Malik performed his daily duties procuring their meals and water, mapping patrols and territories. Her friends in the houses helped her to learn even more, and before long she was able to mend Malik after his fights. It made her tired, terribly so, but just like she had learned to run when Malik fought, Malik had learned to let her heal him. Anything else was foolish, for the end result was always the same.

The memories faded slowly as the silence between them grew, his thoughts and hers alike taking many turns in upon themselves. At last Meika could stand the quiet no longer, and so she broke the silence.

"Five east, two north," she repeated his directions to herself, taking a step away from the corner, signaling that Malik should lead. He would have insisted if she hadn't let him anyways.

Malik gave her a smile of apology at having to put up with his precautions, but where Meika was concerned no means of protection was too small to be enacted. She didn't say anything to his slightly sheepish look, merely began to follow behind, keeping quiet. Until they reached a safe-zone like the corner they had just left, talking was forbidden. It would draw attention to them, after all, and there was no telling who or what might have wandered ahead of them.

Malik walked ahead of her, checking every alleyway ahead of them, down to the last nooks and crannies, before they proceeded. It was slow going, but it was safe and sure, and with the hours edging towards twilight, it was the norm.

Malik paused suddenly at the next corner and put his back to it, looking north through the alley they had hoped to take. He threw up a hoof behind him, staying Meika's advance. The look he sent her over his shoulder was dire, much worse than when he had spotted something simply out of the ordinary. It was clear that abnormal was not the issue here: whatever he had seen was dangerous.

Meika walked as silently as she could towards him. Malik continued to look around the corner, his face grim.

"What is it?" she asked breathlessly, peeking around the corner from under his foreleg.

"Old Hodden," Malik whispered back, begrudgingly giving her a look.

The sight that greeted Meika chilled her blood. The elderly changeling, houseless since his earliest days, was lying on the alley streets, bleeding from his mouth. One of his legs was twisted badly, clearly broken. The old man was just gasping for air, while three younger changelings, about Meika's age, loomed over him, laughing. The largest among them tossed a leather bag to another, the clink of coins clearly audible.

"Thanks for the loot, ya old gnat," he chuckled, giving the old man a harsh kick that caused him to wheeze loudly, the wind clearly knocked out of him. "You old bastards are the easiest freakin' lot... Always loaded, and always brittle in the bones. That leg snapped right out," he guffawed, his cohorts laughing with him.

Meika tensed at his side, drawing Malik's warning gaze. "Do nothing," he commanded her instantly. "We go south, to the main street. Skirt it, cross if we must. Even if they find us, they will not chase us there," he pointed out. Though it could mean trouble with the guards, it was safer than staying around here.

"But the old man," she whimpered, looking on wide-eyed. She had never liked violence, and seeing it enacted on someone so helpless was even more distressing to her than usual.

"Could you even heal his leg fully?" Malik asked scathingly, already knowing the answer.

"I'm not that good..." Meika admitted, sounding very much as if she wanted instead to say that she could do it.

"Then he is dead already," Malik snapped with a huff. "An old man with a broken leg will starve."

"We have to do something," Meika pleaded, tugging on Malik's shoulder, tears in her eyes. Another pained, choking gasp and laughter echoed from down the alleyway.

"I cannot fight them," Malik said simply, a heavy sigh following his words. Meika's look and her pleading pained him greatly, but he knew what he was capable of. "There are too many, and they look strong. If Hodden is dead, let it be so," he whispered. "If he is not, then we will come back. Heal him, feed him... whatever you like, but that is only if he lives. We must let this go," he reiterated, his gaze cold and unrelenting. "The rules, Meika. We come first," he declared firmly, their first and most honored rule.

Meika bit her lower lip, her ears flattened. "I know," she whispered, tears in her eyes and her voice choked. "Alright... we'll come back after-" she began to relent.

Then the worst possible thing interrupted her.

"Hodden!" came the cry of a child from only a few alleys away. "Hodden!"

Meika's eyes shot wide, and her surprised gasp dropped Malik's heart into the frozen pit of his stomach, dread seizing him.

The child rushed out of an alleyway and to the old man's side, draping himself protectively over him. "What you do to Hodden?" he cried fiercely, his high-pitched voice easily piercing the silence. The fear and anger in that voice knew no bounds.

"No..." Meika whispered, having lived long enough on the streets to know what came next. "No..."

"What we got here? A piece o' cave moss what sticks to the old man?" the biggest changeling chuckled, looking at the kid with a dire gleam in his eye, a dark chuckle quick to follow. "Little shits should know to keep in the shadows and stay quiet," he guffawed, his friends joining in his vile laughter as he stalked once more towards the downed old man, and his childish defender. "Time to learn a lesson, kid... how to mind yer own business."

"What you do to Hodden?" he cried out once more, as much cowering as shielding the elderly changeling now. The little changeling's eyes were pinched shut as he curled tightly, the assaulter's front hoof going high before striking down hard. The child cried out in pain, bouncing away from the force of the hit.

Meika was watching, frozen in place, and Malik was afraid that if he broke the silence then she would do the unthinkable.

His was not the stirring voice that spurred her.

"What... you do...?" the little changeling huffed, pushing himself shakily to his hooves.

That got the big changeling's attention. "Well damned if ya ain't a tough roach t' step on," he chuckled, rolling his muscled neck in a show of force. "Tell ye what... ye run off and leave the old man t' die, and ye just might live t' be an old man yerself one day. Fik can be generous, time to time. Whatcha say?" he asked, placing a hoof on the old-man's heavily-breathing, prostrate body, and smiling wickedly.

The little kid didn't understand the much-too-many words. All he knew was his beloved Hodden, his teacher, was in trouble. Hodden must have been to him what Meika had been to Malik, and so Malik knew without a doubt what the child's response would be.

"You leave!" he cried out, flicking his blue lenses into place and charging in.

His charge and Meika's were one and the same.

"Meika, don't!" Malik cried after her, reaching out just a second too late to catch her as she galloped hard, tears streaming behind her.

Clenching his fangs, he launched after her. If he could just catch her, perhaps they could still outrun the three male changelings, before it was too late. He dared not use magic to contain her, for if she struggled it would drain him, and he would not be able to protect her in the worst case.

"Leave him alone!" Meika cried loudly, her horn lighting as she ran.

"Huh?" the changeling called Fik asked as he turned his attention toward the sound of Meika's cry. The look of confusion on his face remained until it turned to one of absolute surprise. He gasped as his hooves left the ground and his back slammed into the wall of the building behind him, knocking the wind from his lungs. He slid down to the alley floor as the green aura around him began to fade.

Meika stumbled, her legs suddenly weak from the powerful, offensive magic she had used so wastefully. It was the first time she had ever attacked anyone, for Malik had always been the fighter between them.

"What the hell?" one of the other changelings asked in surprise, blinking as his boss got sent flying. As the surprise of the moment faded he noticed Meika, though, who was lying on the ground and panting from her sprint and magical exertions. "You freakin' bitch!" he growled, starting a run towards her, ready to return the favor of a sound beating. "Nobody messes with Fik's gang!"

He skidded to a halt suddenly as Malik vaulted the poor, exhausted Meika, his mind racing. She was breathing heavily, and her legs were shaking, as if she had spent a full day running. He gritted his teeth, realizing that trying to run would now be absolutely pointless. Her hit, despite its force and the fury behind it, would not stop that big changeling for long. He didn't stop running as he thought all this, and he came to the conclusion that he would have to fight.

Meika would have to run on her own. His blue lenses snapped into place just as he bore down on the changeling who had charged her.

"What the...?" he asked stupidly, clearly having expected the girl to be an easy, lonesome target. That notion rattled around in his skull as the shorter, younger Malik halted the majority of his forward momentum, putting the rest of it behind a fierce uppercut. His opponent danced up on his back hooves from the force of the blow, balancing there for a tense moment before toppling backwards, stunned. The second, inevitable hit of his head meeting the baked alley floor hardly made his recovery more likely.

"Meika, get up!" Malik hissed, his tone a mixture of anger and worry as he kept his eyes focused on the third, still-standing enemy. The big changeling was getting back to his hooves as well, and this was going to get messy very soon.

"I... I can't!" she gasped, and as Malik spared her a glance he saw that it was true. Her legs were too weak from the sudden expenditure of magic: he had experienced as much before during his lessons, many years ago.

"No..." he whispered to himself, his mind racing as he tried to think of something.

"Malik! Malik, you have to run!" she pleaded suddenly, and time stopped for him as her terrified, pained voice set fire to his every nerve.

Run...

The very same word screamed at the base of Malik's skull, echoing around inside. The voice of instinct, the voice of fear, willed him just as strongly as Meika's voice did. For one seemingly endless moment he desired nothing more than to relent. To turn and run.

Yet, as he returned to reality and saw Meika lying helpless, that most sensible of notions vanished completely.

"I can't," he whispered shakily, turning back to the other larger changeling who was now charging at him. Clenching his jaw against his fear, Malik readied himself for the fight. The element of surprise would not be on his side this time. He would have to use all of his knowledge and skill. Since meeting Meika, he had never truly fought for his life. Once she was safely away, he almost always ran. Their lives came first.

But this time, Meika was not safely away. This time, he could not run. This time he feared his fight would determine whether or not he lived or died. It would decide the same for Meika. This was why he had spent his young life hiding from changelings the size his enemies now were. They were not simply unafraid of death: they created it, as evidenced by the beaten, elderly Hodden, who was sure to die if not treated soon.

No, this was no simple brawl over food or water.

The second changeling was nearing him now, and the time that had previously seemed stopped resumed all too quickly. Malik's many experiences in fighting afforded him a skillful dodge of the first haphazard swipe, his enemy's stride off by just enough to grant him that. Still, as the punch flew past his head and grazed his cheek, Malik's heart stammered with fear.

His enemy was fast. Incredibly so, and strong for his size. The hoof that grazed his cheek tingled with magic overflowing from the muscles it had been pumped into to fuel the attack. If not for the good fortune of an ill-paced charge, Malik would have suffered dearly for underestimating his opponent.

He gasped as he finished his leap out of the way, the sting on his cheek dulled by adrenaline alone. The same source of fearful, exhilarating energy had him panting despite his less-than-daunting efforts so far. he could hear his heartbeat thrumming in his ears, setting its own fast-paced rhythm, as it always did when he fought. This time, it was beating just a little bit faster.

He kept himself between the sadistically grinning changeling and Meika. "Lucky juke, kid," his enemy congratulated, wearing a smug smirk that showed that he understood Malik's good fortune for what it was. "You won't be so lucky twice!" he roared, whirling a kick suddenly without the slightest hint of intending to do so.

Malik barely got his hooves in front of him to block it in time, caught off guard by the unorthodox move. To lash out in such a way with only a single hind-leg was difficult to say the least, and to do so with such force and grace... this enemy was not normal. This enemy was powerful, and spoke clearly unlike his cohorts.

He was like Meika. He was not born houseless like Malik, but had been cast out. He had been trained for battle in his life before the streets, however long ago that was.

Malik knew from the sting in his shins that he had been gravely mistaken. The most dangerous changeling in this group was not the biggest one, who was just now getting to his hooves, shaking his head clear of the impact Meika had set him through.

It was this changeling, whose skill was far beyond his own. But unlike this changeling, Malik was not fighting alone. Meika's fear and the ever-present bond he shared with her itched inside him as much as the anxiety of battle.

As the changeling's leg bounced off of Malik's block he used the rebound momentum to turn the other way quickly, attempting to lash out again with the same leg from Malik's left instead.

Malik's only advantage was to use a skill his enemy would not expect, something most houseless changelings could not use: magic.

As the kicking leg spun around behind his opponent, Malik struck. Channeling just enough to do the job, he pushed hard with a burst of air at the single leg his opponent was rotating on, blasting it out behind him hard enough to kick it into the air. His opponent's own rotational momentum continued its course, and without a leg to stand on he was at its mercy. The larger changeling's eyes widened in shock as he was left with far too little time to react. He tumbled over in the air, landing hard on his back, his wings crunching sickly beneath him.

Malik was on him before he had even hit the ground, wasting not a second of his fortunate advantage. He hammered blow after blow down on his opponent, breathing hard from the magical and physical exertions he had been forced to undertake. His opponent curled defensively, and each blow hurt Malik as much as his enemy, their thick hides clashing again and again. Yet with each blow Malik forced his opponent's blocking hooves down and out a little wider, until at last he punched through with a shout of fury.

His hoof met fang, and the loud crack that resounded was swiftly followed by an outraged cry of pain.

Malik, sensing that perhaps he might be able to press his advantage, raised his hoof for another blow. The big changeling was still across the alley, though he would likely be closing fast. Thinking to end this quickly and use his smaller stature to tire the only remaining adversary, Malik threw his blow down. Rather than watching his intended target though, for the strike was sure, he turned to check for the larger changeling, the one called Fik.

His eyes widened in surprise, and he hadn't the time to so much as cry out as the badly-beaten body of Old Hodden slammed into him, thrown by the angrily glaring large changeling who had so mangled him. The unorthodox move was completely unexpected, and Malik couldn't even grasp at the regret for his oversight through the panic and surprise.

The heavy elderly changeling's unconscious body bore him to the ground, halting the well-aimed blow that would have surely left his most skilled adversary unconscious like his friend before him. He struggled to his hooves as quickly as he could, but once he was back up he felt his heart sink just as sure as he felt the hoof collide with the side of his head, slamming him back down to the ground. The impact of his hard, hide-encased head hitting the alley floor cracked the baked earth there loudly.

His vision swam as he gasped from pain, his front hooves scrabbling uselessly. He wasn't sure which way was up, or where the ground was. All he knew was that he was lying down, and that unless he stood...

He let out a choking cry as another kick slammed into his stomach, blasting the air from his lungs.

"Little prick!" roared the changeling he had narrowly failed to immobilize. His outraged insult ended in a fierce growl as he kicked again, slamming Malik's side, and sending the ripples of pain up through his already damaged stomach, and making his head pound. He no longer had the air to cry out.

"That's it, Beck," grunted Fik, coming into Malik's vision beside his tormentor. Everything was blurry, and the edges of his sight were black, but he could see the green of their eyes both looking down at him, and the red of fresh blood falling from the mouth of the one he had pummeled.

"But this little shit-" he started, but stopped abruptly as the bigger changeling slapped him roughly on the back, the hard hit causing his next word to turn into a cough.

"I said that's it," Fik growled roughly, turning away from him. As Malik's vision started to return a little more clearly, he noted with dread the sick smile on the big changeling's face. "Forget the fang... this kid brought us bigger bugs t' fry," he chuckled. Try as he might, Malik couldn't turn his head to follow Fik as he walked away. He froze in fear as Meika suddenly let out a pained cry behind him.

"I guess you're right..." Beck conceded, glaring at Malik and spitting on him, the blood in his mouth making the saliva all the more coagulated. "Damn, ain't she a pretty one!" he declared suddenly, apparently getting a clear view of Meika for the first time. Malik could practically see Fik holding her up by her mane in his mind's eye, her face scrunched in pain as he displayed her like some prized scorpion on an afternoon hunt.

"Malik!" Meika cried, and he could tell that there were tears in her eyes, for they were in her voice as well.

"So, who's goin' first?" Fik guffawed, and the sudden thud and feminine gasp of pain caused Malik to close his eyes. It did little to stop the all-too-real imagined sight of the big changeling slapping her to the ground.

"Might as well be you," Beck said with a sigh. He chuckled darkly as he looked at his unconscious friend. "I don't think Artez is awake enough."

"Heh, ain't that a bitch," Fik laughed, and Malik struggled to turn his torso and get his hooves under him.

"No!" Meika screamed, but it ended in another harsh slap to her face, one that Malik had turned enough to see. Oh, how he wanted to stand! How he wanted to push every last ounce of his being into his legs and crush Fik like a bug, squeeze until every last speck of air was purged from his body!

But he hardly any air left in his own lungs, and it all vanished as a hoof stepped roughly on his back, slamming him down. "You're tough, but you ain't that tough," hissed Beck above him, a hint of glee in his voice. "You lose, gnat."

"No..." Meika whimpered, and Malik clenched his eyes shut, too ashamed and afraid to look at what was sure to happen to her. He had seen it before with other houseless females, many times, and always he had looked away, taken another alley. He hadn't the breath to even cry out to her, to apologize for his failure. He couldn't even whisper her name, though his lips moved with the effort all the same.

He couldn't save her, and the shame was more crushing than the hoof grinding against his back. The pain of what was happening to her, his dear, sweet Meika, was more powerful than the agony of the blood vessels in his gossamer wings being shredded to pieces.

"Ya sure ya don't want her first?" Fik asked. "Ya lost a fang over this, man."

"Oh, I'm sure," Beck chuckled darkly. "I've got a better idea for my revenge on this little shit."

"Oh yeah?" Fik asked curiously, clearly intrigued.

"Yeah..." Beck hissed, turning the sharp noise into low, dark laughter. Malik could feel the irresistible force of magic pulling his eyes back open.

"I'm going to make him watch."

I: Awaken

The sickle moon drifted high in the night sky, its silver blade of light only half visible over the rim of the high canyon walls. Half the great city was bathed in a pale, almost serene luminescence, the buildings glowing gently in the moonlight, with the other half below the cliff closest to the moon dipped into shadow. It was something anyone would have found strangely beautiful, hauntingly so. Twisted, jagged walls, polished slate roofs, and the deep, onyx base of all Vemn Enox synergized with the night, became a part of it.

It was in the deepest shadows of that sleeping city that a young changeling stumbled his way through the alleyways packed with refuse. His breaths came in ragged gasps, and every few steps he was forced to fall against the side of a building or tumble into a pile of trash just to hold himself upright, or cushion his landing when he fell. It was hard to walk with the cold of the desert night seeping into his bones, and with his front hooves clutching an equally cold body to his chest.

He stopped, gasping from a mixture of his efforts and his unending sobs. Twin rivers of tears shined in the sparse light that reached this end of the city so late into the night, more washing over and adding to those already frozen to his chilled hide, coating his fangs in a thin layer of ice as the embodiment of his sorrow clung to him.

“Meika...” he sobbed, burying his frost-lined muzzle in the mane of his beloved friend. He sobbed her name over and over as he clutched her body tightly to his own, sliding down the wall he had come to rest against, unable to hold himself up any longer. He had been strong this far, but that was the limit of his fortitude, both physical and emotional.

"I’m sorry...” he cried, his teeth chattering with the force of his sorrow, and the bite of the cold. New tears frosted his coat to hers as he held her close, gritting his teeth to stop the chattering. What did it matter what he said? She couldn’t hear him anymore, couldn’t forgive him. Why had he waited this long to tell her that he was sorry? Why hadn’t he begged her forgiveness when she had been alive?

“I should have been stronger,” he wept, now leaning on her body in his hooves as much as holding it. “I should have saved you... I’m so sorry...”

“The poor girl,” a gruff, adult voice called from further down the alleyway, and though such words were generally intended to be sympathetic, the tone behind them was not.

The young changeling whipped his head in the direction of the unexpected speaker, unable to see anything through the water in his eyes, and the deeper shadows further down the alleyway.

An older changeling stepped out of the shadows slowly, revealing himself at last. The young changeling couldn’t see the older one’s eyes, for they were buried in the shadows of a deep hood, which flowed into a wide, black cloak that covered his entire body. It was no wonder he had been difficult to see in the dim light.

“What do you want?” the young changeling asked, his tone defeated and his eyes returning forlornly to the corpse cradled in his forelegs.

“Nothing,” the older changeling replied simply, standing a respectable distance away from the obviously pained child. “The same cannot be said of you, though.”

“What?” the child inquired, too focused on other things to understand what his visitor was implying.

“What is it that you want?” he asked patiently.

The young changeling never took his eyes from the peaceful, lifeless face of his beloved Meika. “If I had just been stronger, I could have saved her... None of this would have happened...” he reiterated quietly, talking as much to himself as to his visitor.

“Had been,” his visitor replied, his tone a verbal shrug of the shoulders: dismissive and uninterested. “Could have,” he continued. “What does it matter?”

“I loved her!” the young changeling roared, ice crackling as his head snapped away fiercely from the place it had been slowly freezing to the corpse. He fixed his bloodshot, suddenly furious gaze on his intruder. “It is all that matters! I loved her...” he whispered shakily, his rage short-lived, the pain in his heart far stronger and older.

His unexpected visitor moved closer, the cloak flowing gently with each step until he came to rest directly in front of the pair, one living and one dead. “What’s done is done,” he intoned seriously. “What could have been... has not been,” he whispered, and for the first time his tone showed the faintest hints of sympathy. “You cannot change it now. But I can grant you at least one of your wishes.”

“What are you saying?” the young changeling asked, his eyes falling back on the body in his hooves, despite the older changeling’s new proximity.

“I can make you stronger,” he clarified, his words quiet and severe. There was a darkness to them, not unlike the darkness seeping into the young changeling’s heart through the portal of grief. “It is not too late for that much.”

“It wouldn’t matter,” the young changeling replied, his words choking momentarily before he gained the composure to continue. “She’s gone... No matter how strong you make me, I can’t go back to save her.”

“No. But you can go forward, and avenge her,” the older changeling replied, reaching a hoof to a pouch hidden under his cloak. In the blink of an eye, and a flash of silver, a dagger leapt into his hoof. He held it up between them, the sharp point of the blade gleaming in the meager light from the mage-lamps on the main streets not so far away.

“This is my gift to you,” he declared simply, turning the dagger over and dropping it, the point sliding easily into the sandstone floor of the alleyway and holding it in place. “You can use it however you like... if you take your own life with it, then I cannot make you stronger,” he said seriously. “But if you take it and avenge her, then there is much I can teach you.”

The young changeling’s eyes followed the dagger all the while, locked onto it even when it had stopped moving, embedded in the ground. Slowly, hesitantly at first, he reached over Meika’s body, grasping at it. He pulled it up in front of his eyes, looking it over as if he wasn’t even sure what it was. In reality his mind was racing. With a weapon like that, he could have protected Meika...

With a weapon like that, he could kill the changelings who had killed her.

He gripped it tighter with new resolve, his eyes filling not with hope, but with simple purpose, and with anger, as they at last found the eyes of his strange visitor, glowing green beneath the deep hood.

“I’ll kill them all for what they’ve done...” the young changeling whispered darkly, letting the hoof holding the dagger drop to his side slowly, his grip never relaxing.

“Then what is your name?” the older changeling asked, the slightly brighter grey of his fangs showing in a smirk beneath the cowl of his cloak.

The young changeling looked at the body in his hooves once more, his hardened gaze softening for a moment, before he tore his eyes away and looked back at the dagger. The scowl of his determination and the clenching of his fangs returned as he looked at it in silence for many moments, until finally he answered.

“She called me Malik.”

Malik’s eyes snapped open as the dream ended, his gaze trailing the ceiling overhead. He didn’t gasp or cry out, or bolt upright in his bed. He simply laid there, eyes open and hooves at his sides as he easily recalled the memory that he had relived as a dream many times before. He sighed to himself, closing his eyes and not the least surprised to find that tears rolled down the sides of his head as they were blinked free.

He stayed there with his eyes closed for a time, trying to clear his head. At last he felt he had put the dream behind him, as he had so many times before, and sat up, turning his hind legs off the bed and resting his hooves on the floor.

“Will it never end?” he grumbled, leaning forward and putting his head into his hooves, rubbing his eyes. With another sigh he got up at long last from the bed, heading straight for the door. There was little else in the simple room to draw his attention, despite the fact that what items it did have were of incredible quality.

He made his way out into the hall, which was as busy as it ever was. Here and there servants polished the high windows or swept the hall clean of the sand that always seemed to find a way in, even three floors above the dunes below. Guards held posts that had likely never been vacated in changeling history, as far as Malik could tell, for there always seemed to be someone standing in those exact same places, no matter what time of day it was.

“Sir,” one of the guards greeted him idly, as the guards had been doing every morning for the last two days since he had begun staying there.

Malik just nodded once, still unsure of how to take being called ‘sir’. Korrick had much to do with it, doubtless, or so Malik thought as he made his way down the hallway. A look past a maid and out one of the grand windows she was cleaning told him that it was late morning: much later than he usually slept... unless he was having one of his nightmares.

There were many of them, and no matter which one he had, it always affected him the same way. Unless something woke him up from outside the dream, he would continue to sleep until the memory was over. It had always been like that, as far back as he could remember, and so it didn’t surprise him to learn what time it was as he passed a room that always had its door wide open, a clock on the far wall of the unused guest quarters.

The room was nicer than the one Malik was staying in, but he preferred the smaller room. It was further into the wing of the castle, and provided him more privacy, even if it wasn’t incredibly plush compared to other rooms in Cliffcrest Castle.

He continued on his way, jagged half-pillars of polished onyx stone breaking the marble walls and various murals at even intervals, the black marble tile beneath his hooves polished to a shine, as always. It was certainly a majestic place. Almost too much for his taste, though he had to admit that given time he could get used to life in such a grand place.

The hallway exited into the enormous main hall that housed the central staircase, which tapered gently the higher it went, widest at its base. Great obsidian pillars soared to the ceiling still fifty-some feet above him, where tasteful glass skylights filtered the morning sun into the expansive room. At each landing the floors swept outward, creating wide balconies with high railings that looked down into the vast expanse of the hall. The towering pillars that supported the roof high above passed through each of the balconies as well, lending their considerable strength to the structure.

He took in the sight with the same awe he had since the beginning of his stay, and honestly wondered if he would ever be able to enter the main hall of Cliffcrest Castle without pausing to take it all in. He certainly hoped that he would never take such a sight for granted, for the rest of his days.

Malik sighed contentedly as he finished surveying the masterwork of changeling architecture, loathe to leave the sight behind as he turned up the stairs, heading up two more tall floors to the fifth. At the top of the stairs, an enormous set of ornate doors barred entry to the throne room many yards across the landing, a wide, gold-embroidered red carpet running from the top of the stairs to the doors.

Something was new about the fifth floor landing that morning, Malik noted. The carpet passed around a wide, recently installed black stone platform, changelings moving around on the floor below it as well as atop it with blueprints and tools in their hooves. A large table nearby showed many more drawings and schematics spread about its surface. It was clear that some kind of monument was under construction, a project that had likely started overnight, or perhaps early that morning.

One changeling in particular caught Malik’s attention as he paused at the top of the stairs. The older changeling female was clearly missing her horn, an unmistakable physical trait, in recent days, of Councilor Morelda Dugrann.

“No, no, no,” she complained, wadding up a blueprint and tossing it aside, bossy to a fault. “It should be more like this one here, but somewhat like this one.” She pointed between two other designs, clearly exasperated. “The king should appear more elegant, and Gerd’s defeat should be more apparent. This makes it look like an even battle,” she huffed.

“It was an even battle, Excellency,” one of the changelings working on the statue design in question clarified, drawing her scathing glare.

“U-until King Aurus unleashed the wild magic,” the designer corrected hastily, withering under her unrelenting stare. “Then it was over in a blaze of glory,” he admitted. That much was true at the very least.

“And that’s what we’re trying to capture, not how much of a struggle it was,” she muttered distastefully. “The history books will cover that part. Understand?”

“Yes, Excellency,” the designer replied dutifully, her point made and orders clear.

Malik chuckled as he kept his distance, heading west down another hallway and away from the bustling project. Fortunately his destination wasn’t the throne room, he thought wryly; else he might have been in for the-hells-knew-what kind of talk with the overbearing female.

It wasn’t long before he reached his destination, the closed door of the room no different from the countless others in the various hallways of Cliffcrest Castle. He pushed it open slowly, careful to be quiet. He was equally careful closing it behind him, though he knew it was a wasted effort.

He sighed in mixed relief and resignation as he beheld the situation within. Relief because the faces that looked up at him showed only concern, and no signs of grief, yet resignation because it was exactly as it had been for the last two days.

Aurus lay in his bed, his body bandaged and his wings bound tightly to his back. Though it was concealed under the blankets, Malik could see the slightly larger lump where Aurus’ back right leg would have been, still in a splint. His eyes were closed serenely, as they had been since his collapse after the destruction of Gerd Gallock.

All around him stood his close friends, the mares from Ponyville, as well as Korrick Varal, the recently reinstated High Councilor. His family was there as well, with his younger sister standing at the side of the bed and holding his hoof gently between her two smaller ones, her head pressed against the mattress as she was forced to lean all the way out just to make contact with him and still keep her back hooves on the floor.

Applejack stood with Aria next to the bed, her hoof on the same one the young changeling girl was holding, the other placed gently on Aria’s shoulders in silent support.

Tired smiles greeted Malik as he entered, and he returned them all with a worried one of his own. “How is he?” he asked cautiously, keeping his voice low. It didn’t really matter of course, for nothing they had tried so far had been able to wake Aurus from his slumber. The concern was great that it was some sort of self-inflicted magical coma, an unforeseen symptom of his use of powerful wild magic.

“Better,” Korrick replied, his own voice similarly quiet. It had become a habit for all who visited Aurus in this state, even if it was meaningless. “The healers were able to do much more with his leg this morning, and the bone is at the least healing properly now.”

“He still won’t wake up, though,” Twilight added, joining the two changelings by the door while the rest of her friends talked to Aurus’ family or to one another, doing what they could to keep their hopes up. “It’s been two days already, and he hasn’t so much as moved in his sleep. He could just be exhausted, especially after what he’s been through, but it’s not natural. I’m starting to agree with the healers... this might be a result of the wild magic,” she said worriedly.

“Which means we don’t know how to fix it,” Malik concluded, having picked up a great deal listening to various conversations between his more magically-educated friends and the healers that visited Aurus almost hourly.

“Right...” Twilight admitted with a tired sigh. She’d tried many things herself to wake Aurus, but even her considerable magical abilities had not been enough to unlock the secret of his ailment. “Whatever it is, it’s in his hooves now. All we can do is patch his body up for when his mind gets back.”

“He is coming back, right?” Malik whispered quietly, too quietly for anyone else in the room but Twilight and Korrick to hear.

Twilight looked over her shoulder to her sleeping friend, a worried look passing over her face. “We don’t know...”

“Bah!” Korrick huffed, startling her and Malik out of their darkening mood. “Of course he’ll come back. He has a history of coming back to those who need him,” the old changeling chuckled, his volume louder than anyone had spoken in days, his tone light hearted.

Malik and Twilight allowed themselves small smiles at his words. Nobody was fooled, of course; Korrick couldn’t know for certain anymore than the rest of them could. Yet his faith in the face of worry was something that all of them had needed to hear.

“He’ll be back,” Aria echoed, her gentle voice sounding determined, more sure, as she squeezed her brother’s hoof tighter. “I know he will.”

“He’s jus’ tired from all the fight he put up,” Applejack agreed, she and Aria flashing one another warm smiles. It was no secret that the two of them were taking Aurus’ condition the hardest, though Aria kept up a typical barrier of childhood optimism to hide it as best she could. One that Applejack did her best to match, ever the strong one.

Malik let his smile linger, along with the first comfortable silence the room of friends and family had shared in a long time.

“You know Aurus is going to be upset when he wakes up, don’t you?” Malik asked Korrick suddenly, unable to deny himself a quiet laugh as he pictured Aurus’ reaction to the statue that was under construction in front of the throne room.

“If you’re talking about the monument, I had nothing to do with it,” Korrick harrumphed. “The council pushed for it on their own.”

“But you’re the High Councilor...” Malik teased, knowing that if the council pushed for anything, Korrick could likely push back, especially with the recent boost to his influence following the council’s admission of false accusations against him.

The old changeling just hummed to himself and raised his eyebrows, wagging his head slightly from side to side in a wordless half-agreement. “True. But the council is a body governed by majority vote. I certainly didn’t vote for it.”

“But you didn’t vote against it either,” Malik chuckled, knowing he was right.

Korrick laughed as well, but said nothing more on the matter, confirming Malik’s suspicions. “He’s earned it, even if he won’t see it that way. Or like it.”

Malik stood by him since Twilight had already wandered off to talk to other friends, leaving him more or less alone with the High Councilor.

The silence grew between them, the moment passed. Malik found himself swept up in his own thoughts, his gaze fixed on Aurus’ sleeping face. The good mood that had slowly been building was little more than a hazy memory as his mind took a grimmer and more personal turn.

He, like all of the others, was deeply hoping that the king would come back to them. Aurus was the man who had saved Malik from continuing down a path of damnation, after all. Malik respected Aurus more than he had respected anyone in his entire life. The young changeling man had, in his own way, become dear to Malik.

Yet he couldn’t deny a certain level of trepidation that coupled itself to his thoughts of the king’s return. He’d spent the months since meeting Aurus and leading up to the fight with Gerd assisting the king: spying on Gerd and the council, delivering intelligence, and doing his part. He’d helped to lead the assassins off the trail, and for all of that time he had been focused on the present, his duty to Aurus’ cause.

Now, with his work done, he had had many days to reflect on other things. The rush of purpose had slowed to nothing, leaving him empty and only looking backward. He couldn’t deny the truth about himself; no matter what aid he had given the king in his time of need, he was still a criminal. No matter his change of heart, he was a murderer, and that was well known by Aurus and Korrick, both figures of power and bound by the law.

Malik sighed to himself, making his way to the door of the room and out into the hall, feeling the need to separate himself from the visage of his sleeping king. He wasn’t surprised, however, to hear the door to Aurus’ room open and close again behind him before he had even gone three steps.

A quick glance over his shoulder told him what he had already known he would see: Korrick standing with his back to the door and looking at Malik with concern.

“What’s wrong?” the old changeling asked quietly.

Malik sighed and took a few more steps away from the door. Korrick followed him patiently, as if sensing that proximity to Aurus’ room was paramount to helping Malik think.

“Korrick... what’s going to happen to me?” Malik asked at last, his tone reluctant as he came to a halt, thinking they’d moved far enough down the hall to keep their conversation private.

It took the councilor only a few moments to discover the meaning behind Malik’s words. “I can’t say for certain,” Korrick replied cautiously. “There’s no denying that you were a criminal, Malik. But you know as well as I do what kind of person our king is, and though I could have the council judge you, I will not. You put your fate in his hooves a long time ago, and since that time you have been loyal. What becomes of you will rest on his decision, regardless of the law.”

Regardless of the law? Malik almost chuckled at that. What was the purpose of the law, if it could be so easily disregarded? He was a murderer. By all rights he should have been sentenced to death already, and yet even Korrick, who served in Aurus’ stead as steward for the time being, was willing to wait for the king’s judgment, even if there was no telling that Aurus would wake, much less when.

His life would once more fall into Aurus’ hooves for molding, it seemed.

“He told me he forgave me, once,” Malik said at length, his tone low and serious. “But what did he forgive me for? Does he know? He hardly knows me, so how can I know he understood... or that he meant it?”

“Of course he meant it,” Korrick scolded. “Even if he doesn’t know you, you know him. You know he wouldn’t lie about something as serious as forgiveness for a man who lived the life you have. What purpose would that have served?”

“But I’ve killed!” Malik groaned, desperate to make Korrick understand his worry. “I could be executed, or at the absolute least rot my life away in prison for the things I’ve done, and it would hardly be enough...”

“So could I,” Korrick replied quietly, his tone sad as he suddenly put a hoof on the ex-assassin’s shoulder. “I was a soldier once. Many hearts beat their last around the blade of my spear, when I was young,” he said gravely. “Even Aurus has taken a life, after all of this.”

“It’s not the same,” Malik retorted, a slight bite to his words.

“Taking a life is always the same,” Korrick shot back sternly. “It is the reason that changes. No cause is great enough to block the pain of killing, in the end. It is a sin that can never be good. It can only be just... Necessary at times, to save other lives,” he said simply. “The lives you’ve taken, no matter how many, and no matter the purpose, are your sin. He has forgiven you once. He’ll forgive you again, when he wakes. He trusts you, as do the rest of us,” Korrick finished.

A long silence followed, Malik staring intently at his hooves as he took in Korrick’s words. Ever since the moment he had pledged to follow Aurus’ path of peace and give up his life as an assassin, he had wondered if he would have to pay his life for the sins he had committed some day. He had done his best to prepare himself against that worry, to accept that possible fate, and yet it still turned his stomach to ice.

“I’m afraid,” Malik admitted tiredly. “Ever since that day, I’ve been able to see my sin clearly. I can’t hide in the dark like I used to, and pretend I can’t see my own failure,” he whispered. “I’m afraid of what he will say, now that he no longer needs my help. I’m afraid to be judged by the man who opened my eyes. Now that I have seen the better road, I am afraid I won’t get the chance to tread on it.”

“He has already judged you,” Korrick said with a sigh of finality. “If he hadn’t, your eyes wouldn’t have been opened to begin with. You can’t go back and save yourself. You can only go forward,” he finished with a smile.

Malik stiffened at that declaration, the similarity to the words in his memory, his dream, too real; almost too convenient.

“I can’t go back to save her...”

“You can only go forward to avenge her...”

In a different life, he had persevered for the sake of revenge. What would he move forward for now?

“You’ll see, Malik. Trust him,” Korrick said simply, his hoofsteps echoing for a short time before the sound of the door opening and closing signaled his departure, leaving Malik alone to his thoughts.

Malik sighed to himself, standing in the light from the window above him as he looked at his sunbathed right hoof, where too many times before a dagger had rested. “I’ll try,” he whispered quietly.

It was night by the time Malik had returned to Cliffcrest Castle, the chill of the dark desert driving him back to its warm interior. Shortly after his talk with Korrick he’d left the castle and the city altogether for a short while, venturing out to the well-remembered cave that he had often escaped to to contact Aurus or Korrick behind Gerd’s back in recent weeks. He’d simply wanted to be alone to think. Alone was his most familiar state, and once his most comfortable. It was becoming less so, as the days drew on.

He’d reached the end of his thoughts, taken them as far as he could take them. In the end, he had decided to accept that Korrick was right. He had known from the moment the old changeling had spoken that he was, but had not wanted to admit it.

He needed to trust Aurus. When he awoke, his will would decide Malik’s fate. He had forgiven him once before, but for Malik that was not enough. He needed to be certain, to know for his own sake that Aurus understood what he was forgiving him of. When the king awoke, Malik would confess everything. Only when he had heard it, down to the last drop of blood Malik had spilled, could Malik truly accept his judgment.

No matter what he commanded at the end of his tale, Malik would abide it. If Aurus commanded him to die for his sins, he would not fight it. If Aurus commanded him to atone somehow, he would dedicate his life to doing so.

He sighed heavily to himself, standing at the door to the king’s room. He pushed it open quietly, having hesitated long enough. He knew it would serve no purpose, that inside Aurus would still be sleeping, and yet he wanted to see him. To face him with the new resolve he had spent the day forging.

The room was far from empty, even at that late hour. Applejack was asleep at the bedside, sitting on the floor with her front legs crossed to rest her head on. Even in slumber lines of worry creased her brow, and that quietly made Malik’s heart ache. That ache deepened even more as he noted Aria, sleeping on the bed next to her brother, her little frame holding his front leg in a gentle embrace as she dreamed.

He was so loved, Malik thought. All the fear, so much so that they could not bring themselves to leave his side, proved to Malik just how deep that love ran. Applejack was tired, it showed on her face daily, and even Aria’s endless childhood zeal was wearing thin after days of worry. They didn’t want Aurus to be alone in his room when he awoke, no matter what moment it happened.

Malik was careful to step lightly, to avoid making noise and waking the slumbering guests as he edged around to the far side of the bed. He wasn’t surprised to find a third guest sleeping in Aurus’ room that evening, for she had done so many times before. Fluttershy was curled up on the sofa that faced the empty fireplace, her breathing slow and even.

Malik hadn’t known any of the ponies that had accompanied Aurus very long, or very deeply. Yet recent days had taught him much about them. Fluttershy was a worrier, timid and easily hurt. The fear ran deep in her that Aurus would never return, though she would never have said it out loud. It wasn’t a mystery why she, like Applejack, had decided to stay close to Aurus in this troubling time.

Malik paused at the side of the bed, taking his eyes away from Fluttershy and looking down at Aurus. He was young, younger even than Malik, though perhaps only barely. Too young to suffer the fate of a mind wandered too far to return, he thought.

“I understand why they worry,” he whispered to Aurus, though he knew he couldn’t hear him. “I worry too,” he admitted with a heavy sigh.

His words were followed by a rustling over by the sofa, drawing his attention. A cream-yellow nose poked up over the back of the couch, followed shortly by Fluttershy’s pink mane and her half-open teal eyes. “Aurus?” she asked quietly, barely able to keep her eyes open as she scanned the room.

Malik was unable to deny himself a small smile as he put two and two together. She was subconsciously wired to wake up for even the smallest sounds, waiting for Aurus to mutter in his sleep or wake up, and so even his faint whisper to the king had been enough to wake her.

“Just me,” he whispered apologetically, drawing her gaze to him with his words.

Her eyes were still only half open as she dragged her chin along the top of the couch, turning to look at him. “Oh, Malik,” she yawned, clearly only barely registering it. “What time is it?”

Malik smiled at first, but his smile shrank slowly as he began to see her reaction in a different light. Would he have behaved so casually if he awoke to the sight of a known assassin standing by the king’s bed? It certainly would have startled him awake, if he were in her position.

The realization of how this situation would have looked to him gave him mixed feelings. On the one hoof, he was appalled that he hadn’t realized sooner the possible interpretation. On the other he was quietly relieved, and even a little uplifted, that not even Fluttershy had thought such a thing. Of all the ponies she was the most easily frightened, the easiest to worry, and so if she thought nothing of it, then perhaps...

He let his thoughts fade as his smile returned, this time slightly apologetic. “It’s still late,” he explained quietly. “I didn’t mean to wake you.”

“Oh... okay,” she murmured simply, her chin sliding off the top of the couch and plopping back down to the cushions, clearly intent on falling back asleep.

Malik was careful to keep his chuckle inaudible, his shoulders shaking slightly with the gentle laughter. He almost couldn’t believe the normalcy she had treated him with. It was as if she didn’t know he had been a murderer once. As if she had forgotten.

“As if I’m a different person from the Malik I used to be,” he whispered quietly, turning his gaze back to Aurus. “I’ve felt like a different person for some time now... I never expected anyone to see it. To see the change,” he admitted with a sigh. “You saw the change in me before it had even come to pass. You coaxed it out of me. How clearly must I be wearing it now?” he asked. He knew he wouldn’t get an answer, but he silently wished for one.

“Will you still see the change in me, when you awaken?”

The young changeling girl cried out as the hoof slammed into the side of her head, slapping her to the alley floor, the half-deep chuckles of adolescent male changelings mocking her pain. The stars danced above in the sliver of night sky visible between the serrated edges of the stone roofs high above, the moon obscured by the cliff side even further beyond, leaving the alleyway in the dim light of the streetlamps far away.

“Please...” the young female sobbed, curling into herself defensively as the three older changeling males advanced on her once more. She tried to beg again, but her words were cut off in a sharp cry of pain as she was yanked up by her mane, her hooves scrabbling to get underneath her and push herself up to stop the pull and the agony that came with it.

“Dumb bitch!” the male who had grabbed her roared, slapping her hard again while his cohorts laughed. The female cried out again and slammed into the side of a building, slumping down the wall, trying her best to sob despite the pain robbing her of her breath and the panic seizing her lungs.

“Don’t you get it? A houseless bitch like you don’t get a say in anything,” the oldest boy in the group of three, the obvious leader, growled. “You don’t get to tell us what we can and can’t do, get it? There’s only one law out here, and that’s that the strong can have what they want.”

“Yeah, and we want to warm ourselves up,” one of the other two males chuckled. “It’s pretty cold out tonight, you know?”

“Who’s going first?” the other asked with a dark chuckle.

“I think Fik,” the other added with an equally disgusting laugh. “He’s doin’ all the work this time.”

“I do all the work all the time,” the oldest added, the three of them laughing while the girl wept and tried to crawl away.

“Uh oh, she’s getting away,” Fik guffawed, his tone clearly sarcastic as he grabbed the shoulders of the beaten girl, dragging her back towards him.

“Be a good girl and just keep quiet,” he hissed, causing the cry rising in her throat to die out as he drew her nearer. “It’ll end better for you that way.”

“Let’s get this party start-,” one of the other boys began eagerly, before a sharp cracking sound issued from where he was standing, followed by a loud thud. All the commotion stole the attention of the other two rapists, who turned to see what had happened.

A young changeling male stood atop the body of their companion, the legs of the corpse sprawled at weird angles, blood pooling beneath him from the hole in the back of his neck, right at the base of his skull. A dagger covered in that same blood glinted in the meager light as the changeling slowly pulled it up, looking at it with a fire in his eyes.

“It works,” he whispered quietly. “It really works...”

“What the hell?” the other younger male cried out in panic, looking at his dead friend. “He killed Beck!”

“I know that little shit,” Fik growled in realization, tossing the female he had been about to mount aside in his anger, and whirling on the young male holding the dagger. “He was the little fucker with that girl we done last week.”

“The girl you ‘done’...” the young changeling echoed quietly, the dagger held tightly in his hoof. “That’s all she was to you,” he muttered darkly. “But she was my everything. She was everything to me!” he roared suddenly, leaping for the other changeling close by.

The other rapist barely dodged the mad swipe of the dagger, his eyes wide with panic. “Shit!” he gasped, jumping back a step as another swing came in, the razor’s edge of the dagger slicing through his hide and drawing blood.

“Stop dancing around and grab the damned kid!” Fik growled, stalking forward to become a part of the fight. He stopped suddenly though as his other friend froze stiff as a board and tumbled to his side.

“Artez, what the hell are you doin’?” Fik yelled at his friend, who was simply laying on the ground as the young changeling with the blade stalked closer and closer, his steps measured and sure.

“I-I can’t move!” Artez screamed in panic, his eyes darting between Fik and the advancing changeling for a moment before locking onto the dagger that hovered right in front of his face.

“My new friend said that would happen,” the young changeling whispered darkly, his eyes sunken and far away; dead, except for the rage burning inside the black depths of his pupil. An anger Artez could clearly see, even in the darkness of the desert night. “He said if I cut you, you would lay down.”

“No, don’t!” Artez cried out as the dagger raced upward. “Please don’t!”

His cry echoed off the alley walls, punctuated by the sharp crack of the dagger punching through his shell and burying itself in the side of his neck. Tears of agony welled in the changeling’s eyes as he gasped, his throat filled with steel. He longed to cry out, but nothing came. He longed to lash out, but his limbs wouldn’t obey him.

He longed for nothing else as the young changeling with the dagger gave the knife a sharp pull, the keen edge passing through flesh and changeling hide like paper, carving its way out the front of its victim’s neck, blood gushing fiercely for a moment before the flow slowed to a trickle.

“By the hells...” Fik whispered, even his violent mind shocked by the carnage, the sheer violence of what had happened. He snapped back to reality though through force of will and adrenaline, knowing that he would be next if he didn’t do something.

“You fucking runt!” he roared, taking the initiative and lunging at the littler changeling, who was still facing the latest corpse he had made. “I’m gonna rip that dagger out of your hooves and into your skinny little neck!”

The little changeling didn’t resist, and Fik bowled into him, wrapping him in a crushing embrace. He pinned the dagger-wielder’s forelegs at his sides, and squeezed even harder. At that range, there was no way that little needle of a blade could do any real damage to a guy his size. Even so, he felt a prick of pain as the knife bit into his side.

“Got you, you shit!” he roared triumphantly, jerking his target to the side in a quick twist and sending him flying. The dagger turned with its owner at first, and Fik grunted in pain as it twisted for a moment before the pressure released, the dagger stuck into his side still as the changeling who wielded it was forced to let go.

Fik gasped as he yanked the dagger out of his side, panting from the pain. He hefted the dagger up as he stalked towards the changeling who had attacked his cohorts, ready to strike down.

“I’ll kill you,” he huffed, his hooves and his tongue suddenly very heavy. “I’ll...” he stopped his advance abruptly, tumbling as his back leg dragged for a moment and then went limp. He could feel the leg there, could feel it dragging on the sandstone floor of the alley, but couldn’t move it. The dagger bounced from his grasp, which had grown as weak as his legs.

The young changeling picked himself up slowly, taking his time retrieving the dagger. “What did you do to me?” Fik hiss through his clenched teeth. The gash in his side burned like hellfire as the young changeling advanced on him, holding the handle of the dagger in his fangs. With his hooves free, he rolled the immobile Fik over onto his back.

Fik’s eyes darted over the scene again and again in panic, just like Artez’s had. “What the hell did you do to me?” he cried out, the fear clear in his tone.

“You can’t move either,” the young changeling said, his tone dark and sinister, yet tinged with a hint of awe. “Even though you’re strong... even you can’t move,” he said, and suddenly he laughed. It was a terrifying sound. It was the laugh of a maniac, of a changeling who had lost his mind. “It’s because I’m so strong!” he cackled, hoisting the dagger high. “Stronger than you!”

“W-wait,” Fik cried weakly, trying his hardest to get his hooves up and defend himself. “Wait!”

The dagger plunged down, biting into his chest. Fik screamed in pain as the blade cracked bone and tore flesh, but his scream turned into a wheeze as the edge sliced through his left lung.

The dagger yanked free suddenly, Fik gasping like a fish out of water, blood pooling in his punctured lung.

“Oh no...” the young killer whispered, sounding disappointed. “I went too far. Now you can’t scream,” he sighed, hefting the dagger high again.

“No,” Fik tried to beg, but it only came out as a weak, slow gurgle. The gurgle sped up in a rush of air as the dagger plunged into his groin and he tried to scream. The pain still lingered as the dagger yanked free, and if not for the burning in his wounds, Fik knew that he would have passed out from the air he could no longer acquire, drowning in his own blood. Between one working lung and the adrenaline coursing through him, the merciful blackness wouldn’t come.

“That was for her,” the changeling whispered in Fik’s ear, the dagger suddenly hovering over his eyes. “Do you remember her? What she felt like?” he asked, as if to mock the damage dealt to Fik’s manhood.

The dagger slowly dug into his right eye, and blood raced down his cheeks as he tried to scream once more, the crimson fluid escaping as the air rushed voicelessly out of his throat.

“Do you remember what she looked like?” the young changeling roared, yanking the dagger out of Fik’s ruined eye suddenly.

Fik was barely hanging on, his one remaining pupil dilating and expanding again as the world came in and out of focus, very nearly fading to black.

“You don’t remember...” the murderer finished with a nod, the dagger that had been hovering over Fik’s destroyed eye rising high. “That’s okay. You’ll never see her again. No one will,” he whispered sadly, and with those final words he drove the dagger down hard, burying it to the hilt in Fik’s only remaining eye. The gurgling in his throat stopped, the bloody froth in his mouth reaching a state of motionlessness as the bubbles slowly popped, no new ones coming to replace them, their maker dead at long last.

The young changeling girl had been frozen in shock the entire while, unable to make a sound or move an inch. Everything had happened so fast. Everything had been so unreal, like a nightmare since the three had descended on her, had tried to take her. She lost all strength as she collapsed, tears still running down her cheeks as the young changeling who had killed her attackers stood from his kneeling position by Fik’s corpse, leaving the dagger buried in the dead changeling’s eye.

“Thank you,” she whispered again and again, unable to think of anything else to say. What those three had gotten, no matter how grim, they had deserved. “Thank you...”

The young changeling didn’t answer her at first. He simply turned to walk away, his hoofsteps uneven. His words echoed back to her on the alley floor as he headed into the darker shadows far away.

“I didn’t do it for you... I did it for Meika.”

Malik’s eyes snapped open, his breathing heavy. From the way his chest ached, he assumed he must have been breathing in that panicked fashion for some time. Such heavy breathing would have woken most any other sleeper after a time, but it never did with Malik. His breathing slowed as he registered the room around him, coming out of the vivid memory. They were always so clear, this particular one always so violent.

Something in the background hammered away, but he paid it no mind. He closed his eyes and forced himself to relax, the tension all over his body slowly fading as he held his hooves to his sides and opened his eyes, just staring at the ceiling: his morning ritual for recovering from the nightmares. “Will it never end?” he asked himself, as he had so often in recent years.

At last he fully noticed the pounding at his door, which stole his attention and brought the tension back to his shoulders for a moment. He eyed the door for a time, only to have the intense knocking come again. With a heavy sigh, Malik pushed himself out of his bed, throwing the portal open.

A guard stood there, a worried look on his face. It slowly faded as the door opened and Malik looked him up and down. Malik hardly recognized the guard, who looked exactly like any one of the other hundreds he had seen around the castle.

“Yes?” Malik asked, his dark dream leaving an edge to his tone. He was not fully recovered from that particular memory, the most gruesome and vivid one he had of that time.

“You had me worried, sir,” the guard explained with a slight note of relief. “I’ve been trying to reach you all morning.”

“For what? And I’m not your sir,” Malik muttered with a scowl, eying the guard with a look that portrayed pure impatience.

“I was told to come and alert you right away. The king has finally awakened,” the guard explained quickly, his tone clearly eager.

Malik’s distaste following his dream shifted to a different negative emotion; the fear he had so familiarized himself with from the day before. On the one hoof he was glad that Aurus had awakened. Many hearts would be at ease because of that. Yet on the other hoof it meant that the judgment he had resolved to face would not be far away.

“Sir?” the guard asked, apparently noting something out of place in Malik’s expression.

“That’s... excellent news,” Malik explained with a forced smile, doing his best to make it seem sincere. He pulled on all of the positive feelings he had regarding the king’s awakening to make that happen. “Thank you. I will go see him immediately.”

“You’re welcome, sir,” the guard replied excitedly, giving him a salute before turning and trotting off, presumably to alert someone else on a long list of people who needed to be told.

Malik let his smile drop once the guard was gone, shutting the door. He left his hoof lingering on the handle, closing his eyes as his thoughts raced. He had already been over it once before; had already made his resolution. That resolve to face the judgment needed to be unwavering, he knew. Still, the fact that it might very well finally be at hoof...

“I’ll trust him,” he whispered quietly, his grip tightening on the door handle. “When that time comes, I will trust him, but right now...” he finished, giving the handle a turn as he sighed, letting the tension go. “Right now, I just want to see my friend.”

II: Beautiful World

Malik climbed the final step of the grand staircase, not surprised to find that the recently begun monument in Aurus' honor was already half finished. Atop the onyx platform stood a changeling cast in solid gold, easily three times the size of any normal changeling, if not larger, with the proportions all properly scaled. It was still incomplete, with the eyes left as simple, empty sockets. Holes in the back of the statue between the wings were likewise vacant.

It was obvious by these facts alone that the statue was awaiting gem-work, a favorite sculpting technique that was highly prevalent in changeling society. If a statue was not made entirely of gems to begin with, it was almost always at least accented with them. The mane, wings, and tail had already been put in place, cut and sculpted from fine smoky-sapphire stone, as frost blue as the king's own mane.

Still, even missing some of its intended features, the statue was majestic. The look on the depiction of Aurus' face was determined, fearless, and unshakable. It was not unlike what Malik remembered of the night Aurus had succumbed to his magic power and allowed it to overwhelm him in his last desperate attempt to slay Gerd Gallock. Surely the gold used for the body was a bit over the top, but in a way even that seemed fitting. In that moment of power it had been like looking upon a being far greater than any normal changeling: a being of light and righteous fury.

A being of divine judgment.

Malik's steps, which had been heavy all morning, felt suddenly heavier as that thought clung to him, causing him to pause at the top of the stairs. That memory of Aurus was little more than days old, and he doubted if he could even forget it after an age had passed. Gerd Gallock had been torn apart by Aurus' fury and made to endure an agony far beyond anything Malik could imagine in his final moments.

It had been an agony equal to his sins, Malik knew, and that more than anything frightened him. What similar fate awaited him? Even if he was not half of the monster that Gerd had become, the idea that he might suffer even half of that fate turned the marrow in his bones to ice. He was no less a murderer.

"Gerd Gallock, as King of T'rahk Enox, I sentence you to death and everlasting torment."

The words echoed in Malik's head, as unforgettable as the sight of the punishment they ushered in. Aurus' tone haunted him, so calm and sure in his declaration. It was not the Aurus that Malik had come to know, not the boy-turned-king who worried over every decision. It was not the familiar man who disregarded his power, but rather one who had recognized it, who had used it with certainty. He had spoken in a voice that was not one, but three: the judge, the jury, and the executioner all at once, and not a single one of them had shown an ounce of hesitation or mercy.

There had been none to show.

Malik snapped out of the vivid recollection to find himself staring unblinkingly at the stern face of the statue of Aurus. He let out a breath he hadn't known he had been holding, the air sputtering out in a shaky, panicked sigh. He yanked his eyes away from the statue and down to his front hooves, not surprised in the least to find his legs shaking. They felt numb, almost as if they weren't even there and he would simply fall forward any minute.

This fear wasn't unfamiliar to him. He'd felt it many times before in the dark line of work he had dealt in. He did his best to let it go, closing his eyes and breathing heavily to make up for the moments that he had seized up staring at Aurus' monument.

"I'm so pathetic..." he whispered to himself, when at last his breathing had slowed to a reasonable pace. "I told myself I was ready for this... that I would deal with it when it came, not here and now," he growled in frustration, angry with himself for losing his composure. Still, he couldn't deny the fear in his heart that centered around seeing Aurus awake once more. Which Aurus would he find when he opened that door? The warm, idealistic, and wise young man? Or would he find the embodiment of divine punishment itself that he so feared?

Were they even separate beings?

Malik shook his head angrily, baring his fangs against his own thoughts. That was enough of that thinking. Why couldn't he just be grateful that Aurus was awake? Why couldn't he just be glad for the news? By the hells, Aurus was the closest thing he had ever had to a friend since his childhood!

Though he didn't realize it consciously, Malik had managed to bury his fears for the moment beneath the veil of self-loathing. "Could I possibly be more selfish?" he grumbled to himself, sighing one final time and making his way down the west hallway, towards Aurus' room.

All morning guards had been running haywire through the castle, pounding on doors and racing down hallways. The servants who normally tidied the place endlessly were nowhere to be seen, likely having carried the news down into town as a gossip piece, Malik thought to himself. However, despite the vacant nature of the majority of the castle, the hallway outside of Aurus' room was packed to bursting, with changelings extending both ways down the hall for many yards, all talking to one another.

Malik scowled as he found himself face to face with a waiting line, despite his recent best efforts to shore up his resolve and go see Aurus right away. "Great," he muttered under his breath, halting a few steps from the edge of the changeling mass crowding around the door. Thinking to get a better look at what was going on, Malik crouched low and launched himself into the air, buzzing up to the ceiling many yards away.

There was a small semi-circle of cleared space around the door, guards in full regalia holding their spears at ease but looking intimidating to keep the press of changelings back at regular intervals. Inside the half-circle, with her back to the door, stood councilor Morelda, along with her ever-present attendant. Her lips were moving and her front right hoof frequently waved here and there or swept in front of her, but despite his keen hearing even Malik couldn't tell what she was saying at this distance through all of the mutterings in the crowd.

The door behind her opened suddenly, drawing the crowd's attention and a small hush for only a moment before everyone realized it wasn't the king. Korrick joined Morelda, the two clearly discussing something serious, as evident by the looks on their faces. Whatever it was did not look like good news, which brought Malik a tinge of worry. Had something happened?

He could hear Morelda's voice but was still unable to make out the words as she shouted for the attention of one of the guards. The armored changeling left his post along the outer edge of the semi-circle and was immediately replaced as he made his way over to the pair of councilors. He nodded several times, a scowl of determination on his face before he saluted and began to make his way through the crowd, heading in Malik's direction and more than likely moving to deliver news to someone on a lower floor. Korrick vanished back into the room shortly afterwards, Morelda returning to her duties of managing the crowd outside.

Malik had little trouble keeping his eyes on the guard, since the crowd was creating a small bubble of space around him as he went. Whatever was going on, Malik wanted to know. As the guard broke free of the mass of people, Malik landed next to him and matched his stride. "Did something happen?" he asked nervously, not even sparing the time for formalities with the guard.

The guard jumped slightly at his words, clearly not having expected someone to follow him away from the crowd and finding himself caught off guard. His puzzled expression vanished in a sudden sigh of relief, which caused Malik to raise an eyebrow in confusion.

"Your timing couldn't be better, sir," the guard chuckled, snapping Malik a quick salute. "I was asked to come find you."

"Come find me?" Malik asked, still confused. Why would Korrick ask a guard to come find him? After all, the castle was practically exploding with the news, and he'd heard that Aurus was awake some time ago. "What for?"

"I don't know, sir," the guard replied simply. "I was just told to find you and escort you to the king's chambers. Councilor Korrick says his Majesty requested it."

Aurus had requested it? Malik sighed in mixed relief and simple exasperation at himself. Of course, he should have guessed as much. It had taken Malik some time to get even this far: long enough for a crowd to form outside the room. If Aurus knew about the crowd, and Malik had still not arrived, it hardly surprised the ex-assassin that he would have sent someone to look for him and help him through the congregation.

"Always thinking of someone else," he chuckled to himself, shaking his head.

"Sir?" the guard inquired, clearly confused by the self-directed dialogue.

"It's nothing," Malik replied simply, a small smile in place. That simple, minor act of kindness did a great deal to assure him that the Aurus awaiting him beyond the wall of changelings was the young man he had so come to respect, and not the one he had lately come to fear… at least for the time being. "Lead the way."

The guard wasted no time, snapping another salute before making his way back through the crowd, Malik close behind to take advantage of the clearing the armed guard's very presence created. It wasn't long before they were out the other end of the gathering, the guard stepping aside and resuming his previous duty, and leaving Malik face to face with a scowling Morelda.

"You should have been here sooner," she muttered, her tone threatening a thorough scolding, but holding back for the moment. Malik didn't know what she was waiting for, but he doubted incredibly if she wanted to hear an excuse.

"I should have," Malik admitted simply, thinking it best not to say anything more to her than absolutely necessary. That way he was less likely to say something that would set her off. Ever since the healers had let her go the night following Aurus' fight with Gerd she'd been a bit of a terror. Korrick had insisted she'd always been that way to an extent, being born into an esteemed house and raised under the old ways, but she'd never been so zealous before.

"He wondered where you were when he first awoke, you know," she chided, like a mother scolding a child late for dinner. "Korrick claims he was afraid you had run off."

"Run off?" Malik asked, shocked to think that Aurus had even taken notice of his absence, especially surrounded by his closer friends and family. As for running off, he'd been considering it only the day before, but he had made up his mind. "I couldn't... I owe him too much," Malik said quietly, and it wasn't until he saw the unnaturally sympathetic expression on the stern elderly female's face that he realized he had said it out loud.

"We both do," she replied, her words equally as quiet as his own had been. "We all do, but... some of us more than others," she said with a sad smile, looking away from Malik, a hoof going almost on reflex to her broken horn.

A strange silence passed between the two of them as Malik put the facts together about her. Aurus had saved her from an otherwise certain, and gruesome, public death at Gerd's hooves only mere seconds before it would have happened. There was nothing the king could have done to save her horn, but he had not been too late to save her life.

It had never occurred to Malik until that moment, but her unparalleled bossiness, her unnatural energy and zeal of late, had all been centered around things regarding Aurus or the castle he lived in. She had been the one to whip the servant crews into shape, enforcing strict cleaning regimens. She had been the one shouting herself blue in the face to get the captains of the castle guard to tighten their watch around their sleeping king and his friends. Overseeing monument construction, assisting Korrick with his duty as steward... the list was practically endless.

Malik understood it better than anyone. It was like she was a different person, almost. Not entirely unlike the woman she had once been, but deeply changed. Everything she had done in recent days she had done in service to Aurus, thanklessly. Even if her methods were harsh, she was eagerly serving her savior.

She, like Malik, owed him too much for anything less.

"Go in," she commanded gruffly, the moment of harmony between them suddenly past as she pointed to the door. "You've kept him waiting long enough."

Malik couldn't hide a chuckle, despite the stern look on her face. "Yes ma'am," he replied simply, moving past her and pulling the door open. He was a little startled to find that the noise from the hall outside vanished the minute he stepped through the doorway, even with the portal wide open. He smiled to himself in understanding as he shut the door behind him, its contact with the frame and the snap of its latch completely inaudible. The purple glow lining the doorframe was faint, but it was there all the same.

"Well if it isn't 'sir' Malik," Aurus chuckled, his normally spiky mane flattened on the back from his long slumber. He was sitting up for the first time in three days, and looking very much like nothing had happened; as if he had simply gotten a good night's rest, with a smirk on his lips as his deep green eyes washed over his friend.

"I never did figure out why everyone started calling me sir," Malik replied, his tone slightly accusing as he shifted his glance to Korrick for only a moment, but his smile remained to show that it didn't bother him. Not at this moment, when sincere relief was flooding through him. "You're a heavy sleeper, I hope you know," he declared, moving away from the door and to the side of the bed, where the body language of all the other creatures in the room told him he should be standing.

"I've heard that a few times today," Aurus chuckled, taking his gaze away from Malik for a moment. Malik's eyes followed his to Applejack, whose face still showed the ruffles in her coat where she had scrubbed away at her tears. A few other faces around the room showed similar trails, most notably Aria's and that of Aurus' mother.

Malik couldn't help a single, quiet laugh. Not one of mirth, but of simple happiness. The smile below Applejack’s reddened eyes told the story well enough. He took his gaze away as Aurus returned his attention to him.

"How are you feeling?" Malik asked, unable to think of anything else to say.

"Better than I should," Aurus replied with a small smile, his hooves resting in his lap. "Though not quite ready to be running around the castle or dealing with the people outside," he admitted.

"He got up earlier, but only long enough to get a rune in place," Twilight explained from the side, her eyes closed in gentle concentration as she maintained her spell of silence over the doorway, her horn glowing lavender.

"It wasn't so bad at first," Aurus chuckled, rubbing the back of his neck, as was his habit when he was feeling sheepish. "But once the news got out that I was awake..."

"I can imagine," Malik replied with a knowing smile. The amount of magic contained in a changeling body couldn't change unless the mind was conscious, so Aurus hadn't been suffering from any kind of magical overload during his slumber. After three days, the incredible joy of salvation that most of his people now shared had been replaced with a more subtle concern for the king, which was what Aurus had awakened to. However, their memories of the battle were as keen as Malik's own, and the news of Aurus' return to the waking world would have rekindled their joy and love of him in a matter of moments, threatening to overwhelm the king had he not been prepared.

"I feel rested, but a little weak in the legs," Aurus explained with a small smile, looking down at his back legs beneath the blankets. "Particularly the broken leg," he joked, a few of the friends gathered around him sharing a small laugh. Though he was awake at last, it seemed as if everyone were still on edge. As if they feared it might only be temporary, and that somehow they would disturb it.

"You're going to be busy when you do get up," Korrick declared from the foot of the bed.

"I know," Aurus grumbled, giving the old councilor a pouting look. "That probably has more to do with why I slept so long than anything..."

"Sleeping away your duties is hardly the kingly thing to do," Korrick scolded him, though the smile on his face showed that he understood the joke for what it was. "Still, if anyone had earned a three-day respite, it would be you. Now that you're awake, we can have the healers finish tending to you. You should be able to address the people as early as tomorrow morning."

Aurus just let out a hefty sigh and a slow nod. Malik understood his reluctance to speak in front of the entire nation, though he had done so before. It was not in Aurus' nature to enjoy being the center of attention, though he was fortunate to be a naturally gifted speaker. It was a part of his role as king that he would likely never enjoy, but a necessary one all the same.

A silence passed through the room as Aurus collected more of his thoughts, his friends following suit. Nobody was in a hurry to disturb that serenity, for what was truly left to say? Malik had arrived so late that he doubted if there was anything left on the minds of Aurus' friends that had not been said and heard, at long last. The same things had been thought and spoken to one another for days while Aurus slept.

Perhaps he was the only one in the room who still had much to say, he thought with a twinge of melancholy.

No sooner had he thought it than Aurus, who was staring at nothing in particular about his blankets, took on a look of slight confusion. He continued to stare, his expression growing less confused and more serious as the moments passed. Malik watched the change in his face with a strange feeling in his stomach, a growing nervousness. The timing was uncanny, yet it had to be a coincidence... He was unable to take his gaze away from the king until suddenly the silence broke, bringing him blinking back to reality.

"Aurus? What's wrong, sugar?" Applejack asked in concern, noticing the growing severity of his expression.

Aurus, lost in thought, seemed startled when she called out to him, and his dire look was replaced by one of sincere surprise. "It's nothing," he replied after spending a moment to compose himself, giving Applejack a warm smile to set her mind at ease. "Just a feeling I had..." he said quietly, his eyes glancing out their corners at Malik.

Malik felt the return of that nervous fear in his stomach. Though it had been almost three months ago, this feeling was familiar to him: it was the same that he had felt when he had been captured and interrogated by the king in Canterlot. He couldn't shake the feeling that Aurus was looking not at him, but through him. Just like in that storeroom when he had been alone and at his mercy, Malik felt as if somehow Aurus understood too much… much more than he should have. That he knew something he should have no way of knowing.

"I know it sounds crazy, but I think I'm still a little tired," Aurus chuckled, breaking the building tension, taking his eyes away from Malik. "Like I'm not all the way awake yet," he added with a wide yawn, which brought smiles to the faces of his friends. Such smiles were contrary to the feeling that still lingered in the pit of Malik's stomach.

"I can believe it," his younger sister replied with a knowing smile, throwing her forelegs up on top of the bed and propping herself against it. "You've never liked waking up," she pointed out.

"That's true," Aurus chuckled in reply, rubbing the top of her head with a gentle hoof. She was too far away to embrace, but not too far for that simple show of affection, which brought a pleased smile to her face.

"Just promise you won't do anything like that again," she pleaded, her tone remaining oddly warm despite her words as she pushed back against the hoof petting her mane with her smile still in place, closing her eyes in satisfaction.

Aurus just let out a small, quiet laugh in reply, pulling his hoof back gently. He didn't make that promise, Malik noted, and the semi-sad smile on Aurus' face told him that it had been intentional. Of course he couldn't make that promise; though one great threat had been put to rest, it had very nearly cost him his life. Considering the state of the world, and the magnitude of the change the young king hoped to bring in, there was no telling when an even greater danger would rear its head.

If Aria realized this, she didn't show it. She seemed to take his gentle laugh as confirmation, and the sadness was gone from his smile by the time she opened her eyes, convincing her further of the promise that was never made.

Malik sighed to himself, letting the tension that had been building fall away from his shoulders, and take the weight off his heart. The sense of normalcy was finally beginning to return, and the memory of that strange feeling Aurus' reaction had given him was beginning to fade. As he looked around the room and took in the smiling faces, the quiet words and warm laughs, and the signs of departed tears, Malik finally took solace in the simple fact that Aurus was well, after days of worry.

A small smile came to his lips as he let that simplicity take hold of his emotions, and let the joyous mood in the room finally rule his heart and mind. There would be time to worry more in the future, but at long last, after struggles both titanic and personal, there was time for peace, even if only for a few moments.

He found Aurus' eyes on him once more, and saw his own feelings reflected in that gaze and its accompanying smile. It housed a pleasant and basic warmth that needed nothing, and had everything: the smile of a man who was at peace in that moment.

It was good to have his king back.

Malik stood at his bedroom window, having left Aurus' room little more than an hour ago. The healers had come to do their work, and had condemned Aurus to nothing worse than even more sleep. Despite his long slumber, Aurus had certainly still looked tired to Malik, and so when the king had announced he was going to sleep early nobody had complained. There was no worry that he would not wake up again and so, though reluctant, his friends and family had departed for the evening.

The sunset through the bedroom window was as beautiful as ever. Though the winds outside shifted the sands far below, not a sound of their passing could be heard through the glass. It was like looking down on a world of silence, in motion and yet strangely still. Somehow surreal, Malik thought, with the dunes soaking in the rays of the sun and sharing the colors of the sky above, distinguished only by the pure-white glint of well-placed grains and the deep shadows that stretched away from them. Directly below the window and for many hundred yards stretched Aurus’ gentle-glowing rune, in a strange but pleasant contrast to the red and orange tinge of the sands.

It was beautiful, Malik thought quietly. Everything seemed more beautiful these days, and he quietly wondered how he could have missed it for so long. How he could have gone so many years without seeing the beautiful world outside the shadows he had lived in.

"You are still blind, my friend. Even now you are only seeing the very simplest of what peace has to offer. It illuminates us, guides us, makes us whole..."

"Truer words were never spoken, back then," Malik whispered to himself, easily recalling the memory of his first real discourse with Aurus, his eyes still on the sands below. "Even now they feel true..."

The quiet click of his bedroom door behind him startled him from his musings. On instinct he whirled around, a hoof going to his side where once he had worn a dagger. His hoof would have frozen even if he had not remembered he no longer carried his weapons, for his intruder was quite a surprise.

"I thought we were past you trying to kill me," Aurus teased, standing with a hoof still on the recently closed door, balancing gingerly on his other three legs, the back-right still in a splint. It had healed a great deal, but it was still a ways away from bearing his full weight. He wore a smile as he turned around slowly, showing no signs of pain despite having to hobble to make the turn without tipping over.

"Aurus," Malik replied with a defeated sigh, dropping his poised hoof. "Just a habit... one that dies hard," Malik apologized quietly. Despite the fact that he knew Aurus was joking, the mention of his attempt to take his life once before still stung. It was hard to remember trying to kill the man who was now the closest thing he had to a friend.

Aurus' smile shrank by a few teeth as the silence of Malik's inner thoughts grew between them.

"I thought you were going to sleep. Healers' orders," Malik said cautiously.

"I'll admit I'm tired," Aurus said with a chuckle that certainly sounded exhausted. "But I'm the king, right? Even healers can't order me around."

Malik knew Aurus well enough to know that he didn't like throwing his weight as king around, so he couldn't help but smile as he recognized the joking lie. "True enough, your Grace."

"Don't," Aurus chided, giving Malik a warning look. He despised titles, and it was a fact well known to those close to him.

"I know, I know," Malik chuckled, turning back to the window and looking out again. "Why are you really here?" he asked quietly. He believed he knew the answer, especially after the events earlier that day, but he quietly hoped he was wrong. He didn't want the king to see the worry on his face as he asked that question, especially after all the effort he made to keep his tone calm.

"You know why," Aurus replied simply, a sort of warm sympathy already present in his tone, courtesy of the worry he could feel flowing from Malik to him, despite the assassin's best efforts to hide it in his words.

Malik just sighed in reply, nodding only once as he continued to look outside.

The hoofsteps on the stone behind him felt agonizingly slow as he waited for Aurus to join him by the window. This was inevitable, he knew. Necessary, and though the worry was strong, the feeling of being cornered was somehow less now than it had seemed earlier that day. Perhaps he had simply had time to come to terms with it all, or perhaps facing the Aurus he had come to know and not the one he had come to fear had set him more at ease.

Whatever the case, he felt ready. Terrified still, but ready.

"It's beautiful, isn't it?" Aurus asked quietly, stopping next to him. Despite being two years younger than Malik, Aurus towered over him because of his position as king, and the metamorphosis it had caused his body to undertake. In a certain way the king of the changelings cut an intimidating figure, yet in the warm light of the sunset and with a gentle smile on his face, Malik felt far less afraid than he had been before.

"It is," he replied simply, his tone level. He didn't really know how else to respond to Aurus. The young man was fond of talking in strange ways, he knew: sometimes in riddles, other times in metaphors. It changed constantly, yet always it seemed as if somehow he knew exactly what to say, and precisely how to say it. Wherever Aurus was taking the conversation, Malik knew that eventually it would arrive where it most needed to be.

"The whole world is like this," Aurus said with a small laugh of disbelief. "Not desert, I mean, but... beautiful. I'm glad to be back," he concluded with a sigh of contentment. A long pause followed, Malik unable to think of anything to say in reply. "Aren't you?" Aurus asked at last.

That question puzzled Malik as he tried to decipher its meaning. Was he glad to be back? The purpose of the question abruptly became clear to him, and it filled his heart with a deep sadness as he realized his answer. "I was never here to begin with," he said sadly, his eyes still on the dunes below. "I never left a world like this... I've never even seen it before," he whispered.

Aurus' smile shrank to one of sadness, the sympathy clear on his expression despite the fact that his eyes, too, remained looking through the window. "I think you have, once," Aurus replied. "Even if only once. There was a time when this world was beautiful, even for you."

"How can you know?" Malik asked, his tone taking a slight edge that he was unable to catch. "How can you say that I've seen this world? My life has been shadows upon shadows," he muttered darkly. "You do not understand."

"I do know... because if you had never seen this beautiful world before, you'd never be able to see it again," he explained patiently, clearly taking no offense to Malik's less-than-subtle anger. "I understand better than most."

Malik sighed, closing his eyes and trying to reign in his emotions. If it had been anyone else, he would have called that statement presumptuous at the least. Yet with Aurus it rang too true, felt too sincere. It was not a boast, but a fact; if anyone understood the nature of this beautiful world, and those who could walk in it, it was Aurus. After all, this world was the one that he was carefully tending, guiding with his vision.

"What has Korrick told you?" Malik asked at length, unable to think of any other reason Aurus would have had to come and visit him for this purpose.

"Nothing," Aurus replied simply. "I'm here because you need me to be."

Malik found words hard to come by in that moment. If Korrick had not told Aurus, then how had he known? Why had he come here, if not in response to Korrick's recollection of his troubles?

"What's on your mind?" Aurus asked politely. His tone carried all of the patience and understanding of one ready to listen, no matter what would be said. "When I saw you earlier you didn't seem yourself. Not the Malik I've known for these past two months. Nor the Malik I knew for the first few hours," he said with a bittersweet smile.

Malik sighed, but remained silent for many moments, trying to collect his thoughts. "There is much I need to tell you, Aurus. Much you need to hear," he began, his voice barely a whisper in his trepidation. "I can tell no one else... It has to be you," he finished quietly.

"Why?" Aurus asked, the question sounding strangely simple. It didn't seem as if Aurus were puzzled, or in any need to ask that question. It felt as if, as always, he knew the answer already.

"Because my fate is in your hooves..." Malik replied. "It has been since the moment you cut me free of my old life. I have done terrible things. In this city I should die for my sins," he admitted, a slight tremor in his voice. "I know that it would only be right."

"Are you afraid to die?" Aurus asked simply.

"I have always been afraid to die," Malik whispered, his voice strained by that fear. "If I were brought to order for my crimes, or even slain by the mark I was hunting. There was never even a guarantee that another assassin would not kill me. Even when I had nothing to live for, I was afraid... a coward and nothing more," he admitted, the sting of shame in his words.

"And now?" Aurus continued, the tone of his questions unchanging.

"I am more afraid to die than I have ever been," Malik declared quietly. "Now that I have seen... I do not want to let it go. Not now. But that is not my decision to make," he finished, a note of determination fighting with one of fear in his voice.

"I've forgiven you once," Aurus cautioned gently. "You trust me to forgive you twice?"

Trust. Korrick had said much the same, Malik thought. Strange that Aurus would use the same words. "I trust you to do what is right," Malik replied simply, finally taking his eyes away from the window, and looking at the king. Aurus still wore a smile, a face of contrasting serenity to the turmoil in Malik's heart. "Your judgment from before... I can't accept it," he continued with determination. "Not until you have heard it all. After that, no matter what you decide..." he trailed off, his tone stern, his words final.

Aurus' smile grew slightly, though the sadness in his eyes remained. "Afraid to die," Aurus replied, his mind seemingly somewhere else. "Forgetful of this beautiful world, but not a stranger to it. Malik... tell me your story," Aurus gently urged him.

Malik simply nodded, closing his eyes in preparation, letting out one final, shaky breath to steady his nerves. "To the last," he whispered dutifully.