Chapter 27: The Girl hiding Beneath the bed

Chapter 27: Chapter 27: The Girl hiding Beneath the bed

The city never truly slept. Even deep into the night, lanterns still glowed along the narrow streets, merchants packed away the last of their goods, and distant voices drifted through the cold air of the empire’s outer district.

But tonight, something else moved through those streets. A girl ran as if death itself pursued her.

Her long orange hair whipped wildly in the wind, bright even beneath the pale moonlight. Her breathing came ragged, her clothes torn in several places, fresh blood staining one sleeve.

Behind her, footsteps echoed, fast and relentless."Don’t let her escape!" The shout came from somewhere behind the alley. The girl bit her lip and pushed herself harder, though her legs burned and her chest felt ready to split open.

She had been running for what felt like hours. In truth she had been running for days, sleeping in ditches and stealing scraps from unwatched carts, never once daring to stop long enough to think about how tired she truly was. The streets changed as she crossed from one district into another.

The buildings grew taller, the roads cleaner, the guards fewer. She had crossed the border. She was inside the Palace now, a place she had only ever heard about in whispered stories traded among frightened slaves.

For a moment hope flickered in her eyes. If she could disappear into imperial territory, perhaps they would lose her trail. But the footsteps did not stop.

"They’re still following me," she breathed, the words barely a whisper. She turned sharply into a narrow passage between two buildings and pressed herself against the wall, holding her breath. Silence answered her, broken only by the distant sound of wind curling between rooftops.

Her heart pounded so loudly she was certain they could hear it from the street. She counted the seconds in her head, one, two, three, and allowed herself to believe, just for an instant, that she had lost them. Then a hand seized her hair from behind.

"Found you."

Pain exploded across her scalp. She cried out as she was yanked backward and thrown onto the stone ground, her shoulder striking first, then her head. A hooded man stood over her, his face hidden beneath dark cloth.

"So much trouble for a little slave," he muttered, and before she could move, his boot slammed onto her stomach. The air fled her lungs. She curled instinctively, trembling, tasting copper at the back of her throat.

"You should have stayed obedient."

Fear filled her eyes, yet beneath that fear lived something darker. Desperation had a shape of its own, and hers had sharpened into a small blade hidden inside her torn sleeve.

As the man bent to seize her again, her trembling hand found the hilt.The blade cut across his leg in a single motion. The hooded man roared and stumbled backward. She did not wait to see him fall. She sprang to her feet and ran, ignoring the fire in her side. "Catch her!" More hooded figures appeared at the end of the alley.

She turned again, nearly slipping on the wet stones, and sprinted toward the taller buildings ahead. Her vision blurred at the edges. The cold night air burned her lungs with every breath.She reached a wider street and looked up.

One of the balconies above had its door left open, faint light spilling from inside. A room. A hiding place. Without hesitation she began to climb, fingers shaking as she pulled herself onto the railing.

Every movement sent pain through her bruised body, but she forced herself onward, thinking only of the darkness waiting beyond the doorway. She slipped inside. The chamber was quiet, furnished with the kind of expensive wood and fabric that told her this belonged to someone of noble blood. She did not care whose room it was.

The shouts outside were drawing closer."Search the roofs!" "She couldn’t have gone far!" Her eyes darted around desperately until they landed on the bed. She dropped to the floor and crawled beneath it, pressing herself into the shadows, her whole body trembling.

Voices passed outside. Footsteps crossed the roof above. Someone paused near the balcony, and she stopped breathing entirely, certain that any sound at all would give her away. A long moment passed before the footsteps finally moved off.

Only when the last echo faded did her body begin to unclench. Exhaustion crashed over her all at once, heavier than any chain she had worn. "No," she whispered to herself. "I can’t sleep." Her body no longer obeyed her. Curled beneath a stranger’s bed, bruised and bleeding, the orange haired girl sank into a deep and exhausted sleep,

unaware of whose chamber she had chosen, or what waited for her when its owner returned. Morning arrived slowly. Golden light filtered through the curtains of the royal chamber, and Theon Nivaris opened his eyes to it. For a few seconds he simply stared at the ceiling, letting the warmth settle over him before the memory of the cave battle came rushing back.

The ancient ice. The overwhelming mana. The strange darkness that had swallowed his own awareness while his body kept moving without him. A frown crossed his face.A knock sounded at the door.

"Your Highness, may we enter?" He sat up.

"Come in."

Two maids entered carrying fresh clothes and a basin of warm water. As they prepared him for the day, a small shape stirred on the couch near the window. Ifrith yawned loudly. "Morning, Master." "You sleep too much for a Flame lord."

"If I’m not destroying kingdoms, I deserve rest."

Theon snorted. The maids exchanged awkward glances, still not entirely used to hearing a small black cat speak with the cadence of an old man.

Ifrith’s crimson eyes drifted briefly toward the bed, and for a single instant his gaze sharpened. There was another presence in the room, weak and hidden and asleep, wrapped in a thin veil of concealment magic that had clearly been cast in desperation rather than skill.Theon noticed nothing.

Ifrith also said nothing either. The scent beneath that veil carried fear, exhaustion, and dried blood, not the intent of an attacker. Whatever was hiding there posed no threat worth interrupting breakfast for, so he let it be.

After the maids finished dressing him, Theon dismissed them and stretched his arms. "Today feels strangely peaceful," he said. Ifrith nearly laughed at the irony, thinking of the wounded stranger curled beneath the very bed his master had just risen from.

Instead he asked,

"What will you do today, Master?" Theon paused.

A thought crossed his mind, and his eyes narrowed slightly as he looked at his own hands.

"After the fight in the cave, I gained several new skills, didn’t I?"

Ifrith flicked his tail. "You did."

"I’ve only used them on instinct." Theon frowned. "If I keep casting ancient magic without understanding it, I might level half the palace by accident again."

"That would certainly make court meetings more interesting."

Theon glanced at him and gnored the remark.

"I need someone to teach me. A real teacher, or at least someone who understands how these elements are meant to behave. "Ifrith puffed out his chest with obvious pride.

"You are looking at one."

Theon blinked. "You?"

"Master, I have existed longer than most empires currently standing. I know how to wield every elemental attribute there is."

"Every element?"

"Fire, water, wind, earth, thunder, ice, darkness, all of them."

He paused for effect.

"Except light.

I never bothered learning that particular one. Tedious business."

Theon stared at him for a moment, then let a slow grin spread across his face.

"So you were holding back during the cave fight."Ifrith froze, visibly offended.

"Holding back?"

"Yes."

"I was not holding back," he declared with great dignity.

"I was exercising restraint."

"That sounds like something people say after getting punched."

"Master, your disrespect deepens by the hour." Theon laughed.

"If you’re so powerful, why didn’t you use your full strength?" Ifrith’s expression turned unexpectedly serious.

"Because if I had used my full force, the cave would no longer exist. "Theon’s smile faded slightly. "I’m serious."

"So am I." Ifrith’s golden-crimson eyes glowed faintly. "The mountain around it would have collapsed. Everything within several kilometers would have been reduced to ash, including the Flame empress body."

He gazed in reverence as he said once more

"And I had no intention of turning my new master into a roasted prince."

"Roasted prince?"

"A delicacy, I assume." Theon stared at him for three long seconds before bursting into laughter. "You’re impossible."

"And yet, remarkably useful."

Theon shook his head, still smiling, and walked toward the window in thought.

"Where can we train?"

The palace gardens were too exposed. An ordinary spell might already draw attention, but what he carried inside him was anything but ordinary.

Ifrith suggested somewhere open, somewhere he could release his mana freely.

Theon thought of the Frostfang Forest, of the frozen destruction that had poured out of him there, and shook his head immediately.

"No. Definitely not the gardens. "He thought for a few more seconds before his eyes lit up as he snapped his fingers.

"I know a place."

"Where?" Ifrith asked.

Theon turned toward the door. "The Imperial Archive."

Ifrith blinked.

"That is the last place I expected."

"Come on. You’ll understand when we get there." He stepped out of the chamber.

Behind him, beneath the bed, the sleeping girl remained hidden in shadow, completely unaware that the owner of the room had already walked away, and that the Flame Lord demon had known she was there the entire time.