The alley stretched ahead of me, narrow and crooked, its cobblestones slick from melted snow. My boots pounded against them, breath fogging the cold night air. The hooded figure moved just beyond the reach of the torches, his cloak cutting like a shadow through the dim.
"Wait!" I barked, though I didn't know why.
He didn't.
He slipped deeper into the dark, and I kept after him. The sounds of the festival had already thinned into muffled echoes behind me—music fading, laughter fading—until there was nothing but the rush of blood in my ears and the steady slap of boots ahead of me.
We twisted down another corner, then another. Solitude's streets were alive hours ago, but now they felt deserted, each step pulling me into some forgotten part of the city. I realized how quiet it had become. Too quiet.
At the next turn, the figure stopped.
I skidded to a halt a few paces away, chest heaving. The air carried the sharp tang of cold iron and wet stone.
He stood in the middle of the street, back straight, hands folded at his sides. When he finally turned, the hood shifted, and for a moment I thought I saw nothing beneath it—just black. But then two eyes burned out of that dark, pale and faintly green, like old glass catching moonlight.
Every muscle in my body locked. That same pressure from before—like the weight of the ocean pressing on my chest—settled over me again.
"You shouldn't chase shadows," he said. His voice was rough, deep, but more than that—it felt wrong, carrying like it came from somewhere inside my skull instead of across the air.
My hand tightened on my sword hilt. "Then stop watching me."
The figure tilted his head. A small, humorless chuckle scraped through the hood. "I watch because you burn. Like a torch in the fog. Bright enough to blind. Loud enough to draw every eye that feeds on light."
I swallowed hard, forcing my blade out of its sheath with a rasp. "Who are you?"
"Not your enemy," he said. "Not yet." He stepped forward, the torchlight touching his cloak for the first time. The cloth seemed too heavy, too still, like it wasn't moved by the wind at all. "But theirs. Always theirs."
"Whose?" I demanded.
His pale eyes narrowed, gleaming sharper. "The Princes. The keepers of chains. They fight over you like carrion-birds. Mora peers through you, Meridia bends you, and others—oh, others are waiting still. Do you feel their claws, mortal?"
The words struck like a hammer. My grip faltered on the sword for a heartbeat before I forced it tighter again.
"Answer me," I snapped, trying to keep my voice steady. "Why are you following me?"
"To see," he whispered, tilting his head again. "To see if you break before they're done with you."
And then he moved.
One instant he was standing in the torchlight, the next his cloak blurred into shadow. I lunged back just as something cold swept past me—a hand, claw, blade, I couldn't tell. My sword came up on instinct, steel ringing as it scraped against something solid.
The impact rattled my arms. I shoved forward, steel sparking, and the figure staggered back into the dark. His hood shifted, and for a split second I caught sight of a mouth—if you could call it that—jagged, twisting, stretched far too wide.
My heart pounded so loud it drowned the silence.
I didn't wait. I swung again, forcing light from my magicka into the edge like I'd done in Kilkreath. The sword flared faint white, carving through the shadow where his body should've been.
The figure hissed, retreating with unnatural speed, cloak bending like smoke. He stopped at the mouth of the alley, eyes burning brighter now.
"You'll see me again," he rasped. "When the walls fall, when her light cracks, when his hunger swallows. You'll see me."
And then—gone. The shadow collapsed into nothing, like smoke pulled apart by wind.
I stood there, sword still raised, chest heaving, sweat stinging my eyes despite the cold. The alley was empty. The only sound left was the distant hush of the city, like nothing had happened at all.
Slowly, I lowered my blade, the glow fading from it until it was just steel again. My arms trembled. My throat burned.
"Not your enemy," I muttered bitterly, staring at the spot where he vanished. "Then what the hell are you?"
No answer came.
I stayed there for a long time, sword in hand, waiting for the weight in my chest to lift. It never did.