The night was quiet again. Too quiet.
Zethra sat cross-legged by the campfire, watching the faint glow of embers lick at the air. Across from him, Ezagone snored loudly, sprawled like a drunk noble after a banquet, mouth wide open, hair sticking in every possible direction.
If someone stumbled on them, they'd never believe Ezagone had nearly blown himself apart with raw Aetherion only hours earlier.
"You're staring," Ezagone mumbled suddenly, one eye cracking open.
Zethra raised a brow. "You were asleep."
"I was pretending to sleep. To test your brotherly loyalty." Ezagone stretched with a groan, then smirked. "You passed. Congratulations, you win the prize of feeding me breakfast tomorrow."
Zethra sighed. "You're hopeless."
"Hopelessly charming."
Before Zethra could throw a stick at him, Amethyst's voice rippled like silk across his thoughts.
"You should not be so relaxed, my dear."
Zethra stiffened. His eyes darted around the fire, but she was nowhere in sight.
"Relaxed?" he echoed silently in his mind. "I nearly burned my hands off sealing him. You could at least give me a day's peace."
Amethyst's laugh curled around his ear like perfume. "Peace is a luxury devils rarely keep. Especially after what just happened."
"What do you mean?"
Her answer came slow, deliberate. "When a hybrid awakens, the surge of Aetherion is… noticeable. To certain eyes, it shines like lightning across a night sky. And you—my darling—are not far enough from civilization to have gone unseen."
Zethra's gut sank. "You mean—"
"Yes." The shadows beside a tree thickened, and she stepped through as though the night had sculpted her. Crimson silk clung to her body, her lips painted sin incarnate. Her violet gaze fixed on his. "You've been marked."
Ezagone sat up, yawning. "Hey, Zeth, you talking to yourself again? Because if you've gone crazy, I get to be the sane brother now."
Zethra glared at him. "She says we've been noticed."
"'She'…? ." Ezagone waved lazily at the empty air. "She…who?"
Amethyst arched a brow, lips curling. "If only he knew."
Zethra pinched the bridge of his nose. "Ez. We need to leave."
Ezagone blinked, then frowned. "…Noticed by who?"
That was when the first arrow split the night.
It whistled past Ezagone's ear, embedding into the tree trunk with a metallic twang. The wood hissed as faint silver light spread from the arrowhead, burning the bark like acid.
Both brothers froze.
Ezagone turned slowly to look at the arrow. "…Oops. That wasn't a squirrel."
Zethra yanked him to his feet just as three more arrows rained from the treeline, their glow searing through the dark. He spread his senses instinctively, catching one midair before it could strike. The other two slammed into the ground where Ezagone had been sitting, sizzling with a faint angelic resonance.
Figures emerged from the shadows of the trees, cloaked and masked, their weapons gleaming with faint light. Hunters.
The leader stepped forward, his voice cold. "By decree of the Concord, the awakened hybrid is to be taken into custody."
Ezagone blinked, pointing at himself. "Wait, me? You guys sure you don't mean him? He's taller, scarier, and way more likely to bite."
The hunter ignored the joke, raising his bow again.
Zethra's Aetherion flared at once, his wings itching beneath their seal. His jaw clenched. "You're not taking him."
Amethyst's voice purred inside his head. "Show restraint. These are not enemies to slaughter—but nor are they friends."
Zethra bared his teeth. "Then what do I do?"
"Protect your brother. That is all that matters."
Ezagone leaned closer, whispering with a grin even as danger closed in. "Well, looks like I was right. I am the handsome protagonist after all."
Zethra groaned. "Protagonists don't die in chapter one, so stop talking and move!"
And with that, the night exploded into chaos.