The cold night air was not enough to extinguish the heat of humiliation burning on Tom's face. He marched over the uneven stones, his heavy steps echoing the irritation bubbling in his chest. The audacity of that man… The smell of cheap alcohol and disdain still seemed to hang around him, a personal offense he couldn't simply ignore.
"Who does he think he is, calling me a girl?" he grumbled to the vapor his own breath formed in the frigid air.
Back in the small square, the confusing maze of alleys seemed even more oppressive under the dying light of day. Tom forced himself to focus, repeating the instructions like a mantra. "To the left of the square, a street with a bridge…"
His eyes scanned the landscape of corroded metal and rotten wood until he found it: a narrow passage, squeezed between two buildings that leaned against each other like weary old men. In the background, the silhouette of an iron bridge was stark against the last glow of twilight. "There!" he proclaimed, his voice sounding more confident than he felt.
With every step in that direction, the lower city swallowed him further. The sun had already bled beyond the arid mountains surrounding Chisanatora, and now, claws of darkness stretched from the alleys, transforming the gray labyrinth into a realm of shadows. The chill emanating from the omnipresent metal penetrated his coat, a dead cold that seemed to suck the warmth from the air itself.
Upon reaching the bridge, Tom stopped. He clung to the icy iron railing, its surface rough with layers of rust, and looked down into the abyss. The city didn't end there; it continued to descend in layer upon layer of misery and chaos, a pit of darkness dotted with faint, sickly lights. On the other side of the bridge, he saw his goal: a small open area and, just beyond it, the base of a spiral staircase that rose like the spine of a metal serpent, disappearing into a corridor that led upward. Lifting his gaze, he could glimpse the soft gleam of the upper city's polished metal, so close and yet a world away.
However, the moment his feet touched the other side of the bridge, a figure emerged from the shadows, blocking his path. It was a man in tattered, filthy clothes, with a greasy, overconfident smile on his face—the universal smile of a troublemaker.
"Please, get out of my way…" Tom requested, his voice a tense whisper, restrained by his latent fury.
"You've come a long way. And you've fallen into the wrong city, kid…" the man mocked, his voice drawling and full of ill intent.
Tom didn't move his face, but his eyes caught the subtle movement behind him. Like rats emerging from their holes, two other men appeared, closing off his escape route. One of them toyed with the dull glint of a dagger, while the other took a long swig from a bottle of cheap beer, the same stench that emanated from the tavern.
"He's from Faraam, isn't he?" commented the man with the dagger, his covetous eyes fixed on Tom's clothes.
"I heard people from Faraam have pockets full of silver!" added the other, wiping his mouth with the back of a dirty hand.
"Please, get out of my way…" Tom repeated, one last time, his patience draining away like sand through his fingers.
The man in front of him laughed, an unpleasant sound that scratched the silence. He raised his own dagger, the cold metal pressing against the skin of Tom's neck. "Even these clothes of yours must be worth something," he hissed. "Just leave everything with us, and I promise that maybe nothing will happen to you!"
Tom's right hand, hidden by the long sleeve of his shirt, opened. With an internal, almost imperceptible movement, three polished, silver-colored metal bars slid from a hidden compartment in his forearm. The instant the cold metal touched his palm, his fingers closed around them in a gesture so quick and discreet that the thieves, focused on their intimidation, noticed nothing.
"I won't ask again!" Tom's voice changed. The pleading tone vanished, replaced by a frigid, cutting command.
"YOU BRAT—"
The thief's arm tensed to slash but didn't move an inch. Time seemed to stagnate.
What? the man wondered, the cynical smile frozen on his face, which now contorted in confusion. When did he get here? I didn't even feel him!
Gripping the thief's wrist with an ironclad firmness was a tall man, with long, shaggy black hair and a full beard that hadn't seen a blade in ages. His unsettling red eyes were narrowed, fixed on the aggressor with a look of contempt so profound it bordered on insult.
"You'd better stop this," the man said, his voice deep and gravelly, yet laden with unquestionable authority.
"Hey! It's that drunk who's always at the tavern!" one of the thieves in the back exclaimed, more surprised than alarmed.
The leader, his arm still immobilized, yelled in frustration and tried to throw a punch with his free hand. His shout, however, twisted into a yelp of excruciating pain. The grip on his wrist intensified, and a sickening, wet snap echoed through the alley. The dagger fell, clattering against the stones, and the man collapsed to his knees, his face pale.
"Kill that bastard!" screamed one of his cronies.
The drunk simply lifted the agonizing thief by his broken arm and, with a fluid, effortless motion, hurled him against the accomplice holding the other dagger. The body flew over Tom—who remained motionless, his gaze fixed forward, his mind struggling to process the surreal speed of events.
The two men fell in a tangled heap on the ground. The third, the one with the bottle, stood paralyzed, his eyes wide with terror at seeing his companions neutralized so easily.
"You… You bastard!" he stammered. The moment he blinked, the man was in front of him, a cynical smirk forming on his face.
"Actually, I came for this. Since I'm broke, Joshua didn't want to give me any on credit today…" he commented, his red gaze fixed on the beer bottle.
With a desperate cry, the thief tried to use the bottle as a weapon in a clumsy swing. The drunk's hand moved like a snake, stopping the attack by seizing his wrist. With an agility that completely betrayed his appearance and state, he spun, moving behind the attacker, and delivered a precise strike to his elbow, forcing him to drop the bottle.
With a comical reflex, the drunk leaned down and caught the bottle in mid-air, saving it from shattering on the ground. The thief, clutching his sore arm, looked at him with tears in his eyes. The other two, already staggering to their feet, stared at him with a mixture of anger and terror.
"Shoo! Go on, get out of here," the man said, before raising the bottle to his lips and downing it in a long gulp.
The thieves didn't need a second warning. They ran, stumbling over each other to flee the alley.
"This isn't over!"
"I'll get my revenge!"
The empty threats echoed and faded into the darkness, pathetic. Tom finally turned, silently observing the man who had saved him—Vernh, the drunk from the tavern—who was now emptying the stolen bottle as if nothing had happened. The boy he had dismissed as a mere nuisance was, without a doubt, much more than he appeared.
The silence that settled in the alley was heavier than the darkness. The echoes of the thieves' empty threats had dissipated, leaving behind only the smell of fear and the soft clink of the abandoned dagger on the stones. Vernh leaned against the corroded metal wall, raising the bottle to his lips and letting out a long groan of relief that was part satisfaction, part pure exhaustion. His half-closed red eyes assessed the tense figure before him.
"You alright, girl?" he asked, his voice slurred but with a sliver of curiosity.
Tom, who had been paralyzed until that moment, his body still tense with unused adrenaline, seemed to awaken. The three silver metal bars were still clutched tightly in his hand. He made them slide back into the hidden compartment in his sleeve with a fluid, irritated gesture before turning around.
"Why?" The question came out dry, cutting through the air.
"Why what?" Vernh questioned, eyeing the boy sideways, like a sleepy predator deciding if the prey was worth the effort.
"You knew. You saw," Tom insisted, taking a step forward, his face a mask of frustration. "You knew I could handle them. So why did you do that?"
Vernh stared at him, his expression empty of any discernible emotion, a deep and ancient boredom etched into his features. "Because I don't want trouble. That's all."
"Hah? Trouble?!" Tom shouted, his voice echoing sharply in the narrow alley.
"Yeah, brat!" Vernh retorted, pushing himself off the wall and turning fully to face Tom, his body moving with a deliberate slowness. "You weren't going to go easy on them. Your stance, the way you held those… little metal things of yours. You were going to break them. Maybe even kill them! And I, decidedly, am not in the mood to have the City Guard sniffing around my home!" He finished with an accusatory finger pointed at Tom's face.
The man's perception was so sharp it dismantled Tom's anger for an instant, replacing it with a cold shock. He was right. But the reason was so selfish, so trivial, that the fury returned twofold.
"That doesn't justify your 'charity'!" Tom hissed. "And I already told you, I'm a man!" The proclamation sounded thinner and more desperate than he intended, weakened by his anger.
"Oh, yeah… Sure, sure… A man…" Vernh scoffed, disdain dripping from every syllable as he took another long, noisy swig.
"Why do you keep saying that? Is it because my face is effeminate and my body is small?! You old fool!" Tom protested, stomping his foot on the ground in an undeniably childish gesture.
Vernh paused with the bottle halfway to his mouth. A light of false understanding shone in his eyes. He slapped his free palm against his forehead as if he'd had an epiphany. "Oh, right, of course! Now I get it! You're going for that stereotype girls these days love, right? Sensitive, delicate men who look like women! What's it called again…"
Tom ground his teeth so hard his jaw ached. Blood rushed to his face, painting it with the vivid red of humiliation.
"…what was it…" Vernh continued to ramble, his free hand on his chin in an exaggeratedly thoughtful pose. "Ah! Androgynous!" he proclaimed, pointing at Tom as if he had discovered a new species of insect.
The boy flinched, holding himself back from exploding.
"I see, I see…" Vernh went on, now with a professorial tone. "The idea of pursuing beauty to attract girls… In my day, it was different, you know? Women liked real men. Tall, strong, masculine!" He puffed out his chest with pathetic pride, as if describing himself in his former glory.
"I already said I'm a man! For your information, I—" Tom's voice, laden with pure frustration, was abruptly cut off.
In the blink of an eye, Vernh had moved. The space between them vanished. The man's face was inches from his, and the stench of cheap alcohol and sweat invaded his senses. His gaze was no longer mocking, just empty, bored. The voice that came out was a murmur without any inflection.
"If you're really a guy… pull out your dick and take a piss right there."
Tom's world stopped. The air caught in his lungs. The affront was so raw, so vulgar, and so direct that his brain simply refused to process it. He stood there, paralyzed, his eyes wide.
Vernh stared at him for another second of absolute silence. Tom's face, if possible, turned an even deeper shade of red.
"That's what I thought."
With that, Vernh turned, showing him his back with the same indifferent slowness as before. He took another sip from the bottle and began to walk away, his steps echoing and disappearing into the darkness.
And Tom was left behind. Incredulous, his mouth half-open, moans of pure mortification dying in his throat before they could even form. He felt as if he had been stripped bare and examined in the most humiliating way possible, defeated not by a blade or a fist, but by a few vulgar words from a common drunk.