Days passed.
Kael showed her how to move through the city without drawing attention, trading leather her armour for simple clothing that still allowed her freedom to move. She learned the rhythm of the street, the patterns of the crowds, the way danger hid not in forests but in alleys and unspoken tensions.
Yet the world never felt entirely real.
The nights were the worst. She would wake expecting to hear owls or the whisper of winds through leaves, only to be greeted by distant engines and the hum of unseen machinery. The silence her was different - heavier, lonelier.
One evening, while practicing with her bow on a quiet rooftop, she noticed kael watching her.
"You never miss," he said.
"Years of training," she replied, lowering the bow. "In my world, if you miss, you starve."
He nodded thoughtfully. "Here, people forget how close survival still is. They just hide it behind walls."
Ariya studied him. "You speak as if you don't belong here either."
His smile was fleeting. "Maybe I never did."
The wind tugged at her hair, carrying the faint scent of rain. For a moment, she imagined she could hear the forest again—faint, distant, calling her home.
"What if I can't go back?" she asked quietly.
Kael didn't answer immediately.
Instead, he stepped closer, close enough that she could see the tiny scar at the corner of his lip. "Then you won't face this world alone," he said.
Her pulse quickened, though she didn't know why.
Hunters were not meant to rely on others. They survived alone, trusting only their instincts and their aim. Yet standing beside him, she felt a strange steadiness—as if the ground beneath her feet had finally stopped shifting.