I grabbed her outstretched hand and allowed her to guide me across the street. The grass was cool beneath our feet, and the world blurred at the edges as I collapsed onto a weathered bench.
“Water,” I croaked. “I need water.”
She reached into a large, clunky bag slung at her side and pulled out a garish pink-and-purple container, adorned with swirling patterns and a narrow, hollow tube jutting from the top.
“Here,” she said, thrusting it toward me.
I recoiled instinctively. “What… is this?”
She laughed, an easy, unbothered sound. “It’s a water bottle, silly. It’s got water inside.”
I took it with hesitation, turning it over in my hands. It was unlike anything I had ever held. So light. So flexible. It lacked the coldweight of iron, the familiar roughness of clay, or the carved smoothness of horn. It felt alien—slick and almost… delicate. And yet, it didn’t fracture or bend. It was resilient in a way I didn’t understand.
My pain dulled as curiosity overtook me. I gently squeezed the container, startled by how it compressed beneath my fingers.
The girl tapped the narrow tube. “You look like you’ve never seen a water bottle before. How is that even possible?”
I didn’t answer. I turned the bottle side to side, listening to the liquid shift inside like a quiet tide.
“You suck on the straw. Like this.” She took it, placed her lips on the tube, and drank. Then, she handed it back with a small smile.
I mirrored her. Water surged into my mouth, cool and tasteless.
But not like spring water. Not like the rich, clean clarity of glacial melt or the mineral tang of deep well water. This… this was something else. It was hollow. Sanitized. Lifeless. As if the vessel itself had stripped it of all character. The water quenched my thirst, but it offered no comfort.
I handed it back, shaking my head.
She frowned. “Don’t you like it?”
“It’s not to my liking, no,” I muttered.
The pain surged again, unrelenting now that the odd container no longer distracted me. I wanted to disappear—vanish—anything to escape this place, this time.
Images of that stranger near Alina flared in my mind, stoking my fury. Who was he? Why had he stopped me from reaching her? He had felt unnatural, like hebelongedin this strange era in a way I never could.
Rage bubbled in my blood, tangled with fear and confusion. I was losing control.
“Sir?” came a soft voice.
I snapped back to the present. The girl, still there, hovered nearby, her face full of concern. “Sir, do you need help? What do you need?”
“My name isn’t,sir!” I roared, the sound ripping from my throat. “It’s Balthazar!”
She didn’t flinch. Instead, she smiled—smiled, damn her. “What a powerful name,” she said cheerfully. “I’m Scarlett.”
The calmness in her voice left me momentarily speechless. Iwanted to hurl insults, to shred her placid kindness—but I couldn’t. I was too stunned by her serenity, too wrapped in my pain.
Then she tilted her head. “Do you need a place to stay?”
I collapsed, my knees hitting the grass with a dull thud. My lungs refused to fill..
“I can get a place,” I gasped. “I just… I need a moment.”
Scarlett knelt beside me. Her gaze softened, her expression unreadable—equal parts pity and resolve. “You don’t have to do this alone,” she said. “Let me help you. Come to my place. You can rest there.”
I hesitated, pride flaring.
But the pain didn’t care about pride.
