By the time they made it back to the inn, it felt like hours had past. In reality, although their return had been slow and hindered by Nafan’s limping gait, it had probably only been a couple minutes. The villagers outside were throwing water onto the nearby buildings in an attempt to prevent the fire from spreading across the street, and Da Shan – along with several others of the more fortunate – were handing out bread to the workers and the injured. Spotting the child’s mother sitting near the door of the inn with her children, Nafan headed in that direction.

Her oldest boy spotted him first – the teen’s eyes widened in shock and he reached down to shake his mother’s shoulders.

“Ma, they found her! They found A-Niu!”

The woman lifted her head and let out a small shriek of relief, but as she tried to get to her feet, Nafan gestured for her to stay sitting. Khyriel didn’t follow as Nafan limped over and handed the toddler over to the woman’s arms.

“She’s just passed out,” Nafan explained hastily, seeing the fear in her gaze when she saw her unconscious child. “We…” He paused and turned away to cough. “Ugh… we breathed in a lot of smoke, though.”

“Thank you!” The woman’s eyes glistened with tears of appreciation as she reached one hand and grabbed his arm with thin, white fingers. “Thank you so much. Bless you. May all the heavens bless you.”

Nafan chuckled, pleased, only to break off again with a raspy cough. “There’s no need, but you’re welcome.”

The woman let go of him with a shaky sigh of relief, and as Nafan straightened he glanced over and saw Da Shan staring at him. But his impulse to go and ask the man for information was overshadowed by his desire to find Khyriel again. Giving the man a brief nod instead, Nafan turned his back and left the crowd.

He found the boy standing in the shadows of the foliage beside the inn, well away from the crowd. The air here was cool and damp, and smelled sweet. Gulping deep, grateful breaths, Nafan walked towards the boy and felt a crooked smile twitch onto his lips as he was instantly pinned down by Khyriel’s venomous blue glare.

“… Dumbass.”

Nodding in reply to his expected greeting, Nafan walked over to the boy’s side and promptly collapsed onto his rear end in the moist moss. Pulling up his half-burnt trousers, Nafan ran his hands gingerly over the stinging burns on his legs. He couldn’t see much in the darkness.

“I didn’t think you had the guts to run in there like that.” There was some rustling, then a faint breeze of husky air, and Nafan glanced over in brief surprise as he realized Khyriel had squatted down next to him.

“You ran in there, too,” Nafan murmured, remembering the momentary horror he’d felt when he’d thought the lycan hadn’t made it.

Khyriel grunted and rubbed his nose. “You paid me to keep you safe,” he muttered in a muffled voice.

Nafan hung his head but felt a chuckle bubble out of the heaviness in his chest. “I didn’t think you’d die for a bit of extra money.”

“I didn’t think you’d die for someone else’s brat,” Khyriel growled in reply, sounding strangely unhappy.

“You didn’t?” Nafan uttered a brief laugh of surprise.

“No,” Khyriel grumbled. “I thought you were just a perverted doctor.”

Smiling guiltily to himself, Nafan sighed and tilted his head back, enjoying the rush of cool air against his stinging skin. “What do you think I am now?”

“… A dumb perverted doctor.”

Chuckling, Nafan glanced over at the boy. To his faint surprise, Khyriel also did the same. When their eyes met, the boy’s blue irises blinked and then slid dodgedly to the left.

“You’re wounded,” Khyriel said in a low, quiet voice. “I can smell the blood.”

“What about you?” Nafan murmured worriedly, reaching out and touching the boy’s face with his sooty finger before he could stop himself.

Khyriel stiffened, and he froze too, instantly apprehensive as the boy’s blue irises narrowed and slid back in his direction. But Khyriel didn’t swat his hand away, or bite his fingers off, and after a couple seconds Nafan felt his wariness fade away into something thicker, something… less understandable.

Swallowing hard, Nafan held the boy’s gaze and slid more of his hand onto the boy’s face. He stared at Khyriel’s eyes, watching with held breath as the sharp blue streaks of the lycan’s irises twitched and pulled taut, dilating the boy’s glistening pupils. He became acutely aware of the soft skin pressed against the pads of his fingers. Khyriel’s cheek was cool and soothing to the touch, but underneath the cold exterior Nafan could feel a warmth from deep within. Letting his breath out slowly and shakily, Nafan trailed his thumb lower, down the boy’s cheek and to the corner of Khyriel’s lips. The boy’s lips were crusty to the touch, and Khyriel’s tongue flickered out to unconsciously wet his dry lips. The skin became smooth and supple underneath his finger, and Nafan felt his thumb slip forward and slide deeper into the warmth.

He hit something hard. A tooth, Nafan realized numbly. Overcome with a sudden sense of awe, he pushed his thumb up, spread Khyriel’s lips apart, and leaned closer so that he could see the boy’s fangs.

The lycan aged differently from humans. Within three years of birth, their wolf forms were big and strong enough to hunt and fight, even if their human forms remained toddler-like. Both forms reached their prime at around mid-twenty, after which the aging process slowed and they remained young for a long time. Khyriel looked eighteen or nineteen, but he could just as well have been thirty or forty human years old.

Judging by his teeth, though, he truly was less than a decade old.  

Amazing. Even in their human form, the lycan’s teeth structure were distinctly different – especially their large, sharp incisors. Khyriel’s teeth were quite new, but there were the tell-tale signs of worn – some stains, scratches, and a small chip in his top top incisor.

“… Hey.” Khyriel’s voice rumbled in muffled protest and a hand grabbed Nafan’s arm, stopping him from going any further. “What are you doing…?”

Blinking, Nafan glanced up and realized with a start that their faces were almost touching. Khyriel’s eyes were narrowed and hazy as they gazed down at him, and Nafan was struck with a different kind of awe as Khyriel shifted and brushed their noses together.

It was almost like an affectionate nuzzle. The boy paused, his breath suddenly loud and heavy against Nafan’s face. He’d closed his eyes now, and Nafan could see his throat quivering and his chest heaving with some kind of effort. In an astonished stupor, Nafan stayed still, not daring to move as he watched Khyriel’s lips part and press together several times, a mere eyelash length away from his own. A faint shadow flickered near his face, and Nafan flinched ever so slightly when he felt something warm touch his jaw, only to realize with another jolt of surprise that it was Khyriel’s hand. The boy trailed his fingers lightly along his jawbone, down to his chin, and ended up rubbing Nafan’s stubble. His eyes were still closed, and his lips were still indecisively hovering a painful distance away.

… I need to cough, Nafan thought dizzily, gulping hard as the pooled-up saliva in his mouth slid back. His throat bobbed, and Khyriel’s fingers trailed down from his chin and followed the movement of his throat. They stopped on the bump of his throat, and Nafan glanced down in apprehension as he felt the boy’s nails scratch his delicate skin. After another pause, Khyriel’s eyes fluttered open, and Nafan promptly found himself blinded by the intense blue of the lycan’s irises. In a sudden flash of insanity, Nafan felt his hand jerk forward – but before he could complete his act, a sharp voice and a light flooded their shadowed corner.

“Khyriel!”

In an instant, the lycan shoved him away and moved back. Rolling over onto the ground with a pained cough, Nafan let out an exaggerated groan. But Khyriel ignored him, and instead he heard the boy’s voice call out matter-of-factly.

“Da Shan. What’s up?”

“Don’t ‘what’s up’ me, I was coming to check on you.” Da Shan’s voice was weary and slightly irritable. As Nafan sat up, he saw the big man lumbering closer with a lantern in hand. He was slightly surprised to see Da Shan’s attention on him, rather than Khyriel, and he raised an eyebrow slightly in response to the man’s concerned glare. “Nafan, was it? My daughter is worried about you. You should come to the inn and rest. There are a lot of injured people but I can spare a room and a bath for you.”

“Are you sure?” Nafan straightened, surprised by the man’s hospitality despite his disgruntled tone. “That would be amazing.”

“Hey,” Khyriel complained, lifting his hands behind his head and kicking at a rock nearby. “Where’s my special treatment?”

“I thought you said you liked sleeping outside better,” Da Shan called wearily over his shoulder as he led Nafan back towards the inn. “If you want a room so badly, you can share with your demon friend.”

“I’m not a demon,” Nafan protested out loud this time as he stumbled after the big man. The wounds covering his skin stung, and he suddenly remembered the herbs that he’d bought earlier that morning – good thing he’d left them in his room, or the turpentine oil would surely have exploded in the heat of the fire.

“I know, I’m just teasing,” Da Shan grunted grudgingly. “You surprised us with what you did for her, you know. The widow.”

“What do you mean?” Nafan laughed lightheartedly, catching up to the man and lifting his hand to the innkeeper’s shoulder. “She needed help and her child was in danger. Anybody would have done the same.”

Da Shan glanced over with an exasperated look and opened his mouth, but then stopped and pressed his lips together again with a heavy sigh. “I’m surprised Khyriel is sticking to someone like you.”

“Me, too,” Nafan blurted out truthfully, before seeing Da Shan’s mildly questioning gaze and hastily changing the subject. “By the way, may I borrow your kitchen later? I want to make some ointment, for treating my burns. It’ll be useful for the other wounded villagers, too.”

“Oh?” Da Shan looked confused at first, but after a couple seconds of raising his eyebrows at Nafan, he turned away with a chuckle and paused to wave Nafan into the inn. “Right, you’re a doctor. Next thing I know you’re going to tell me you’re a monk, too.”

“Haha,” Nafan laughed, half-expecting Da Shan to continue and suggest that he was a spy from the capitol. But the man fell silent after that, exchanging somber nods with some women inside the inn instead, and Nafan retreated back into his own thoughts with a slightly sombre smile.