Izver didn’t stop at one, though. He was no longer interested in inflicting physical pain. He wanted to taunt now. He slapped Luric again.

“What was that?”

Slap!

“Ya wanna say somethin’?”

Slap!

“Go on, whoreson, I’m listening.”

Slap!

“Though, for ya sake, it better be an apology.”

Slap! Slap! Slap!

Insult to injury, tears of frustration were starting to well up in Luric’s eyes, and he couldn’t stop it. Izver’s grin widened at the sight of them.

“Awww, what’s the matter? Thought ya were supposed to be brave now.”

Slap!

“Go on, say something!”

Luric wanted to call him a wretched pile of dung and then spit in his face, but he also wanted this to be over. If he laid there quietly, Izver would eventually get bored of him. But he was not going to apologize. Never. And Izver wasn’t letting up so easily.

“Say you’re sorry!”

SLAP!

“Say you’re sorry!”

SLAP!

“Say you’re sorry!”

SLAP!

The acid in his stomach burned and then spread to his chest. He felt a strange shiver come over him, yet oddly enough, his body wasn’t trembling. It was like a vibration underneath his skin.

The muscle in his shoulders and upper arm tightened, and he then felt that tension run up his neck and in his jaw. Luric clenched his teeth so tightly he was afraid he was going to shatter them. For some reason, they felt bigger than before, his tongue also not quite fitting inside the cave of his mouth as neatly as it should. It made him draw his lips back.

That’s when he heard Izver scream.

He jumped off of him, ripping his wrist from Luric’s hold. He scurried away, face pale and eyes large with panic. Luric blinked in confusion, but took his chance and got up to his feet before Izver could recover from whatever had spooked him. That’s when he noticed Izver cradling his arm protectively to his chest; the arm that Izver had been holding him with.

Thin rivulets of red were flowing down from four identical and evenly spaced puncture marks. Right where Luric had been clutching him.

There’s no way I could’ve done that, he had thought while raising his right arm to look at his fingers. He couldn’t have the strength to get his blunt fingernail -

They were sharp.

They were long.

As were the fingers.

And the span of his palm.

This wasn’t his hand.

But it seemed to be attached to his arm that was attached to his shoulder that belonged to his torso. He tried to get his fingers to move a little, and sure enough, the hand before him complied. But there was a disconnection between what he was seeing and what he was feeling. This isn’t mine. This isn’t me. He grabbed it with his left arm, almost as if this was a costume glove and he wanted to tear it off. The left hand wasn’t his either. Same sharp nails, same long fingers.

“M-Monster. MONSTER!” yelled Izver.

What? Where?, was Luric’s first thought, but Izver was looking only at him. He turned around. Someone had to help him. Someone had to go get Mr. Carshtin.

The kids that had gathered around all flew backwards in fright when Luric turned to them. Some screamed, some ran away, but most where just standing there, looking at him with the same terrified expression Izver had.

Wha- did something happen to my face too?  When when he tried to speak his teeth got in the way, and what came out was a spit filled gurgle that scared even him.

He brought up those hands that weren’t his to his face to feel around his mouth and found there teeth that weren’t his. He had been right, they were bigger. And sharp. Fangs? WHAT HAPPENED TO ME?, was what he meant to yell, but an inhuman wail was what he heard.

And then.

“Auntie was right,” someone said breathlessly. Luric looked up to see Buck staring at him. He had come a little closer now, standing between him and the other sniffling, whimpering kids. His face showed the same kind of terror the others were wearing, but his eyes held a shine of fascination as they ran over his changed features. But it was his next words that broke Luric.

“Ya really are a cursed child of Shulffa. That’s why ya don’t have any parents.”

A cursed child. A bastard of Shulffa. That couldn’t be right. No! He wasn’t. But then how could he explain this? Was this really the reason he had been abandoned? Or did he even have real parents to begin with? Didn’t he read that monsters were spawned from darkness? Or were those the shadow critters he was thinking of? He couldn’t remember. He read so many books about legends and lore and mythical monsters, and his mind was reeling. But there was something he did remember clearly, and that was what people did when they came across someone like this.

When he heard one of the kids yell for help, he ran.

He ran, and ran, and ran.

Then he hid.

Then cried until he fell asleep.

The next day, he heard them come for him. Heard Mr. Carshtin call his name. By the time he reached them, Mr. Carshtin was already on the ground, unconscious and bloody. He watched them carry him away from behind bushes, too much of a coward to do anything else.

He creeped back to his school and into Mr. Carshtin’s bedroom where he was lying alone and unattended to. Nobody came to care for him. Luric sat there helplessly and watched the life of the only person he had ever loved expire.

He had cried again, loudly and bitterly. That’s when they heard him. He ran again, but not far this time. He stood close to town, because he needed food and he didn’t know how to hunt. He stole an egg here, a loaf of bread there. He managed to evade them for a while, but eventually, they caught him. 

And just like he remembered correctly from his books, sentenced him to death.