The fourth day came with a storm.
Not from the sky—but from the hearts of men. A storm that brewed in glances and sharp tongues, in furrowed brows and whispered curses.
By midday, word had spread: Another field was lost.
Not crops this time.
Livestock. Six goats, bled dry and left twisted in their pens like discarded dolls. The flesh rotted in minutes. Their eyes boiled in their sockets.
It wasn't just nature anymore. It was something else.
Something sentient.
And fear, as always, needs a target.
Xerces stood outside the village well when it happened.
He'd come to draw water. A simple task. Something normal. Something human.
But even the bucket trembled in his hand. The illusion was still holding, but only just. His soul-core flickered beneath the mask like a candle in the rain. Every breath he faked was a lie.
The bucket never made it to the water.
Kallan was the first to step forward.
"Where were you last night?"
Xerces turned, slow and deliberate.
"Sleeping."
"Convenient," Kallan snapped. "Six goats, gone. Melted from the inside. Same as the crops. Same as before."
A crowd had already begun to form. Thirty villagers. Maybe more.
He'd seen this before. In another life. This was not a question. It was an accusation.
"You've brought a curse," someone muttered. "Since the day he came."
"He speaks to himself in the barn," a woman hissed. "Have you heard him at night?"
"Something lives in him."
Xerces said nothing.
He had no defense that wouldn't unravel everything. No words that wouldn't crack his mask. He could burn them all to ash—but that would only prove them right.
So he stood. Still. Unmoving. Like a man facing the gallows.
And then—
"Enough!"
Mira's voice cut through the gathering like a sword through silk.
She strode between them, fire in her cheeks, wind tearing at her braid. She didn't flinch. Didn't pause.
"You want someone to blame? Blame the thing rotting our land. Not the one who helped stop it."
"He's not like us!" Kallan barked. "He doesn't belong here!"
"No," she said, stepping in front of Xerces. "He doesn't."
Gasps rippled like a wave.
"But neither do I. My mother was a foreigner. My father was too poor to be useful to any of you. I've been different my whole life. And I've seen how you treat those who don't fit your little world."
She turned to Xerces then, softer.
"You've never hurt anyone. You've been kind. Even when no one deserved it."
A tear welled in her eye, but she blinked it away.
"Cerric isn't the monster," she said. "But if you make him one, gods help you all."
No one moved.
For a moment, the only sound was wind stirring the leaves.
Then the crowd began to scatter—slowly, grumbling, uncertain. But no one stepped forward again.
They left him alone.
Because Mira had burned for him.
Later, in the barn's loft, silence hung between them like a curtain.
Xerces sat with his hands folded, watching the firelight dance across the wooden beams. The mask still clung to his face, but barely.
Mira sat beside him, arms crossed, anger still radiating from her like heat from stone.
"You were going to let them turn on you," she said.
He didn't deny it.
"They wouldn't have stopped."
"I've seen worse."
"That's not the point!" she snapped. "You just… stood there. Like it didn't matter."
He turned to her. Slowly.
"I've learned that when people want a villain, they'll find one. Whether or not you speak."
"But you're not—" She stopped herself.
"Not yet," he said quietly.
The words hung in the air.
She studied him for a long moment.
Then: "You've killed before."
"Yes."
Her voice dropped. "You've raised the dead."
He hesitated. Then nodded. Once.
She exhaled. "Then tell me why I still trust you."
He didn't answer.
Because he didn't know either.
Later still, after she left, Xerces stood by the open window, watching the stars.
He should have left this place. That had always been the plan. Gather power. Learn to disguise. Move on. Hunt the Nocturne Clan until their bones sang in agony.
But Mira…
She had stepped into the fire, not knowing what burned.
And now she was marked.
Not by the villagers.
But by the thing beneath the soil.
The Devourer knew who he was now.
And it had seen who he cared for.
Far beneath the village, deep under roots and rock, something stirred.
The wretches had failed. The earth was still alive.
But the vessel—the one masked in mortal skin—was vulnerable.
And the girl beside him?
Even more so.
The Devourer did not rush. It had lived eons.
But its hunger had a name now.
And that name was Mira.