Isaiah Saul woke before the sun, the way a man wakes when sleep feels like an accusation.
He sat up on the thin cot in his exile shelter, a lonely metal capsule hidden beneath an acacia grove. The world outside hummed with early-morning insects, each chirp sounding like a reminder that life kept moving even when you didn't.
He rubbed his face, breath shaky.
Another nightmare.
Same one.
The body on the floor.
His hands shaking.
The blood he couldn't wash off, no matter how many times he tried.
And the eyes. those damn eyes, looking at him like he was a monster wearing a boy's skin.
He exhaled, long and slow.
"Pull it together, bru," he muttered to himself. "It's a new day. Sort of. I guess."
He stood, stretching until his spine cracked. He wasn't tall, but he carried himself like someone who wanted to be, shoulders tense, chin determined, heart too heavy for his years.
Lion-born.
Lion-burdened.
That was Isaiah Saul.
He stepped outside.
The wind brushed past his cheek like a tired auntie telling him to behave.
The savanna stretched wide, golden and endless.
Somewhere far north, his people, House Lion, ruled their territory from the Sunplain Fortress. Tradition said the first Lion Elder tamed the sun itself, forcing it to rise gently over their lands so no one woke in fear.
Isaiah hadn't seen that sunrise in three years.
Not since the murder.
Not since the banishment.
He bent down, picking up a rusted panga buried halfway in the sand. He used it to carve lines into the dirt, habit, ritual, maybe coping. Little circles, small slashes. His hands moved on their own.
Then-
he felt it.
That prickling at the back of the neck.
That heaviness pressing against his ribs.
A presence.
He froze.
Not fear - awareness.
Lion senses never truly left you, even in exile.
Someone was approaching.
He straightened, turning slowly.
And there he saw her.
A woman.
Tall. Wrapped in layered beige robes. Hood drawn. Face shadowed.
But the moment she stepped closer, Isaiah felt the air tighten, not violently, just... decisively. Like the world itself was waiting to hear her speak.
A DOMA wielder.
No question.
Her steps were silent, too silent.
Her posture too controlled.
She stopped a few meters away, lifting her chin.
"Isaiah Saul," she said.
Her voice was low, calm, shaped by sorrow rather than authority.
Isaiah swallowed. "Who are you?"
She didn't answer the question.
Instead, "You have been in exile for one thousand and ninety-two days."
He blinked. "You counting my mistakes now?"
A faint smile ghosted her lips.
"Not your mistakes," she said softly. "Your suffering."
Isaiah's breath caught.
That wasn't something strangers said.
That wasn't something strangers were allowed to know.
Her eyes shifted, a deep, weathered brown, carrying a weight that felt older than she looked.
"I come with an invitation," she said. "From a place that has watched you quietly. A place that does not judge you by your worst day."
Isaiah scoffed. "Sounds fake."
"It is not."
Pause.
"It is the Gentleman's Covenant."
Isaiah nearly dropped the panga.
The Covenant?
The galaxy's most respected, most terrifying, most mysterious guild?
The same one parents warned their kids about when they skipped chores?
He stared at her, disbelief mixing with fear.
"Why... why would they want me?" His voice cracked embarrassingly.
The woman stepped forward, hand gently brushing the air.
The wind died.
The insects stopped chirping.
Even the dust seemed to pause mid-flight.
She wasn't just a DOMA wielder.
She was a master.
"Because" she said, "your wound is still bleeding. And wounds that refuse to close become powerful DOMAs."
Isaiah flinched.
"I don't want a DOMA," he whispered.
"Wanting is irrelevant," she replied.
"Suffering decides."
The words hit him like a slow-moving truck.
Isaiah looked down at his hands.
Hands he hated.
Hands that once took a life.
"What if I say no?" he murmured.
The woman lowered her hood.
Her face was scarred, burned, roughly healed, one side smooth as melted wax. But her gaze was sharp and unwavering.
"Then," she said gently, "you will remain here. Alone. And one day your suffering will swallow you from the inside."
She extended her hand.
Palm open.
Still.
Patient.
Isaiah stared at it.
His heart pounded.
The Covenant meant danger.
Pain.
Tests.
The Ritual of Heart and Mind.
It meant facing the night he'd spent his whole exile trying to forget.
But exile was killing him slowly.
A different kind of death.
He swallowed hard.
"What... what happens if I accept?"
"You begin again," she said.
"Not clean... but honest."
A tear rolled down Isaiah's cheek before he could stop it.
"Damn," he whispered. "You people know how to pitch."
Her mouth twitched in amusement.
"Is that a yes?"
He took the hand.
And the world exhaled sharply, a gust of wind roaring like something had been released.
Before Isaiah could blink, everything blurred, sand whipping upward, the acacia trees bending, the light distorting like heat on metal.
Then-
silence.
The woman leaned close, breath warm.
"Welcome, Isaiah Saul," she murmured.
"To Verden's only sanctuary for broken lions."
And the world disappeared.