Rain softened the city into a blur, turning the back streets into dark throats where sound went to die. Zoya walked beside Manraj, her hand still a warm memory on his arm. The bus stop was far behind them now, swallowed by the gray curtain of night.
"You're shaking," she whispered.
"I'm fine," he lied.
He wasn't.
Something had followed them.
Not footsteps.
Not breath.
A pressure — like eyes carved out of old night.
They passed shuttered shops. Neon signs flickered like dying insects. Zoya kept glancing behind them, her jaw tense.
"Don't look back," she breathed.
Manraj didn't ask why.
He already felt it.
A shadow peeled itself off the far wall — separating from the darkness like it had been waiting there, patient and hungry.
Manraj stopped walking.
Zoya froze.
The shadow stood motionless at the mouth of the alley. But the air around it rippled, warping like heat above a flame.
Then—
A whisper of Old Tongue brushed across Manraj's mind:
"Fyrn-marah… kel sa'thar."
He didn't know the words.
But they knew him.
Zoya stepped in front of him.
"Show yourself."
The darkness bent… shifted… and a fox-shape stepped out — nine tails unfurling like smoke, its eyes reflecting Manraj's fire back at him.
It didn't attack.
It bowed.
Zoya's breath hitched. Manraj's heart kicked against his ribs.
Then a figure stepped out behind the fox.
Human height.
Human shape.
But carrying an ancient stillness — the kind that belonged to places untouched by time.
He walked into the light.
Rain dripping from his hair.
Black flannel shirt clinging to his shoulders.
Shadow-light swirling around his feet like loyal animals.
Azhar.
Manraj's breath left him in a single jagged exhale he didn't understand.
Azhar looked at him like no years had passed at all.
Like he'd been waiting for this exact moment.
"Hello, brother."
The word hit Manraj like a strike.
Not because it was wrong.
Because it felt like something pulled from inside him.
Something missing.
Zoya blocked him instantly.
"Stay back."
Azhar's gaze slid to her—calm, unreadable.
"You shouldn't stand between him and his past."
"And you shouldn't call him that."
Azhar ignored her.
He stepped forward.
The shadows followed like trained creatures.
"You left," Manraj whispered—though he didn't know where the accusation came from.
Azhar answered softly.
"No.
You forgot."
A memory slammed into Manraj—
A boy's hand pulling him away from fire.
A scream.
A circle of burning runes.
Azhar shielding him—
Then the memory ripped away violently, like something ancient slammed a door inside his head.
Manraj staggered.
"You're remembering too early," Azhar murmured. "They won't like that."
"Who?" Zoya demanded.
Azhar's expression cracked—just enough to show something aching beneath.
"The ones who rewrote him."
Manraj swallowed hard.
"Why are you here?"
Azhar exhaled. The shadow fox padded forward, its tails dragging darkness across the pavement.
"To finish what they started…"
He paused.
"…and to stop what's waking."
Lightning split the sky behind him—white, merciless.
When the flash faded—
Azhar was gone.
Only the rain remained.
Only Zoya's trembling whisper:
"Manraj… what are you?"