Tristan didn't speak much these first few days,
From what he picked up, talking too much especially among this pack of hungry predators could cost you a limb or two, maybe even your life. So he kept his words to himself, head bowed down but eyes open.
They traveled through wastelands — ash plains that swallowed the horizon, red sands that looked like dried blood, and empty lands where water used to be. The Hygrons led the way. With every step they took, the earth shuddered beneath them, and wherever their claws sank, the ground stayed broken.
From time to time, the bandits laughed, made jokes about the gruesome things they'd done, then bragged about it, Fought each other about who did worst and then laughed it off.
Hearing all this, Tristan knew deep down these people weren't really people — just wolves wearing human skin. But he could care less.
He watched the way they moved, the way they spoke so highly of Scarface, the rumors that he could control those monstrosities. And he saw the way Scarface led his people, not by barking orders, but by silence. His mere presence alone made others obey.
Sometimes when Scarface spoke, the ground itself seemed to carry echoes of his voice. And sometimes, when the air went still, Tristan swore the wind answered back.
Mostly, it came to him at night — when there was total silence, when the others were asleep, and the fires burned low. A whisper, not words, nor sound. Just breath — Soft and Soothing.
Sometimes he would close his eyes and listen. The sound moved through what used to be remains of trees, through the silent camp, and through him. It wasn't the earth calling this time — it was the sky.
He started testing it, a breath here and faint stirring there.
When he focused, the dirt near his feet shifted — small, subtle, almost nothing. But it was there. It was real.
And each time this happened, Scarface's gaze fell on him. That same grin — the one that could make a man's heart sink — was plastered across his face, like he already knew.
Tristan hated that look. He hated what it meant.
Because if Scarface commanded what was beneath, and he could hear and bend what moved above, then maybe the world was trying to bring them together.
He didn't know if that scared him more, if it made him feel small, or if it excited him.
****************
They stopped near dusk on the sixth day.
The land stretched dead in all directions — red-stained dirt and a sky devoid of its celestial bodies.
The camp stirred into motion, fires lit, Meat burned and Voices carried.
Tristan moved quietly. He got into it — hauling crates, setting up tents. In the few days he'd been with them, he'd learned the basics: when to move, when to stay still, and most importantly, when to say nothing. He didn't speak, but the air around him hummed — faint and calm.
Then someone shoved him.
"Fucking watch it, Scrawny," a man growled. One of the bigger ones — not as huge as Scarface, but he had a presence. Eyes mean, breath heavy with wine. "I don't know why Scarface broke the one rule he held most because of you. What makes you so—so so special?"
Tristan didn't respond. He stepped back, lowering his head, avoiding eye contact.
That only made the man angrier.
"Look at me when I'm bloody speaking to you!" he shouted, grabbing Tristan by the collar.
The others turned, Swift stood off to the side, arms at her sides, watching with that cold, detached stare she always had. Scarface didn't even bother to look.
The man shoved him to the ground. dust filled Tristan's mouth and laughter followed — sharp, cruel. This was normal to them.
But then, something inside Tristan tightened, thoughts of that man — that stranger he once called father — crawled back into his head. The pain, the silence, the beatings, the helplessness.
And then, the whisper.
Breathe.
He did.
The air around him shifted — soft at first, a ripple crawling through the camp. Then stronger.
The laughter stopped.
Wind rose where there hadn't been any. It spun around them, lifting dust, snapping ropes, rattling tents. The Hygrons stirred, uneasy, growling low in their throats.
The man who'd hit him stumbled back, blinking through the grit. "What the hell—?"
Tristan stood slowly, his hair whipping across his face, He wasn't doing it. Not on purpose, Just on instinct.
The air moved with him.
For a heartbeat, it felt right, natural, alive.
Then he reached out — his hand trembling, unsure why he did it at all — toward the man.
And boom.
Just like that — like a hot knife through butter — a hole tore clean through the man's neck.
The body hit the ground with a sound the group knew all too well from their raids — that all-too-familiar sound. Soft. Wet. Final.
No one moved and no one breathed.
The only sound left was the faint whine of the wind, thinning, fading, disappearing into the red dust.
Tristan stood there, chest rising and falling like someone that just ran a marathon, with his hand still outstretched.
The camp's laughter was gone now, replaced by something colder. something they've inflicted on others — Fear, Disbelief.
Scarface rose, slowly and deliberate.
The firelight caught the long scar across his face as he stepped forward, boots sinking into the red dirt with each step. He didn't look angry. He looked… amused.
When he stopped, he stood over the corpse, eyes dragging from the body to Tristan.
The silence stretched thin.
Then, that grin again. Slow and Sharp.
"Well," he said softly, voice carrying like a whisper through smoke. "Looks like you were special Afterall."
He turned his head toward Swift. "Bury him."
Swift hesitated — just a flicker — before nodding.
Scarface's eyes lingered on Tristan for a heartbeat longer, like he was studying something he hadn't decided to destroy yet. Then he said, almost gently, "Next time boy, try to aim it."
He walked away, the sound of his boots fading into the dark.
The others stayed where they were, no one daring to speak or move.
Tristan stood in the middle of them all, wind-touched dust still clinging to his clothes, the scent of blood heavy in the air.
He didn't feel powerful. He didn't feel alive.
He felt hollow.
Like something had finally answered him — and now he wished it hadn't.
The wind passed by one last time, cold and thin. Almost like a whisper:
You breathed.