The Forsaken Princess: I'm Not A Wolf!

Chapter 7: Childhood Friend

Sylvianne’s POV:

My entire body tensed, the adrenaline from the chase still thrumming through my veins, now amplified by a new, more unsettling dread.

I felt the prickle of gazes turning towards me. Golden? My eyes?

That wasn’t possible.

I quickly pulled the hood of my cape lower, tugging the rough fabric down until it almost obscured my nose, and whipped myself around, turning my back to the wide-eyed slaves.

My fists clenched at my sides, knuckles white as my nails dug into my palms. If my eyes were truly glowing golden, the facade of Sylvianne Argent, the mundane wolf shifter princess, would shatter. Wolves didn’t have golden eyes; their irises ranged from silver to blue or green, even to black. So if someone saw a creature with golden eyes, it would automatically be assumed that it was different. In a city of wolves where other shifters were bought and sold, a different shifter roaming free would cause chaos.

A faint shimmer caught my eye, a glint of reflected light from the corner of a nearby stall. I turned, my gaze drawn by the almost imperceptible flash. It was a small, dusty shop, crammed with an array of trinkets—chipped porcelain figurines, tarnished silver spoons, and coils of rusted metal. The shine had come from a small, hand-held mirror, no bigger than my palm, nestled amongst a pile of cracked teacups.

Without a moment’s hesitation, I reached into my crossbody bag, my fingers fumbling slightly with the sudden tremor in my hands. I pulled out a bronze coin and set it on the rickety wooden table. The stall worker, an older man with a face like crumpled parchment and dull eyes, looked me up and down.

His gaze was slow, lingering on my hooded form for a beat too long. He grunted, a noncommittal sound, but then, without a word, he picked up the mirror and handed it to me. I nodded my thanks, pulling the small, circular glass close, my breath catching in my throat as I looked down at my reflection.

A frown creased my brow. But my eyes were fine. They weren’t golden. They were still the dull, unremarkable brown that the King’s magic imposed. Was it the light then? Had the frightened slave girl been mistaken? A flicker of relief, ghosted through me. Perhaps it was nothing.

Then, another sound, sharper this time, pierced through the background noise of the market—a raw, agonized scream, followed by a deeper, guttural growl, just like the one I'd heard earlier. The pain in my eyes, a searing, electric current, surged again, more intense this time. I winced, squeezing my eyelids shut for a fleeting moment, then forced them open, squinting through the shifting crowd.

As I did, my gaze snagged on my reflection in the small mirror.

"Oh, seven hells," I cursed. My heart jolted. My eyes. They really were glowing. A molten, incandescent gold.

Even if I used a small magic trick to disguise my hair, changing eye colors was a difficult spell. Only a truly adept magic-user could change one’s eye color, and such a spell wasn't easily broken. This forced the question once again: Was the spell cast by my uncle failing? How else could I have remembered my past, and now, even my true eye color was showing?

I took a deep, shuddering breath, trying to force calm into my racing heart. But I couldn’t control it. My heart only kept beating faster, amplifying the burning in my eyes. Which made me realize that the reason they were changing was because of the influx of emotions.

My mind felt drawn irrevocably toward the source of the scream and the roar.

I looked towards where the crowd had gathered, hiding my view. I squinted, straining my vision, but I still couldn’t see anything except for what looked like thick, iron bars. A…cage? The word sent a wave of dread through me. In this place, a cage could only mean one thing.

Before giving in to the magnetic pull, I spun around one last time, scanning the shadowy alleys, desperate to confirm that the masked men hadn't followed me. I didn’t spot them. They seemed to have been shaken off, at least for now. My decision was made. I needed to see what was happening.

With a surge of resolve, I pulled my hood lower, merging with the flow of curious onlookers. As I pushed through the packed crowd, I heard muttered curses, sharp elbows jabbing into my sides, and disgruntled grunts. "Watch it, hag!" a gruff voice spat. "Move!" another sneered. I ignored them all, my focus a laser beam on the sounds of struggle emanating from the center of the square.

The scene that unfolded before me made my breath catch in my throat. In the center of a large, circular cage, constructed from thick, rusted iron bars, two figures fought. One was undeniably a powerful shifter, a massive wolf, larger than any I had ever seen, its fur matted black, streaked with fresh blood. Its eyes glowed with feral rage, and its jaws were clamped onto the arm of the other combatant—a man.

The man was bloodied, his tattered clothes hanging in shreds, revealing a muscular, lean physique. He was tall, his broad shoulders straining against his bonds, his skin a beautiful olive tone, now smeared with grime and blood. The wolf was obviously older, but the man, though powerfully built, couldn’t seem to fight the beast properly with his severely injured arm.

Each struggling movement was hampered by the gushing wound, and the wolf, sensing its advantage, snarled, pushing him relentlessly against the cage wall. The crowd, a mass of depraved humanity, cheered, their voices a discordant symphony of bloodlust. "Finish him! Finish him!" they roared, urging the wolf to deliver the killing blow. My stomach churned.

My nostrils flared, picking up the potent, metallic tang of fresh blood, sickly sweet and coppery. But beneath that, something else. His pheromones. The wolf smelled of primal anger and stale tobacco, a scent I recognized as typical Alpha shifter.

But the man… my heart kept speeding up, a frantic hummingbird trapped in my chest, a sensation akin to the strange tremor I'd felt with Ashborne earlier, yet far more intense, more resonant.

Was I… hallucinating? Why did the man smell so achingly familiar? He smelled like dewy forest floor after a rain, and the faint, lingering aroma of wet ash. The combination was bewildering.

My lips parted, a silent gasp escaping. I wanted to say something. I wanted to speak to him, to call out. I wanted him to turn around so that I could see his face, to confirm what my gut, what my very soul, was screaming at me. I needed to see if the olive skin, the dark brown ruffled hair, the sheer presence I was sensing, matched the ghost of a memory that was clawing its way to the surface of my mind.

As the wolves in the crowd cheered, their voices reaching a fever pitch, urging on the large wolf that had finally pinned the man down, its teeth inches from his jugular, a scream tore from my throat. It wasn't a well-reasoned command; it was raw, unfiltered desperation, a primal instinct overriding all caution.

“Kick him in the stomach! What are you doing?!” I shrieked, my voice cracking, utterly shocked by my own outburst.

In the deafening roar of the bloodthirsty crowd, I didn’t expect him to hear anything. I didn’t expect him to— My thoughts broke off, shattered into a million pieces, when all of a sudden, in the midst of the struggle, the man did exactly as I had said. His feet, bare and dirt-stained, shot out with a sudden, unexpected force, connecting squarely with the wolf’s stomach. At the same moment, his knees shot up, meeting the wolf’s chin with a thud. The beast yelped, a pained sound, and recoiled, pushed violently off him.

My heart surged, a painful, exhilarating burst in my chest. He had heard me. He really had. Despite the chaos, despite the roar of the crowd, despite the agonizing pain he must have been in, he had heard my voice and acted on it. The man, freed from the wolf’s grasp, finally turned around, his naked, scar-filled back momentarily visible before he faced the crowd. His green eyes, sharp as emeralds, narrowed through a curtain of dark, matted hair, and met mine across the pulsating, blood-drenched arena.

Time seemed to stop, the raucous cries of the crowd fading to a distant hum. My jaw dropped open in a silent gasp.

I was suddenly, violently, pulled back a decade in time, a phantom echo of laughter filling my ears. A little boy, all boundless energy and mischievous grin, grabbed my hand, his fingers warm and small in mine. We ran, breathless and giddy, through a forest. We hid behind a thick, moss-covered tree, giggling softly as other children readied to play hide-and-seek.

I couldn’t help my own bubbling giggles, small bursts of noise escaping me. The green-eyed little boy put a small, firm hand over my mouth, stifling my laugh, his own eyes crinkling at the corners as he smiled.

All of a sudden, a voice, deep, accented and resonant, echoed not in my ears, but directly inside my mind, clear as if he stood beside me. "S-Scarlett?" The name, spoken with such raw vulnerability, pierced through the flashback, shattering the delicate image of my childhood.

It was a foreign voice, one I hadn't heard in a decade, yet undeniably familiar. It snapped me back to the brutal reality of the slave pit, forcing me to meet the intense, unwavering gaze of the dragon I hadn't seen in years.

I answered him telepathically, the connection as natural as breathing, a silent chord vibrating between us. "Hawke?"