Chapter 13: The Instincts
1114 Words
The door closed with a soft click, and the world shifted. Behind her—dozens of lives tucked away in fear. Ahead of her—silence, smoke, and one missing child.
It clicked into place like a seal.
Behind it—dozens of lives tucked away in fear. Children wrapped in trembling arms. Elders who didn’t need to ask what was coming. The injured holding in their pain to keep the others from breaking.
And somewhere above all of that, Joaquin.
Six years old.
Too curious for his own good.
Always slipping through cracks, always running just a little too far.
She could still hear his giggle in her head—sharp and bright like kicked gravel.
She held onto that sound like a lifeline. If she let it go, she’d start to spiral. And there was no room for spiraling—not tonight. Not while he was still out here.
He should’ve been down there with the rest of them. Curled up between cousins. Asking if he could sit next to her. Safe.
But he wasn’t.
And now he was alone. Somewhere in a world that had just started to burn.
Sofia didn’t ask for permission. She didn’t pause long enough to let fear catch up. It would be easier to explain later than to live with not trying at all.
She just moved.
The air in the corridor above felt deceptively still. The world outside was chaos—shouting, engines, movement—but here, there was only the hollow quiet before the blow.
Sofia dropped to a crouch—just like Metz had taught her.
Start where they were last seen. Don’t chase. Follow.
Use your breath. Use your weight. Listen to the air.
Her heartbeat slowed. She hadn’t made a sound in minutes. Not even her breath.
Finally, she inhaled long and deep through her nose, steadying everything inside her.
Panic had no place here. Fear was noise.
She stripped it away like skin, one layer at a time, until only her senses remained.
The scent of Joaquin was faint, but distinct.
Cedar soap. Sweetbread. Something soft and familiar—like fresh sheets warmed by a sunlit nap.
She moved low and quiet, scanning the floor first. Not for prints—there were too many. But for the rhythm of movement. The way a small foot turned inward at the heel. The scuff of a right shoe dragging slightly. Joaquin always dragged one foot when he ran.
There. A shift in the dust by the door.
A toe catch. A slight stagger.
She tracked it down the hallway—eyes sharp, breathing steady. She moved like instinct had taken the reins. Her weight landed on the balls of her feet. Her arms stayed loose at her sides. She stopped before corners, checking air currents, watching for the way scents caught and clung to walls.
The hall split. One side led toward the storage rooms. The other—the kitchens.
She closed her eyes again, reaching with more than her senses now.
Joaquin wouldn’t hide near the meat locker. It was too cold, too quiet. He would’ve gone toward the kitchens. Toward the light. Toward the smell of something warm.
She turned right.
The scent hit harder now—concentrated.
She paused at the side exit, crouched again. A faint impression near the doorframe. Fingers, maybe. A hand pressed flat against the surface. Her jaw tightened.
He had hesitated here. Maybe scared. Maybe trying to come back.
Then the trail veered.
Out the door.
There was no more time for careful guesses. Her body had to know what her brain couldn’t.
Then the cold slapped her as she stepped into the open air.
Not wind. Cold. Heavy and sharp, like it had teeth. Like it meant to steal her breath.
Then came the smoke.
It coiled in her throat, stung her eyes. Not like a kitchen fire or someone burning brush. This was thicker. Greasier. Wood and oil.
Leather and fur. Things that weren’t meant to burn—but did anyway.
And then the scent of blood.
Everywhere.
It hit like a punch—copper and salt and something deeper beneath it, something that made her stomach twist and her knees want to buckle. This was the kind of scent that meant something was dying.
Sofia blinked fast, vision blurring from the sting. But she didn’t stop.
Her breath came in slow pulls. In. Out. Again.
Filter. Like Metz taught her.
She crouched low to the ground. Let the chaos move above her, around her. Let the war slip over her like a wave.
Beyond the metallic sting of blood—beyond the sulfur and the ash—there it was.
Joaquin.
Faint, but present.
Warm bread. Sun-warmed cotton. Cedar soap clinging to old fabric. His scent was being swallowed by everything around it, but it was there.
Still breathing.
Still alive.
She moved.
Not fast. Not loud. Not like a wolf.
Like a shadow. Like a whisper against the earth.
Like an Ixchele.
Around her, the packhouse grounds were alive with movement—support teams crossing between buildings, warriors reinforcing the secondary gates. Someone barked into a headset near the training hall. Another ran toward the medical tents with bandages wrapped tight around his arm. The perimeter pulsed with wolves—silent, steady, organized.
The battle hadn’t breached the walls. Not yet.
But it was coming.
She passed the gardens. The orchard fell away behind her, replaced by the jagged outlines of the southern treeline. The scent grew thinner here—wind-snatched and scattered—but she kept it. Followed it like a splinter in her palm.
The ground shifted beneath her boots. Softer. Charred in places.
Smoke thickened again. The air pulsed with the rhythm of war—shouts, the crack of gunfire, the wet sound of claws against bone.
Still no sign of Joaquin.
Still no sound.
The child’s scent twisted ahead of her, faint but real—carried on the back of the same wind that reeked of blood and flame.
She pressed forward, jaw tight.
If he had wandered this far…
If he had crossed the line between the safety of the walls and the chaos beyond it…
She didn’t finish the thought.
She couldn’t.
Another howl split the air—close.
She sank lower to the ground, breath steady, every step placed with intention. Every scent, every shift in air, burned a trail into her brain. Her body moved like it remembered the earth better than it remembered sleep.
She would find him.
Even if she had to walk into the mouth of war to do it. Even if the scream that found her wasn’t his.
- Writer
