EXILE (PT.3) NO HOME
1975 Words
The sensation of the void didn't last. A second later, they hit solid ground. Hard.
The impact jarred Azaliyah’s teeth, the cold, rigid surface slamming against her hands and knees. It felt completely different. There was no bucking mud, no screaming air, no roaring vacuum. It was still. It was quiet.
Too quiet.
Azaliyah pushed herself up first, her breath ragged and uneven, her bare hands braced against the cold, packed earth. She closed her eyes for a brief second, feeling the steady ground beneath her thin flats.
“…We made it,” she breathed, the words tasting like a miracle on her tongue.
Camron did not answer right away. Because the moment he lifted his heavy, antlered head and looked past her shoulder, the air in the clearing turned to ice.
Everything changed.
They were not alone. Far from it.
They were completely surrounded.
Dozens of villagers stood in a wide, unbroken circle around the clearing, their figures illuminated by the dim, ambient light of the village boundary. They were silent. Perfectly still. Watching.
But there was no rush of relief in their postures. No one stepped forward with blankets or water. No one called out to see if Azaliyah was harmed. They stared down at the two travelers with a suffocating mix of deep suspicion and raw, unadulterated fear.
Azaliyah’s chest tightened, a familiar, bitter weight settling right back over her heart.
“Of course,” she muttered under her breath.
She forced herself to stand, her spine straightening instantly into a rigid line. She brushed the gray dirt from the palms of her hands and smoothed down her clothing as though she hadn't just sprinted for her life through a collapsing dimension. She wore her mask of cool, untouchable indifference like armor.
“Relax,” she said, her voice cutting through the heavy quiet, carrying just enough of a sharp edge to make it clear she wasn't begging for approval. “We’re not here to cause any problems.”
No one moved. No one spoke.
The silence was deafening. Azaliyah realized with a jolt that their eyes weren't even on her. They weren't looking at her torn clothes or her iridescent violet wings.
Their terrified, wide-eyed gazes were locked entirely on him.
Camron rose slowly behind her. He was unsteady on his hooves, his silvered, blood-stained Kirin legs trembling slightly under the sudden change in gravity, but he still stood tall, his massive shoulders broad and intimidating. In the clear light of this realm, he was entirely visible. Entirely different. A creature of pure myth standing in a world of ordinary fae.
The whispers began at once, rippling through the crowd like a foul wind.
“What is that thing?”
“Is that… a monster?”
“Look at the legs. The horns. That’s not one of us. It’s a demon from the void.”
Azaliyah’s jaw tightened, her violet eyes flashing dangerously as she stepped slightly in front of him, shielding him from their glares. “He’s with me.”
That did not help. If anything, it made everything infinitely worse.
A collective gasp went through the crowd, and the circle tightened by a physical fraction, the villagers tensing as if preparing for a s*******r.
Then, the crowd parted.
The village Elder stepped forward. He moved with a slow, calculated grace, his long robes sweeping against the stone ground. He was calm. Controlled. Utterly, terrifyingly too calm. His ancient eyes settled on Camron first, tracing the obsidian scales, the silver fur, and the blood. Then, slowly, those cold eyes shifted to Azaliyah.
“You brought this… thing into our village?” he asked, his voice low and resonant.
Azaliyah’s spine straightened further, her shoulders locking. “He needed help. The forest was collapsing on the other side of the threshold. He would have died.”
“That is not what I asked, Azaliyah.”
Her violet eyes narrowed into dangerous slits, her patience evaporating into pure, defensive wrath. “And I didn’t stutter.”
A shocked ripple moved through the crowd. No one spoke to the Elder that way. But Azaliyah had spent her entire life being pushed to the margins of this village, and she was entirely done playing polite.
The Elder did not react outwardly to her disrespect. His expression remained a mask of stone. “You practice an unstable, forbidden magic,” he said, his level voice carrying across the silent clearing like a death sentence. “You refuse to bind your power, and now you bring unknown, monstrous creatures into a dying realm. You risk the safety of everyone here for a stray.”
Azaliyah’s hands clenched into tight fists at her sides, the skin over her knuckles turning white. “He’s not a creature. He has a name.”
“Then what is he?” the Elder demanded, his voice hardening by a fraction.
She did not answer.
Because the brutal truth was, she didn't fully know. She had only just learned the word Kirin minutes ago. She didn't know where he came from, what his magic did, or what he was capable of.
The villagers noticed her hesitation instantly. The fearful murmurs flared up again, louder this time, filled with judgment.
The Elder’s gaze hardened completely, a triumphant, cold satisfaction settling into his old eyes. “Exactly. You have no idea what curse you have invited past our gates.”
The tension in the air snapped like a over-tightened string.
Without her permission, the magic reacted to her spiking emotions. It sparked violently at her fingertips—uninvited, chaotic, and loud.
“Don’t,” she whispered under her breath, a desperate command to her own soul.
But it was already happening. The air around her shifted, growing heavy and charged with static. A brilliant violet light, shot through with unpredictable sparks of gold, flickered wildly around her hands and then surged outward like a tidal wave.
The villagers screamed, drawing weapons and preparing to strike.
Azaliyah moved on pure, survival instinct. In one smooth, blindingly fast motion, she reached down and drew her dual blades from her thighs. She spun once in a full, graceful circle, her violet wings flaring wide to push the air back, before crossing her weapons in front of her chest in a fierce, defiant X.
“Stop!” someone shouted from the crowd.
It was too late.
The spell was released.
A massive, brilliant blast of violet-and-gold magic tore outward from her crossed blades. It was beautiful, violent, and utterly destructive. The shockwave ripped through the clearing, cracking the ancient stone ground, shattering nearby pottery, and sending the front line of villagers stumbling backward in pure terror.
And then, mid-explosion… the magic stopped.
It froze completely in midair. The violet arcs of lightning hung suspended in the space between her and the crowd, humming softly, unable to move forward.
Azaliyah blinked, her breath catching.
The Elder had not moved an inch. But his right hand was raised, his fingers splayed out in a rigid command posture. He wasn't just blocking her spell—he had seized it.
Slowly, under the weight of his ancient, practiced authority, her magic was no longer hers. The violet energy began to dissolve, breaking apart into harmless, fading dust until it looked as though it had never existed at all.
Silence crashed back down over the clearing, heavier and more suffocating than the sky itself.
Azaliyah’s chest rose and fell unevenly, her arms shaking slightly from the sheer force of having her power violently stripped away from her.
“I told you before, child,” the Elder said quietly, his voice cutting through the stillness like a scalpel. “You do not control your power. It controls you.”
Her grip tightened around the hilts of her daggers until her palms ached. “I was defending us. They were moving to attack.”
“You were losing control. As you always do.”
Her voice sharpened, desperate and bleeding with raw frustration. “They were about to attack a wounded man!”
“And now,” the Elder replied coldly, gesturing to the terrified, shaking crowd around them, “you have given them a perfectly good reason to.”
That landed hard. It was a physical blow straight to her chest.
Azaliyah looked around the circle. She looked at the faces of her neighbors, the merchants she bought fruit from, the people she had grown up with. She saw nothing but fear. Total distance. Absolute judgment.
None of them saw her. Not really. They didn't see a girl who had just risked her life to save someone. They didn't see the daughter of the heroes who used to protect them.
They just saw a problem. A dangerous anomaly that needed to be erased.
The Elder slowly lowered his hand, his robes settling around his ankles. “You will leave this village. Tonight.”
A dead silence followed his command.
Azaliyah’s heart stopped. She looked across the crowd, waiting for someone—anyone—to object. She waited for a single voice to be raised in her defense. Someone to say she didn't deserve this. Not one person stepped forward. Not one voice spoke up.
Her throat tightened, a burning, suffocating lump forming in her chest.
“Right,” she said quietly. Too quietly.
She didn't let them see her cry. She didn't give them that satisfaction. She smoothly sheared her blades back into their scabbards, turned on the heel of her flat, and walked away.
And just like that, she had no home.
No one followed her as she marched down the main path of the village. That was the very first thing she noticed. It wasn't the cruel, venomous whispers trailing behind her. It wasn't the fearful looks from the windows. It was the fact that absolutely no one tried to stop her. No one reached out a hand to say goodbye.
Azaliyah walked through the streets as if she still belonged there, keeping her back perfectly straight and her steps steady. Her expression was entirely unreadable, a mask of pure porcelain.
But inside her head, it was louder than the cataclysmic collapse of the forest.
That’s it? her mind screamed. That’s really all it takes?
A lifetime of existence. An entire legacy. Gone. Just like that.
She passed people she had known since she was a child. Faces that had once softened with kindness when they saw her playing in the square. Voices that had once warmly called her name. Now? Nothing. No one spoke. No one reached out a hand. No one even pretended to hesitate.
Her hands curled slowly into fists at her sides, her long nails biting into her palms.
Have they entirely forgotten? the question burned hotter the longer it sat in her chest, turning into a fierce, protective anger. Do they not remember who my parents were? What they sacrificed for this peace?
The agonizing thought almost made her stop in her tracks. Almost.
But she refused to give them the pleasure of seeing her break. She kept walking. Because she knew with terrifying certainty that if she stopped, she might turn around. And if she turned around, she would not leave this village quietly. She would burn it to the ground.
And right now, quiet was the only shred of dignity she had left.
- Writer
