Page 58 of Thane's Demon
SHADOWS ON OUR HEELS
My demon hissed, its voice curling into a sharp coil of warning that threaded through my spine, the kind that never came without reason. My steps slowed, and my senses sharpened with instinctive precision, every part of me shifting into a protective stance even though I made sure Alora did not notice the sudden change in my posture.
The edges of the world seemed to narrow as every distant sound stretched thin beneath the rising pulse of danger crawling up the back of my neck. Someone was behind us. Someone skilled. Someone who believed they were clever enough to track me through my own streets. Alora did not know yet, could not know, and if she sensed anything wrong, it would be only the tension that began sinking into my arm as my muscles tensed. Perhaps the faint tremor in my breath betraying the onset of a hunt I could no longer ignore.
I tightened my grip on her hand, guiding her forward with a new urgency I tried to disguise as determination. But her steps faltered the moment she felt the shift. She looked up at me with a flicker of worry forming across her delicate features. Her voicewas soft and uncertain as she whispered my name as though afraid to disturb the dangerous air gathering around us.
“Thane?”
I cut her off gently but firmly, murmuring for her to keep walking, my tone steady and even as the demon inside me snarled in anticipation. That was the moment everything began to unravel.
But the man behind us was not the one from earlier. It was not Ren Qiang. This presence was lighter and quieter, someone trained well enough to stalk prey but arrogant enough to think I would not notice.
Someone who should have known better than to stay inside my shadow. Someone who had just signed his own death sentence by trying.
I didn’t let my expression shift. I didn’t look behind us or react in any way that would alert the stalker or frighten the girl beside me. Instead, I guided her forward with controlled urgency, ignoring the way her breath hitched. Her fear shimmered through her, but more than that, I felt her trust sink into me like a blade I welcomed.
I made a sharp turn into a narrow side street she would never have chosen on her own. Not after what had happened to her in the alley. Now pulling her gently yet firmly into a bottleneck where the tall brick walls trapped the sound and movement in ways I understood intimately. It was a place to listen, a place to mislead, a place to corner whoever dared follow us.
My demon prowled beneath my skin, its voice low and malicious as it urged the violence it craved.
‘Kill him.
Rip him from the shadows.
End him before he touches our girl.’
The urge to obey ran deep, instinctive and wild, but I forced restraint into my veins. Not with her here. Not where she could see what I would do to a man who dared follow us. Not yet.
Alora tensed again beside me, her breath catching as a faint echo of footsteps filtered into the narrow street we had just left. Too close. Far too close.
Her voice trembled as she asked, “What’s happening?”
I inhaled slowly, letting every sense sharpen to a lethal edge. The heartbeat behind us paused for half a second when I stopped. They had not expected me to change course. Skilled, yes, but they were not me. They had no idea what kind of monster they were trailing.
I turned to her, meeting her wide, frightened eyes.
“You can’t come with me,” I said, the words low but unshakably certain. Her lips parted, her breath catching as hurt flashed through her expression.
Her voice cracked when she whispered, “But I thought you said…”
I cut her off again, this time with a truth she needed to hear.
“There is someone following us.”
She froze, her voice barely forming the shape of fear when she asked, “Are they coming for me?”
I held her gaze and corrected her gently but firmly.
“For both of us. But I will not let them use you to get to me.”
Her expression trembled, and her eyes dropped for a moment before she whispered in a voice that made something in my chest tighten painfully, “So, what do we do now?”
I looked down at her small hand cradled in mine. So, trusting still, despite the danger I had brought into her life. The guilt hit me hard. Yet despite knowing that the right thing to do would be to let her go completely, I knew that I was too far past that point. To the point that it nearly killed me to loosen my grip, but I forced my fingers to unclench.
“You need to go home,” I said, even as every instinct I possessed screamed against the words. “Take the main road where there are people, and do not stop until you are inside your building... do you understand me?”
She flinched, the hurt sharp and immediate, as though my words had been a blow.
