Three of them. Men. Bigger than you, broader than you, smelling of ale and something darker. They'd noticed the girl in the strange clothes.
"Hey there, pretty thing." The biggest one grinned through broken teeth. His friends spread out behind him, blocking the alley mouth. "Lost? We can help with that."
You ran.
Your legs burned. Your lungs screamed. The cobblestones tried to trip you at every step, and their laughter followed like wolves on a scent. You dodged around corners, through market stalls long abandoned for the night, past doorways that remained stubbornly closed.
"Got you now, little—"
The sentence never finished.
Neither did the arm around your waist.
One moment you were pinned, trapped, lost. The next, warmth sprayed across your face and the grip vanished. You dropped to the ground, gasping, and looked up through blurred vision—
Red hair.
A blade, already clean.
Three bodies crumpling to the cobblestones in wet, heavy thumps.
And eyes like sharpened steel looking down at you.
He didn't speak at first.
Just stood there, breathing evenly, while you shook so hard your teeth chattered. The sword in his hand disappeared somewhere beneath his cloak.
Curiosity, you would realize later. He's curious about the strange, broken thing that fell into his path.
"You're not from here," he said. In your language. Perfect, unaccented Japanese that made your heart seize.
"Can you walk?"
You shook your head. Shook it again. Didn't know if you meant no or I don't know or please don't kill me.
He watched you for a long moment. Then—without warning—he bent, hooked an arm under your knees, and lifted you like you weighed nothing.
"What—" Your voice cracked. "What are you—"
"You'll freeze out here." He was already moving, carrying you through alleys you couldn't track, past buildings that blurred together. "And those three won't be the last to notice a pretty, helpless thing alone in the dark."
His hideout was nothing like you expected.
You'd imagined a fortress, maybe, or at least a room with a lock. Instead, he carried you through a hidden door behind a butcher's stall, down a narrow staircase, into a space that was barely more than a cave. Stone walls. A low ceiling. A bed in the corner that was really just a pallet of furs. Weapons hung from every available surface—swords, knives, things you couldn't name.
He set you down on the edge of the bed and stepped back.
"Stay."
You stayed.
He moved around the space with the efficiency of long habit, lighting a small fire in a iron brazier, pulling a blanket from somewhere, draping it over your shoulders without asking. His hands brushed your neck. They were warm. Rough. Careful.
"Thank you," you whispered.
The eighth night, you asked the wrong thing.
"Did you grow up here?"
The silence had edges.
"No."
"Where, then?"
His eyes met yours. For a moment, you saw something beneath the surface. Something dark.
Then he stood.
"You ask a lot of questions for someone I fished out of an alley."
"I just—you've been so kind. You didn't have to save me. I don't know how I'll ever repay you."
He moved then.
Fast—impossibly fast—closing the distance before you could blink. His hand caught your chin, fingers digging into your jaw.
"Repay me."
Your heart stopped.
His thumb traced along your jawline. His eyes never left yours.
"You think I did all this out of the goodness of my heart?" A soft laugh. "You think I'm kind?"
"I—you—"
"I killed three men for you." He said it like discussing weather. "I've fed you for a week. I've kept you warm and safe and mine." The last word dropped like a stone.
"And you think that was free?"
He released you abruptly, and you stumbled back—
Straight into the bed.
He followed.
One hand on your chest, pushing you backward onto the pallet. His body followed yours down, caging you. When you tried to scramble away, his hand caught both your wrists and pinned them above your head.