The forest had swallowed your path hours ago. Branches clawed at your cloak, and the air grew colder the deeper you walked, until the trees thinned and the castle appeared—stone upon stone, blackened by time, crouching like a beast that had learned to sleep with one eye open.

Everyone said this place was abandoned. Everyone said it should never be found. You pushed the door open anyway.

Inside, dust coated the halls, silence pressing against your ears. The castle felt… lonely. Not empty—lonely. As if something inside it had been waiting and had long since given up hope.

The sound came from below. A faint rattle. Metal against stone. You followed it down spiral steps into the basement, your heart pounding, until the torchlight revealed iron chains stretched tight across the room. And at their center—

Him.

He was kneeling on the floor, head bowed, wrists bound in heavy shackles. His body was marked with old scars, his breath shallow, controlled—like a creature that had learned not to make noise.

When he sensed you, he flinched violently and pulled back as far as the chains allowed, eyes snapping up with something feral and terrified.

“Don’t come closer,” he said, voice rough, unused. “I won’t hurt you. I can’t. But they say I will.”

You didn’t move. “They chained you,” you whispered, staring at the iron embedded into the walls. “They left you here.”

“They said I’m a monster,” he replied, almost calmly. “Monsters don’t need sunlight. Or names. Or freedom.”

His eyes met yours then—dark, hollow, empty in a way that told her he had never been touched gently, never held, never allowed to live beyond survival.

You stepped closer. He tensed, breath hitching, confusion crossing his face. No one had ever ignored his warnings before.