The morning should have been ordinary.

  The sun was soft through the curtains, the kind that made the dust float lazily and forgave the world for whatever it had done the night before. Mira’s small living room smelled like warm bread and tea leaves. The couch still had Rai’s blanket folded over one armrest, as if the boy might appear at any moment and claim the space with quiet stubbornness.

  But the table—

  The table looked like someone had robbed a banquet hall.

  Platters covered nearly every inch. Steaming dishes arranged with absurd care. Fresh bread stacked in neat rows. Fruits so glossy they looked lacquered. Meat cut thin and perfect, sauces poured into small bowls like offerings. Even the utensils were polished.

  Mira stared at it for a long second, then turned her head slowly toward Azhareth.

  “…Did Aldrean kill a king for you?” she asked, deadpan.

  Azhareth sat at the table without posture or ceremony, shoulders loose, eyes half-lidded like he’d rather be anywhere else. He didn’t answer.

  He picked up his fork and started eating.

  Not greedily.

  Not politely.

  Like a machine refueling.

  Mira watched him out of the corner of her eye as she poured tea. She’d seen him eat before—quick, indifferent, as if food was an inconvenience he tolerated only because his body demanded it.

  This time was different.

  He didn’t comment. Didn’t praise. Didn’t even blink in appreciation.

  But he reached for a second serving.

  Then a third.

  He adjusted a plate closer without thinking. Took another bite of the same dish like he’d decided it was acceptable and wanted to confirm the decision again. He chewed slower than usual.

  He was enjoying it.

  He would never say it.

  Mira hid her smile behind her cup.

  “Look at you,” she murmured, amused. “Someone feeds you properly and suddenly you remember you’re human.”

  Azhareth didn’t respond. His expression didn’t change.

  But his fork paused for a fraction of a second, as if the accusation had landed.

  And then his hand drifted toward the fridge.

  It wasn’t a conscious choice. It was a reflex.

  Mira slapped his wrist lightly.

  Azhareth’s fingers froze mid-reach.

  “No,” Mira said.

  He stared at her.

  Mira stared back with the kind of calm only someone who had raised children and survived monsters could manage.

  “It’s breakfast,” she said. “You are not drinking cola first thing in the morning.”

  Azhareth’s lips pressed into a line.

  “I’m fine,” he muttered.

  “You’re addicted,” Mira corrected. “And don’t give me that face. I’ve seen worse addictions in this building.”

  Azhareth pulled his hand back slowly, like he was being forced to surrender a weapon.

  Mira slid a cup of tea toward him.

  “Tea. Then you can ruin your teeth.”

  He glared at the cup like it had personally offended him.

  “I’m not drinking that.”

  “Yes you are,” Mira said, and took a bite of toast like the conversation was over.

  Azhareth stared at the tea for several heartbeats, then lifted it with the air of a man accepting punishment.

  He took a sip.

  His face twisted.

  Mira hummed in satisfaction.

  “That’s what you get.”

  The television murmured in the background.

  Mira hadn’t turned it on. She didn’t need to. Someone else in the building probably had, and the noise seeped through walls the way panic always did.

  A banner crawled across the screen in bright red.

  BREAKING NEWS

  The camera was shaky, zooming in and out as if the person recording couldn’t decide whether to run or stare. A pale-blue ring hung in the air above a city skyline, glyphs rotating in perfect circles.

  Then the feed cut to another angle.

  Men and women walking out of the light, calm, orderly.

  Not monsters.

  Not hunters.

  Something that looked too clean to belong to Earth.

  Mira leaned on the counter, watching with interest as she buttered toast.

  “They’re pretty,” she said. “That’s suspicious.”

  Azhareth didn’t look up.

  The anchors spoke too fast, voices overlapping with other commentators and scrolling messages. Livestream clips played in boxes inside boxes, thousands of viewers yelling through text that the news could barely censor.

  Stolen from its rightful author, this tale is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings.

  Then the camera caught it.

  An elegant woman—horns polished, posture perfect—moving toward the crowd.

  Mira’s eyes widened.

  “Oh no,” she whispered, already laughing.

  The woman sat down on a man.

  Just… sat.

  The man’s face turned red. The crowd screamed. Someone shouted, THAT SHOULD’VE BEEN ME!

  Mira burst out laughing so hard she nearly dropped her toast.

  “HAHA—!” She slapped the counter with her palm. “Did she really— oh my god! That man— he looks like he’s enjoying it!”

  On the screen, another horned figure made a disgusted face.

  Mira wheezed, wiping at her eyes.

  “This world is finished,” she declared, still laughing. “You can open portals and summon demons and the first thing humans do is volunteer as furniture.”

  Azhareth’s fork stopped mid-air.

  Not at the chair.

  Not at the laughter.

  At the name that followed.

  The anchor’s voice sharpened, serious now.

  “…and the leader identified their demand. He asked for— quote— the woman who bears the FLERCHER TOME. Authorities—”

  FLERCHER.

  Azhareth’s hand froze.

  It was only a fraction of a second. A single slip in the mask. Something behind his eyes tightening, as if the world had just spoken a word that belonged to him.

  Mira noticed.

  She always did.

  Her laughter softened into curiosity.

  “…Flercher?” she repeated slowly, watching him. “That’s… someone you know.”

  Azhareth resumed eating as if nothing had happened.

  “…Yes,” he said.

  Mira studied him, then glanced back at the television, where horned figures stood beneath the hovering gate like they owned the sky.

  “They’re looking for a Tome,” she said carefully. “And you just made that face like you got punched.”

  Azhareth didn’t answer.

  He swallowed. Took another bite. Chewed.

  The TV volume rose with urgency—commentators saying A.R.E.S couldn’t identify the target, that the name meant nothing to the public, that the situation was escalating.

  Mira lowered her voice.

  “And Damian too,” she added, as if she were stepping onto thin ice. “You… all seem to know each other.”

  The words landed differently.

  Azhareth’s eyes flicked downward. His jaw tightened.

  Silence filled the kitchen for a moment, thick enough to make the clink of utensils sound too loud.

  Inside him, something shifted.

  Not violent.

  Warm.

  A quiet presence pressing against the edges of his awareness like sunlight through leaves.

  Children, Damian’s voice murmured, faint and amused.

  Always so impatient.

  Azhareth exhaled through his nose.

  “…You’re not helping,” he muttered under his breath.

  Mira’s brows lifted.

  She didn’t look confused.

  She didn’t look afraid.

  She just turned around, poured another cup of tea, and set it on the table—across from Azhareth, as if someone else were sitting there.

  Then she spoke into the air, casual as breathing.

  “Damian,” she said, “get out here and drink your tea before it goes cold.”

  Azhareth’s posture changed slightly.

  Not a transformation.

  Just… a softening. Like tension leaving muscles that had been clenched too long.

  His eyes warmed, almost imperceptibly.

  Damian didn’t fully emerge.

  He didn’t need to.

  The difference was in the way Azhareth’s hands relaxed around the cup.

  He lifted the tea.

  Took a sip.

  This time, the face didn’t twist as hard.

  Mira nodded, satisfied, like she’d successfully fed a picky child.

  “There,” she said. “See? Everyone can drink tea.”

  Azhareth—Damian—made a sound that might have been a quiet laugh.

  Then the warmth receded.

  Azhareth’s usual flatness returned like a curtain dropping.

  He set the tea down and stared at the television again.

  On-screen, the horned leader spoke calmly.

  The camera shook as lightning descended, striking empty pavement. The ground vaporized in a perfect circle, steam rising as if the earth itself had been cauterized.

  The anchor’s voice cracked with panic.

  “…He said— he said next time it won’t be empty—”

  Mira’s laughter was gone now.

  She leaned her elbows on the table, watching Azhareth’s profile.

  “You’re not going,” she said.

  Not a question.

  Azhareth didn’t look at her.

  “No.”

  Mira nodded once, accepting it immediately.

  “Good,” she said quietly. “Breakfast is better when you’re actually here.”

  Azhareth’s lips twitched—barely.

  The smallest crack in the cold.

  Mira reached out and confiscated his cola from the fridge anyway, holding it up like evidence.

  “And you can have this later,” she added, wagging it once. “Not now.”

  Azhareth glared at it with silent fury.

  Mira smirked.

  “Don’t look at me like that,” she said. “If the world is ending, it can end after you finish chewing.”

  Azhareth looked back at the screen.

  He knew what this meant.

  He could feel it—like pressure building behind a door.

  A name he hadn’t expected to hear spoken aloud. A lineage stepping onto Earth and pointing in the wrong direction, toward the wrong person.

  Toward his student.

  He could end it.

  One appearance. One sentence. One step outside Mira’s kitchen and the gate would close like it had never existed.

  He could erase the war before it began.

  He didn’t move.

  He set his fork down carefully.

  He stood.

  Mira watched him.

  “You’re thinking too loud,” she said, not unkindly.

  Azhareth’s eyes narrowed slightly.

  “I’m thinking,” he corrected.

  Mira waved a hand.

  “Same thing.”

  He turned away from the television and walked to the sink, rinsing his hands as if he were washing off the entire world. The water ran. The mundane sound cut through the distant chaos outside.

  Mira leaned back against the counter.

  “You know them,” she said softly. “Flercher. These people.”

  Azhareth shut off the tap.

  His voice was quiet when he answered.

  “They came looking for a teacher,” he said. “They chose a student instead.”

  Mira didn’t fully understand what that meant.

  But she heard the weight under it.

  She set the tea pot down and crossed her arms.

  “And you’re going to let them?”

  Azhareth’s gaze flicked toward the hallway—toward the room where Rai slept, toward the boy who didn’t know the world was rearranging itself outside.

  Then back to Mira.

  Then down at the table, still cluttered with food and warmth and ordinary life.

  “Yes,” he said.

  The word wasn’t cruel.

  It wasn’t cowardly.

  It was… decided.

  Mira sighed.

  Not disappointed.

  Not angry.

  Just tired in the way only someone who had raised too many broken people could be.

  “Fine,” she said. “But if they break my door, I’m charging you rent.”

  Azhareth almost smiled again.

  Almost.

  On the television, the gate glowed like a second sun.

  Outside, the city trembled under rumors and lightning.

  Inside Mira’s kitchen, tea cooled on the table.

  And the man who could stop the war before it began—

  refused to appear.