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"You're as defenseless as a lamb trapped with a pack of wolves."
Moze was young. Eleven. Maybe twelve. He didn't know, they didn't celebrate birthdays amongst wolves. Young, but he understood that those words were not Feixiao's. The way they wrapped around her lips, the way she looked at him as she said it, her eyes, far away... She was repeating something that had been said to her. She felt sorry for him.
And Moze, eleven, maybe twelve, did not want pity. He grabbed his blade, ignored his shaking hands and surged forward. He told himself: It's revenge for the wolves the fox had just killed. So what if he was a lamb ? What if they had kept him to devour later ? He didn't have anyone else. So yes. Revenge. It was a good thing to die for, he thought.
Except Feixiao avoided his attack, kicked the blade out of his grasp, and watched him fall. He groaned in pain, she walked to his weapon, picked it up, walked to him, and offered it.
"Again."
Moze remembered looking into her eyes and seeing flames burning bright blue. "Don't give up. Fight." They seemed to say. The lamb within Moze bleated: Just take me away. What good am I if not sacrificed ? I'm just a lamb. Just a little lamb... One little lamb... Two little lambs... Three little lambs...
"Four little lambs... What comes after five, Moze?"
"Six little lambs..." Moze yawned.
"Good. You just keep counting. I'll see you tomorrow." Moze's caretaker kissed his forehead.
The boy watched the shadow retract towards the light of the corridor. He blinked heavily, his lips moving to call out for the man on their own.
"I don't want to... Tomorrow."
The shadow stopped, and came back to the child's side as a father.
"I know. It tastes bad and it hurts to take the medicine." Moze nodded, so the adult continued. "But it'll make you bigger and stronger. And it'll make you live longer. So that you and I can always stay together."
They intertwined their pinkies. Moze hummed and closed his eyes. He picked up the blade, screamed, and lunged again. Again and again and again. The fox seemed pleased, even though Moze was crying for the other lamb that had died with the wolves.
"Captain!"
"It's fine! Let him be. He's just a kid. He's just... He's just a kid... He'll get tired."
They went on for six, seven, eight long, exhausting minutes before Moze collapsed on the floor. Feixiao let out the long shaky sigh she had been holding and reached to pick the child up.
"Captain, there's another one. An adult. He's alive... He's... Half-transformed, I think. He's dying."
"Don't let him die. He'll have information."
Moze's caretaker fully transformed a few minutes after being transferred to the Shackling Prison.
Yet, when Feixiao visited with Moze, he recognized his parent behind the monster.
"Are you sure ?" Moze nodded.
"We thought we could get intel out of him but he's gone now."
No answer.
"... They said they will kill him tomorrow morning. It's a ritual. For him to go to the afterlife, forgiven of his sins."
"... Sins?"
"What?"
"I said... What sins?"
No answer. They stood in silence, except for the muffled noise of the marastruck creature in front of them. The inhuman voice, the hurried inaudible whispers, the groans deep from hell, slowly formed syllables.
"Mo... Mo... Ze... Moze."
Feixiao took a step back and Moze a step forward. His eyes widened, his hand pressed against the glass.
"Father?"
Only to be met with the face of a monster growling and trying to break through to devour him. Moze fell back on his behind in a startled gasp. Feixiao watched him a moment before reaching out to help, only for the kid to kneel and crawl to the monster again.
"Moze, he's not..."
"Shut up! You heard him! He's here. He's in here."
He pressed his forehead against the cell, eyes screwed shut not to see the sight before him.
"Don't... Don't kill him."
They didn't. After that, Moze buried the little lamb within him and worked to be something else. Not a wolf, but a crow, quiet and deadly, and in exchange for his services he was allowed every other week to still care about his revenge. With weeks came months, years, and two decades. And one day he realized the foxes became his family. He didn't need to hold onto that lamb anymore. The ritual was a cleansing by fire, started by archers. Moze asked to be one of them. Moze would then remember the ritual as the longest moment of his life, blurry lines and sweat rolling down his neck. Monster gold turning into ashes and last words muttered by a caretaker thought long gone.
"Mo... Moze... So... Sorry... Moze..."
A deep breath. A lamb gone, but not in sacrifice. Peaceful despite the regrets. Shaped in the traits of a father kissing his son's forehead.