Chapter 12

Hwayoung nearly stumbled in shock, though thankfully, Kyungsoo was a lot faster than her. In a flash, he’d drawn his own blade, eyes narrowing at the girl, who still had her weapon pointed in Baekhyun’s direction.

She didn’t dare move. Not that she would be much help in a fight either, technically speaking, because whoever the intruder was was fast and Hwayoung was nowhere near even half that speed with her injured ankle. Her only bet was Kyungsoo because he could control the earth and he was quick, too.

She scanned the girl up and down again. She was obviously scared, eyes flitting around nervously, but the one thing that seemed to scream a warning to Hwayoung was her eyes. She was pretty sure it wasn’t the light that was deceiving her—the girl’s irises were completely black, and that could mean one thing. She was Marked.

In any other circumstances, it wouldn’t have been exactly too much of a worry because all three of them were also Marked, but Baekhyun was somehow still asleep amidst all the ruckus and she had the upperhand if she was threatening them with him. There was also the girl’s power to worry about, which none of them could tell—all of that put together could end up in a possible tragedy and Hwayoung wanted to avoid that happening for as long as possible. There was no way she was losing another companion, even if she’d only known them for a couple of days.

“Hey,” she said, sounded a lot calmer than she felt. “We’re not going to hurt you.”

How Baekhyun was still asleep, Hwayoung didn’t know, because she was pretty sure he claimed to be a light sleeper.

The girl didn’t respond to her, blade still pointed in Baekhyun’s direction. Hwayoung was beginning to wonder if she could even understand what she was saying, and then in a flash, she pulled something out of her cloak and narrowed her second blade at her and Kyungsoo. She wasn’t willing to find out how fast the girl was able to throw if she could move at such a speed.

She glanced towards Kyungsoo. He had his sword leveled in front of him, but they were definitely too far away to reach Baekhyun.

“We’re not here to fight,” Hwayoung repeated. “I don’t know if you can understand me, but please, put the blade down—”

“Get away,” the girl hissed in a low voice. It was trembling. “Back up. If you don’t, I won’t hesitate to kill him.”

Hwayoung had to swallow the urge move forward, even though she knew it was fruitless. She’d never be able to reach Baekhyun on time even without a sprained ankle, and with an injury, she was useless. She also wasn’t sure how much help wind would do in such a situation, given that she could even summon enough wind and precisely enough to do so.

Kyungsoo solved that problem for the two of them. He took a step back, still tense, and Hwayoung was about to demand what he was doing when she felt the faint tremor running through the ground, barely noticeable, until it abruptly turned more violent. A wall of earth rose up scarily fast between the girl and Baekhyun, and amidst the rising dust and confusion, she saw said boy scrambling out of the way, thankfully awake and quick enough to come to his senses. Kyungsoo darted forward in front of her, and Hwayoung limped behind him, hoping that it wouldn’t strain her ankle more.

Whatever he’d summoned with his power had died down when the dust cleared, and the intruder had been thrown to the side, coughing with one arm to , both hands still clenching her weapons. She’d been half buried under a layer of dirt.

The black of her eyes seemed to catch the fleeting moonlight as she looked up at them, fear reflected clearly in them. Hwayoung was expecting her to admit defeat, but before she could move, her vision blurred dangerously in front of her and she lost her footing.

And then she realized her eyesight wasn’t blurring—she literally couldn’t see. It was like a black veil was covering her sight, obscuring everything, and the shadows seemed to close in the more she tried to struggle against it.

Panicking, Hwayoung summoned the strongest bout of wind she could manage, though at that exact moment, somewhere behind her, Baekhyun shouted something (it could’ve been instructions, she didn’t know) and then the darkness before her eyes shattered and gave way to blinding light.

The familiarity of Baekhyun’s light flooded over the clearing again, though before her vision even cleared, Kyungsoo was already moving in the direction of the girl. A distinct clang rattled through the whole forest, and then he was standing over her with the tip of his sword pressed to her neck, though this time, she was completely disarmed.

Both she and Baekhyun headed over.

Her ankle was throbbing again (it really wasn’t going to heal if she kept at it), though she forced herself to ignore the pain before focussing on the girl in front of them. Her hood at fallen off, the light still catching the shiny substance it was made of. Now that she was closer, Hwayoung realized that they were obviously scales of some creature, an extremely dark green color that caught that seemed to catch every bit of light there was. It was blinding to stare directly at.

“You’re Marked,” she said aloud. “Your eyes, right? The shadows was you too.”

She bared her teeth at her, and Hwayoung figured she wasn’t going to get a friendly response anytime soon.

Baekhyun ruffled his hair, squinting down at her. “Why are you here? What are you even wearing? Are those scales?”

She shot a glance at him, though he looked genuinely curious about it. “What do you want with us? What happened?”

Her scowl only deepened, almost like she was offended that Baekhyun had no idea what was going on (which Hwayoung supposed was true, because he’d only woken up when Kyungsoo had used his power. He’d been fast asleep when she was threatening to stab him with her blade). “Let me go,” she hissed. “I don’t want to have anything to do with any of you.”

“You’re the one who snuck up on us and threatened to kill him, though.” Kyungsoo jerked his chin in Baekhyun’s direction. “None of us are going to do anything of that sort, at least until you explain everything. You could’ve left us in peace if you wanted to get away so badly.”

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