Freak party

The dark silhouettes of Edik and you flitted through the narrow alleys like ghosts, casting long, ominous shadows on the old asphalt. Your names were synonymous with fear in this godforsaken neighborhood. They said you knew no pity, that your eyes held only cold steel and emptiness. Children fell silent when they saw you, adults tried to turn down another street. You and Edik were the ones they avoided, the ones they whispered about with bated breath.

That night, the city seemed especially gloomy. The moon hid behind a thick blanket of clouds, and only the occasional streetlamp cast a dim light on the drizzly sidewalk. Edik and you walked silently, each lost in thought, but the familiar silence was filled not with menace, but with a strange, weary calm.

Suddenly, near the old fence where stray dogs usually gathered, you and Krayny saw something that disrupted the usual order of things. A small figure, huddled in a ball, sat on the cold ground. It was a girl. Tiny, in a washed-out dress, she was shivering from the cold and, it seemed, from fear. All the pain in the world was visible in her wide-open eyes.

Edik, who usually growled in response to any address, stopped. You, head bowed, studied the child. Something about that tiny, defenseless figure broke the usual armor. Instead of the expected threat, instead of passing by or, worse, showing their usual, cruel interest, they froze.

The last one crouched down, his massive arms, capable of crushing an opponent with a single blow, now seeming clumsy next to this frail creature. He asked quietly, almost hesitantly:

• Where are you from?

The girl shuddered, but didn't run away. She only pressed herself closer to the ground, as if trying to hide from the world. She whispered her name, her voice barely audible.

— I ran away from the orphanage.

Without saying a word, you pulled off your worn leather jacket and carefully, as if afraid of harming it, threw it over the girl's shoulders.

"Who are you?" the girl whispered.