* Sorry, I forgot today was Wednesday lol
[TAMIKO]
Feeling the wind against his fur, Tamiko ran and ran, without stopping. He didn't care that shifting into his lycan would trigger his scent to be in the air.
Soon enough the whole of Grealor would know that there was a lycan in their woods. They would know that someone who didn't belong there had been with them. Soon enough, but that wasn't what Tamiko was worried about.
As he ran through the woods, he only had one thought.
Kawai.
For the past seven years, he had spent his life fantasizing about what his home looked like. About whether Kawai would be a beautiful field of flowers or a bed of blood. He always wondered if lycans were as cruel to their people as the rumors said.
He wondered if they would notice him and call him home. Lycans didn't have packs, they just had a kingdom and that was Kawai. Tamiko wondered if they would notice that he came home and if they would want him.
"What if they don't want me too?" Tamiko wondered, as he slowed down.
He had been going too fast, and it was then that he realized that his lycan speed was fast. Faster than even the speed of vampires, and vampires were really fast.
It was a new realization, but what Tamiko didn't know was that only the lycans of house Hinata were that fast.
"At least I'll be home," Tamiko decided, seeing as his doubts would just make him question everything. He needed to be back in Grealor before they noticed he was missing so he needed to be fast too.
And so he ran until he reached the borders between Kawai and the unclaimed lands.
The unclaimed lands acted as boundaries between kingdoms and they were neutral. So when Tamiko hit the unclaimed lands, he breathed a breath of relief. He looked around and could smell a few more lycans roaming around.
Sure it was risky, but lycans always loved the risk.
Excited to be in the same space as his people, even though he hadn't entered the walls of the Kawai kingdom, young Tamiko shifted into his human form before he began walking along the borders.
He was twenty-five and that was really young in the lycan lands.
Most of the lycans were hundreds of years old, especially those that had finally made it outside the wall. The rule stated that no lycan under fifty years was to be found outside the walls, whether they were rogues or not.
But then there were never lycan rogues and King Zaffuto had made sure of that from the very beginning
"Hey kid, why are you away from the wall? Lord Sadako might have you punished for this," one of the lycans said to Tamiko who looked around him and realized that they were talking to him.
He was happy because at least here, even though he had nothing on him, he was treated normally.
Like the kid he was.
They looked harmless and actually looked worried for him instead. Were lycans that protective of the kids? Well, the incident twenty-five years ago had made everyone under fifty years old a national treasure.
They were to be loved and protected, though the lycans had learned to love each other like a family over the years. Sure, they were still scared shitless of the mighty Zaffuto, but that was understandable, given they hadn't seen his face since the burial of the queen years ago.
"Me?" Tamiko asked and the bunch of men walked towards him. Of course, they looked stern and intimidating, but Tamiko didn't feel intimidated.
Instead, the young orphan smiled at them, as if he was ready to hear everything about the lycan land. He had hoped for home for so long and right now, he couldn't imagine that he was actually living his dream.
Maybe he wasn't cursed after all.
"Did you sneak out with us? You might get in trouble. The king hates it when kids sneak outside. Come along, you look famished. You need to get something to eat," the man from earlier said and Tamiko stood there in shock.
He wasn't sure if they wanted to kill him., but even if they wanted to, they wouldn't have been nice to him, right?
"But you just met me—"
"And you're a kid who ran away from home. Your Mom must be worried sick for you.
The least we can do is feed you and send you back home through one of the sneak points before Lord Sadako finds out you're gone," the man said and Tamiko couldn't help but stare at him with a wide mouth.
This wasn't what he had expected. All the stories usually said that lycans were brutal, but right now, they didn't look that dangerous or brutal with him.
Maybe there was something else, right?
"But—"
"No buts. Our punishment for sneaking out is usually hard labor, but which lycan doesn't like hard labor right? But if we're found to have been in the company of a lycan kid, we would have to meet the king, and no one who's ever met the king ever came out of the palace.
"I still love my life. Now come along, hurry," the man insisted and his friends joined him.
Tamiko could tell they were sincere, and that they were not just doing this because they were afraid of Lord Sadako, whoever that man was. But then again, maybe Tamiko was a little too trusting, right?
"Okay," Tamiko said, as he felt safe with the people around him. They were complete strangers and yet with them, he felt like he was home, despite being away from home.
And so in silence, Tamiko walked with the group, though they were busy chatting about their next games and hunts. In their talk, Tamiko learned that Lycans always went on monthly hunts, and that the next hunt would be in three days.
The way the men talked of the hunt made it seem like it was the pride of the lycans and Tamiko was tempted to want in.
He wasn't sure if he would be allowed, but first, he would let them feed him.
Besides, who knew if this was the last actual meal he would have before he went back to his pain in Grealor, right?
"We're here. You'll eat up and take a bath. There are clothes in the next room. And don't run again, none of us want to be butchered by the king for losing a child, okay?" the man who had been talking to Tamiko said and the young lycan just nodded.
He couldn't deny that he loved it here even though they were at a huge house outside the gates. The house seemed to be the place where all the lycans who crossed over to the unclaimed lands came to take a bath before going home.
It was huge and beautiful, at least that much was evident with the portraits on the walls and the marks on the walls. They were territorial signs and a reminder that everyone was equal before the king, and it also smelled like home.
Maybe Tamiko was so desperate for a palace to lay his head, that everything started feeling like home but this time, he couldn't deny that this place was warm, and these people were nice too.
He had so many questions, but he knew better than to ask. That was because the more questions he asked, the higher there was a chance that they would also ask him who he was and which house he came from, and honestly, Tamiko didn't know shit about himself.
So he had to spare himself the trouble of shooting himself in the foot before he found a way to make sense of everything.
"What's your name?" Tamiko asked when he saw that the man had brought him food. He was currently seated at one of the long tables that had food. The man and the other lycans had also sat down to eat.
They looked full, but Tamiko could tell that they were eating, to make him feel comfortable. They seemed to be happy and all smiles, something that Tamiko had realised was because they thought of him as an actual child.
That in itself made Tamiko wonder what age lycans had to be for them to be considered adults. besides, he was also curious to know how these men had known he was a kid, even though they all looked to be in the same age bracket of under forty years.
Once again, Tamiko felt like this was his family. However dysfunctional it seemed, he wanted to live in that moment, when he didn't eat alone, but with actual people who were happy around him.
None of them had even sent him on an errand or treated him harshly, and they had been here for a few minutes. Usually, he would be tasked with a lot, but this time, he was just lucky he was a kid.
Oh, to be a lycan and loved, right?
"He's Lord Sadako, but he likes to pretend he isn't. And we're lycan warriors," one of them said and Tamiko choked on his food.
"What?"