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Chapter 18: The City of Giants
The city rose like the bones of gods.
Towers of black stone scraped the sky, crowned with flags and smoke stacks that exhaled like breathing lungs. Roads wide enough for armies cut through the chaos, pulsing with footsteps, cries, and the clatter of hooves. The sheer scale of it made Lucien feel small—microscopic. Like an ant crawling into a world that had never been meant for him.
He shuffled behind a trader's wagon, wrists bound, still chained to a dozen other prisoners. Half-starved, half-dead. The heat clung to him like rot, and each step on the cobbled path sent pain lancing through his feet.
They passed through gates flanked by towering statues—thirty-foot warriors with swords as long as ships, carved from the same black stone as the towers. Their heads tilted downward, as if judging every soul that passed beneath their gaze.
Lucien didn't flinch.
His body hurt. His skin burned. But worse than all of it was the silence inside him. Not around him—in him. A kind of quiet that felt like part of his soul had shut down just to survive.
The city was overwhelming.
Guards in bright cloaks shouted orders in a language he still didn't know. The symbols etched into buildings and banners may as well have been written by aliens. Nothing made sense here.
But Lucien didn't need to understand to see the difference.
He crossed bridges that arched over deep canals, passed through walls thicker than houses, watched marketplaces layered on platforms that stacked upward like scaffolding. People laughed in the alleys. Children played in the mud. Warm lights glowed behind windows.
And it hit him.
They were living.
While he and the others were starving in cages, tearing each other apart like animals… these people were laughing. Eating. Sleeping. Existing like nothing was wrong.
It wasn't fair.
Eventually, the line of prisoners was handed off to another group. These ones wore black-and-red sashes across their armored chests. Silent. Precise.
The chain was separated.
One by one, they were marched toward a low structure built from red marble and black iron. It stretched out like a scar across the stone. No windows. Only open archways, each flickering with torchlight.
Lucien stepped through.
His legs shook beneath him. His throat was dry. He hadn't spoken in… he didn't even know. His voice felt like it belonged to someone else now.
Inside, it was cleaner than expected.
Stone floors. High ceilings. The air smelled faintly of incense—an attempt to mask the deeper stench of sweat, piss, and old blood.
They passed cells. Not cages this time. Real rooms with heavy doors and narrow windows barred in black iron. Lucien was guided to one near the end.
The door creaked open.
There was a bed inside.
Not much. Just a wooden frame with a thin mat of woven reeds. A pillow that looked like it had survived a war. But after rocks and dirt and straw, it looked like royalty.
The guard shoved him in.
The door slammed behind him. The lock turned with a hard clunk, echoing through the cell like thunder.
Lucien didn't move.
He just stared at the bed.
Then—slowly—he dropped to his knees. Crawled. Pressed his face into the mat and let out a long, shaking breath.
It was soft.
Not really. But soft enough. Soft compared to everything else.
And then…
Then the silence hit him.
Not just the lack of noise. The absence of it. No coughing. No screaming. No breath on his neck. No hands fighting over a scrap of meat. No corpses beside him.
Just silence.
For the first time in what felt like eternity, he was alone.
The tears came without warning.
Hot. Angry. Wordless.
He buried his face in the mat and wept. No sobs. Just deep, wracking shudders that broke through him like a flood. He didn't even know what he was crying for anymore.
His parents?
The people he killed?
The part of himself he had to kill just to survive?
He couldn't remember their faces. Couldn't remember the sound of his own name. Lucien felt distant. Like someone else's story. Like a whisper from a life that had ended long ago.
That boy was dead.
The one who had clean clothes and laughed at the dinner table. The one who had rules and plans and a quiet, ordinary life.
Now there was only this.
Whoever he was now… he didn't know if he liked him.
He curled up on the mat, knees to his chest, breath steadying inch by inch.
Tomorrow might bring beatings.
Tomorrow might bring blood.
Tomorrow might bring another cell. Another collar. Another chain.
But tonight…
He had a bed.
He was alone.
And he was alive.
For now…
That was enough.