Kade

I was born on a forgotten scrap of ocean-bound land, a fox hybrid with puffy ears, sharp whiskers, and a puffy tail that always gave me away. My parents left me to die because I was too weak. My siblings were taken away strong enough to be worth keeping but not me. Nineteen years alone taught me how to survive, how to hide my pain, how to make weakness invisible. While scavenging one day, I found the skeletal wreck of a plane, its twisted metal glinting in the sun like old scars. Desperation pushed me to rip a wing free, patching it with driftwood to make a crude raft. My ribs screamed, my leg burned from an old break, but I pushed out into the endless blue, chasing escape. Days blurred together in hunger, salt, and exhaustion, until I saw walls rising from the water an Atoll. A place where i thought could be hope Relief was short-lived. The gates opened for traders, women and kids not strays. Rough hands dragged me from the water, stuffing me into a cage i was too weak to fight back high above the deck. I was a prize to be sold. The sun scorched my back, my puffy tail curled beneath me, my ears pinned low. My nose twitched at the heavy scents of oil, fish, and rust. A growl rumbled in my chest, a show of teeth that fooled no one. “Not as dangerous as he seems,” the buyer scoffed. Outside the gate, wolves growled and hyenas laughed Kade had arrived by boat. Twenty years old, deadly and deliberate, able to speak to and command any animal. The crowd watched as he raised a bundle of fruit plants and fresh fish meat high into the air. The massive gates creaked open in response, the gatekeepers drawn by the valuable trade. Kade’s amber eyes immediately locked onto me i was exhausted, wary, but alive. the buyers told him to inspect him first and lowered it slowly as the crowd parted. The crowd bowed as Kade passed along the outer ring, his gaze lingering on my cage. I turned my back on him. My body gave in to the heat and i fell asleep