Disclaimer: I don't own Miraculous

Chapter 30

Dinner had been quiet and now Felix could hear Saura in her shower. He was sitting on the couch staring at his hands resting in his lap. She had explained how humans and magic rarely every got along without dire consequences. The materials that Saura had got for dinner were still put away as she had simply made packaged ramen for the both of them with boiling water as she explained about foxes. Felix knit his brows as he went over all the information in his head and swallowed the lump in his throat.

"I need some water," he muttered to himself and got up to get a glass. After drinking, he placed his hands on the cool counter as a cold sensation ran up his spine and his chest tightened. He didn't know much about foxes, but from what she had told him she is currently immortal due to using her tails for a wish. 'One wish for each tail. They must be something that normal magic is incapable of.' Her voice rang in his head and with his next question the possibilities ran wild. He had asked her what kind of wish would be able to facilitate that. He remembered as she had smiled and said to him 'oh, simple things like destroying an entire people, bringing the dead back to life, hiding an entire race for millennia, changing an entire world's history.' He had looked from her mouth to her blank and empty eyes. It was startling to see her eyes that were usually bright with mischief or power to be empty. Pieces began to click together. The immortality of a fox was a curse for using taboo magic. Magic Saura had used at least once. He knew that when she had used her tail she was between 300 and 1000 years old as it was known that the first 200 years of a fox's life was spent with one tail to harness their power. Her knowledge and ease with magic was evidence of her age before she became what she is now.

The counter vaguely reflected Felix's reflection as he stared at it without seeing. Saura had answered the first two things she said she would answer, but the last question he had asked had been delved into as well. Everything else seemed trivial compared to it. The look she tried to hide scared Felix as she talked about them. She never gave a name to what she had been chasing for hundreds and possibly thousands of years. She called a darkness from corruption, a spirit banished from the realm of the Fey around the time his ancestors banished the fox chieftain for betrayal and murder. 'It's something that will never die' shame had flashed across her face in that moment as she looked down at her hands. 'Every time I get close to it, they get away and people die. This isn't the first time I worked with the other kwami and their chosen. Sometimes… sometimes the chosen are the ones who die. It's happened many times before and every time I promise that it will be the last.' Her jaw was rigid to the point he was afraid she was going to break her teeth from the pressure. 'This has to be the last,' she had whispered the last part and the raging storm of emotions in her eyes had Felix confused as there was more present than fear and anger.

This them she is chasing isn't Hawkmoth, they weren't human and that terrified Felix. This wasn't what he had been expecting. Daddy issues or unresolved grief was what he thought may have corrupted the human using the kwami, but the possibility of another more powerful force pulling the strings behind the scenes was beyond his imagination. He swallowed the lump in his throat again as he glanced at the kitchen clock and back at Saura's closed door. She had been in the shower for longer than she usually took. He took a breath and walked to her door to knock and check if she was alright. Yet, before his hand made contact with the door he stopped himself and lowered the hand. For a moment Felix looked at the closed door in front of him and then sighed as he ran his fingers through his brown hair and walked back to his room hoping to get some dreamless sleep.

Inside of the shower, Saura stood with her palms flat against the wall as past memories she desperately tries to keep hidden from herself resurface. The water had long turned cold, but Saura couldn't feel it, but at least Zorren couldn't feel any of her pain as she had sealed him before entering the shower. Her long white hair was weighed down by the water that soaked through it and her matching triangular ears bowed at the water pressure. As memories passed through her mind her hand scraped against the tile of the shower and would have left marks from her undisguised claws if she had applied more pressure to the tips of her fingers. Her heavy tail was limp behind her as her shoulders shook and she clenched her teeth. Hot water streamed down her face as she held in her voice hoping the pain and anger would subside enough for her to relax her muscles.

Eventually it did and she shut off the water. She walked out without a towel and looked at herself in the mirror. It was haunting. Her hair was as white as moonlight and her aqua eyes almost leapt out from her pale features; the cold had brought a blue tinge to her usually bright skin. The rim of her eyelids were red as salty water continued to flow down her cheeks. She felt a chill on her shoulder as a shadow materialized behind her. Familiar silver irises surrounded by black darkness floated in the shadow as it ran its outstretched hand across her shoulder and the top of her back beneath her wet hair. The eyes grew closer to her ear as the squinted and she could feel them smiling against her skin. Cold air blew past her ear as they spoke. "I'm getting tired of waiting," they whispered in a dark voice. "It has been too long since I've had my own body, now I hope that you won't disappoint me." Their hand traced back over her back, leaving chills in its place as it went, and up to the hairline on the side of her head to wipe away a stray hair.

Saura's jaw that had been clenched so tight her lips paled, opened her mouth as she stared at the shadow in the mirror. "You will not get what you want. You never have and I've made sure of it." Her voice was factual and devoid of emotion besides the twinge of hatred in her words.

The hand that had been lazily stroking her shoulders, back and face stopped where it was. If it wasn't just a shadow she would have felt their teeth be bared as the smile they displayed earlier was turned to a sneer. "And yet, you have not achieved what you wanted either. How many dead are on your hands? How long have you hunted me around the world at every disaster an war that has been known to man? The answer is countless." The sneer was brought from her ear to her neck as the shadow hand wrapped around the still blue skin of her neck threatening to squeeze. "And how many times have you come close enough to touch me, let alone defeat me? You never have Saura, not before I've torn you apart from the inside out and made you watch as I break free and imprison you for all of eternity. There have been many promises that we have made to each other, but this one I will keep." The venom in the dark voice grew with every word they uttered and their teeth gnashed against the last sentence they spoke.

Saura's eyes had been dry since the shadow had made its presence known. "I will find a way to destroy you. I have been hunting you for a countless number of years and this is the closest I have ever been to you. Your time is running out and I will be sure to keep everyone around me alive. You have been too afraid to face me head on for millennia and I'm tired of waiting. Kylain." The anger in her voice grew as the heat in her palms became palpable. Before the shadow disappeared, the silver eyes narrowed in disgust and vanished before she launched a fire ball where their head used to be.

Saura closed her eyes and let go of the breath she was holding. Then she dried herself off with a towel and got dressed before getting Zorren out and returning to her auburn human disguise. He didn't ask what had happened and let Saura go to sleep, but he had an idea from the singe marks on the tile where she had stood in front of the mirror minutes before. He changed into his humanoid form and sat on the side of her bed to stroke her still damp hair as she slept.

A/N: It has been a while, but I am still working on this story (slowly) along with grad school work.

Thanks for reading!