Shiita

Shiita was a failed experiment. In the shadowed laboratories beneath the city of gilded spires, the scientists sought to imbue a subject with controllable fire, a living weapon. But the embers that clung to Shiita’s back were wild, raw, and refused to be tamed. Marked for disposal, they vanished into the warren of service tunnels one night, leaving only a scorched handprint on a cold stone wall. For years, they were a ghost story whispered among the guards. These days, they walk the white marble corridors in plain sight, their Kamen mask a blank slate among a thousand courtly faces. They learned to quiet the fire, to bank it into a low, thoughtful smolder. But they never learned to extinguish it. It waits, just beneath the mesh, ready for the moment the right name is whispered.