Chapter 3 - THE LANGUAGE OF FEARClack. Clack. Clack.
The sound of Maisie's cane hitting the dirt floor was the only noise in the massive, packed arena. Cyrus locked onto her instantly. To the German Shepherd, every human he had encountered over the past two years belonged to one category: tormentor. The men who beat him with iron pipes to break his spirit, the handlers who shocked him with cattle prods to make him attack on command, the boss who watched from the shadows with cold detachment. They all smelled like violence, adrenaline, and malice.
Cyrus lowered his massive head, his ears pinned flat against his skull. He let out a sharp, ear-splitting bark that made several hardened criminals flinch.
"Don't look at his eyes," Julian muttered, crossing his arms, a morbid curiosity flickering in his own gaze. "Not that it matters when you're blind, little one."
Maisie stopped ten feet away from the beast. She didn't raise her hands aggressively. She didn't yell commands like 'Sit!' or 'Down!' the way the professional trainers had done before getting mauled. Instead, she did something no one in the room expected.
She knelt down slowly in the dirt, right in the middle of the grime and gravel, and sat cross-legged.
Then, she closed her eyes—though it made no visual difference—and began to hum.
It wasn't a song with words. It was a low, melodic, vibrating tone, matching the exact frequency of a soothing heartbeat. It was a technique she used when her own panic attacks hit her in the dead of night, a frequency she had learned by pressing her ear against her mother’s chest when she was a frightened little girl.
Cyrus froze. The snarl caught in his throat, turning into a confused, ragged choke.
His ears twitched. The chaotic, frantic rhythm of his breathing—the sound that had drawn Maisie across the room in the first place—suddenly hitched. He took a hesitant step forward, his massive claws digging into the dirt.
"What is she doing?" an enforcer whispered in disbelief. "Is she casting a spell on the damn dog?"
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"She's out of her mind," another muttered. "He's about to lunge."
Cyrus closed the distance between them in a heartbeat. He lunged forward, his heavy body launching into the air like a furry missile, directly toward Maisie’s throat.
