My Pet Fox Is Actually A Demon Prince-Chapter 29: How To Calm A Child

The young fawn blinked.

She had gotten tired of walking.

Everything felt too big, too loud, too confusing and unfamiliar. The trees, the roads, the people, none of it felt like home. So she had changed, just like she always did when she didn’t know what to do, trading away her soft furs and hooves for tiny hands and wobbly feet.

Humans walked like this too.

So maybe... if she walked like them, she’d find where she was supposed to go.

But she didn’t.

No one stopped her, or called her. 𝑓𝘳𝑒𝑒𝓌𝘦𝘣𝘯ℴ𝑣𝘦𝑙.𝘤𝑜𝑚

No warm place opened its doors for her to come in.

So she kept going.

And going.

Until her feet hurt.

Until her tummy hurt more.

She pressed a small hand against her stomach, her steps slowing as the empty feeling twisted inside her. She didn’t know where to go anymore. Didn’t know who to seek help from.

She just kept walking.

But then she stopped, sniffing something smokey in the air.

Like... fire.

Her head lifted, her messy brown hair shifting as she looked ahead. The sky looked funny there, darker, like it was grumbling. The air felt different too, like when a storm was about to come.

But there was something else.

Something that made her remain at her spot.

Her small body shivered, though she didn’t know why. The atmosphere wasn’t cold, but it felt... scary. Like when you know something is wrong,something super dangerous, but you can’t see it yet.

She should have turned around like her instincts told her.

But she didn’t.

Instead, she walked forward, slowly maneuvering through the bushes until she saw him. The little girl froze.

It was a beast!

He was big.

Too big.

Everything about him felt wrong, like the air around him did not want to move.

She gasped when she heard multiple screams of agony coming from the building that was on fire, her eyes spotting someone who managed to burst through the inferno, but he was running around in flames, trying to quench it while screaming in pure terror, but the fox man before her didn’t even flinch at the sight.

He was hurting those people!

Her fingers curled into the fabric of her pink sleeves, and her heart started to beat faster.

But she didn’t run, she couldn’t. Her legs wouldn’t listen. It remained stuck in a place like roots had grown from her feet into the ground. All she could do was stare at the terrible, impossible thing in front of her.

A beast who was a fox....

But he was not a normal one.

Behind him, he had more than one tail, and she counted slowly.

One... two.... Three...

Her small brows scrunched together at the number, her eyes growing wider and wider.

"...eight..."

Eight tails.

She knew this.

She had heard of the eight-tailed fox.

Her head hurt a little as she tried to remember, little thoughts bumping into each other until something finally clicked into place.

There was only one.

Only one fox like that.

He was the demon fox Prince.

The bad one.

The really, really bad one.

The one grown-ups spoke about in whispers and quiet voices.

The one who hurt his own people terribly.

The one who tried to take the big seat from his father.

He had been stopped.

And yet... still managed to escape.

It was him.

It had to be him.

But now she was facing him, fear creeping in deeper now that her mind had caught up with what she was seeing.

If he was that fox...

Then he was dangerous.

Very dangerous.

But he said he knew her.

She didn’t know him.

Why?

Her lips wobbled.

Was... was he going to hurt her too?

Meanwhile...

Calhoun stared at the girl in his grasp, the fear in her wide brown eyes utterly unguarded.

It took him a moment, just a moment too long to understand.

He was no longer a small, harmless fox, so she didn’t recognize him.

What she saw in his stead... was one of his true forms.

’Shit.’

The girl’s lips quivered. Tears welled, spilling over in an instant before she broke into a piercing wail.

"WAHHHHHHHHH!! DEMON!!!!! LET GO OF ME!!! SOMEONE—"

Caught completely off guard by her raw, unfiltered terror, Calhoun flinched, and only then realized how he was holding her.

Upside down.

By one leg.

He grimaced and quickly adjusted his grip, releasing her ankle and catching her mid-squirm before she could slip, holding her upright with more care rather than the careless grip he’d had before.

She was even smaller than he’d first presumed, wrapped in soft layers of flowing pink that pooled and fluttered with every frantic movement. The robe swallowed her tiny frame effortlessly, the sleeves far too long and bunching around her hand. A pale sash cinched at her waist, slightly askew now from being yanked about so abruptly.

She looked no more than five.

Her hair, a warm chestnut brown, had come half-loose from its tie, strands spilling wildly around her flushed face. A delicate pink blossom still clung stubbornly near her temple, though the rest of her ribbons had slipped, trailing unevenly behind her like petals caught in a storm.

But it was her face– round, soft and tear-streaked.

Her wide brown eyes shimmered with pure, unfiltered fear, her lashes clumped with tears as she stared at him like he was something dragged straight out of a nightmare.

She hiccuped mid-wail, her small trembling hands flailing helplessly as she urged him to release her. Her eyes were squeezed shut now.

"You’re a demon...!"

Despite holding her properly now, it didn’t help.

Her cries only grew louder, shriller, and it echoed through the path like a siren.

Calhoun winced at that.

The sound was drilling straight into his skull, and he did not like that. Should he just kill her and be done with it?

"...Calm down," he said flatly.

No effect.

If anything, she cried harder.

Tears soaked her flushed cheeks, dripping from her chin, her voice breaking as panic overtook any sense she might’ve had.

"H-hic— LEMME GO!!"

Calhoun clicked his tongue, irritation flickering across his expression as he searched, vainly, for something, anything, that might make her stop.

This wasn’t the young enthusiastic fawn he remembered.

"Are you hungry?" he tried, the words awkward and foreign on his tongue. "How about this... I’ll buy you food, anything you want. Just... stop crying already. It’s damaging my eardrums."

The girl froze.

Her sobs hitched, catching awkwardly in her throat as if the words had tripped something in her panic.

"...F-food...?"

Her tear-blurred eyes peeked up at him again. She was still terrified,still convinced that he might kill her too.

But also now confused as well.

The idea of a demon buying her food didn’t quite fit into whatever story her mind was trying to tell her.

Demons didn’t buy food.

Her lips trembled.

"...Y-you’re gonna... kill me after..."

"What? No."

The answer came too fast and too flat to be a lie.

The girl blinked at him, startled.

Calhoun had no experience with children. Most people feared him too much to come close, and he had never seen a reason to change that. But now, faced with her terror, he found himself at a loss. It was loud, chaotic and impossible to ignore.

If only he knew how to make it stop.

Her cries had softened into uneven hiccups, her breathing still shaky, but no longer as piercing.

He frowned slightly, his gaze shifting past her, as if just realizing she had almost stumbled into the wrong den.

How had she even made it this far?

His eyes returned to her, narrowing just a fraction.

"...Do you really not remember me?"

The question hung in the air.

The little girl went still.

"...remember...?" she echoed weakly.

She looked at him again, more carefully this time.

At the tails swaying languidly behind him.

At his face.

She met his eyes, and her breath hitched as she recalled seeing those striking amber eyes somewhere.

Her thoughts scrambled.

A cage.

The fox in a cage!

Her eyes flew wide open.

"No way—!"

"You’re that fox! The baby fox!" she announced, pointing a trembling finger at him.

Her cries had ceased now, replaced entirely by stunned disbelief, and for a brief second, something unreadable flickered across Calhoun’s face, but he did not loosen his hold on her.

If anything, he secured her properly.

Now that she knew who he was, he couldn’t risk setting her free and having her inform anyone about his whereabouts. He did not need that kind of trouble right now.

"H-how did you grow so fast?" she asked, blinking up at him, her fear now tangled with pure, childlike confusion.

Calhoun only stared at the girl, as if weighing whether the question deserved an answer.

"...That’s none of your concern."

Before she could react, the world tilted.

"Wah—!"

He hoisted her over his shoulder like she weighed nothing, one arm keeping her firmly in place despite her startled squirm.

Her pink sleeves flopped downward with gravity, her hair hanging loosely as she blinked, disoriented.

"You never found the shelter, did you?" He said, already turning away as if the decision had been made long ago. "Let’s get you something to eat first."

"I didn’t," she admitted quietly, her voice smaller now.

"... you’re... really not going to kill me...?"

Calhoun didn’t look back as he walked.

"...if I wanted you dead, you wouldn’t be asking that question."

The little girl fell silent at that, too afraid to press him further, lest she somehow provoke him into making it true.

In the end, he led her back toward the human town. By the time they arrived, she noticed that his eight tails had vanished, his fox ears gone as well. It left behind nothing but the appearance of a stunning man.