Beneath a wide-open harvest moon, the low hills of the Westfold were bathed in a silvery mist that hovered close above the earth. Lurking between blades of dewy grass and spreading boughs, it filled the hollows of the wooded dells, turning the hunting footpaths into shadowy corridors where little could be seen beyond one’s own feet. The air was damp and cool, a sweet kiss upon naked skin after the wearying heat of summer. Where others shrouded themselves in cloaks and hoods, the golden-eyed woman crept about in the same thin leather tunic, her arms bared to the starlight and fog.
For she relished the chill, the way it bit at her fingertips and firmed the pores of the skin along her shoulders and the nape of her slender neck. The way it made her heart pulse a little more strongly, made her breathe through parted lips to stave off the impulse to shiver. Made her feel real and alive.
She could not get a clear glimpse of the man she trailed in the misty gloom. Now and again, she heard the snap of a twig, the crunch of a fallen leaf. Clearly, he did not know the paths as she did, and he fancied himself alone in the midnight wood. It would be his undoing. She could smell the blood that lingered in the air of his wake, along with a faint tinge of woodsmoke. The subtle hatred that seethed in her veins was keenly pleasurable. She savored the thought that one of the men of Dunland dared to tread on the soil of her mother’s people.
The river was near. Its voice was hushed and gentle, muted by the heavy fog. The fishing village was not far ahead now. Her soft boots plied against the leaf litter and damp soil with near-perfect silence. She could hear the man’s breath, raspy and uneven, perhaps a dozen paces ahead of her. Carefully, her foot moved over a jutting root from the gnarled willow that grew over the path. Many times she had tripped over it in the darkness as a girl, still learning the trails of the forest.
She remembered the mysterious tale of the unfortunate fisherman, and the faceless ghost who had never been found. Why then, did this infiltrator walk through her wood in the dead of night, with blood still steaming on the tips of his fingers, unless it were the same demon? His form began to take shape in her mind. Black-haired, swarthy, heavy-limbed. Perhaps he craved not one sliced-off tongue, but a collection of them. A line of horse-lord body parts dipped in gold, strung about his neck as one displays hunting trophies. The men of the fishing village were not warriors. They would make easy prey for the slakeless thirst of such a beast.
The ring of a bell came now through the brisk air, sounding further off than it was, for the mist played tricks with one’s senses. There was no time to circle ahead of the man and alert the villagers. She felt an abrupt rush of desire to see him clearly and feel the weight of his body collapsing beneath hers. To see his monsters’ eyes gaping wide before she put out their light forever with the tip of her blade. To know that the village was safe, that its people could sleep without fear, and that one more sliver of the justice she so deeply craved had been meted out.
The carved-bone handle of her dagger was like ice beneath her palm. She held it firmly in its sheath as her boots quickened over the rolling earth, and the billows of mist whispered past her, numbing her cheeks and dampening her hair. She could see him now. A slender shadow against paler shadows. Beyond his silhouette, a speck of yellow glowed in the darkness. The first house of the village. Drawing the blade, she fixed her eyes upon the center of his back, and raced forward.
