The cabin reeked of blood and smoke. Charred embers glowed dimly in the shattered hearth, casting faint orange light over the ruin. The wooden beams, splintered from the violence, loomed overhead like broken ribs of a fallen beast.
Outside, dawn had barely kissed the horizon with silver light, but the assassins moved with methodical precision, unhurried. Their boots left dark prints in the blood pooling across the straw-strewn floorboards.
Crowshade knelt beside the huntsman's limp body, his curved bone-handled knife still slick with blood. He pressed two fingers against the side of the man's throat, holding them there for several silent moments.
No pulse. No breath.
The huntsman's head lolled sideways, cheek pressed against the cold stone step at the bottom of the cellar stairs. His eyes, half-open and glazed with death, stared blankly into the shadows below.
Crowshade rose to his feet, wiping his fingers clean on the huntsman's torn tunic. Around him, his men moved through the wreckage, checking bodies, collecting weapons, and sheathing their own bloodied blades.
"Is he dead?" asked one assassin, his voice muffled behind his veil.
Crowshade tilted his head slightly, studying the huntsman's corpse with detached interest. "Dead enough," he rasped.
Another assassin approached from the far corner, his boots splashing in pooled blood. "What about the heads?"
Crowshade gestured to the row of burlap sacks lined along the broken table. Each sagged heavily, dark stains seeping through the coarse fabric. "We have them."
The assassin nodded, glancing toward the cellar where the huntsman lay. "What about him? Do we take his head too?"
Crowshade considered this for a moment. The silent cabin echoed with dripping blood, the crackle of dying embers, and the faint rustle of wind pushing through shattered shutters.
"No," he said at last. "The king wanted proof of the family's death, not his. Let him rot here. He'll feed the crows."
The assassin grunted and turned away. Another man, shorter and broad-shouldered, walked over to the huntsman's corpse. He crouched down, studying the motionless body for a long moment. Then he spat.
A thick gob of saliva splattered across the huntsman's cheek, mixing with the dried blood crusted there.
"Traitor dog," the assassin muttered under his breath.
He rose and walked back toward his brothers, sheathing his dagger with a quiet click.
Crowshade ignored the gesture. He stood in the centre of the ruined cabin, surveying the devastation. Lira's headless corpse lay slumped near the hearth, her blood soaking into the cracked clay tiles. Aryn's small body rested beside her, his lifeless eyes staring at nothing, the boy's final tears dried upon his pale cheeks. Sila lay farther back, half-hidden in shadow, her stuffed hare clutched against her chest, its matted fur soaked in dark red.
Crowshade felt nothing. No guilt, no triumph, only the steady certainty of duty fulfilled. He turned away, gesturing to his men.
"Burn it," he ordered.
One assassin moved to the hearth, gathering the still-glowing embers in a metal pan. He poured them across the dry straw near the table, where blood had soaked deeply into the wood. Another assassin smashed a jar of lamp oil across the floor, glass shards scattering among the corpses with a delicate, crystalline clatter.
The fire caught quickly, orange tongues licking at the straw and spreading across the broken timbers. Smoke coiled upward, filling the cabin with bitter fumes. Sparks drifted through the shattered door into the dim forest dawn.
"Leave it," Crowshade said.
The assassins filed out one by one, stepping over corpses and pools of blood. The last man paused at the threshold, casting a final glance back at the huntsman's broken body lying at the bottom of the cellar stairs.
"Burn in hell," he whispered.
Then he turned and left, disappearing into the dawn mist.
The silence that followed was heavy and absolute. Flames crackled and popped, consuming straw and splintered wood. Smoke curled around the bodies, coiling toward the low rafters. Shadows flickered against bloodstained walls, dancing like dark spirits in mourning.
In the cellar, the huntsman lay unmoving. Blood pooled beneath his head, seeping slowly between the cold stone slabs. His eyes, half-lidded and lifeless, reflected the dim glow of firelight filtering down through the broken stairwell.
Outside, the assassins mounted their horses. Crowshade glanced once over his shoulder at the smoking ruin of the cabin before signalling for departure. Their horses snorted and stamped, eager to leave the scent of blood behind.
As they rode into the frost-bitten forest, torches flickering in the predawn gloom, the first pale shafts of sunlight crested the eastern hills. They cast long shadows through the trees, turning the snow to glass and the rising smoke to drifting silver ghosts.
Within the cabin, flames spread across the floor, licking at broken chairs, shattered dishes, and lifeless bodies. The burlap sacks containing Lira, Aryn, and Sila's heads lay by the door, ready for transport to the royal court as proof of duty fulfilled.
But down in the cellar, where moonlight filtered faintly through a gap in the timber floorboards above, the huntsman's corpse lay silent in gathering darkness. Smoke drifted down the stairwell, curling around his limbs, coiling through his blood-matted hair.
For a long time, there was only silence.
Then the flames flickered lower, burning away the straw and wooden debris, leaving blackened embers glowing sullenly in their place. The cabin settled with faint creaks as timbers charred and cracked, falling inward upon themselves.
Moonlight pooled through the shattered shutters, falling in pale beams across the corpses. It gleamed upon blood-slick wood, upon steel blades fallen from limp hands, upon the huntsman's motionless body lying broken in the shadows below.
And there, in the silence of death and ruin, the air seemed to shift.
Something unseen moved across the floor, disturbing the smoke in a silent ripple. The pale beams of moonlight dimmed slightly as a cold shadow fell across the huntsman's lifeless face.
The silence deepened, pressing down like a grave.
No birds called. No wind whispered. Only the crackle of fading flames and the faint creak of collapsing timbers broke the tomb-like hush of dawn.
In that moment, the huntsman's corpse lay still and silent. Blood congealed around his wounds. His breath did not stir. His pulse did not beat.
But somewhere far beyond the veil of death, something waited in the dark.
Watching.
Smiling.