The bell rang from the red tower. The sun cast long shadows on the streets of Luxen. The market dispersed, and the merchants packed up their goods and headed back to the hills. Slowly the lanterns lit up and traced the streets all the way to the magistrate's house.

Eileen carried a sack of vegetables home. She was supposed to return much earlier, but there was a performance at the local theatre that she'd never miss. It was something she enjoyed without restraint, ever since she first saw “Three birds of Fury”. She was too young to understand it at the time, but the costumes and colors of the stage were too mesmerizing to forget.

On the cobalt blue stone, she walked at a steady pace, humming the tune from the play, dodging the carts and people. The house she had grown up in was just one in a long row of yellow brick houses climbing up Galeris Hill.

She found her mother in the kitchen, cutting up meat for roasting.

"Where's your brother?" her mother asked, tossing small cubes of beef into the pan. "I thought you two were out together," she said.

"I don't know. I was at the theatre," Eileen returned. "I haven't seen him since I left."

"He should have been back by now. The little vagabond. Who knows what he does all day."

"Ah, don’t fret, Maffer, you always worry too much. The boy's probably stuck in the Rils again. He'll turn up," Eileen's father said, coming in from the backyard with a stack of firewood.

"It's almost dark, Ferron, and how many times have I told him to come back before it gets dark? It's all your fault. You spoiled him."

"I'm just letting him be a kid. I was never home on time, and I was always playing in the Rills, as well. I turned out all right. Didn't I?"

Maffer grumbled at him and grabbed the vegetables off the table, cutting them furiously. "Go find him!" she said, flicking the knife toward her husband.

He stoked the fire under the kettle, sighed, and left.

Before the last bell had rung, the doors of almost every house were locked, and life had disappeared from the streets. It was not for another hour that Ferron returned, his face pale and his hand trembling. He said nothing before stumbling to find a place firm enough to hold on to. He faltered to the table and stopped there.

"Where is he?" cried Maffer, sensing that something terrible had happened.

"Outside," said Ferron, as if he had no breath left in his body.

"Outside where?" asked Eileen, looking at the empty street.

"Outside the walls."

Maffer dropped the ladle and it fell into the fire. "No," she cried, "It can't be."

"We've got to get him!" screamed Eileen at the open window. "He can't stay there."

"The guards," Ferron said with growing anger. "They won't let anyone out. I tried, I begged the bastards. All they could do was tell me to wait for morning."

"We can't wait that long," Maffer said. "He... ah, that fool. I never should have let him. What was he thinking?"

"What about the hunters? Ha?" asked Eileen. "There must be someone who can go out and at least make sure he stays alive."

Ferron pounded his fist on the table.

"There are no more hunters, Eileen. They've all been killed, every last one of them, and you know it."

"But we still have the weapons, don't we? All the things great-grandfather left behind. I know it's here somewhere."

"We can't go out there ourselves!" shouted Maffer. "Have you lost your mind?

"There's a passageway. I can go out. I can find him."

"No. You're not going anywhere."

●

The bushes and vines hid it well, making it almost invisible from both inside and outside the wall. It could have been there for many years, but no one would notice.

Eileen tossed the ax to the other side and slid her leather satchel and the lantern behind it. She wondered if Julle had done the same. It was the only thing that made sense, him sneaking into the forest unnoticed to satisfy his curiosity. She had done that herself countless times, but she had never dared go further than the tree line. 

Lastly, she pulled herself through the stones, as slowly as she could, minding the sharp edges and thorns.

It was silent on the other side, the kind of silence that makes you uncomfortable and makes you doubt the sanity of your own mind. There were no people, no chatter, no cartwheels squealing on the stone. The forest gave no indication that anything living roamed its borders. And yet it had proven time and again that it wasn't only alive, but hungry for life, ravenous for all things that moved and sang.

Eileen put the ax back into her belt and took a deep breath of the night air before entering the abysmal place that lay outside the city walls. The stories she had heard all her life spoke of things that went hunting as soon as the sun went down, and those things were so feared by the people that they built their walls higher and their gates thicker until their lives revolved around stone and glass rather than twigs and leaves.

She heard nothing but her own breathing. Even her footsteps were silent on the forest floor. There was a point where light gave way to shadow and no one but the hunters dared to venture any deeper.

In the old days, woodcutters would clear the paths through the forest to make it safer and brighter, but the trees would grow back so quickly that all their work was in vain.

There was even a priest who wanted to eliminate the menace by burning down the whole forest, but when he approached the first tree with a torch, it refused to burn. He ran in circles wielding the fire, touching every branch and bark, but the embers didn't spread. A short time later, his own house caught fire for no obvious reason and burned down with him still inside.

Eileen put one foot in front of the other, keeping an eye on everything that moved, but all she saw were rotten leaves and hungry roots. She held the small lantern above her head, but it was not enough to fully light her way.

Above, she heard rustling, followed by a soft cracking. She couldn't be sure where it was coming from, because the trees towered so high and wide that nothing, not even the moonlight, could light it all the way.

She heard it again, closer this time, and the shadow of a child appeared in the tree.

"Hey," she whispered as loudly as she could. "Is someone there? Julle, is that you?" 

"Who goes there?" said a voice from the trees.

"It's me, Eileen, you fool. Get down here."

"No, you come up here. The monsters are close."

She felt a light breeze blowing in her face that was neither fresh nor cold. It smelled of warm rot and uneaten prey and only grew stronger the longer she hesitated.

"Quickly!" 

There seemed to be no other choice, and as she reached for branch after branch, she found that the forest was much less frightening when one had some distance from the ground. The smell of rot faded with each step upward, and for a moment she thought she was safe.

"Where are you?" she asked the leaves, unable to find anything resembling a child sitting among them.

"Here, just a little higher up than you," the voice said, but it had a strange tone to it. She couldn't make it out from the ground, but now that it was closer, it was clearer, and it sounded deviated to her ears.

Still, she kept climbing until she got tired and sat down on a thick branch to catch her breath.

"How much farther is it?" she asked.

"Nothing at all," said the same voice, now fully revealed. It was sinister, twisted to make it a child's voice, but what came out was an imitation of the worst kind.

She shivered, stood up and reached for her ax. There was nothing around her but rustling leaves. "Where are you?" she cried, feeling a slight tremor in her knees, and looking down she found a good explanation.

A creature appeared before her eyes. It was like a human being, it had arms, it had legs and a face. And yet it was a mockery of all that lived. It resembled a human form, but it was made of horrible things. 

Its skin was pale, almost transparent, revealing black veins under the surface. The eyes were small, sunken deep into the skull, while the teeth were too big for its mouth, constantly cutting into its bottom lip.

Eileen could no longer scream. Fear paralyzed her and curdled up into a rock in her throat. She reached for something to lean on, but the monster moved closer, matching every piece of ground she found behind her.

It was a trap, a prison of inescapable fate between the hard earth and the sharp teeth of a monster.

"This is my domain, little human," it screeched, "and it's a rare treat when one of your kind wanders in. Human flesh is… heavenly."

"No." was all she could muster. It was not unlike a dream in which one cannot run and cannot speak but lies exposed to terrors of their own creation. The ax she held was as useful as a feathered pillow in those short moments, and the monster knew it.

It knew that the prey was paralyzed and that the feast had served itself.

A scream rang out above. The cry of a child enraged by injustice. "Eileen," it cried out, "Do not touch her, you foul creature."

That was almost all she needed. A distraction that would divert the monster's gaze. It was the most basic instinct that overcame her, and she grabbed the lantern and slammed it against the creature's head with all her might. It tripped over the branch, screeched, and ran its claws over its head, full of shards and embers.

That was not enough, she thought, and another instinct flowed from her mind to her arm, and she swung the ax right into its head, embedding it deeply. It fell off and hit the branches before slamming to the ground.

The body released a thin could of red mist and many horrible sounds circled the tree in seconds.

 "Julle, is it really you?" Eileen yelled upwards, watching the boy descend as fast as he could.

"It's me. I’m not a monster. I promise," the boy said.

"Come on, you fool, we must get out of here. Now."

No sooner had they reached the ground than the growling became louder and more menacing. Eileen yanked the ax from the monster's head, nearly throwing up, and pulled the boy by the hand as fast as she could to get them on their way back.

"You killed it," Julle said with a gasp, trying to keep up with his sister's long strides.

"Be quiet. We’re almost there."

Without the lantern, the darkness was heavier and ready to yield a monster out of every shrub and tree, but they moved so quickly, the trees looked like nothing more than passing things.

They were certain something was chasing them, but neither of them dared look back until they reached the edge of the forest. It was close, a claw away from them, and its footers made it seem as though an uneven number of legs was chasing them. It growled and panted behind them until it stopped.

Stolen story; please report.

"Look around," it said, sounding almost human. "Just a little look."

Eileen shivered, but the wall was close and rescue was almost certain. She clutched her brother's hand, but she sensed that it was different somehow. It was heavier and full of scaly skin that almost wanted to peel off. She turned around and saw she was holding the hand of another monster. It looked like a great shadow, darker than the darkness of the forest itself, and its burning eyes stared into her soul.

She let it go.

●

Years went by. Luxen remained the same. It hid behind its walls, safe in its cocoon of stone, never daring to face its true foe. They chose to forget those lost to the forest, and they chose to pretend that there was nothing that could be done.

Eileen never stopped thinking about it. Day by day her resolve grew, from anger to absolute dedication. She stopped caring about the simple life, about theatre and markets. She only had one goal, to rid the world of monsters.

At dawn, she set off, through the city gates and followed the stream to the piece of wall where the old crack used to be. After her brother's demise, they had patched it up with stones and mortar, leaving nothing but a bad scar.

Winter was approaching and the forest was losing its power to hide things under the leaves. It was the beginning of the hunting season for monsters.

It was strangely quiet that morning, without wind, the trees could not move, and without movement, anything that breaks those laws could easily be discovered.

She walked straight ahead, following a line of trees, each marked with a symbol in blue, the color they used every year during the Summer Festival of the Sky Gods. One blue after another led her deeper into the enemy territory.

The path she had marked finally came to an end. She took a small knife from her satchel and continued to brand the trees that came after. The bark came off easily under the blade, and soon, a dozen more bore the symbol of the hunters.

Like a clap of thunder, it burst from above and covered her eyes in shadow with its wings. A black bird swooped down from the mountain and tore a hole in the pattern formed by the trees, crushing everything on its way down.

Eileen instinctively drew her bow and followed the bird's every move with the edge. It was as tall as she and had wings three times as wide. Its feathers seemed to absorb all the light that fell on them. It looked as if the bird wasn’t truly there but the blackest of all the shadows marked itself on the air.

It clawed its talons into the leaves and let its wings rest at its side.

"Name yourself," Eileen said. "So I know what to write under your head when I hang it on the city gates."

"I had a name. I forgot my name. I do not have a name," it said with a creak.

"The nameless one then," returned Eileen.

"Save your anger for the one who deserves it," said the bird. "Save it for the one who plagues us with terror and ruin. Kill the two-legged beast."

"What are you talking about? You will not trick me, not again." She fired an arrow at the bird, but before it could hit, the bird was in the air and over her head, landing on the other side.

"Listen," it squawked. "Make it known that we are doomed."

"You are doomed."

"Release us, and you will be released from this hatred within you."

"There is no release. Only death."

"Julle is waiting."

"Do not play with me, you monster. I will tear you to pieces," she roared, holding back the inevitable pain.

"We were all like you once. Now, we bite into the bitter flesh of those who venture too far. Go to the well, Slayer. Let it in."

The bird flapped it wings, pushing upward into the sky, and like an apparition, it disappeared to the east.

The well, Eileen thought. What could the bird have meant? It should not have said those things to her. Monsters cared for nothing but the flesh. They did not crave salvation.

She listened for the light breeze coming from far ahead. There was a melody, barely audible, so she stopped and kept listening until she could hear the words.

"The water is running, running down the stones..." it said, "The monster is waiting to eat our bones."

Cold sweat covered her and she clutched the arrow in her hand so tightly that it snapped in half. She did not get so far only to turn around and run back to the safety of the walls. They could not keep her safe forever. Even the beasts feared something more terrifying than themselves.

The song went on, inviting her to come closer, and she followed it, placing her feet carefully on the ground. It told her a story from a time when there was no Luxen and no walls, only people and peace.

One day, they came across a temple in the forest. It was old and crumbling and needed care and worship. It contained no treasures, only an endless array of creatures carved in wood and stone. The people feared it was a remnant of a twisted civilization and left it as they found it.

But then a plague came over them like a thick black cloud, decimating them faster than they could count the dead. They buried them at the edge of the forest, placing a wreath of white flowers on their graves, hoping that they were the last.

Their priestess lost faith in her gods and in order to save the people, she went back to the old temple and marked each statue with blood and water. She saw everything in a dream and whispered the words that were spoken to her.

In the days that followed, the forest began to change, taking possession of their homes and preventing the sun from shining through. Some saw this as a reckoning and fled to other places, far away. Others considered it a blessing and salvation from the plague. They were the ones who awoke one day and were no longer human. The forest had turned them into monsters.

When the priestess finally realized what she had done, she threw herself into the well in the middle of a small square, hoping that she'd not suffer the same fate. But when she reappeared, she was the worst of them all.

The song stopped when Eileen peered into the dark abyss of the same well. She could not tell if there was any water down there, so she threw a stone into it and received no response. Cautiously, she looked into the darkness, trying to come to terms with the idea that all she saw around her might be the fate of her own city. Sooner or later the walls would fall, either through war or negligence, and the trees would crawl into them like parasites, leaving only the most resilient things as evidence of the past.

The forest would always win.

A shriek pulled her away from the well. It seemed to come from many sides at once, but she knew it came from a single monster. Spear in hand, she turned and followed the soft rustling of leaves beneath its feet.

"Welcome back to my domain," said the monster from behind. It stood on one leg at the edge of the well and bent right over Eileen's head.

With a swift movement, she pushed herself off and looked up at the human-like creature she’d been hunting for years. She had almost forgotten how wrong it looked. Its eyes were yellow, murky and small, embedded deep in an elongated skull. The ghastly skin was stretched too far to hold itself together, making it seem to her like a pile of bones in a far-too-small sheep's bladder.

"I know what you are looking for," it continued in a twisted tone. "But you know nothing of the world. To be so vane and stupid to think you can hunt me down and display me as a trophy, is exactly what I expected."

"I came for you, and I will not leave until I have done just that," Eileen said, swinging the spear at the creature's head. It jumped back and crawled across the stone on all fours like a spider.

 "Sharp things won't save you," it returned, leaning forward. Its jaws loosened and the rotten teeth tried to bite Eileen, snapping together again and again.

Eileen faltered to the ground and rammed the handle of her spear right between its jaws, but the monster was too strong for her to hold back. It pushed her down until she could feel its long tongue licking across her forehead.

Several times she tried to fight back until she managed to push the spear aside and let the back of the blade cut through the bonds of the monster's mouth. Black blood trickled out of it until it fell to the side.

She rolled off and gasped for air, barely feeling any strength left in her arms. The creature was far from dead. It held its jaw in its hand and set it back in place. Its eyes were no longer bleary, but burning like embers. Eileen could see her own demise clearly in them.

The creature laughed and raised its bloodied head in the air. Without opening its mouth, it spoke, "The forest is mine. It can never die. Nothing can hurt us. We are eternal. It is you who think you can tame us, control us. Look at what happens to those who desecrate things older than time."

Once again it was a predator playing with its prey, certain of victory. Eileen had no place to run and no place to hide. The hunt was over. She leaned against the stone wall of the well and awaited judgement.

The beast took one last look at her and slowly walked toward the well. She lounged the spear at it, stabbing it multiple times, always hitting the bone. It did not stop and did not try to defend itself.

One last time she lounged and managed to jam the blade in between the monster’s ribs. It screeched and faltered back, but neither fell nor tried to attack. It simply pried it out of its chest and kept on walking until it backed Eileen into a corner.

It picked her up off the ground and held her above the precipice of the well as it soaked up the terror on her face.

The melody returned to her mind. A story that repeated itself, and a sudden desire to take a trophy straight to hell awoke within her. With a small blade she kept hidden in her vest, she poked out one of its eyes, and then the other. 

It was a desperate move, but she feared no death and the only thing she wanted was to at least make it suffer.

The monster let out a scream so terrifying that the trees snapped away. As she fell down the well, she kept reaching for something to hold on to, until the metal pins in her boots got hold of moss and sharper stones. She looked up at the small round circle that was the sky and realized what a wonder it was she was still alive.

Once she was able to climb out, Eileen saw no sign of a beast, only a trail of blood on the grass and the body of a little boy lying beside a tree.

"Julle?" she screamed, "It can not be."

The boy had no eyes, only holes full of ashes, but he was just as young as he had been the day she had lost him at the edge of the forest.

"I am sorry," said Eileen, knowing very well what she had to do.

The black bird circled the sky above them, waiting for the story to end. 

The beast was eternal, for it became those who hunted it. It took their power and their shape, twisted and devoured their energy. It ruled since the day the old city fell and wickedness was allowed to fester. It called to itself all the other things that the forest had brought to life. It fed on it, and it would forever seek another victim to latch on to.

Eileen lifted the fragile body of her brother and let it sail down into the endless darkness of the well. She boarded up the top with metal and stone, ensuring that no one, not in a thousand years knows what it’s like to look into the face of a true monster.

She returned home, without a trophy, avoiding the eyes of the people of Luxen. She put the weapons back in the old chest her great-grandfather used when he went hunting and buried them by the wall. For the first time in many years, she was able to sleep soundly.

But when she awoke, she was taller than she remembered. The world she saw was red, burning in perpetual flames. Her hands were long and her bottom lip ached and bled from sharp teeth poking through it. There was nothing but malice on her mind, and nothing but blood on the streets of Luxen.

The walls could no longer protect them.