Humans and creatures of the night have been at each others necks for long centuries. Hundreds have died on both sides. Now it seems, the breaking point has been reached.
Fueled by centuries of smoldering hate, both sides openly declare war, killing...
Aeline watched from a safe distance away as the crowd pushed against the edge of the wooden platform, screaming at the figure tied to a post in the center. Several of the agitated people were throwing rotten fruit and glass bottles at him, all of them impacting harshly against his body.
Children danced at the border of the crowd, their excited voices like mocking melodies, "A night-beast! It looks so small. Why does it look like a man, father?"
Aeline closed her eyes and tried to block out the voice of the child as it resounded in her head, louder with each echo.
What is wrong with these people?
The anger and hate of the crowd closest to the platform grew greater and greater with each passing moment, until a bald priest, his hands clutching a large ornate cross, climbed up the stairs of the platform. The crowd of hundreds quickly quieted at the sight of the respected man towering above them.
His black robes now seemed more like the attire of a Hangman. It drew an appropriate solemnity from the crowd. He stared across the multitude of faces filling the town square for a long moment before he began to speak.
"This beast, who stands bound beside me, has been convicted of ravaging the borders of our small town, destroying our livestock, and attacking farmhands. This is a creature which should not exist, and its very presence among us demands its death."
Aeline felt herself trembling from where she stood, hidden behind a stack of barrels as she watched and rage tendered in her bones as she watched.
"I speak from the book of our Lord when I say 'thou shalt not suffer a witch to live.' We will not abide with the spawn of the devil." The priest's voice had steadily increased in volume and his face twisted in the righteous passion of anger. The crowd took up the rage, their voices shouting and calling for the life of the man tied to the pole.
"You will here witness the triumph of the Lord over the minions of the Pit."
He glanced to his side, where a man bearing a wooden keg had joined him on the platform. The man nodded and stepped over to the tied-up individual. He hesitated for a fraction of a second before he doused the tied-up man with the contents of the keg.
The screams of the crowds reached a crescendo as the smell of lamp oil washed over them.
A moment later, someone handed the priest a burning torch. He stared at it with fanatical reverence, his next words coming from deep within him. "In the name of the Patriarch, the Heir, and the Hallowed Spirit."
He turned to the oil-soaked figure and thrust the flaming torch upon him.
The effect was instantaneous, as the flames exploded to life, swallowing the body in a small inferno. The priest and the man with the keg stepped back from the sudden searing heat.
When the flames reduced, they were treated to the sight of a man whose limbs and torso gave of flames, whose clothes peeled off his body from the heat. White smoke began leaping from his body, filling the air with an acrid smell.
The crowd had once again gone silent as they watched the night-beast burn. The town square was as silent as a graveyard.
It took several long minutes before someone realized that the burning figure was not dying at all. There were no screams of pain, no snarls as the beast transformed into its true form.
It took a few more seconds for an old farmer to identify the acrid smell as smoke from burning hay. The priest was the one to finally put it all together.
This was no night-beast. This was a hay doll.
By then, Aeline was long gone, riding out of the town on a stolen horse, heading for the Black forest, its border just a few miles away.
An injured man rode behind her, hands gripping her waist as they rode away. The true night-beast. The one she'd rescued from death at the hands of her people.
She heard the rising voice of the crowd as she rode out the town gates, and she urged her horse faster across the road. Time seemed to slow around her, and the irrational fear that at any moment, the crowds would come charging after her, fast enough to outrun her horse, nearly swallowed her.
"You know what they will do if they found out it was you," the man behind her rasped, forcing his injured lungs to function. His normally pleasant voice was nearly torturous to listen to now, the work of a throat wounded by a silver blade.
"I do," Aeline answered, not glancing back at him or the town she was leaving forever. Her family was there, parents and elder siblings. Her work at the inn. The house, built with her own hands.
Her life, all left behind.
"You can't run forever," the man warned.
"I can run long enough." She ground her teeth, forcing a long, frustrated breath out her nose.
"My clan will never accept you," the bleeding man continued, his voice fading away as he neared unconsciousness. "They will rip the both of us apart."
"I do not run for my sake, Connor." She finally glanced back at him, staring into his half-lidded eyes. "I run for the sake of our child. I would do anything to give it the littlest chance."
Her hand went to her abdomen as she imagined the baby that would one day, several months away, be born to her. A small smile of joy and happiness twisted her face, replacing the hard-edged determination and anger.
"I'm sorry I did this to you," Connor whispered as his eyelids fluttered shut. He slumped further against her, no longer able to keep his own weight upright.
"Never apologize, my love," Aeline said fondly, shifting her hand from her abdomen to his large, slightly hairy ones at her waist. "Never. I'm sorry. For all of humanity."
Connor didn't respond, his head dropping onto her shoulder as he finally fell unconscious.
Aeline pulled in a deep breath, steeling herself for the years-long journey before them, and aimed her horse in the direction of the black forest.
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