Eoghan rose before the first light of dawn, the kind of hour where silence still clung to the windows and the world beyond felt like it hadn't quite decided to wake yet. The embers in the fireplace had cooled to a faint orange glow, shadows long and curling over the wooden floor. The cottage, still heavy with the weight of the previous night, felt colder than usual, as if the walls themselves braced for what was coming.
He moved quietly, careful not to wake Shanane. But she stirred the moment he stepped beside the couch. Even in half-sleep, her body was attuned to his presence. She shifted beneath the blanket, blinking through the haze of dreams and dread. The soft carpet brushed against his bare feet as he leaned over her.
She looked up at him, her eyes already glassy with fear she hadn't spoken yet. He folded the blanket back gently, as if the way he touched things could soften what he had to say.
__Shanane: "Do you really have to go alone?"
__Eoghan: "Yes. I need to go quietly. If he senses fear or desperation, he won't speak. I don't want to risk scaring him off."
She sat up straighter now, pulling the blanket around her shoulders like armor.
__Shanane: "And if he doesn't help you?"
He crouched down in front of her, resting a hand on the edge of the couch.
__Eoghan: "Then I'll come back with nothing. But I won't stop searching. There has to be someone who knows something. Someone who isn't bound by fear or disbelief."
__Shanane: "And what if something happens to you?"
Her voice cracked at the end. The vulnerability in her words clung to the air between them.
The huntsman reached out and gently cupped her cheek. His thumb brushed away a tear that hadn't yet fallen.
__Eoghan: "Nothing will happen. I've hunted worse in places colder than this. And I have something to come back to now."
Shanane's breath caught.The weight of it: their bond, the danger, the unknown sat between them like a third person in the room.
__Shanane: "You shouldn't have to carry this with me."
__Eoghan: "Maybe not. But I chose to."
His voice was firm, and he leaned forward then, brushing his lips softly against her forehead. Her eyes fluttered shut, and when he pulled away, her voice trembled.
__Shanane: "Come back to me. Please."
He gave her a tired smile.
__Eoghan: "Always."
She leaned into his touch, her hand finding his wrist. The moment stretched, soft and fragile.
Then, almost hesitantly, as if asking permission, he leaned in again and kissed her. A real kiss this time. It was soft, warm and grounding. It lingered, saying everything that words couldn't. She clutched his shirt briefly, wanting to stop him from leaving, to pull him back down beside her. But she didn't.
When the kiss ended, he rested his forehead against hers for a moment.
__Eoghan: "Try to rest today. Don't carry everything alone."
__Shanane: "I'm not the one leaving." she whispered.
__Eoghan: "I'm not really gone. I'm just out there, looking for a way back."
He stood and crossed the room, pulling on his coat. She watched him in silence, memorizing the way his shoulders moved, the way his boots hit the floor.
__Eoghan: "I'll be back before nightfall."
She nodded once, her voice lodged somewhere behind the fear that rattled her ribs. When he left, the door closed with a soft clickone echo of distance, two marks of separation. An oppressive stillness settled around her.
The day stretched ahead like a wound, raw and throbbing with worry. She sat on the edge of the bed, legs pulled close, knees rising against her chest. Her mind raced as the sky lightened outside.
What if something happened to him? What if the mountain was too far, too lonely, too dangerous?
She remembered his gentle offer: "I won't let you go into this alone." and felt the ache of the promise. Now he had gone into that darkness, alone.
Ashamed for her despair, she forced herself to stand and pace the small room. Each creak of the floorboards underscored her anxious heartbeat. She tried to busy herself, tidying the fireplace, straightening rugs, fluffing pillows but the quiet screamed with absence.
The walls felt thinner somehow. The house colder. Like the safety had followed Eoghan out the door.
The cottage held no comfort. Her eyes drifted to her phone, tucked in the corner by the door. It seemed centuries away. She forced herself not to look.
________________________________________
∆ ☆ ATHERAMOND ☆ ∆
________________________________________
The minutes blurred into each other, thick with silence and dread. Shanane moved through the cottage like a ghost, her footsteps slow, her breathing shallow, her thoughts circling the same jagged cliff edge.
Every creak of the wood made her flinch. Every gust of wind scraping the window made her glance toward the door. She couldn't sit still, but moving didn't help either. The ache in her chest was relentless. A loop of fear that never stopped spinning.
She tried reading. She tried cleaning. She even tried making tea, but her hands shook too much, and she poured boiling water down the side of the mug and burned her palm. She didn't cry out. She didn't even flinch. The pain felt distant. Unimportant.
Eoghan had said he would return before nightfall.
But what if the mountain was cruel? What if Atheramond had sensed his absence, sensed her alone and struck while they were apart? She kept thinking of all the ways he could die: falls, traps, creatures and darker things, too. Things they couldn't name anymore.
He was strong. But strong men broke.
The more time passed, the more the silence took on a shape, something cold and knowing. Something that whispered she was cursed, and the people near her never stayed whole for long.
She tried not to think about her friends, but their faces flickered behind her eyes. The ones Atheramond had named. The ones she hadn't spoken to in weeks. They didn't know the danger she carried. They didn't know their connection to her could mark them for death. That thought finally broke her resolve.
But as the hours crawled forward, she found herself needing something to sate the panic. She pulled it out around midday, one look at the screen was a betrayal.
Her social media feed was flooded with messages, statuses, and comments in tribute. Friends' faces flickered across the screen, some had changed their display pictures to black ribbons. Others posted photograph of Ren, lit from behind by firelight in an unguarded smile.
Shanane's stomach roiled. Her blood turned cold. The device trembled in her hand. Her voice wouldn't form.
She tapped on Aurora's name, her fingers shaking. The message sent before she could think to stop it:
["Aurora… please tell me what's happened."]
Moments stretched. Then a reply appeared:
["It's Ren. Ren is gone."]
Her breath left her lungs.
[I… She died last night. They say she was attacked...eaten...by wild animals near the woods on East Lane. Just after sundown.
We… we're all in shock.]
Sensation drained from the room. Her legs buckled. She fell to her knees, phone slipping from her grasp. Social media exploded around her< photos of Ren smiling, hugging friends, notes from college group chats echoing disbelief, each message questioning what had happened, recounting Ren's kindness, or offering support to her family.
She looked at the final reunion post: "We lost Ren. Rest in peace."
Every word stabbed her heart. Every detail spread across the feed like wildfire. She tried to cry but tears came dry and hot.
How could she accept this? How could she live with what happened?
Ren was loved. Ren was cherished. Yet animals had ripped her apart, just as Atheramond had promised.
Guilt sank inside Shanane like an anchor dragging her into endless water.
It's all her fault. It's because she refused him. So the demon lord kept his word.
Ashamed, she pressed her face to the floor, tears soaking the carpet, each convulsion of sorrow carrying more shame than guilt alone. There was no mercy in her heart. She had refused his power and now her friend had died.
She closed her eyes. Her chest felt crushed. She remembered Ren's laughter, her voice telling jokes in classes, sharing sunrise coffee on cold mornings.
She failed. If she had obeyed, maybe Ren would still be alive.
She sank forward, resolving to believe Atheramond's lies and her own guilt. Each promise echoed in her mind. She had stood firm, stood brave.
But brave was not enough.
She rocked back and forth on the cold floorboards, sobbing freely at last. The room held her grief without judgment. Alone, she let it unravel her.
Outside, the wind stirred the trees, leaves rattling with empty voices. Inside, she lay spread like a question, broken and helpless.
________________________________________
∆ ☆ ATHERAMOND ☆ ∆
________________________________________
Hours passed, and still the cottage stood in aching silence. The sunlight had faded into that golden-blushed hue that softened the edges of the world, the kind that whispered that day was dying, and night was rising again.
But Eoghan had not returned.
Shanane stood at the window, her arms wrapped tightly around her chest, watching the empty path that led toward the mountain's distant edge. She could almost imagine the sound of boots on gravel, the shift of weight in a familiar step. She listened for it. Prayed for it.
But there was nothing. No movement. No voice. Just the wind through the trees and the breath of a world untouched by her waiting.
Her heart tightened, the fear becoming something physical now. He had said he would return before nightfall but the sun was already kissing the tops of the hills, and he was still gone.
"What if something happened to him?"
The thought pierced through her, sharp and merciless.
What if the man he went searching for had led him astray? What if the mountain swallowed him? What if Atheramond had reached out, in shadow or spirit, and taken him like he promised?
She hadn't just sent him into the unknown, she had let the only person left who stood by her walk into the jaws of something ancient and cruel.
Her breath trembled. Her knees nearly gave out.
She sank to the floor again, the same corner where she'd collapsed earlier, arms wrapped around herself like they could protect what was left.
She wanted to believe he would come back.
She needed to believe it. But the fear now whispered alongside her resolve.
Her phone lay silent on the table. There's no messages, no signal.
Each second carved a deeper hollow inside her.
And still, she would not move from that spot. She would wait for him. Because if he was out there, walking back through dark woods or across rocky paths, he deserved to see her standing at the door, waiting. Alive. Holding on.
Even as her fear thickened with every fading ray of sunlight, she forced her trembling limbs still.
She could not fall apart now. Not when he might be out there, hurt. Not when he was all she had left.
So she waited, heart thundering, breath tight, fear climbing. And through the rising dark, she whispered to herself:
"Please… come back."