Marschal had been sliced and stabbed in the past but never deep enough or in the right place for it to kill him. So he was surprised when he was still conscious enough to feel a nicking pain stinging his left ear rather than a sharp point impaling his skull. Just as he opened his eyes, Marschal's body became victim to Walton's falling weight, forcing a groan from an impact to the chest. It wasn't until the bandit's head fell over Marschal's shoulder did he notice a dagger protruding from the back of Walton's head. He glanced at the dagger, wondering where it came from.

That was when he saw Kollo standing a few steps back with an arm outstretched: the arm that threw the dagger.

"Papa?"

Both Kollo and Marschal turned to see the boy slowly rousing from his sleep with gradually opening eyes. When they were halfway open, he noticed and recognized the dead body draping over Marschal's scrawny form.

"Go back to sleep," said Kollo. "There's nothing-"

At the sound of shuffling feet, Kollo whipped around to face the rest of his men approaching the commotion. They were staring back and forth between Walton's dead body and their leader's wary posture, as though he were preparing himself for a fight. Kollo's eyes reminded Marschal of a cornered animal assessing the three remaining bandits arrayed before him. Those same eyes then shifted to Walton's corpse. Then to the pathetically frail body pinned beneath it.

That was when they both locked gazes for a moment with Marschal struggling to decipher the thoughts in the bandit's head. In that brief silence, Marschal caught the emotional landscape of Kollo's face suddenly switch from a frightened uncertainty, to a cold scathing glare before finally falling flat and expressionless.

The bandit calmly strode towards Marschal with what seemed to be a relaxed gait. Marschal instinctively inched himself back away from him, or at least tried to. He could only move so far with a literal dead weight pressing his own body into the forest earth. When Kollo stopped in front of Marschal and loomed over him, Marschal slightly flinched when the bandit bent down to grab the back of Walton's collar. In a single motion, Kollo heaved up the corpse and relieved Marschal of the heavy weight. Marschal was straightening himself up when the bandit dragged the body unceremoniously through the cold dirt. When Kollo stopped before his crew, he half-heartedly threw the body at them which landed with a dead thud beneath their gaze. It wasn't until they were able to tear their eyes away from their lifeless comrade did they finally notice their leader's hard eyes boring into them.

"What's the number one rule?" Despite the softness of his voice, it still managed to be carried across the forest air.

His men remained silent.

"I said," It almost seemed as if he were baring his fangs as he addressed his pack, "What's the number one rule? Boys?"

One of his men answered with a meek whisper. "Don't kill the money."

"What? I can't hear you. Speak up."

He answered louder. "Don't kill the money."

"Good." Kollo nodded before facing another one of his subordinates.

"D-don't kill the money," replied the second bandit.

Kollo nodded and turned to his last man.

"Don't kill the money."

"Good!" The bandits jumped at the stabbing word from Kollo. "I'm glad we're on the same page!" He interrupted himself with hocked up phlegm and spit which streamed through his teeth. It was probably no accident that it landed near the dead body beneath them. Kollo turned back to his men after sniffing and wiping his face. "What? You're awake now! We might as well get a move on! Hurry up! Go, go, go!"

Like dogs to the barking order, the remaining bandits began scrambling frantically to prepare themselves for the ongoing journey. All the while, Kollo broke away from them and started heading towards Marschal, still lying on the ground. The bandit leader reminded Marschal of a shark closing in on its quarry.

"Centes!" Kollo shouted. His son perked up at the mention of his name. "Get up! We're moving! Now! The faster we get out of this god-forsaken forest the better."

Marschal could see the boy reluctantly obey his father from the corner of his eye, while he looked up to see a shadowy blank face looming over him.

The palpable silence that followed felt stretched until it suddenly snapped. "Now we're even," said Kollo with a leveled tone. "A life for a life."

Marschal blinked.

With that, the bandit turned and headed back to the rest of his men. Marschal glanced at the boy who was already packed and ready to move. Unexpectedly, the boy offered Marschal a faint reassuring smile before following after his father to join up with the rest of the group. Marschal sat there in the cold forest dirt contemplating the events that had just occurred.

After sitting there for a while, he eventually smiled to himself.

***

Guis and Sitio were sitting on their own branches looking down at the humans preparing for another long trek.

"They were pretty easy to track," said Sitio.

"The fire last night certainly didn't help," Guis agreed.

Sitio scoffed in reply. "From the way the Aethe'eyllum spoke about this human, you think we'd be hunting the ultimate prey."

"Don't make the same mistake they did."

"What?"

"Don't underestimate them." Guis squinted at the small human litter. "Don't underestimate him."

Sitio bristled at the comment. "I wasn't going to. You saw the way he fought. He won't go down easy. Even with our skills."

"We're not going to do anything. We promised." Guis interrupted his brother before he could get a word in. "Besides, he's not our prey."

"He's not?"

Guis gestured with a nod to the young lanky human who was only now deciding to pull himself up from the forest floor. He then reluctantly gravitated towards the rest of the group.

"That skinny thing?"

Guis nodded.

He remembered when the large Lektüs chased the boy up and down the battlefield. Something he wouldn't normally pay great attention to were it not for the human's other close escape from death. Guis and his brother were spectators when the larger and stronger human tried to kill the weaker one. Yet the strong one was dead. And the weak one was alive. His brother called it luck. But Guis wasn't entirely sure. He could only shake his head and shrug.

"I think he's our prey. I just have that feeling."

Time passed as the brothers waited for a while until the humans were finally ready to move on. When they eventually trailed forth and disappeared deeper into the ocean of trees, Guis could hear Sitio fidget beside him. "Shall we?"

Guis had to nod. At the signal, they both manoeuvred nimbly off their perch and began to scale down the sides of the wide tree.

He should have seen him. He should have heard him. They both should have. But they didn't.

So when Guis and his brother landed on the forest ground with light feet, they jerked up when they saw the dark hooded stranger obstructing their path. In a split-second reaction, the brothers drew out their hunting knives and braced themselves for a fight.

The stranger remained unmoved, showing no sign that it felt threatened.

"Wh-who are you?" Guis asked.

The stranger didn't answer straight away. When he did, it was only to sidestep Guis' question to ask one of his own. "May I ask something? To both of you?"

The brothers perked up from the stranger's voice. Not from what he said. But from the language he spoke: the common Aethelin tongue. Was he Aethelin? The Venar brothers glanced at each other before turning back to the stranger.

The stranger asked his question. "If I were to ask you two to cease your tracking of these humans, would you do so? Would you turn your back and leave?"

Guis and Sitio shared another glance. Sitio spoke up before Guis could. "We...we have a contract. The Hunt has already begun. We are Aethe'venar. We always catch our prey."

They were met with silence. The Aethe'venar prided themselves on being the best hunters in the world so a part of Guis knew he should've been proud of his brother's words. But there was another gnawing part of him that felt, that knew, that Sitio should have lied.

The hooded stranger hung his head and sighed. "I would rather not kill if I can avoid it." The threat wasn't delivered with malice or force. Just a faint undertone of regret.

To Guis it was a taunt and an insult. The brothers crouched low to the ground with feral tusked smiles. "If you'd rather not kill..."

At an unspoken signal, Guis and his brother suddenly zipped off into the surrounding trees. "Then don't," Sitio finished, with a snickering laughter that echoed around them. They both flanked either side of the stranger, remaining unseen in the shadows of the forest. Yet, despite their expert execution and demonstration of stealth, the stranger still had yet to move. Guis struggled not to growl at the sheer brazenness. However...there was something about the frozen statue that made his steps slow with caution.

A caution that wasn't shared by his brother.

From the opposite flank, Guis witnessed Sitio lunge at the enemy from the forest shadow. What followed should have resulted in the stranger falling from a slit throat. He should have been bleeding out onto the cold leaves. He should have been writhing or twitching as his eyes faded into oblivion.

Instead, Sitio was now hanging from the stranger's hand clutching his throat. Still hiding, Guis stood paralysed, watching his brother flail around as his face grew increasingly red. He fought to breath for a while longer.

Then he died.

When his brother's body fell limp in the stranger's grip, Guis could hear the word 'Nooo!' rip from his own lips. He knew he should have remained in the shadows. He knew he should have run. But his body moved all on its own and carried him out from the cover of trees. Still hazed in bestial rage, Guis leapt at the hooded murderer with his hunting blade held high. However, his blade never had the opportunity to kiss the stranger's skin as the enemy effortlessly hurled Sitio's body at him, sending Guis flying backwards. The insult of being struck by the corpse of his own brother was further punctuated by a heavy stinging pain to the back of his head and spine. He landed at the base of the tree with a thud while his brother's body pinned him down. With the inside of his skull rattled by a throbbing headache, Guis struggled to pull himself up only to have his movements restricted by Sitio's corpse.

Guis then looked up to see the stranger looming over him. "I am sorry that it had to come to this." His apology sounded sincere in Guis' ears. It still didn't help with the pain, though. "But you left me no choice." The stranger bent forward close enough to provide Guis with a clearer glimpse into the confines of his hood.

The Venar's eyes widened. "What are you?"

He was met with silence. For a while it seemed as if the stranger was about to answer. However, Guis never received a response as his neck snapped under the simple grip from the stranger.

Like a wolf's jaws around its prey.