Long before the soldier's scream tore through the trees—
Before even Ralme had set foot in the steaming mire—
Someone else had already claimed the forest as his domain.
The air was thick with rot, clinging to the skin like a diseased shroud. Steam rose from the damp earth in curls that coiled around the ankles, swallowing footsteps, muffling sound. Here, the mud did not just slow men—it erased them.
No torch.
No armor.
No noise.
Only the sound of slow, steady breathing—
A man who moved like a shadow that had forgotten it once belonged to flesh.
He wasn't lost.
He wasn't hunting.
Not yet.
But something in the stillness… called to him.
And something ahead… waited.
Fedran had been in this forest for two days.
Two days were all he needed.
He knew its twisted canopy now. The slick stones. The stench of bubbling puddles that hissed when stepped in. The crooked limbs of trees that seemed to recoil from moonlight, as if ashamed to be seen. He had mapped the terrain not with parchment, but by feel—each texture underfoot, each change in the wind, each breath of the earth beneath him.
He wore the forest now.
It was his second skin.
His only home, for now.
Then—voices.
Muffled. Close. Too loud for this place.
Fedran vanished.
He melted into shadow, gliding behind the corpse of a fallen tree, its bark mottled with rot and fungi. He crouched low, unmoving, the steam swallowing his outline until even the forest forgot he was there.
Three figures.
Two men in worn Mayfrost armor, mud-caked and dull beneath the dim light.
And between them—
A woman.
Her hands were bound. Her shoulders trembled. She stared at the ground as if it had betrayed her. Silent. Small. A breath that hadn't been exhaled.
Fedran watched.
His eyes narrowed in recognition.
This was not new.
He had seen this before. Felt it.
From birth, he had been taken from the woman who gave him life.
Traffickers.
She had begged them to name him Fedran, the name her mother once wished for a son she never bore. And as the child cried, desperate to cling to the warmth that had carried him, they took her from him.
One stroke.
Clean. Cruel.
A blade through her skull—side to side, ear to ear.
The gift of life had been returned to the void it came from.
He remembered no face. No lullaby. Only the heat of blood on an infant's skin, and the silence that came after.
The men who raised him were butchers. Thieves. Smugglers who spoke of her death as a fact of childbirth, not murder. It didn't matter.
He had lived with it.
He stood now in the steam-choked mire, watching another woman bound. Another pair of men pretending to wield purpose. Orders. Authority.
He didn't draw his blade. Not yet.
First, he wanted to see their hands.
To know who would reach for steel…
and who would beg.
He stepped forward with no sound, no warning.
"I don't think we've met before," he said, voice low, almost amused. "You look scary."
The soldiers spun around.
One of them opened his mouth—
"Who the hell are y—"
Too slow.
Fedran appeared in front of him like a curse given form, the point of his dagger pressed gently to the man's lips.
"Oh, no no no… that's not very nice," he murmured.
His eyes shifted to the second soldier.
"You. Take one more fucking step toward her, and you'll be swimming in his blood before you draw breath. Am I clear, sir?"
The soldier froze. "Okay…"
"Good."
He tilted his head slightly. The dagger barely moved, but it glinted with quiet promise.
"I don't like wasting time on irrelevant questions. So. Why are two Mayfrostians carting around a hostage in a forest not even light wants to enter?"
The answer came surprisingly fast.
"We were tasked with the abduction of Lady Arya Verdar from within the Weavers. Escort her to the southeast and await further instructions within a week."
Fedran blinked once.
"…Well I'll be damned. A straight answer."
He turned to the girl.
Then back.
"So this is the 'lady whatever' you mentioned?"
"Yes."
He raised a brow. "Which means… the week isn't up. No further instructions yet. Which also means…"
A pause.
"…I'm here to relieve you of your burdens."
The dagger vanished into his belt. A second later, his forehead collided with the first soldier's nose in a sickening crack of bone. The man dropped like a puppet with its strings cut.
Fedran turned—
A kick to the second soldier's knee dropped him into the mud with a scream. He scrambled for his weapon, but Fedran slammed his boot down, pinning the man's arm.
Then—steel met flesh.
A wet sound as Fedran drove the dagger clean through the man's palm, into the earth below.
"A warning," he whispered, crouching beside him.
"Try again… and you'll lose more than your grip."
Blood mixed with the swamp as the man writhed. Fedran rose, bound their hands with cold precision, then shoved rags between their teeth.
He pointed into the trees.
"Walk. Walk until your bones give in. Die under the sun like the dogs you are. And when we meet in hell—tell me every detail of how slow it was."
He shouted after them as they limped away.
Arya stood in stunned silence.
Not from the violence.
She had seen blood.
Seen cruelty.
She had been the hunted.
But Fedran's face…
That grin.
The wide, unblinking eyes.
The way his shoulders trembled—not from effort, but from exhilaration.
It was the look of a man who didn't just know violence.
He liked it.
"What do you want?" she asked, voice sharp. "What do you hope to achieve? Why does everyone think they have the right to capture me—chain me—own me? Why do I have to keep running, just because I'm a sorce—"
The blade flashed.
She flinched, but it wasn't meant for her.
The ropes around her wrists fell loose.
"Shut up and go," Fedran muttered, not looking at her. "I wasn't even talking to you."
There was something in his voice—not anger. Not pity. Just… absence.
As if something had been missing from the entire encounter.
He turned, already walking away.
"You know…" he added over his shoulder, "I didn't kill them because I don't like behaving like an animal in front of women."
A beat.
"…Sometimes."