The night air in Cherwood was a cold, damp shroud that tasted of charcoal and anticipation. Victor sat in the absolute darkness of his attic, the heavy grey greatcoat draped over his shoulders like a second skin. He wasn't sleeping. He was listening.
In the days since the Warehouse 14 job, a subtle shift had occurred in the clock shop's atmosphere. Mr. Egmont was increasingly erratic, his hands trembling as he worked on the iron-bound chest Victor had retrieved. The shop had become a beacon for the desperate—those who smelled the scent of a secret and wanted a share of the spoils.
The Hunter does not only track the prey; he understands the gravity of the bait, Victor thought, his fingers absently tracing the edge of the new steel carving knives he had secured from the blacksmith.
Around 2:00 AM, the rhythmic ticking of the clocks below was interrupted. It wasn't a loud sound—just the faint, metallic scrape of a crowbar against the rear window frame.
Victor didn't rush. He stood up with a silence that seemed to defy the rotted floorboards. His Hunter senses, fueled by the slow digestion of the potion and the meager calories he'd been hoarding, mapped the intruder's movements through the ceiling.
One man. Heavy footsteps. Breathing is shallow—panic, not professionalism. A desperate thief, not a police agent.
Victor descended the attic stairs like a ghost. He didn't head for the back room where the intruder was entering. Instead, he slipped into the main shop floor, positioning himself behind a massive mahogany grandfather clock near the internal door.
The rear window shattered with a muffled crunch. A figure tumbled into the backroom, gasping for air. The intruder was a man in his late twenties, his clothes tattered, his eyes wild with the kind of frantic greed that only starvation can produce in the East Borough. He carried a rusted kitchen knife and a sack meant for plunder.
Victor watched him from the shadows. He could have shouted. He could have called for Egmont. But a Hunter sees an intrusion as a test of the perimeter.
The thief moved toward the workbench where the iron-bound chest sat. He was clumsy, knocking over a tray of brass gears that scattered across the floor with a series of bright, musical pings.
"Who's there?" Egmont's voice wavered from the upstairs bedroom.
The thief panicked. He grabbed the chest, but it was far heavier than he expected. He stumbled, the iron-bound corners slamming into the floor. He let out a curse, his eyes darting toward the stairs.
Victor stepped out of the shadows. He didn't draw his knives. He simply stood in the doorway, the moonlight from the broken window catching the sharp, gaunt lines of his Anakin-like face. He looked less like a man and more like a statue of judgement.
"You're in the wrong forest, scavenger," Victor said, his voice a low, chilling baritone that seemed to vibrate in the thief's marrow.
The thief yelped, lunging forward with his rusted knife. It was a desperate, uncoordinated strike.
Victor didn't panic. To his Hunter eyes, the movement was agonizingly slow. He saw the shift in the man's weight, the tension in the shoulder, and the lack of balance in the feet. He stepped aside by a mere inch, the rusted blade whistling past his greatcoat.
In one fluid motion, Victor caught the thief's wrist and twisted. The sound of a clean snap echoed through the room, followed by the thief's agonizing scream. The rusted knife clattered to the floor.
Victor didn't stop. He slammed the man against the wall, his hand gripping the thief's throat. He pulled one of his new steel knives from his belt, the blade cold and gleaming as he pressed it against the man's jugular.
"I could kill you," Victor whispered, his blue eyes devoid of heat. "I could feed you to the river, and no one in Backlund would even notice you were gone. You are nothing but a distraction in a world of predators."
The thief sobbed, his eyes bulging. "P-please... I have... I have nothing..."
"That is your weakness, not your excuse," Victor said.
He felt the Hunter potion pulse. For a moment, he felt a surge of genuine bloodlust—the urge to finalize the hunt. But his rational mind, the part of him that was still Victor, pulled him back from the precipice. A dead body in the shop was a problem for the police; a terrified messenger was an asset.
"Listen to me," Victor commanded, his voice dropping to a whisper. "You will tell whoever sent you that this shop is protected by the Saurons. You will tell them that the next man who enters through that window will not leave with his head. Do you understand?"
The thief nodded frantically. Victor released him and shoved him back toward the broken window. The man scrambled out, disappearing into the fog of the alleyway without looking back.
Victor stood alone in the backroom, his breathing steady. He picked up the rusted knife the thief had dropped and looked at it with disdain. It was a tool of a victim. He looked at his own steel carving knife—a tool of a tracker.
Mr. Egmont appeared at the top of the stairs, holding a flickering candle and a heavy iron poker. He saw the broken window and Victor standing over the iron-bound chest.
"He's gone," Victor said, cleaning his blade on a rag. "He won't be back. And he'll make sure no one else comes tonight."
Egmont looked at Victor, his gaze lingering on the cold, predatory stillness in the young man's eyes. He didn't ask how Victor had handled it. He didn't ask why Victor hadn't called for help. He simply nodded.
"Fix the window, Victor," Egmont muttered, his voice old and tired. "And keep the knife. You'll need it before the winter is out."
Victor returned to the cellar to find a piece of wood to board up the gap. As he worked, he realized that the "sludge" was no longer just the mud under his fingernails. It was the violence of the city itself. He had successfully defended his first territory. He had "acted" the role of the protector-hunter.
He felt the bronze medal in his pocket. It didn't vibrate this time, but it felt warm—a steady, glowing heat that seemed to approve of his choices.
He looked up through the cracks in the boarded window. The moon was a pale, sickly yellow, hanging over a city that was waiting to consume him. But Victor wasn't afraid. He was beginning to realize that in a city of sheep and wolves, he was the one who knew the paths through the woods.