The darkness had no end. Thick and sticky like tar, it clung to thought and memory—and to flesh, though there was no flesh anymore. No hands. No legs. No eyelids left to close.
Only existence remained, suspended in the void—the same void where he had died.
The world around him was neither empty nor fully formed.
It quivered at the edge of perception, as though everything had been stretched and twisted—present, yet not quite of this dimension. The sky spilled out like blood across metal: a crimson tide rippling in surreal streaks. The ground below—if it was ground at all—throbbed with a dark violet light, as if it were the skin of something alive. Something that breathed. Something trembling in absolute silence.
He lay paralyzed.
Motionless.
There was no pain—only weight. A great heaviness pressing him down, drawing him deeper, until even the shape of his being began to dissolve.
It felt like a nightmare, the kind whispered in folk tales—the mare that sits on one’s chest at night, suffocating sleepers in their beds.
Something was near him.
Standing over him.
But he could not turn to see.
And then he saw her.
She moved slowly, but weightlessly—
as though reality bent beneath her steps,
as though her presence unraveled the world from the inside out,
burning it to ash and remaking it in silence.
She was neither shadow nor light.
She was the exact seam between them.
Her garment—was it a gown? Armor?
He could not say.
It was not fabric. It was not metal.
It seemed not made by human hands, but spun from night itself.
Born of a power beyond defiance.
The folds of black-scarlet shimmered and pulsed like living tissue—yet it repulsed nothing.
It was beauty beyond naming, caught between liquid and solid, beyond the bounds of earthly vision.
Where it touched her skin, there were no seams.
As if there was nothing beneath.
And when she moved, it rippled—reptilian, like snakeskin; delicate as velvet; thin as dragonfly wings.
If it was armor, it had no joints.
If it was flesh, it was flawless—perfect, and utterly cold.
No human flaw marred her.
Nothing familiar lived within her.
She drew near.
Her skin was pale, yet alive. She breathed—but not as a body breathes. Something ancient pulsed through her veins. Something nameless.
And on her forearms burned symbols—not runes, but signs alien and arcane, glowing crimson like fire-carved letters, each one holding a secret too deep for men to grasp.
The markings pulsed in rhythm with her breath.
Her face was stern.
It held no mercy.
It held no judgment.
It was stone—unmoved by wind, untouched by fear or doubt.
And yet, deep within her gaze, there flickered something else.
Not pity.
Not kindness.
But something that resembled… care.
She raised her hand.
A vessel appeared in her grasp.
Heavy. Austere. Forged, it seemed, of metal that had never cooled. Within it swirled a dark, viscous liquid—red as old blood.
It did not reflect light.
It swallowed it.
The Queen of Scarlet lifted the vessel, looked upon him with that same immutable gaze, and tilted it toward his lips.
– Drink.
Her voice was not loud.
And yet it was everything.
He could not refuse.
He could not say no.
The red elixir flowed into his mouth.
Thick.
Sticky.
Sweet.
There was no other taste.
There was no other world.
Only this.
He jolted awake.
Air tore into his lungs like a blade—ripping him apart from within, shattering the silence with the spasms of returning life.
He gasped, greedily, like a man dragged from drowning.
Like a newborn flung into the world.
His body shook.
His chest burned.
He opened his eyes.
*
He rose too lightly. Too swiftly. He should have felt pain—stiff muscles, drained limbs, the dull weight of fatigue. He should have felt something. Anything. But he felt… good. Too good.
The night still lingered. Deep. Unmoving. But not dark—it brimmed with moonlight. Cold, clear light poured over the path and the woods on either side, revealing sharp edges and shadows that stretched into eternity.
Mist drifted low across the earth like smoke, slipping between stones and branches, spinning pale threads along the path.
The sky was cloudless.
Deep, nocturnal—
As if the world were holding its breath.
The hero drew breath into his lungs—sharp, clean, glacial.
Each inhale felt vivid, crisp.
And yet… it brought no relief.
He breathed, but not out of need—more out of memory. As if his body had not yet realized it no longer required the habit.
He lay on the ground, where the path forked near a scattering of stones—remnants of a ruined chapel, perhaps, or a wayside grave.
The stones were slick with dew, cold as tombs.
The soil beneath him was sodden, the dampness soaking his clothes.
He should have felt the chill.
Should have shivered.
But he felt nothing.
Beside him, silent as a shadow, sat a dog.
Dark.
Still.
Watching him with empty eyes—eyes that held no question, no judgment. Slowly, the hero pushed himself up on trembling hands, taking in his surroundings. The forest felt… wrong. Too dark, despite the silver light.
The trees cast long, angular shadows, their branches entwined like twisted fingers—shaped by something foreign, something not of this world. He looked up. Thirty paces ahead, a horse stood in the path. Still. Head bowed. Breathing slow and quiet. Its flanks rose and fell with rhythm, but otherwise, it might have been carved from wood. He frowned. No one else was there. No hoofprints, no scent of riders.
Only himself, the dog, and the horse.
It felt… unnatural. He didn’t remember how he’d gotten here. He remembered a dream. A vision etched into his mind like a heated blade. The sky, crimson, the earth breathing beneath him. He remembered her face. Her voice, when she commanded him to drink.
But that was impossible. Just a dream.
Wasn’t it?
He tried recalling the last thought before darkness fell, but there was nothing. As though someone had torn out a fragment of his existence and replaced it with emptiness.
Shaking his head, trying to dispel his confusion, he looked again at the horse. The animal still stood in the same spot, neither frightened nor anxious, as if waiting.
It made no sense.
He swallowed, glanced at the dog, still sitting silently beside him.
– Alright. – he muttered, wiping his mouth on his sleeve.
– What the hell just happened?
The dog did not move. Just watched. Still and quiet, eyes empty of judgment. As before. And the night endured. The hero steadied himself, squinting as the moonlight caught the wet leaves like shards of silver.
He raised his gaze once more, surveying the forest.
Something was… changed.
The birches, usually pale and spectral beneath the moon, now bore scarlet leaves. Their branches bowed with the weight. A breeze stirred the canopy, and leaves drifted down—lazy, deliberate—layering the forest floor in a crimson carpet.
Rowan trees hung low, their branches heavy with fruit the color of clotted blood.
Some berries split open, overripe, their juices ready to burst. Thorny vines of wild roses twisted among them, petals fraying but not yet wilted—flashes of deep red in the silver night. Late autumn here spoke its own tongue. Not of death. But of flame. The hero froze, absorbing the strange beauty—then turned again to the dog. Still it sat. Still unmoving. Still watching.
He cleared his throat, gently—reassuring himself that his voice still belonged to him.
– And you’re still here? – he asked softly.
The dog tilted its head, just a little.
– You waited – he said. – You stood over me… until I woke?
Not a growl. Not a nervous twitch of the muzzle. Something different.
The dog’s muzzle twisted oddly, briefly, as if the ghost of a smile passed across its face.
The hero stared for a moment.
Then, without understanding why, he smiled back. Just slightly. For a fraction of a second.
– What’s that grimace?
The dog barked twice. Short, hollow.
Not joy.
Not alarm.
Only affirmation.
The hero reached out, fingers brushing through the coarse fur.
He felt old scars, rough patches—fur that had never been soft.
The dog didn’t shy away.
– Seems like you’ve decided to follow me. Stick by me, is that it?”
He hesitated.
– A grimace, huh… Fine. Grym.
The dog gave no sign of approval.
The hero exhaled, running a hand across his damp coat.
The fabric was sodden. Heavy. But the cold didn’t touch him. No ache stirred in his limbs. No weariness weighed on his bones. But there was something else. A hollow unease. A sense that something was off—dislocated from the world he knew. He wiped his face with one hand, let out a soft snort.
– Truth be told…– he muttered, more to himself than to the dog – sticking with me right now might be the worst idea you’ve ever had. The words sounded strange. Too real. The dog narrowed its eyes. As if it understood something the hero had not yet uncovered. Grym said nothing. But he did not leave. He remained.
Like a shadow.
**
Pain struck him.
Without warning.
No subtle tightening in the gut. No slow fade of strength.
Just a blow.
Like a blade of fire thrust through his temples.
His body folded, knees buckling beneath the weight of something he could not name.
Nausea.
No.
Worse.
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His stomach twisted violently, gripped by a fist—hard, unrelenting. He opened his mouth, but no sound came. Only a dry, rasping silence. His spine arched. Fingers clawed blindly into the earth, nails digging deep into damp soil.
The world spun.
Shrinking. Expanding. Swallowing him.
His muscles dissolved. His hands disappeared. His body no longer belonged to him. He was trapped inside his own chest. Locked in darkness. Helpless.
He became a passenger.
He did not exist.
Did not think.
Did not feel.
Had no control.
He became hunger.
He lurched violently forward. Vomiting, shuddering uncontrollably. Only bile. Nothing else. Nothing that could satisfy him.
And then, he sensed it.
Not cold, not heat. Not fear.
A scent.
Not the musk of soil. Not the rot of leaves. Not forest mist.
Something else.
Red.
Wet.
Alive.
Meat.
Blood.
It clung to the air, impossibly clear.
Moonlight poured over the world in a cold tide—and within it, he traced the scent. Trails. Pulses. Invisible rivers, drawn through light and mist. The horse. Still standing. Just as before. But now—he didn’t merely see it. He felt it. Its body. Muscles warm and tense beneath the hide. The subtle ripple of breath. Blood. Sweet. Salty. Thick. Beating beneath skin like war drums. The horse trembled. Not fleeing. Not fighting. But something in it twisted—a primal alarm. The world was not as it should be. Its breath grew shallow. Nostrils flared. Sensing something. Too late.
The heart—
He heard it.
He should not have.
It wasn’t possible.
But the rhythm throbbed clearly:
Thump.
Thump.
Thump.
His mouth opened without command. He drew it in— The scent. The pulse. The life. Into lungs, across tongue, through veins.
It smelled like home.
Like life.
He did not remember moving. Didn’t feel the moment the world contracted, stretched, when mist blurred into silver streams and the moon shattered into droplets. Suddenly—he was there. Beside the horse. His hands clutched its mane. Fingers sank into warm skin. The horse froze. Couldn’t move.He felt its terror.
No scream. No kick.
But the heart pounded harder:
Boom. Boom. Boom.
A drumbeat. A blade. A hammer on anvil.
He did not think.
Thinking was gone.
Only scent.
Only pulse.
Only hunger.
His mouth opened.
He bit.
Explosion.
Not of pain.
Of something else.
Memory.
But not his.
The memories of another.
Something that had never formed a word.
But still remembered.
First breath.
The warmth of his mother’s body.
The shadow beneath her neck.
Her heartbeat—his entire world.
Milk. Sweat. Soil.
Safety.
First step.
Legs unsure, foreign.
She nudged him.
He understood.
First run.
Morning meadow.
Dew exploding beneath hooves.
The sky too wide, the air too light.
Freedom.
First rain.
Cool drops on skin.
Scent of trees awakened.
Earth turned to mud beneath his feet.
First snow.
Silence.
White emptiness.
Frost on muzzle.
No pain.
First rider.
Not understood.
Too heavy.
Strange scent—metal, leather, blood.
Not of the herd.
He tried to throw him off.
Was not allowed.
First spur.
Pain. Sudden.
Brutal.
Until then, all had been motion and light.
Now—obedience.
First blood.
Not his.
A man on the road.
Eyes too wide.
Blood hot—so hot he mistook it for sun.
It was not.
First fear.
Not instinct.
Not flight.
Real fear.
The knowing:
It will never be the same again.
First night alone.
No herd.
A stall.
Cold straw.
Other horses, but not his.
They breathed wrong.
First departure.
And now—
The end.
Silence.
Just warmth.
Like summer rain down the throat.
Filling the hollow.
Completing the broken circle.
No death.
No ending.
Only completion.
Blood flowed downward.
Life passed into another shape.
And then—
Not pain.
Not ecstasy.
But warmth.
Slow.
Seeping.
Like hot wax across skin.
A flame without heat.
A breath that moved through every cell.
Muscles flexed.
Then went soft.
As if the body no longer remembered who it belonged to.
The heartbeat quickened.
Was it his?
Was it the horse’s?
One beat.
Two hearts.
Or none.
And then—
Silence.
***
He was alone.
The horse lay at his feet.
He didn’t know when he’d let go.
Didn’t know when he’d started breathing again.
Didn’t know when the world had returned to what could be called normal. But was anything normal now? He didn’t look down—not right away. He didn’t want to.
But he felt the horse. Felt the final spasms of its body. Muscles contracting. Shudders of pain echoing through it in the last beats of its heart. It wasn’t like looking at a dead animal. It was deeper. He didn’t see a corpse.
He saw memories.
His memories.
Galloping through fields.
Wind battering his flanks.
The first sharp sting of a spur.
The first long, lonely night in a strange stable.
He knew who the horse had been.
He knew about the two scars along its muzzle.
The stubborn wound on its leg—now faded, just a faint line beneath the fur.
He knew it remembered the road to Cz?stochowa better than most men.
He knew someone had wiped its back a few days ago with a dry cloth—half-heartedly, leaving the dust of the road clinging in the seams.
He knew.
He shouldn’t have. But he did.
His breath came fast. Not with panic, but with rhythm not his own. A breath still tethered to another life, another heart. He looked down at his hands.
Clean.
And yet he felt blood. Not on his skin— but inside him.
He swallowed.
Warmth.
That’s what remained.
Blood now flowing in his veins. A heartbeat now silenced.
A life no longer separate. A vessel emptied, and another filled. He knelt slowly. Unsure why. Perhaps to touch the lifeless muzzle. Perhaps to apologize. Perhaps to give something back. But there was nothing left to return.
This wasn’t death as he’d known it. Not the battlefield’s fury. Not a saber dripping red. Not a scream torn from a dying throat.
This wasn’t killing.
This was absorption.
He held his breath. Clenched his fists until his nails pierced his palms. But no pain came. The air was frigid.
The world pulsed in faint shades of crimson. But inside— Nothing. It was already too late. He didn’t notice what remained— not at first.
He looked again, expecting to see a body.
A fallen beast.
Flesh.
Form.
But everything was there.
The coat still shimmered in moonlight. The skin unbroken. Muscles taut, as though ready to spring into motion. As though it had simply… laid down to rest. But it wasn’t alive. There was no death-stench. No trembling breath.
No cooling of the chest.
The horse was hollow.
Drained.
Not a single drop of blood remained.
None on the ground. None on his hands. None at the horse’s mouth. All of it… inside him. His heart rose into his throat. He lifted his hand—reflexively—wanting to touch his own face. Needing to confirm that he was still himself. But in the moonlight, his skin looked different. Not darkened by shadow— But moving— as though something beneath the surface stirred. Eyes stared back at him from the horse’s lifeless gaze. Not his. Still dark— but now with a glow. Not reflected moonlight. Something internal. Pulsing. A dark crimson shimmer, like embers smoldering in ash. Spilling across the iris. He opened his mouth— But no words came. No thoughts solid enough to shape.
Only breath. Quiet. Too quiet.
Then he saw the shadow.
Cast by the moon. Long. Sharp. Etched across the pale ground. His shadow. But… not his. The silhouette was familiar. And wrong. A figure crouched low—
half-man, half-beast. Something primal threaded through it. Elongated limbs. A hunched frame.
Predatory.
He blinked. As his vision adjusted, the shadow twitched— as if the moon itself had shifted.
A longer neck.
Teeth—
Bare and too many.
His heart stumbled. The shadow stumbled with it. He stared— at what should’ve been his own silhouette. But wasn’t.
Was it even a shadow?
Or something else?
Something more?
He moved slightly.
The shadow followed. But not immediately. Late. Not with the lag of shifting light. No— As though it had just realized it was being watched. He shivered. The shadow trembled. Then— slowly— It opened its eyes.
Two slits of golden fire glowed in the dark.
Grym.
The dog sat still. His form melted into the shadow, becoming one with it.
He stared.
But at whom?
The man?
Or what the man had become?
Not the same.
Not human.
Not known.
Grym did not move.
He remained— wrapped in gloom.
Watching.
A slight shudder passed through his frame. Fur bristled—barely. Then he barked.
Not a greeting.
Not the call of a companion.
A warning.
****
His heart hammered in his chest—but he wasn’t sure it was truly his. He took a step back. Then another. Not by will, but by instinct, as if the ground beneath him had turned soft and unreliable, the very earth no longer familiar. He wasn’t breathing. He didn’t need to.
He gasped sharply, out of reflex more than necessity. But nothing changed. The air brought no chill, no clarity. His lungs filled and emptied with the mechanical rhythm of memory, not need. There was no fear. No shock. Only a body that no longer obeyed its master, and a mind that began to slip behind it.
There was heat inside him—but not like fire, nor like blood stirred by adrenaline. This warmth didn’t burn. It settled, slowly, like mist rolling in after rain, seeping through his pores, creeping across the surface of his skin from within.
He looked down at his hands.
Red.
They shouldn’t be. Couldn’t be. But under the sterile glow of the moon, his fingers glistened—wet, sticky, slick all the way to the wrists. Blood. Not just spilled on the skin, but absorbed into it, threaded beneath his nails, running down his arms in thin, shimmering streams that pulsed faintly, like a living web.
Without thinking, he wiped his face—and instantly regretted it. The blood smeared across his cheeks and chin, thick and clinging. A bitter, metallic tang spread across his tongue, as if his very breath had turned to iron.
He still wasn’t breathing.
Then his gaze fell on the horse.
And in that moment, everything aligned.
It had happened. It was real. No dream, no delusion—only truth, thick and red and irrefutable.
The horse was still there. Dead. Yet not in any way he had ever understood death. Its body lay untouched. Whole. Unbroken. But hollowed. As if all that had made it living had been drawn out. As if the shell remained, but the soul had been poured into him.
It was his blood now.
He gasped again, harder, as if his body might still purge something—but nothing came. His stomach twisted painfully, but yielded nothing. There was nothing left to give.
No... It couldn’t be like this.
He raised his hands again.
Still red.
Still wet.
The blood ran in slow, sticky trails down to his elbows, soaking into his sleeves, seeping into his skin like rain into dry soil. Panic seized him. He pulled at his coat, tried to rip it off, scrubbed at his arms, desperate to rid himself of it—but the more he rubbed, the more it spread. The blood was in him now. No gesture could undo that.
Staggering back, he tripped over his own feet and fell hard to the ground. His palms struck damp earth. He should have felt the cold. He should have felt the sting. But there was nothing.
Only blood.
He trembled, though he barely noticed it. His heart raced wildly in his chest—but the rhythm felt wrong, alien, as if something else were pulsing through him now. Something borrowed.
— No… The word came out thin, strangled, not quite his own. He pressed his forehead to his arm, breath quick and shallow, mind grasping blindly for a thought, for a reason, for something solid to hold onto.
But this wasn’t blood on his hands.
And it wasn’t a corpse beside him.
It was something far worse.
It was him.
He clenched his fists, trying to feel pressure, pain—anything. His nails dug into his palms. No response. No blood. No pain. Just silence, and that same consuming emptiness beneath the skin.
His breathing quickened, ragged now, but the air felt foreign—cold, thin, unreal. He raised his trembling hands again, as if he could finally wipe it all away. But the blood clung, smeared deeper, and the metallic taste stayed thick on his tongue. The warmth inside him bloomed, spreading, even as the night around him turned bitter with cold.
He curled in on himself, pulling his knees close, pressing his head between his hands as if to stop it all from spilling out. His breaths came shorter, sharper. Each one felt shallower than the last, as if the act of breathing itself was slipping beyond his reach.
— I couldn’t have…
The words sounded foreign. Not like something he would say. Not in his voice. Not with his mouth.
He squeezed his eyes shut, but the image remained—etched into the dark behind his lids: the horse, motionless. Hollow. He couldn’t push it away. Couldn’t escape what had happened. Couldn’t deny what he had become.
He flinched backward, trying to push himself up, but the touch of his own hands against the ground felt unbearable. Too hot. Too wrong. As though everything he touched now absorbed that same cursed heat radiating from within.
He wanted to tear his coat from his back, claw his skin from his body, rip from himself whatever had taken root inside him.
— What have I done…
No tears came.
No sorrow.
Only stillness.
Only that cold, suffocating emptiness spreading inside him like rot.
Only the blood, and his hands—
still trembling, harder than ever before.
*****
The forest had not changed. But he had.
His breathing had steadied, his heart no longer pounded, and the tremors in his hands had ceased. His body was returning to something resembling balance—though he couldn’t say whether it was his balance. This new stillness carried no comfort, no relief. Only silence.
The scarlet birch leaves, once uncanny in their color, now seemed natural. The dark, swollen rowan berries, heavy on their branches, no longer struck him as wrong. Even the mist—thick, pale, curling low among the trees—had lost its menace. It was just mist. The world had not shifted. He had simply adapted to it.
With every second, his thoughts returned. Not calmer, not clearer—just ordered. They arranged themselves with cold precision, like stones stacked in a ritual wall to hold chaos at bay. One by one, memories found their place.
The red woman.
The dream.
Her eyes.
The way she had looked at him—as if she already knew him. As if nothing within him was hidden from her gaze. As if everything he would become had already been decided long before their meeting. There had never been a choice. That was the most devastating part.
It hadn’t even been a fight.
She hadn’t struck him down in anger or hatred. She had merely acted—lifting him and casting him aside like a broken tool, a scrap of cloth caught in a gust of wind. He wasn’t an opponent. He was irrelevant.
And she... she was something inevitable.
Something outside of struggle. Something that did not try or plan or justify. Something that simply was.
He clenched his jaw.
He was a soldier. War had taught him to analyze every strike, every fall. If an enemy was faster—you anticipated. If they were stronger—you endured. If they carried heavier weapons—you wore them down. There were rules to battle. Patterns.
But not this.
There had been no pattern, no logic. No anticipation, no defense. No meaning.
She had consumed him without effort.
He had been a spectator, not a challenger.
He remembered falling—mud splattering against his skin, the bite of cold against his back. The distant rattle of a shield rolling over wet ground. Her voice.
Detached.
Flat.
Devoid of contempt or compassion.
?You’re just a dog”
It hadn’t been an insult. Not even judgment.
Just fact.
And when she had turned and left, he hadn’t even tried to rise. He hadn’t been able to breathe. He’d lain there waiting, because death had seemed the only ending left to him.
But death hadn’t come.
Red had come instead.
And now—here he was.
He wiped his face with the sleeve of his coat once more, as if that simple motion might remove what had taken root within him. The blood had dried. It was no longer warm or slick. But it was still there.
And it would never leave.
His breath remained steady.
The mist rolled softly over unseen waters. Nothing else moved. The forest stood in silence, the sky breathless and pale.
The night held its stillness.
And he, no longer quite himself, remained within it.
