I wake up slowly, eyes gummy with sleep. The dawn is just breaking through the thick trees, and birds are chirping in the branches. That's a good sign. It means the monsters haven't frightened them into silence.

I get up, careful of my large belly, and poke at the embers of the fire. Leon left a few slow-burning logs in the pit before he left last night. Considerate, as always. It doesn't take long before the fire is burning merrily again and I can stand up, painfully aware of my stiff knees and back. Nothing to do for it but grimace and stretch.

Nothing has disturbed the salt circle during the night. To be honest, I'm not sure how much I believe in it. Salt is supposed to repel evil, but I've caught glimpses of what Leon fights and I don't think they'd notice. And even if they did, ordinary wolves and bears wouldn't.

It's a grim, familiar thought. I put it aside, as always, and focus on preparing food. We've still got a bit of dried meat left from the farm three days ago - why couldn't we have stayed? - and some barley. Thankfully I fetched all the water we'd need yesterday. It's awkward, carrying the battered pot to the fire while the baby kicks inside of me, but I'm used to it by now. That's the lot of a vampire hunter's wife.

I put a handful of barley and a few scraps of meat into the pot, and then there's nothing to do but wait. I could pack up our camp, but there doesn't seem to be much point. We won't be leaving right away anyway.

So I sit and watch the sky change color through the bright new leaves, humming a few snatches of a lullaby under my breath. Best to stay quiet for now.

Two years ago it wouldn't have occurred to me to sing at anything but the top of my lungs. Two years ago I was still an ordinary farmgirl, youngest of the family, who never expected to travel further than the great river. And then the monsters came, and the hunter came, and my father, who never had money but always had a surfeit of ideas, struck on a scheme to get rid of a daughter he couldn't afford to feed. Leon was reluctant, but he knew he needed an heir. My mother already had too many children to worry about. My siblings were glad of the extra space.

And I? I was enchanted by the brave, handsome hunter.

There's a noise behind me and I jerk my head around. My arm curls protectively over my swollen stomach when I see what it is.

My husband steps over the circle, eyes distant. He's filthy and bloodstained, and he drops three hairy disembodied heads at the edge of our camp. His other hand never leaves the whip.

"Leon-"

"Don't get up." He walks past me and settles under the tree. His eyes close. "I'm going to take a nap. We'll break camp when I wake."

"Did you get all of them?"

"All the ones plaguing this part of the forest. If there are more, they're further than I can reach now."

"Then..." I pull myself painfully to my feet. "Leon. Listen to me. This is important."

He cracks open one eye to look at me.

"The baby will come any day now, I can feel it. We need to find a town - or even a farm - something, anything. I can't stay on the hunt. Not like this."

His eye closes again. "But I'm so close."

"The baby-"

"He's near, I can feel it!" The intensity in his voice forces me back a step. His hand is clenched tight around the whip. "Just a little bit more...just a little bit. Then we can stop wherever you want. You can even go home."

It would be easy to nod and sit back down, the way I did every other time we've had this argument. But the baby kicks and rolls inside me again, and I can't. This is too important. My hands knot in my dress. "Why do you need to hunt this badly? Your child is about to be born! If I have to give birth in a forest, what do you-"

"I know!" It comes out as a snarl, and he looks as surprised as I do. "I know," he says, softer. "But I cannot stop now. You'll just have to bear it."

"I've been bearing it for the past two years!" I snap back. I'm sick of this. I'm sick of being dragged along, sick of cowering in the darkness, sick of being a replacement. "I'll bear it again soon, but I can't have the baby here! I need someone to help, a midwife or a farmer, and I'll need a place to rest, and..." I trail off, helplessly. What I really want is someone to sit beside me, to hold my hand through the pain I know is coming, and I know the kind, considerate ghost of a man I married won't be able to do it through no fault of his own. I try another tack. "There'll be blood. What will you do if a wolf smells it?"

"Kill it." He could, I know. I've watched him. He grunts mulishly and his fingers tighten on the whip. His hand has never left it, not once. He's weighing between us, and that's not a fight I can win.

"Leon..."

"But I'm so close." He sighs and tilts his head back. "We can be out of the forest by nightfall if we leave early. We'll find a farm where you can stay and I'll come back when I'm done."

"All right." It's more than I expected. It must be the prospect of losing his heir - men get wild about that, no matter what the woman they got the heir on.

"They might attack you while I'm away...I'll be back as soon as I can. Just a little bit more and I'll finish this for good. Soon...soon now..." The last isn't to me, it's to the whip.

To her.

He doesn't like to talk about her, the girl in the whip. I know she's there. I know she's why he's chasing this mysterious "him" that Leon speaks of even less than her. I know he loved - loves - her. There's no way I couldn't notice.

Some time ago, before he met me, Leon was young and happy and betrothed. And then his lady was stolen by a vampire, and imprisoned in the whip somehow, and that's why Leon is on this endless quest. And now he speaks to the whip, clutches it close, and sleeps beside it. It - she - shares his life. His beloved.

If I were her...I wouldn't be waiting for blood and pain in the depths of the forest. I'd be resting in a bed next to a fire, and Leon would be getting me anything I wanted, smiling all the while.

The pot is boiling merrily, and I move it to a cooler part of the fire to simmer. Behind me Leon falls into a doze, wrapped in his ragged cloak. I hesitate for a long moment, then, in a furious, miserable rush, cover him with his blanket. He doesn't move, still curled such that his lips brush the whip.

It's not his fault. It's not her fault either, though I wish by all the angels in heaven I could blame her. But what living woman can compare to the dead?

She is frozen in memory, an eternal, youthful beauty, never to grow old and fade. She asks for nothing, refuses nothing, is distracted by nothing. She is always kind and gentle, never cursing in pain or sobbing in sorrow. She does not get bloated with child, ask to stop the hunt, demand more food or rest. She is forever happy at his side, never wishing she could be back with her family.

She is perfect, as only an image can be.

Leon shifts in his sleep and murmurs "Sara..." I have never once heard him call my name.

I grimly start to pack.