The hunter's shirt was tight around their neck and the seams of their overcoat pulled harshly at their underarms as the crow dragged them over the floor of the passageway. They were limp and their head was still hazy with the impact against stone. While the slice across their belly had been mended with the cold and coagulating healing blood the hunter had consumed right off the ground, there was still an ache, sore and deep, acting as an echo of the sword inside them.

The crow let go of the hunter, then bent down; two strong arms hooked under the hunter's shoulders and they were lifted into a chair. The hunter slumped against the tall backrest and the wood creaked. They breathed in, then out. Their head pounded.

The crow lifted a hand, as if to take the hunter's frayed hat and set it aside, but the hunter caught the gauntlet at the wrist.

The silver helm tilted. The hunter glared.

The crow knight had just gutted them— had delighted in gutting them, performing for the crowd of nobles, playing—

If thy role is played with care...

That hesitation with the sword, the abruptly abandoned motion— if the crow had followed through with it, what would have happened? Had the crow stopped for fear of the hunter understanding what the sword could do, or had it been out of fear for what the sword would do to the hunter?

And that singular whispered command to drink, the only word the hunter had ever heard the crow utter— why? The entertaining humiliation of the hunter lapping at puddles to survive, or…

The crow knight was as beholden to expectations as the hunter was. A role was played, but a bit of careful stagecraft had been performed; the crow had killed the hunter without killing them.

The hunter sighed and their grip slid down until the crow's hand was clasped beneath their own. They squeezed once, gently, before dropping their hand down to their lap.

The crow stood still for a long while, one hand held in the air right where the hunter had let go of it; then, a slow return to motion. The crow took the hunter's hat and hung it off a carved spire of the chair's backrest.

The hunter watched with muted surprise as the crow drew back and swept one hand over the other. A thin leather strap was undone and the cuffs of the gauntlets pulled down from the vambraces. The crow had long, thin hands, elegant in movement and yet still belying some undercurrent of brutality— there were scattered streaks of scars and the nail of the ring finger was torn, with the surrounding creases of the nailbed dark with blood. The hunter could see the blue of the crow's veins stark against ghostly pale skin, and with the sight came the scent, the awful iron sting that the hunter wanted to drown in.

The crow brushed a palm along the hunter's head, the touch delicately drifting over the spot that had been slammed so harshly against stone, and despite the care the crow was displaying, the hunter couldn't help but wince.

The touch trailed lower. The blood smeared across the hunter's face was growing tacky as it dried and when the crow tapped a fingertip against their cheek they could feel it faintly stick. The crow made a low, quiet sound; a huff of amusement, perhaps— the handkerchief would do nothing to help this mess, the hunter thought.

They thought of the warmth of a bath, if that was a luxury that could still be afforded to them. They thought of the clashing scents of Elaine's extensive collection of oils and soaps. They thought of the soft comfort of the vastly oversized robe. The hunter thought of such mundane things with growing desperation because between the closeness of the crow and the sickening smell of blood it was growing very difficult to think at all.

The crow dropped their hand to pull at the hunter's overcoat. Part of the leather had been sliced apart, as had the shirt beneath. Everything was slicked red from the first fight with the beasts, the shallow channel on the floor, or the hunter's own innards, all of them messily intermixed and smearing onto the crow's pale hands.

The crow knelt, pulled the cloth apart, and assessed the damage. There was an angry red line arcing across the hunter's abdomen. The crow traced a finger along the slice in a slow, almost reverent way.

The hunter shuddered. Is this sympathy? Or are you admiring your own handiwork?

The helm tilted up, as if the crow was now staring at them.

The hunter stared back. The crow's nails pressed tiny crescents against the long red line. There was panic now, slow, as if bubbling up through congealed sludge.

I wish to drink of you until I am sick, the hunter thought, and you wish to tear me open again.

"Well done," Annalise said, and the hunter felt as if they should have startled, but all they could do was slowly turn their head to look at where she stood. The crow remained kneeling with one hand pressed to the hunter's stomach.

"I take it," the hunter said, "that I played my role well."

"Indeed," Annalise replied. "And not all that play the part are kept as preciously as thee."

"Your subjects were all cheering for my death. Am I to greet them again after this and pretend as if nothing happened?"

"As if nothing happened," Annalise echoed slowly, considering every syllable. "Thou wouldst be wise to do so. Besides— thou'rt a hunter of the Dream, art thou not?"

There was a slight increase in pressure from the fingers on their stomach. The hunter glanced at the crow before taking a deep breath and looking back at the queen. "That I am," they answered. "This one followed me for long enough to surmise that, surely. It also seems that most can smell it on me." They paused. "You said I smelled like the moon."

"Thou'rt beholden to the moon," Annalise replied. "In bondage to it."

The hunter fell silent.

"It pulls thee," she continued. "As strongly as it pulls the sea, it pulls thee, and the world is carved by thy movement. Thou'rt but a tool in a greater hand."

The hunter stared at her.

"To what ends thou'rt being used… 'tis beyond thy ken. Beyond perhaps even what I may divine. But tell Us, truthfully— thou'rt not blind to it. Is the pull felt?"

The hunter nodded slowly. There had been nudges, things that locals had said, things that Gehrman had said, guiding them through Yharnam, but above all that, subtle yet inescapable, was the call of the hunt, the silver living thrum of the night.

"Then why," she asked, and she leaned in close, close enough that the hunter could feel her warmth, and that scent, that vile iron scent— "Why, good hunter, didst thou not slay the spider?"

The hunter said nothing. The crow dragged a thumb across the welt left by the mostly-healed wound and the hunter twitched.

"She was all alone," the hunter finally said, "and— and doing no harm to anyone. I could feel the pull, and I know she held back some terrible secret like— like a levee holding back a flood, and to kill her would let the truth come surging back in. I know that I was meant to kill the spider. But I didn't."

"If killing the spider would end the long dark night," Annalise asked, "wouldst thou do it then?"

"The night is over," the hunter said, and the wavering in their voice made it obvious that they were loath to leave the lie even after it had been named.

"The night," Annalise said, "is still young."

The hunter closed their eyes and sighed. "Why?" they asked.

"Why what?" Annalise replied.

"All of this," they murmured. "Any of this. The duel, the dawn— why?"

The queen drew back and paced, slowly, to circle the chair. "What of the people in Yharnam, those under the auspices of the Church? How were they faring? Has the night been kind to them?"

The hunter remembered the cramped and twisting streets beneath the Cathedral Ward, the shacks of Hemwick, and the collapsing homesteads deep within the woods, and upon knocking on any door they could hear the mounting fear, or fearsome joy, or, in some cases, no more than wordless howling. "No," the hunter admitted.

"Then thou'rt capable of understanding why," she continued. "We have varnished the sky with sanity— and if not sanity, normalcy. The castle is sustained by the dawn." She paused and draped a hand over the hunter's shoulder. "As are the people. And the people here have habits: food and frivolity. We thank thee for playing participant in both."

Her touch withdrew and the helm tilted slightly; the crow's hand slid down, away from the wound, until the palm was merely resting upon the hunter's knee. "To play a role, however, is quite different from reality," Annalise said. "We hope to delve into the reality of thine allegiances, dear hunter, and soon. But thou'rt deserving of respite, and We did promise thee further knowledge of thy past."

The crow knight stood. Annalise held up a hand; between thumb and index finger, she held a small glass vial of blood. She held it out and the crow took it with a deep bow of the head as thanks.

"Meet Us in Our chambers when thou'rt prepared to delve deeper," Annalise said. "In the interim, slake thy thirst. Choose, though— the devil thou know'st, or the one thou'rt desperate to be acquainted with."

The hunter could see peripherally that the queen was walking away; looming close over them, however, was the crow. One hand brought the vial of blood close to the hunter's mouth, while the other reached out to cup the back of their head.

The hunter grasped at the crow's forearm. The helm tilted. The hunter dug their fingers in, a firm and guiding pressure, not harsh enough to hurt, and they pulled the delicate skin of the crow's wrist to their lips.

The hand at the back of their head gripped at their hair. The vial dropped and splattered its contents over the other bloodstains already coating the hunter's lap. The crow's wrist pressed eagerly at the sharp edges of the hunter's teeth.

Healing blood brought a sense of effusive warmth, like a spark that spread out and soothed; the crow's blood felt like fire, as if the hunter was being consumed by consuming it. They held the crow's wrist tightly and planted their lips firm against the bitten incision. Was it healing them? The hunter could hardly tell. For the moment, the world was no more than the bleeding pulse beneath their teeth and the surrounding smell of iron.

They were faintly cognizant of the fingertips gently dragging along the nape of their neck, petting them. The wrist pulled back and the hunter clutched at it for a moment before regaining some semblance of control. They dropped their hands to instead grip at the arms of the chair as they caught their breath.

The crow wrapped the bitten wrist with a long length of clean cloth. Once it was fastened, the crow traced a touch over the hunter's hands before grasping them and guiding them up from the chair.

The hunter wavered, dizzy with the remnant feverish heat of the blood; when it looked as if they could faint, the crow slung the hunter's arm over a shoulder and supported them. The crow led them a step forward, then paused; with a twist and a reach the hunter's hat was retrieved from the chair and set carefully atop the hunter's head.

The hunter huffed with faint amusement and let their bloodied cheek rest against the crow's shoulder. With each attentive step, the crow guided the hunter deeper into the castle.