The crow led the hunter back inside. The raging fireplace had faded down to a few dim and lonely embers. The room now only held the discarded husk of the party; the nobles must have migrated over to the proper dining hall, and the detritus they had left behind was now the spoils of the servants. Glasses and trays littered the tables, and the hunter felt a prickle of discomfort upon seeing the scattered aperitif glasses that they themself had left behind. There was a recollection, more in the muscles than in their memory, that they had always cleaned up after themself before.
There was no opportunity to consign themself to dishwashing, however. The crow had already exited into the hallway. The hunter hurried, expecting to follow the knight to the dining hall, but instead the crow veered to the stairwell and began ascending. Back the way they had fled, the hunter realized. Back to the high keep.
They dallied at the threshold of the staircase, their dread growing more insistent with every step the crow took. Just as the knight was about to turn and disappear from sight around the narrow corner, the hunter cried out. "Am I to follow you still?" they asked, and with a smile they forced a levity that they did not feel. "I thought the dining hall was the other way, closer to Lady Elaine's chambers."
The crow turned on the step, tilted the silver helm down as if to stare at them, and then nodded. A quick and beckoning curl of the gauntlet urged them along.
"That man," the hunter blurted out. "When I was last at the bridge to the keep, he tried to kill me. Is it safe to just… have him roaming around up there? I think he wishes to murder the Queen. I know he's quite aged," and here the hunter leapt up the first few steps, trying to keep the crow in sight— the knight, unbothered, had started up the stairs again. "But I think he's still dangerous, and without my weapon—"
The hunter paused.
Where was their cleaver?
They assumed it had been returned to Elaine's room after their bath, but— had it?
Gods, what was wrong with them? They had been aching for the thing like a phantom limb ever since fleeing the keep, but they hadn't actually sought it out. Where was it?
The crow stopped and turned again as if more concerned with the hunter's silence than their previous babbling about the martyr. The silver helm tilted.
"My things," the hunter began tentatively. They still had their little hand-lantern affixed to their trousers, and the secret half-vial of blood tucked away, but their pistol, their cleaver, their overcoat, bracers, hat— "Are they in Lady Elaine's chambers?"
The crow nodded once. Then, while turning to continue up the stairs, the tatters of the cloak were flung aside and the hunter saw the ribbon-laden hilt of the sword. The crow's gauntlet was draped over the engraved grip with practiced ease. Beside it was a smaller and more decorated sheath; probably a knife. There was another thing, too, glimpsed as a gleam on the crow's hip as the cloak swept back into place. Twin flintlocks were angled against the cold and severe double barrel of a gun. The hunter could easily intuit the stopping power of the quicksilver load delivered by those barrels. Their own pistol was a tool of timing more than anything else, stunning beasts for just long enough to allow their cleaver to do the real work. This gun was less a single step in a greater dance than it was the final bow.
It should have been reassuring. The crow was one of Annalise's favored knights; the martyr's violent rants were surely no surprise. Still, some cold finger of instinct pressed at the back of the hunter's neck, and each step they took to follow the crow was one battle in a war. As they approached the bridge path to the high keep, the crow walked ahead as the hunter slowed. They faltered at the threshold once more, caught in the shadow of the great wooden doors. The icy wind ahead was like a brandished knife keeping them at bay, the line of mortar where the bridge joined the wall like a cliff.
The hunter wavered, their balance truly disturbed by vertigo; they had crossed this bridge to the keep so many times before, but now it felt more akin to the edge of the lakeside balcony. Another step would mean a plummet. Another step would mean the terrible burden of the truth. Another step would mean…
The crow was watching them closely again with the silver helm cocked inquisitively. The hunter breathed in, out. They looked up at the false light laid over the sky. The keep crouched under it, waiting.
As they stepped forward, the last cry of instinct was smothered; each new stride came easily. The hunter caught up with the crow and smiled.
The throne room held so many treasures in such disarray that it seemed more like the toy hoard of a very well-off toddler. There was the marble crowd, of course, frolicking naked over the polished tile. Some were broken as if they had been crashed together like dolls, and their arms littered the ground. Gold and jewels were strewn among them as carelessly as spilled paint, with shining puddles of yellow and red catching the candlelight. A mounted skull, an elk as far as the hunter could discern, lay flat among them instead of being fastened properly to the wall. The hall before the throne had been tidier, and yet the same decorative sense had prevailed; lines of toy soldiers on horses, lances at the ready, and each with their right leg missing— the old Yharnam superstition held true here, the hunter figured, that the corruptive taint of beasthood crept up that unlucky leg…
There was some order, at least, on the walls. The crimson banners of Cainhurst hung down between the columns, resplendent with twin golden beasts. The gaudy clutter had also been cleared from the center of the room to allow passage to the throne. And on the throne was Annalise, looking out-of-place and slouched against the golden armrest. Compared to her surroundings, the delicate fabric of her gown seemed plain, and the mask encasing her head was austere. But she sat on the throne with the supreme confidence of someone who knew that the seat was meant for her, and her alone.
The hunter's heart swelled with affection. As the crow knelt before the throne, the hunter mirrored the gesture with their arm thrown out wide, and their knee dropped to the golden beasts of the emblem beneath them.
Or, not quite so golden. The fabric fur of the beast on the carpet was stained with red. The splotch spread out past the emblem, soaking into the brighter ruby tone of the carpet itself, but the hunter could see the breadth of the stain dark against it, and the way it arced out beyond in a rust-colored semicircle. The blood had spilled on the carpet in patterns the hunter could read like a book. A line as straight as a ruler where a sword sliced skin. Droplets that trailed after hurried movement. A vast and ugly blotch of red beneath the empty throne at the queen's side, the perimeter of it brushing up against her gown.
The hunter ducked their head down, deepening their bow to hide their reaction. The stains could have just as easily come from a careless noble sloshing blood over a glass or dropping their goblet completely. Perhaps, on special occasions, Annalise hosted them here and a select few drank from the source. The hunter's own mouth twinged at the thought.
(Why, then, would the stains remain? The servants would have leapt upon the opportunity to clean these carpets, crushing snow against the fabric until it went pink, gathering the diluted sweetness, not minding the indignity of it.)
The hunter glanced behind them, looking for any more stains, but what they saw instead blanketed them with calm. They let out a slow, quiet sigh. Tucked back between a few of the statues, a hunter's lantern glowed violet. It was a familiar and reassuring light.
"Visitor," Annalise stated, and the hunter swung their head back up to look at her; after a moment's consideration, they tilted their head back down, their face flushed. Their mere presence in the throne room felt like a dream and an awakening and then a dream again, and the possibility of being accepted into Cainhurst was so lovely they could hardly believe it.
"Dearest moon-scented hunter," she continued. "Speak true. What is it thou'rt in search of?"
They glanced up at her again; her posture was easy, as if she was assured of their answer. "I wish to stay here, in service of you," they said.
"Thy wish is to share in Our plight? To take oath against the Church? To strive to end these piteous nights?"
The hunter nodded. "Yes."
"And art thou to merely borrow Our strength?" she asked. "Or to become one of us, heart and soul?"
A grin tugged at the hunter's lips. "Heart and soul, your majesty. If you would let me, I would call this place my home."
"Rise, then," she said, and as the hunter got to their feet, the crow stood alongside them. Annalise leaned forward and draped her arm out over her knee with her wrist tilted up. The hunter stared at the pale, translucent skin and waited.
"Come here," she said with a laugh, and the hunter bounded up to her. They knelt again, right at the foot of her throne, and they grasped her hand in theirs.
They did not falter. Her skin split against their teeth and they were drowned. Rust and fire in their throat, in their belly; her pulse fluttering against them as waves of iron against their tongue; at the fringe of their narrowed senses, a hand brushing back their hair and a laugh.
"Now, thou'rt too a Vilebood," she said— and the hunter was dredged back up into awareness by a marionette-string pull. They sat back on their thighs and stared at nothing, their senses still clouded in red. It was her influence, however brief, that had stopped them from sticking to her like a leech. They were shivering and feverish, aching to kiss at her wrist again, but already the ragged tear was healing. They watched the fading pink line without comprehending.
The healing blood, processed and medicinal, could not compare. The crow's blood, in distant echo of this source, didn't even come close. Elaine's aperitifs had been water.
The hunter, in tasting her blood, was now truly hers. They couldn't keep any secrets.
"I wanted to tell you," the hunter mumbled. "I wanted to tell you…"
"Go on and get it," Annalise said, and it took the hunter a moment to realize she wasn't speaking to them; her helm had nodded towards the crow. The hunter heard light footsteps over the carpet, and then on the tile, as the knight walked off.
"I found something," they said.
"Hush, now," she replied, and her fingers drifted over their hair. "Thou'rt to earn your knighthood. Thou wouldst like that, wouldn't thee?"
"You told me my reluctance was like a dishonesty," they insisted. "I was reluctant, and I lied to you, and I'm sorry."
Her hand went still. The ribbon-blinded helm drew close. The silence grew densely expectant.
"I told you of the workshop," the hunter said. "The real one. I actually found something there, upon the altar."
Annalise let out a long-suffering sigh and leaned back. "The perversions of the workshop's keeper are of no interest to Us."
"Not the doll," the hunter said. "I found— I don't know what I found," and they winced at the lie, the lie that they kept telling themself— they knew what it was, and they had thrown that clarity away, only to have it keep washing back up upon the shores of their awareness. "I think it was an umbilical cord," they finally said. "They used it to make the Dream."
Annalise slowly settled back against the throne. Her reaction was so subdued that the hunter was acutely aware of the control she was exerting to keep it so. She tapped her fingers against the golden whorls of the armrest. "And where is this… cord, now?"
"Gone," the hunter answered instantly. "It must have been ancient. It crumbled to dust when I— when I touched it."
"Well," she said, flatly. "No matter. I imagine the Vicar's protégés followed in his footsteps and liberated a dozen more." She traced a touch along the hunter's jaw until her fingertip pressed just beneath their chin. "Wouldst thou seek them out for Us?"
The hunter, growing aware that the dread they were accustomed to regarding Annalise and the arcane had been so wonderfully washed away, nodded.
"Good," she said, absently. "Good. That is a beautiful prize to strive towards. But for now, thy task is of the easiest sort. Our crow brought thee a little gift from the mainland." Her hand drew back and she waved them off, directing them to stand back on the emblem-marked space upon the carpet. "Be good and wait."
The hunter returned to the spot, their excitement and curiosity stoked anew. The castle clearly loved its treasures. Perhaps the crow had brought back some other abandoned workshop's trick weapon, or some Church artifact for them to tend to the same way the knight tended to those gloves. They would prefer something less fearsome, but with the heat now creeping through their veins, the hunter felt prepared to take anything in stride. The knight could bring them a common carrion crow for them to fashion their own cloak from the feathers and the hunter would gladly give thanks.
Or, they thought as they straightened their shoulders and shifted their weight from one leg to the other, there was also that idea that Annalise had propositioned. The hunter felt doubly aware of their body, and of the way the queen's blood was coursing through it. The possibilities that the future held…
The hunter was jolted from their reverie by heavy footsteps. Something large and ungainly was balanced over the crow's shoulder, turning the knight's light stride into a plod. At first, the hunter thought it was a rolled-up carpet, but they soon realized the thick roll of fabric was merely burlap, and it wasn't a roll, it was a large bag wound with two thick bars of rope. It slid off the crow's shoulder and landed on the floor with a dull thud.
The crow gripped the handle of a knife, knelt down, and sliced between the two ropes that trussed the burlap, tearing the bag open at the middle. A strange smell wafted towards the hunter, something chemical and heady that reminded them of their awakening in the clinic, although they weren't sure why. There were odd spots along the upper portion of the bag, like beads of silver had evaporated away to leave a faintly shining imprint.
The intricate helm turned and the crow gestured for the hunter to come close. With a strange feeling of quiet blankness, the hunter obeyed and knelt at the knight's side.
The crow tugged the burlap apart. There was a body within the bag. An embalmed corpse, perhaps— but no, the hunter realized, it was still breathing. What the hunter could glimpse of the person's garb confirmed that they were a Yharnamite, or, at least, they were dressed like one. There was blood spattered over their button-up shirt, but it seemed like an old stain, washed down to brown dullness. This person wasn't hurt, or even sick; they were merely unconscious. They were a participant in the local hunt, probably, but not as badly changed by beasthood as the others. The hunter couldn't smell the pungent stench that came with matted fur and elongated limbs. The only smell here was the crisp silver vapor that the bag must have been drenched in. Some kind of soporific, the hunter figured. They felt a tight lightheadedness at breathing enough of it in secondhand.
"Our blessings of blood," Annalise said. "Communion, baptism, and then communion again. Take what is now thy right, for the honor of Cainhurst. And bring thy spoils to Us, so that thou mayst indulge thyself in Us, and know fully the joys of thy station."
The crow held the knife out towards them, handle-first.
The hunter stared at it, unwilling to understand. They stared at it for far too long. The crow bobbed the knife briefly, as if to reassure them that they were meant to take it, but still the hunter did not move.
"Art thou in need of instruction?" the queen asked, and the familiar flippancy she affected was no more than a sheath over a blade of her own.
The hunter remained very still. Blinked. Looked the body over, from one wrapped end to the other, and then at the center, where the tender abdomen was so exposed. They expected the sight to sober them, for a grim lens to focus their vision, but instead there came a laugh. It bubbled out of them helplessly as a buoyant disbelief to cling to.
"No," they said, and their shoulders briefly shook. "No, no."
"No?" the queen echoed, her voice a razor.
Their last laugh was more of a gulp made while drowning. The only answer they could muster was silence. Their gaze swam over the prone form, taking inventory once more of the restrained and limp limbs, the swell and fall of living breath. The current of blood, so easily diverted. Finally, cold dread lapped against the hunter's neck. They risked a glance towards the crow. The knight was sitting stiffly, with gauntlets curled into fists atop silver cuisses. The knife was no longer being offered.
This was the true test, the hunter thought. They had to refuse her to prove their integrity. It was what she had sought for so long, after all— someone with the wherewithal to challenge her. They would stand here firmly, the truth would be revealed, and she would thank them, reward them, and the body before them would safely rise. This stranger was in on the ruse, surely— some servant of the castle dressed up in city-dweller clothes. If the hunter had gone forth to slit their belly, they realized happily, then the crow would have cut the hunter down as punishment, and they would have been thrown out of the castle.
The hunter leaned back, smiled, and struggled against the urge to look back at the lantern. "No," they said again. "I will not."
"I will not," Annalise echoed, and she leaned the chin of her helm against her palm. "Why?"
"It's—" They stammered, struggling to put what had seemed so clearly to be the truth into words. "I don't have any clue who this is. You haven't told me if this is some criminal to be executed, or— or just some innocent right off the street. I won't murder them just because you've told me to. I know you're the queen," they added, wincing. "But also I know you said… the last… someone who could challenge what you say—"
She sighed. "Fine, then. This is a remorseless killer of children brought here for final justice. Or a thief. Or a rake. Whatever eases thy heart. Who within the city is without sin? Surely not hunters like this one, like thyself. Grant this pitiful creature its deserved end, and claim the evidence of its transgressions for Us." She leaned forward, her tone so sincere it had to be mocking. "It will be painless. Thou couldst chop the thing in twain with thy cleaver and it would have no knowledge of it. If the thought of pain is what makes thee pause, then be assured there shall be none."
"No," the hunter said. "I'm not—"
She tapped her fingers against the throne. "It was my thought that concealing most of the body would help thee. To let it be anonymous and impersonal. Would thy preference be to see the face of thy prey? There are those who enjoy it that way."
The hunter blanched. "No, that's not what I'm upset about. I don't want—"
"Well, thou hadst no such unease towards those thou hadst met in the long night," she interrupted. "The crow spoke of thee as fearless. Ruthless. Wading deep in blood."
They hazarded another peek at the knight at their side; the helm had inclined slightly away from them. If they could garner anything from the crow's posture, it was embarrassment. They felt a sickly heat rising in their own face in response. "I was surviving," they said, far more loudly than they had intended to; their voice fell almost to a whisper as they over-corrected. "I was only trying to stay alive. I've tried to save people, too. At the chapel—"
"A father lies dead," Annalise said. "A father, slain aside his wife. This is still true, no?"
The hunter swallowed. "He was turning into a beast, you know someone had to stop him, I told you— and Eileen said to me—"
"And the butchered vicar?"
"A beast, too, I told you." The hunter's hands curled into fists. "There's no safety to be had in leaving such a thing alone. She was about to go for the balcony, there was someone hiding up there— what if she had killed them? I forced her attention to me, and then I had to fight her."
Beside them, the crow shifted uneasily.
"Of course," Annalise said, her tone growing bored. "And thou couldst not slay the spider, for she was not a bother to anyone."
"I know the spider has to die," the hunter insisted. "I still do want the night to end. But I'm not… I'm not about to…" They trailed off and gestured vaguely at the body.
"Of course," she said again, sounding tired. "Then, We were right."
Right? Their theory may yet hold true. The stranger before them was never meant to die. The hunter's hands were shaking as they kept their gaze fixed upon the carpet.
"Thou hath brought to Us a coward and a hypocrite," Annalise said, and the hunter felt shame flash cold up their spine as she turned her attention towards the knight, "and not the prized apprentice thou hadst hoped for."
Beside them, the crow took in a deep breath; the tatters of the cloak shifted as the shoulders rolled. Upon the exhale, the crow leaned forward and pushed the knife into the body's stomach.
The hunter recoiled, falling back on their palms; blood welled up from the wound as the crow pulled the knife in an arc.
"'Tis not a total loss," Annalise said dryly. "Thy knowledge of that is firsthand, and delving further may reveal yet more reward."
The crow shrugged. Blood seeped into the burlap, over the red and gold of the carpet. The silver gauntlets plunged into the body's gut and it was then that the hunter turned and made for the lantern. They staggered to their feet, managed a few strides, and then fell to a lunge; their hands grasped at the thin stave and they squeezed their eyes shut.
They did not dissolve their way out of the world. "And an idiot, too," Annalise said as she sighed. "Truly, thou'rt of many faces."
The hunter did not attempt to use the lantern again; their hand slipped from the stave. The rune, then— they fought to focus, to make the familiar shape dark upon their mind's eye, but that only blurred and danced apart like a thing misremembered. The hunter felt completely adrift.
What did she do? they first thought, but then every silenced sense was screaming at them, had been clamoring at them all along, had been begging for them to heed their own fear— and they hadn't. What have I done? then, was the question, and now it echoed in their thoughts to exclude all else. What have I done? What have I—
The hunter turned and stared at the throne. The crow was preoccupied with uncovering something that must have been hidden away deep within the Yharnamite's intestines. One twisting pink coil had been pulled free of the fascia, and now it writhed as if unbothered by the flagging breaths of the body it belonged to. Beyond that, Annalise sat upon her throne and stared back at the hunter with an air of self-satisfied patience.
"Remember that thou'rt Ours," she said, "and that Our claim to thy person truly began with thy eager acceptance of Our invitation."
"Please let me leave," the hunter said.
The helm tilted; her posture was almost pitying. "It is not a question of Us allowing thy egress. Didst thou not know? This place is forsaken, and now thou'rt forsaken for wishing it thy home. There was a time in which thou couldst have made use of that thing, but it is well past," she said with a nod towards the lantern. "The little ones had waited for thee so hopefully, but even they know better than to linger here."
The hunter struggled to think. Forsaken Castle Cainhurst, anathema to the gods— commit a great enough sin and the Gods will again turn their gaze towards what they have abandoned— the encounter with the pale moon—
"We are not so foolish to think that all attention is good attention," Annalise said, "but the Gods do take notice when their favorite baubles are stolen away. And if the toy be broken…" She waved her hand, the inquiry left open. "What will come to collect thee, I wonder?"
"You are drawing curses down upon yourself," the hunter said breathlessly. "You're—"
She waved her hand dismissively. "Curses and blessings are the same. To see this castle sink into the sea would be better than this unending stagnation. Let the Gods rain calamity upon me, let them wash the sins of my blood away until naught is left. That will be an end. 'Tis better than nothing. I think thou shalt find, however," she said, and she leaned forward with her elbows against her knees, "that thy betrayals are manifold, and that thy keeper may be more than willing to accept alternative arrangements." She drew back, relaxing against the throne; something landed with a wet plop as the crow sorted through the body's innards. "If thy contact with the umbilicus is true, all the better. Perhaps some fragment of it remained in thee. Perhaps thou holdst the remnants of thy own tether, if there was such a thing that bound thee to thy Dream. As surely as we shall seek thy sin, we shall retrieve all else we can from thee. I've my dowry to offer. Thou shalt contribute to it."
The hunter surprised themself; out of the icy pit of their fear crawled a small but fierce anger. "You always intended this," they said in biting accusation. "You lured me here, and— and I was stupid enough to let you keep me. All you've told me of my past— did you lie to me? You only wanted me to stay here long enough that I couldn't escape, and to make me think I had no other place to return to—"
"No," Annalise said, and there was no guile in her tone; there was only exhaustion and a distant hint of sadness. "I merely planned ahead. Thou doth take any opportunity to lie to thyself, though. It would have been nice, really." She sighed and her helm tilted against the velvet backing of the throne. "Thy company was agreeable enough. A pity."
The crow's arms emerged from the viscera. A thick dreg of blood had congealed against the palm of the knight's gauntlet. Deep inside the murky crimson, teeming organisms squirmed. The crow wiped the flat of the knife against the carpet, slid it back inside the gilded scabbard beside the sword, and then knelt before the queen, offering up the dreg.
Annalise leaned down to accept it. The hunter turned away and forced themself to move. They ran. They bolted past the statue crowd, the lines of knights on horseback; they went the way they knew, the way the crow had led them, as they tried to escape the keep.
The crow withdrew from the queen's wrist and the red-splashed mouth was quickly hidden by the helm's jaw being lifted back into place. The tatters of the cloak briefly fluttered as the knight turned to watch the hunter flee.
Annalise sank a little lower into her seat and let her helm rest against her palm. She drummed her fingers against her knee before idly brushing the fabric of her gown out flat. Her head tilted, as if she was about to say something, but then she stopped. A few more long moments passed; the crow waited.
"I suppose that is enough of a head start," she said, her tone devoid of humor. "It isn't as if they have anywhere to go." She leaned against the arm of the throne, looking somewhere between sullen and sick.
Still, the crow waited. Annalise turned away from the knight. Her helm faced the empty seat at her side. "Go on, then," she said. "Have thy fun."
The crow nodded once and began to walk.
