A year had passed since that night, yet Eoghan wandered the village with the weight of that loss pressing on him. Every shadow seemed to hold Shanane's absence, every gust of wind carried a memory he could neither shake nor soothe.
The man who once leapt from crag to cliff, who had spent days among the jagged peaks and winding forests, who had hunted with a zeal that left no prey alive and no heart unmoved, was gone. In his place walked a shadow of the man he had been, his body marked by wounds the demon lord's strike had never fully healed. Some muscles had stiffened, some joints ached with a pain that would never fade, and certain movements, once second nature, were now impossible. He could never hunt again.
Hunting had been more than survival; it had been a communion, a rhythm that connected him to the pulse of the land. Every rising sun over the mountains, every brush of wind across a hidden glade, every scent and whisper in the undergrowth; it had all belonged to him. The forests had known his footsteps, the streams had felt the weight of his passage, and the wild had recognized him as one of its own. Without the chase, without the thrill of the hunt, it was nothing but silence. And silence, in all its breadth and emptiness, was a cage.
The weight of the village pressed on him, too. The old head of the village who had been like a father, was gone, leaving a vacuum Eoghan was expected to fill. It had been the dying wish of the old man to see Eoghan take his place, and he had honored it. But the role, as sacred as it was, brought no joy. It was a mantle heavy with expectation, threaded with unspoken threats, and polished with the fragile hopes of people who believed in him because he had survived and endured. The manor that had replaced his modest cottage was grand, the seat of the village head, but it felt more like a gilded prison than a home, surrounded by the trappings of authority that felt alien against the ache in his chest. The simple tools of his hunts: his dagger, bow, and pack; were gone. In their place, he now wore ceremonial robes and carried symbols of leadership, responsibilities he had never asked for and never truly wanted.
Where once he had moved among friends, hunters who shared his love for the mountains and forests, now he moved among advisors, men of wisdom and influence, sharp and clever, yet lacking the camaraderie he had once known. Their words were measured, their counsel thoughtful, but their presence reminded him that he was no longer a man of action. The mountains no longer called to him; the chase no longer stirred his blood. He was a man tethered to responsibility he had never sought, ruling people whose eyes both feared and respected him.
And yet, none of it dulled the sharp edge of his loss. The night Shanane had been stolen played on a loop in his mind. Every crack of thunder, every gust of wind through the trees, every shadow that fell at the edge of his vision, returned him to that moment. He could feel the storm pressing down, the agony of her absence, the weight of helplessness crushing him from the inside.
Every day since, he had refused to accept her death. A demon lord may have taken her, yes, but death? He could not bring himself to believe it. Somewhere, she lived. Somewhere, she suffered. Somewhere, she waited for him as he waited for her. For the past twelve months, Eoghan had sought answers. He had combed through the forests, questioning those with gifts, diviners, seers, and anyone who claimed a connection to forces beyond the natural world. Some had whispered, some had lied, others had been frightened into silence. None had offered even the faintest clue. It was as if she had been erased, obliterated from existence in every tangible sense, leaving only a void where her presence had once been. As a man of science, of reason, Eoghan had once laughed at superstition. He had believed in what could be measured, weighed, and touched. Yet now, he had become a seeker of the impossible. If magic could exist anywhere, if the supernatural had any foothold in the world, it was here, in the shadows where his beloved might be trapped.
In the quiet moments, when the advisors had left and the halls were empty, he allowed himself to feel the full weight of the emptiness inside. He remembered her laugh, the warmth of her hand. He remembered the cursed night, the shriek of the wind, the roar of the tempest that had stolen her from him. And he remembered the forest floor, the shattered sigils, the silence after the storm that had promised nothing but absence. Sometimes he imagined her out there, somewhere beyond the reach of human knowledge, trapped by some infernal power, waiting for him to find her. He imagined her strength, her resilience, even as her captor bent her will. He refused to believe she could be broken completely. That hope, fragile as it was, was all he had left.
Yet it gnawed at him, this hope entwined with despair. Even surrounded by wealth, authority, and advisors, he felt naked before the memory of that storm. Every meeting, every decision, every call to action reminded him of what he had lost, and what he might never regain. He could command the village, lead them through famine, illness, and threat but he could not command the return of the one soul who had made life bearable.
He wandered the manor grounds often, walking among gardens he had no heart to admire. He ran his hands along the stone walls, thinking of climbing mountains, feeling the weight of the pack on his back, hearing Shanane's voice calling out from the trees. He missed the simplicity of his former life, the purity of the chase, the shared laughter in the shadowed wilds. The palace was gilded, yes, but gilded cages offered no warmth.
At night, he stared into the darkness beyond the windows, tracing the shapes of the forest in the distance. He listened to the wind, hoping, imagining, praying. Every snapping twig, every rustle of leaves made his pulse quicken with a mixture of fear and hope. He wondered if she had survived the storm, if she had been taken to another place, another world perhaps, where only her captor's will dictated her fate. His hands often went to his dagger, long since replaced by ceremonial regalia. He missed the feel of it, the weight, the certainty of its edge. Hunting had been his freedom, his assertion of life over death, and now he had none of it. He had the trappings of power, but the soul of a hunter had been hollowed out by loss and despair.
And still, he would not despair. For in the quietest hours, when the world slept, he heard her voice in the wind, soft and elusive, reminding him that some things were worth chasing even when they could not be found
He lifted his head to the horizon where the first light of dawn brushed the forest. Somewhere beyond those shadows, beyond the reach of reason and men, Shanane waited. He would find her. He would bring her home. And he would endure the waiting, the searching, the weight of a world that had gone on without her, for as long as it took.
Because hope, however fragile, was the only blade he still had.