The trees were trembling.
Not from wind.
But from something far worse.
Two figures moved through the woods—not running in fear, but in hunger.
They weren't being chased.
They were chasing.
The Devil Twins.
Silver hair that shimmered like frost under moonlight. Eyes red like split veins, glowing in the dark.
They didn't speak.
They didn't need to.
Their laughter echoed like broken music, bouncing off bark and stone, too sweet to belong to anything human.
Their bare feet barely made a sound, but blood followed where they stepped.
They were ten years old.
And they were hunting a grown man.
⸻
The assassin had come to kill them.
Paid in gold and promised pardon.
He had believed the rumors were just that—rumors. Noble whispers and fairy tales spun from fear.
But then he watched one of the twins twist his comrade's neck with a smile.
He saw the other tear out a man's throat with his teeth and giggle like it was a game.
He ran.
He ran like hell.
But the forest never ended.
The trees blurred. His lungs burned.
And behind him, that laughter never faded.
"I shouldn't have taken this job," he panted, stumbling through brush and branches.
"I shouldn't have..."
His voice broke.
He fell to his knees.
Crying.
Begging.
Too late.
⸻
They found him.
The older twin leaned down beside him, tilting his head like a curious cat.
Blood speckled his cheek. His hands were soaked in red.
He smiled.
"Why did you stop running?" he whispered, voice soft and sweet.
"Wasn't it fun?"
The younger one giggled, crouching behind the man and tugging on his hair like a toy.
"I like the screamers more. This one's already boring."
"No, no—" the man choked out. "Please—"
But mercy was a language they never learned.
They played with him.
Ripped him slowly.
Bit by bit.
Slice by slice.
Until the forest swallowed his screams like they were part of the wind.
Until his body was just something red and broken on the leaves.
⸻
The twins sat beside the corpse when they were done, giggling and humming to themselves.
They had killed the last man.
Laughed while he screamed. Smiled when he broke.
And now the forest was quiet again.
Too quiet.
The older twin—Eryx—wiped the blood from his fingers and looked around, blinking slowly.
The trees all looked the same now.
The scent of blood was fading into bark and moss.
The trail was gone.
The younger one—Viel—tilted his head. "Where are we?"
"We followed him too far," Eryx murmured.
They turned in a slow circle. Nothing but dark trunks and fog. The moon above was barely visible now, tucked behind clouds like a frightened eye.
"We're lost," Viel said flatly.
Eryx didn't like that word.
He never got lost.
They always knew where they were.
They weren't scared. Not exactly.
But the woods felt... wrong.
Thicker. Heavier.
Like they had walked into someone else's dream and forgotten how to wake up.
⸻
Viel crouched and touched the earth. "It smells different here."
"It's not his scent anymore," Eryx said, frowning. "There's something else."
A pause.
Then, quietly—almost curious:
"Someone else lives here."
They both went still.
Not afraid.
Not excited.
Just aware.
Someone. Somewhere. Deep in the woods. Quiet as a ghost.
Not a soldier. Not a hunter. Not a threat.
But someone.
And though they didn't know it yet...
they were already walking toward him.
The candle had long since burned down.
The stew pot was clean. The hearth, still warm.
And Cael was asleep.
His breath was steady. One arm draped over the pillow. The windows were open, letting in the scent of damp moss and summer leaves.
It was quiet.
Until it wasn't.
⸻
The scream didn't sound close.
It echoed from far off—deep in the forest. Muffled. Dying.
A man's voice.
Sharp. Full of pain.
Then silence.
Cael stirred.
At first, he wasn't sure if it was a dream.
But the way his heart began to race—slow, steady, instinctual—told him it wasn't.
He sat up, still groggy. His room was dark, the shadows stretching longer than they should have been.
He blinked. Listened.
Nothing.
Only the chirping of insects and the soft rustle of leaves. But even that... sounded wrong. Offbeat. Uneasy.
⸻
He stepped to the window. Looked out.
The forest, which always felt like home, now felt like it was holding its breath.
It was the kind of silence that didn't belong to night.
It belonged to something else.
Something watching.
Something approaching.
⸻
Cael's fingers gripped the windowsill. His breath caught.
He didn't see anything.
But he could feel it. In his bones. In the back of his neck.
Something was in the woods.
And it was getting closer.
⸻
He didn't know yet what had happened.
Didn't know about the blood on the leaves.
Didn't know about the corpse lying cold, broken in the dark.
Didn't know that two silver-haired devils were wandering now—directionless, curious, and cruel.
But tonight, for the first time in months...
Cael didn't feel safe.