The evening air hung thick with resin and the gentle hum of night insects as Ethan slipped into the forest. His father remained absent from his hunt, and his mother was absorbed in her evening tasks within the cottage. Alone with his restless thoughts, he walked deeper beneath the towering black spears of the Ashspires, drawn by an irresistible need for solitude.
Creatures stirred at his approach. Glowmice scattered in curious arcs around his boots, their green bellies pulsing like earthbound stars. A pair of fawncats padded behind him at a respectful distance, tails raised, eyes bright with familiar devotion. From the branches above, a cloudy moth drifted down with the lazy grace of falling snow and settled on his shoulder.
Terror shot through Ethan's chest like a blade. "No," he whispered, sweeping his arm to scatter them. "Not tonight. Stay away from me."
The creatures tilted their heads in confusion. Their bond with him was ancient and instinctive. They trusted him even when he could not trust himself. But something in his wild eyes made them pause. When Shimmer, his beloved crystal-scaled drake, fluttered down and tried to perch on his shoulder as she always did, Ethan jerked his gloved hand up to ward her off.
"Please," he said, his voice cracking. "I don't want to hurt you."
Sensing the storm raging within him, the beasts reluctantly melted back into shadow. One by one they disappeared into undergrowth and branches until he stood alone in the gathering dusk. Only then did he dare to breathe.
He walked deeper, past familiar landmarks into a grove where young saplings sprouted between moss-covered stones. Evening light slanted through the canopy in golden shafts, painting the slender trees in fragile radiance. Here his steps slowed, and his heartbeat became thunder in his ears.
He had carried this desperate curiosity all day, nurturing it like a fever. He had tried to bury it beneath mundane tasks and forced conversation, but it clawed its way to the surface each time his gloved fingers flexed. Six years ago he had worn this leather prison. Six years of waiting for some sign that his curse had weakened. Six years of hoping to be normal.
Tonight he will have his answer.
His fingers trembled as they worked beneath the leather edge at his wrist. The glove clung stubbornly, as if reluctant to release its hold, but finally came free with a soft sigh. His bare skin gleamed pale in the dying light, five ordinary fingers, smooth knuckles, nothing visibly monstrous.
Yet Ethan knew the terrible truth that appearances concealed.
He knelt before a sapling barely taller than himself, its trunk supple as a reed, its young leaves shivering in the evening breeze. With deliberate reverence, he extended his hand and pressed his palm against the smooth bark.
The tree convulsed.
Life fled instantly, as if drawn into some hungry void within his flesh. Vibrant green dulled to ash grey. Leaves withered and curled like dying fingers. The slender trunk blanched, cracked with sharp sounds like breaking bones, and sagged under its own weight. Within heartbeats, the sapling became nothing but brittle remains clinging to the ghost of what it had been.
Ethan bowed his head, though he had steeled himself for exactly this outcome. Preparation could not blunt the sharp edge of grief. "Forgive me," he whispered to the desiccated corpse. He touched its fallen leaves gently with his right hand, as if tenderness might somehow restore them. "I'm sorry."
When he stood, sorrow pressed down on his shoulders like stone. He turned toward home, unaware that eyes had witnessed everything from the darkness between trees.
Three village hunters had entered the forest that evening, tracking deer along the western ridges with bows slung across their shoulders and quivers rattling softly. They had been close enough to see the tree blacken and crumble to ash beneath the boy's touch.
For a long moment they stood paralyzed, hearts hammering, unable to draw breath. Then Gareth the blacksmith spat into the dirt and spoke the word that would damn them all:
"Witchcraft."
"Worse than witchcraft," muttered Aldric, his weathered face grey with fear. "The horned boy brings death into his hands."
They did not linger to see more. Terror lent wings to their feet as they crashed through undergrowth, branches whipping their faces in their haste to escape. They reached the village while Ethan still knelt in grief beside his victim, and their tale spread like wildfire through every cottage and workshop.
By the time full darkness claimed the sky, the entire village knew of the horror they harbored in their midst.
Night fell, and with it came the mob.
Villagers gathered in the square with torches clutched in white-knuckled fists and weapons hastily torn from walls and sheds. Pitchforks, wood axes, rusted swords that had not tasted air in decades. Their faces were carved from stone and shadow, but beneath the fear burned something more dangerous—the fury of cornered animals who believed their survival demanded blood.
They marched through the narrow lanes toward the healer's cottage at the forest's edge, their voices rising like an approaching storm. "Monster!" some shouted. "Death-bringer!" Others hissed darker accusations: "Burn him out before he kills us all!"
Inside the cottage, Lila sat at her worn table with embroidery spread across her lap, alone in the lamplight. Marline had not yet returned from his hunt. When angry voices reached her ears and torch-glow painted her windows orange, her heart clenched like a fist.
She stepped outside to find herself facing the rage of neighbors she had known since childhood, people who had brought their sick children to her for healing, who had shared bread at harvest festivals, who had once called her friend.
"Leave this place," Gareth commanded, his eyes reflecting firelight like mad things. "Take your cursed spawn and go. You have no place among decent folk."
Lila drew herself straight despite the terror clawing at her ribs. "Why should we leave? He has harmed no one here."
"Harmed no one?" Marta, the baker, stepped forward, her round face twisted with revulsion. "Three men saw him with their own eyes! They watched him touch living wood and turn it into corruption. What name do you give such an abomination?"
Lila's hands clenched at her sides. "He is not an abomination. He's only"
"Enough lies!" Aldric's voice cut across her words like a blade. "Would you see your neighbors wither at his touch? Would you have cursed beasts drawn to our very doorsteps? We will not wait for the darkness to spread!"
The cry went up from a dozen throats: "Fire! Burn the house before evil takes root!"
Some faces showed doubt, guilt flickering in the torch-thrown shadows. But fear burns hotter than conscience. A brand arced through the air, and dry thatch caught with a hungry roar. Flames climbed the cottage walls like living things, consuming everything Lila had built in her quiet life.
She screamed and lunged forward. "Stop! Please, I beg you!" She beat at the flames with her cloak, but they only spread faster, greedier.
Rough hands seized her arms and dragged her back. "Better your house than our children!" someone shouted above the crackling fire.
Tears ran silver down her cheeks in the hellish light. "You don't understand, he's just a frightened boy!"
"No," came the pitiless reply. "He is something else entirely. And we'll risk nothing for his sake."
The flames climbed higher, painting the night in shades of destruction. Roof timbers groaned and buckled. Lila's heart shattered as black smoke rose like prayers to uncaring stars.
And then she saw him.
Ethan, running hard through the trees toward their burning home, his copper hair streaming behind him, his horn catching the fire's glow like polished bone. Panic seized her by the throat as she heard the mob's bloodthirsty roars grow louder.
"No!" she screamed until her voice cracked and bled. She fought against the hands that held her, desperate to reach him. "Run, Ethan! For the love of all that's sacred, run!"
But the boy could not hear her above the crowd's fury or perhaps would not. He saw only the flames devouring their life, the mob surrounding his mother, her face painted with terror and grief. He ran toward them all, heedless of danger, desperate to save what remained of their world.
The villagers shifted and snarled. Blades caught firelight. Axes rose. The cry built like thunder:
"Kill the monster!"
Lila's voice rose above them all, raw with desperation:
"RUN!"
But Ethan kept coming.