The air in A'Coruña tasted of smoke and fear. There was no time to grief our losses Tomas, the hunters... Isla.
By the time I reached the center of town, the sky had already begun its bruising descent toward nightfall, that sickly blue-purple that makes every alley feel like a throat ready to swallow you. And the people…..
God help us, they had become something else entirely. Fear corrodes judgment faster than any blade.
Nowhere was that clearer than in the town hall.
They had dragged families inside displaced Spaniards from villages burned or pillaged after the war, men, women, children, clutching each other while the townsfolk held spears and pitchforks like they were warding off plague victims instead of people who had already lost too much.
I pushed through the crowd, hearing shouts:
"Encerrarlos!"
"Check their eyes…..quiet….QUIET!"
"We must find who brought this curse here!"
Inside, lanterns swung violently from beams, throwing disjointed shadows over terrified faces. A mother shielded her little girl behind her skirts. A boy barely eight cried so hard he couldn't breathe. Elderly men sat trembling, their wrists bound with rope.
All of them were prisoners of panic.
My stomach twisted.
"This isn't justice," I muttered. "This is madness."
But no one listened.
They were too afraid.
And fear is its own commander.
I pushed through bodies until I reached the stage the council used for announcements. From here, I could see nearly a hundred displaced villagers packed into the hall, shoulder to shoulder, pale with dread.
I raised my voice.
"Let them go. This won't fix anything…."
But the crowd roared back so loudly the floorboards vibrated.
"Why? Why defend them?"
"The creature came with the outsiders!"
"They arrived after the wars after YOU came back!"
"Manuel, we trust you, but this time you're blind. The answer lies in them, someone here is tethered to it!"
I forced myself not to flinch. They didn't mean the words out of malice, they meant them because they were drowning.
And drowning people grab onto whatever they can, even if it drags someone else under.
Through the doorway, I saw silhouettes, familiar ones pushing in with urgency. Maria, limping but armed. Bruno, stern-eyed and ghost-pale. Theo alongside Ivan's hunters. Several newer faces, villagers clutching newly-sharpened blades, ready to join us.
Their expressions matched mine: we didn't have time for this.
Maria stepped forward first, voice cutting through the chaos:
"Enough!"
Her tone had weight, enough to make the shouting soften into uneasy murmuring.
She looked at me sharply, then at the imprisoned families.
"We don't have the luxury of tearing each other apart," he said. "Night is coming. And whether these people are guilty or innocent, every second spent here is another second closer to a child dying."
Bruno's voice boomed next, his grief warping into force. "But if one of them carries the creature's tether…"
Maria snapped, "Then the creature won't kill THEM, will it? It'll kill someone else's child while we discuss morals."
The crowd began arguing again.
Ivan glared at me like I had personally unleashed chaos.
Bruno folded his arms, unmoved.
And in the middle of it all, Theo raised his hands .
"Look around," he said, voice rising. "Everyone standing here lost someone or will lose someone. We cannot undo what has already been said or revealed. The truth is out. Yes, revealing it caused this frenzy. But it is DONE."
His eyes met mine, and I knew he meant no disrespect.
He meant urgency.
"If we waste one more minute," Theo continued, "the creature will take another innocent. And none of us will be able to live with that."
Silence finally fell.
Even the bound families at the center of the hall looked up, trembling but listening.
And God help me, Theo was right.
I swallowed hard.
I wanted to tell them all to stop to untie those villagers, to take a breath, to think clearly.
But I looked into the eyes of every parent in that room.
I saw fear.
Raw, unfiltered fear.
Fear for their children.
Fear for their family name.
Fear of an invisible enemy wearing human skin.
And in that moment, whether they were right or wrong no longer mattered.
Time mattered.
Nightfall mattered.
Francisco's visions mattered.
The next scream mattered.
I stepped forward. "Listen to me."
The hall went quiet.
"We all made mistakes. Revealing the truth… hiding the truth… none of that changes what's coming. If we keep arguing, we'll lose more children before dawn."
Someone shouted, "Then what should we do?"
I exhaled sharply.
"Lock these doors," I said. "Bar your windows. Keep these children close and make sure yours are safe. And pray. Because the creature is coming again tonight."
A wave of murmurs washed through the hall, half fear, half surrender.
"The hunters will stop this," I added though I felt the hollowness of my own certainty. "But we need time. And all of you need to stay alive long enough for us to kill it."
I wasn't sure they fully heard me.
But they stepped back.
Some lowered their weapons.
Some went to embrace crying children.
And that was enough.
While the town dissolved into sunlit panic, the Marino home was a storm of its own.
Isabella tightened the leather straps of her boots, breath trembling but hands steady. Francisco tied a small satchel around his waist, books and charcoal tucked inside just in case his visions returned with clues. Matteo checked a rusted dagger from his granduncle's belongings, jaw clenched, eyes hollow.
Ana stood in the doorway, hands shaking.
"No," she said. "No, I won't allow it."
Francisco didn't stop buckling his belt.
Isa didn't stop checking the powder in her small pistol.
Matteo didn't meet Ana's eyes.
"You're children," Ana said, voice cracking. "Children don't hunt demons."
Francisco looked up, eyes shadowed in a way no sixteen-year-old should ever know.
"Madre," he said softly, "I can sense it. I'm… connected to it somehow. If I stay behind, someone else will die."
Isabella added, quietly but firmly, "Tomas and Isla are dead. Jorge is wounded. If we do nothing, more will fall."
Ana's teeth clenched so hard her jaw shook. "And what about you? What about Francisco, my son? Or you, Isa, I've known you since you were small. I cannot bury another child!, including you, Matteo."
Matteo lifted his head then, voice hoarse. "My granduncle burned himself alive so I could live. I'm not wasting that sacrifice."
Ana grabbed the back of a chair, steadying herself as tears blurred her vision.
"You're all mad," she whispered. "Mad… or too brave for your own good."
Francisco stepped toward her slowly.
"Madre… I need to do this. Please."
Ana closed her eyes.
She saw Jorge pale and broken in the healer's house.
She saw Francisco screaming in pain when the creature neared.
She saw Tomas's lifeless body.
When she spoke again, it was barely a whisper.
"Then I'm coming with you."
Isabella blinked. "Ana—"
"You're right," Ana said, voice stronger now. "There's no reason for children to be on a battlefield. So if you insist on entering one… I'm going to make sure you walk out alive."
The town hall was barred slowly, those with kids went home but they kept the displaced citizens as prisoners, it didn't sit well with me but I had no time to fight.
The sun was sinking fast, that terrifying moment when day is no longer day, but night hasn't fully arrived. A limbo where every shadow looks like it wants to move.
Maria joined me first, wiping dried blood from her brow.
Bruno followed.
Ivan and his hunters formed a grim circle.
Theo checked his rifle.
More villagers stepped forward, faces determined, shaken, terrified.
And then Francisco burst out of the healer's house.
His hands shook violently.
His breath came in ragged bursts.
His eyes were white with terror.
"I can feel it!" he screamed. "It's coming…. It's coming …..NOW!"
He ran.
Just ran.
As if something invisible had hooked its claws into his spine and was dragging him toward the woods.
Isa sprinted after him.
Matteo followed, teeth clenched.
Ana rushed behind them with a kitchen blade.
The hunters around me stiffened.
Maria whispered, "God protect us."
Theo muttered, "No turning back."
Ivan said nothing, but his face already knew the truth.
Bruno tightened his grip on his weapon.
And me?
My heart was already pounding.
"AFTER HIM!" I shouted.
And the entire hunting party hardened fighters, grieving parents, frightened volunteers charged after Francisco as the last of the sun vanished behind the hills.
Just before the scene dissolved into full darkness, I had one final thought, chilling and unmistakable:
We weren't hunting the creature anymore.
It was drawing us in.
Francisco's cry still echoed through the pine-lined paths, sharp enough to send a flock of birds jolting out of the trees. Manuel, Maria, Ivan, Bruno, Theo, and the rest of the hunters sprinted after him. Their boots hammered the dirt, breaths coming hard, their shadows long and jagged in the last sliver of sun.
Francisco ran as if dragged forward by invisible chains chest heaving, hands trembling, eyes unfocused yet burning with something primal. Isa and Matteo struggled to keep up at first, but adrenaline gave them a strange, desperate speed. Ana stayed at Isa's side, her hands shaking as she held her lantern and the short blade she had taken. She had never been a fighter, never wanted to be. But she was a mother and that was enough to override every fear.
"Francisco, slow down!" Manuel called, knowing the plea wouldn't work.
"It's close!" Francisco shouted back, his voice cracking under the strain of the connection tearing through him. "It's moving fast towards the cliffs no, the woods no, it's… it's everywhere"
He stumbled mid-stride. Isa reached forward instinctively.
"Francisco!"
But he didn't fall; he twisted and bolted again, even faster, like something inside him had snapped taut and pulled violently.
Behind them, the hunters were still divided in more ways than one.
Ivan muttered, "We should've warned the whole town from the beginning. Maybe then they'd be helping instead of panicking like headless chickens."
Maria shot him a glare so sharp it could've cut the night. "They are panicking because of the information because you lit a fire in people already half-broken from the war!"
"Oh, please," Bruno snapped. "People deserve to know when something's killing their children."
"They deserve peace!" Manuel countered, voice raw with the weight of all the dead he had seen. "Fear makes people cruel. Look what they're doing now!"
Theo ran between them, panting. "Enough! Whether telling them caused this or hiding it would've made it worse none of it matters anymore. The creature is moving. We waste another minute arguing, we'll lose another child."
Silence hit them like cold water.
Even Ivan didn't argue.
They ran harder.
Ahead, the ground sloped downward into denser forest, trees clustered so tightly that barely any moonlight seeped through. The air grew colder, heavier. The scent of damp leaves, pine resin, and something faintly metallic wrapped around them.
The wind shifted.
Francisco gasped violently and skidded to a stop. The hunters nearly collided with him.
"What, what is it?" Isa asked, breathless.
Francisco pressed a hand to his chest as if trying to steady the erratic pull inside him. "It's close. Very close. It's watching"
A crack in the trees.
Ana stiffened and grabbed Isa's arm.
Bruno pulled his spear forward. "Position! Form up!"
But Francisco shook his head. "No… it's not here. Not yet. It's moving toward the town hall."
Manuel's stomach dropped. "The town hall, where the displaced families are…."