A heavy pain weighed down Ninovan. With each dull, labored beat of her heart, the hole in her chest throbbed. Each step a struggle on her now lame leg. There wasn't much left to keep her going. The weathered stone path guided her way; the long, beaten stick she found kept her up and helped her limping gait. But she was old again. Small again. She used the furs she shed of minutes ago to wrap around her frail form and keep the cold at bay as the sun disappeared behind the tall pines.

A pathetic sight. She thought to herself. A pathetic, sad sight indeed.

But it was in sight. The sagging, partially collapsed, and completely claimed by nature manorhouse was just over the horizon. The windows of the house were cracked and grimy, the wooden walls wrapped up in thousands of vines. The stones of the path leading to the front doors were mostly concealed by grass and earth. Weeds and flowers grew up tall and tangled on either side. Ninovan had hoped to be able to smell old smells and remember old feelings, but now all she could smell was her own blood.

Are you still in there? She asked in her own mind, her pale yellow eyes trained on the doors. Perhaps it was the distance and the growing shadows, but they appeared open slightly. Inviting. Are you still waiting for somewhere in the dark?

The nightmares were plaguing. Even in her waking mind she could hear the screams. She knew from the beginning it was the Hunter taunting her, tormenting her, and trying to goad her out of hiding. All it really served to do was keep her trapped. Mind and body ensnared by fear.

"You said you'd take care of it, didn't you?" Ninovan asked aloud, despite the pain it caused her throat and lungs. She was so close now, maybe he could hear her. "I'm sorry I kept you waiting, but I'm here. I can save you now."

A throb of pain. A hacking cough. More blood joined the stains down the front of her furs and flesh. Blood trickled and spilled and splotched the grass and stone beneath her feet. Ninovan had always been afraid of death. She had seen many times how hard life fought to stay living. She heard the voices of animals that cried out and shuddered in terror in their final moments. Many did so between her own teeth and claws. Begged with wide eyes. Pleaded with gurgled moans.

Maybe it was because she was not altogether an animal herself. Maybe it was something the body of a human did when it reached its final moments, when the end was inevitable. Even as each step bled more life out of her, Ninovan did not feel fear. It was almost funny, in a dark sort of way. So many years spent hiding for fear of pain and death, nearly her entire life spent in caves, trees, and abandoned cabins and now, hardly even a month out of hiding, all her fears were realized. And, yet, no fear.

No, all Ninovan felt was rage.

"I'll be damned," the old witch growled, more blood spilling out from between her cracked lips. "I'll be damned if I give in before I see you again."

A sudden, rumbling of the earth nearly knocked Ninovan to the ground as she reached the half-collapsed porch of Wildwood manor. The shaking made some of the trees sway and sent loose pieces of wood breaking free from the decrepit building. The old witch fell to one knee, gripping hard on the makeshift staff to keep herself from falling. She knew right away what this meant and forced herself up with a rattled cry of pain and anger.

"Familiars!" she shrieked inside her own mind but knowing it stretched out far and wide beyond it. "If you can hear me, come to my aid! Our time to strike the heart of Wildwood is now!"

One of the posts that had managed to remain standing all these years was knocked loose by the shaking earth, sending what remained of the porch's balcony crashing down. Ninovan forced what remained of her body forward, crying out when a particular large slab of wood cracked against her back, causing her to stumble forward. The branch was dropped in the process, but the old witch was able to brace against the front doors which, to her immense delight, were in fact already slightly open. Just one push she would be inside. One push and she could begin her final search.

As the outside world began to crumble, Ninovan threw open the battered and cracked doors. A moment later there was a sound that cut through the rattling of the manor and the rumbling of the earth. A sharp, resounding bang that sent Ninovan'sears ringing even as she found herself slumping up against one of the open doors.

A pool of fresh blood was already welling up from her stomach where the bullet had lodged itself deep inside. As the old witch slid the rest of the way to the ground she looked up to see the bullet's owner. What she saw was a thin, frail, and perhaps even crippled form of a young man who sat in a dusty, cushioned chair just inside the doors she had come in from. In one hand he held a bronze, stylized gun that he was struggling to keep propped up on one knee. Even in the seconds Ninovan watched, it shook and struggled to stay upright before finally falling to one side and sliding out of the grip of the pale, gnarled hand before clattering to the floor.

Ninovan looked from the fallen weapon and up to the cold blue eyes of Alex Foxy. Eyes nearly lost in the dirty tangles of his red hair. Encrusted with dirt and blood, said hair tumbled over small, shaking shoulders and down a torso riddled with scars and bone pushed tight against sun-burnt flesh. Here was the decrepit remains of something that was no longer a familiar, something that was hardly even alive, but something that put an end to the Witch of Beasts.

Ninovan chuckled despite the way it made her frail body seize up and more blood to bubble up in her mouth. She had wished to spit it out before speaking, but her mouth only sagged further open, allowing the excess crimson fluid to drain out and down her chin.

"Brother," she gurgled out, coughing up more blood and shuddering out the last of her life."Where is my brother?"

The cold eyes met hers. The colorless mouth opened and whispered out the final words Ninovan would ever hear.

"I killed him."

The aged manor continued to rattle and shake, struggling to retain its form as the ground rumbled violently below it. A polished cane that was leaning against the chair Alex sat upon clattered to the ground, drawing the frail boy's attention as he leaned down and reached for both it and the gun.

Ninovan chose that moment to strike. Fueling the last of her power with the final vestiges of her anger, the old woman pushed herself off the cracked, rattling floorboards. Muscles grew and expanded, thick white hair erupted down her arms and legs, her face twisted and elongated, growing teeth both large and sharp. All this happening in an instant as fresh blood shot out from her wounds. The old wood creaked, groaned, and finally splintered apart when she leaped forward. Alex Foxy only had time to look up and cry out before she crashed into him, knocking the chair backward and sending the both of them sprawling.

Even in her death throws, the drained boy was easy to overpower. Bones snapped and flesh tore wherever she put pressure upon. In another instant he was beneath her, hardly moving, hardly saying anything except for murmurs and moans. Her clawed hands and feet held him in place as her body bled on top of him. Perhaps this would be enough, but the witch wanted to be sure. She opened her jaw as wide as it would go as she lowered her face toward his neck.

"Was it anything like this?" she thought at him, knowing he could not hear it but thinking it anyway. "When you killed my brother, did it look anything like this!?"

Alex looked up at her with those wide, blue eyes. She had seen that look many times before, from both man and beast. Fear, desperation. Begging.

Ninovan let out a gurgled, strained roar before her teeth sunk into the waiting flesh. She bit down hard as he screamed. She closed her eyes and thought of her brother as the sounds of screaming and crumbling faded. She let her muscles relax when she could no longer feel.

Too cold to feel. Too dark to see. Here, finally, she had found the place no one could reach her.

Now, at last, she could rest.

...

Giles Copper awoke to the world breaking apart. The couch he was laying on teetered on its aged legs. Photos and paintings chocked full of dust rattled and fell off walls. Somewhere beyond the crumbling room, it sounded like more of the same chaos was occurring outside. The witch moved to sit up, but his body was slow to respond and bled relief when he stopped his struggles.

But Giles did not stop because of new aches and pains. His clouded mind was struggling to remember how he got here. The past events of nearly any stretch of time. Where was he? How did he get here?

And, most importantly, who was he?

A sudden, horrid scream of pain brought his attention to a distant hallway that connected his room to several others. There was a heavy clattering sound, like something large had fallen over, and then two figures were sprawling partway into the hall. It was a violent scene. A bestial creature covered with white fur was pressed against a smaller, frailer one with long red hair. The former had its teeth clamped on the latter, drawing blood as the weaker one howled.

Giles let out a cry of his own, but it was strained and rasping. He fumbled to get off the couch again, his hands slick on the aged fabric. When he forced his body up again, a stabbing pain suddenly shot up from his stomach, making him double over and slide off and onto the floor with a groan. A layer of dustburst upwards and around his hunched-over form. He reached out with one hand—the other still clutching his pulsing stomach—and tried to find something to cling onto and drag himself back upwards.

Pieces of the walls were breaking apart now. Large sections of the ceiling fell and broke against tables, counters, and chairs. Deep orange light spilled into the darkened interior from the new openings. It allowed Giles to see he was clutching at nothing but dust and debris. It also showed him the two struggling creatures, although there wasn't much of a struggle anymore. The white beast was still on top of the red, clawed hands stabbed into thin arms, jaw still clenched tight around soft flesh. The red monster only gurgled now, twitching movements all it had left to muster.

Giles let out another unintentional, feeble cry when a loud series of cracking sounds split through the continuous rumbling. A moment later, a large chunk of the floor broke apart. Broken pieces of furniture, the walls, and ceiling tumbled inwards, breaking open the split even further, turning it into a rapidly growing, starving hole that led into darkness. Even as the witch futilely crawled on his belly back and away from it, he saw the two monsters slide into the hole alongside the crumbling house without so much as a whimper. More broken pieces of the house fell in after them and the witch tried to grab at one even after the floor below him tilted enough to begin to feed directly into the darkened, churning vortex.

"No!" Giles Copper wailed in a strained voice that he did not think sounded like his own as he began to slide toward his end. "I don't want to go! Please! Some—!"

He cried out with a sobbed, choking sound when something grabbed hold of his elbow, holding him in place. The witch looked from the collapsing room below him and back and up toward whatever had a hold of him.

A young girl. A girl with long blond hair tied back into an elaborate braid. Sweat and dirt stained her wide forehead and pale cheeks. She was standing partially outside the house, holding onto a portion of the remaining wall with one hand while the other gripped him tightly.

"As you command, Master," the girl said, staring down at him with big blue eyes and a dazzling, coy smile.

"Wh—" Giles started to say, but was cut off by his stomach dropping down and then up into his throat as he was yanked up and out of the doomed building.

The girl was small, but adjusted him in her arms with ease before she took off and away. Giles Copper was distantly aware of the great rustling and snapping sounds of dozens of trees in constant motion. Of the great expansive wilderness that now surrounded him. But the majority of his focus was of the girl who held him close to her as she leaped and bounded over large cavities that formed and were forming in some great collapse he had wound up in the middle of.

"Honestly, I know I have said it before, but what would you do without me?" the girl said as she continued to run, her voice showing only a slight hint of strain as she continued to perform feats of incredible strength and dexterity."I leave you alone for a few days and you escape, lose your mind, get aged up several decades, and nearly die in a collapse. I know some of that is my fault, but hopefully this makes us even?"

She was talking fast. Too fast for Giles to keep up with his addled mind. But he was able to pick up a few things and he knew she did not see the creatures he had seen. The girl had traveled a far distance in such a short amount of time. Far enough that the rumbling sounds were more like a distant echo. Fair enough, hopefully, that no one else could hear them.

"I wasn't alone," Giles warned, forcing his voice out despite his protesting stomach. "There were other things in there. Monsters!"

"Monsters?" the girl repeated. She stopped moving then, standing amidst trees that only moved against the occasional gust of wind and looked down at Giles with a raised brow.

"Yes!"

Did she not believe him? Giles struggled to recall everything he saw. Even though it had been such a short time, it was difficult to remember great details. "They—There were two of them. Yes! Two. One ha—had white fur all over its body and the other, ah, the other just had hair I think—buh-but longhair! Long and red! They were fighting, I think—"

Was he rambling? It sounded like he was, and Giles was afraid the girl wouldn't take him seriously. However, a new, grave expression decorated her round face. Without an initial response, she slowly laid him down on the grass, underneath the deepening shade of a nearby tree.

"Wait here," she said to him as she straightened up and turned her attention back towards the churning sounds far away. "I'll be right back."

Giles did not understand right away, but when she started to move he reached out. He tried to stand, but only got more pain in his stomach for trying. Even then he called out for her as he gasped, collapsing back to the ground, eyes on the various branches swaying above him.

"What!?" she called, already sounding so far away despite the short amount of time since he had last seen her.

"Where are you going!?" he tried to shout back, but his voice did not allow him to do much without cracking and breaking. Afraid she couldn't have heard him, he swallowed and was about to shout again when she gave a response.

"To fix someone else's mess."

Giles Copper felt a twinge in the back of his mind. It was an odd feeling, but the same feeling he had received when he first saw her and she called him 'Master'. What did it mean? Did it have something to do with his lack of memories? He knew he didn't have time to ask her about it. She had to already be moving further away. But she would be back and they could talk and maybe he could remember. In the meantime, he forced his voice to attempt to shout one more time. To ask one, final question that he can mull over the answer to while she was gone.

"Who are you?!"

Silence. Too long of a silence. Did he wait too long? Giles groaned as he strained his head to rise off the ground and looked down to where he had last heard her voice.

The girl was still there. Not as far away as he first had thought. She stood in the light of the dying sun however, which made it unclear to where she was looking or how she looked when she finally answered him.

"Your knight in shining armor, who else?"

And with that, she was away. Racing into the dense line of trees and towards the crumbling house and the monsters that lurked within. Giles let his head fall back down with an amused sigh. What a strange girl he thought as he waited patiently for their reunion.

His quiet reverie did not last long. A distant, but fierce cry of rage made his injured stomach twist upon itself. He gripped the injury tightly as the cry—the roar lingered on for another moment or two. It could be heard even over the distance, over the rumbling and crumbling of the earth.

Still alive, the witch thought as his old heart beat wildly. The white monster is still alive.