Her past rushed in like floodwaters, violent and suffocating—that terrible day when everything she loved was ripped away.
Ten years old, fragile and small, her bones thin as bird wings beneath sun-browned skin. She'd been picking wild berries that morning, her tiny fingers stained purple with juice, humming a wordless melody the monkeys had taught her.
The forest had felt safe then, wrapped around her like a mother's embrace, every rustle of leaves and distant bird call a familiar lullaby.
But safety was always an illusion in the wild.
The Gorehowl—that's what the people called it, their voices dropping to terrified whispers whenever they spoke the name.
A hulking nightmare of muscle and malice, its humanoid frame towering over even the ancient oaks, casting shadows that seemed to devour light itself.
Its buffalo head was a grotesque mockery of nature, crowned with twisted horns that curved like scythes, each one capable of gutting a grown man with a single swipe.
