AN: 

Hang in there for this one folks! 

It happened fast.

One moment, Fenris clung to Petyr and the next, the Woodsman swung his axe toward the Wolf. The blade's intent was clear, his swing was meant to connect with the other man's throat.

"Stop it!" Marjorie's world erupted in chaos.

At Petyr's attack, Fenris ripped away from his grasp. His hands wrapped around Marjorie's shoulder, tucking her close until her entire front was pushed flush against him.

"Duck!" He shouted.

She followed his command just as Petyr's blade swung down, hitting the empty air where Marjorie's head once was.

"Petyr, what are you doing—" she screamed out as he lifted the axe up again.

She narrowed her gaze on his face, finding that his brown eyes glowed a stark white. There was no iris nor pupil, just a blank canvas watching her.

"You stupid Wolf," Vivian shouted, laughter tinging the end of her words. "You brought me a Woodsman. A real one."

"What?" Marjorie rushed out before Fenris pulled her farther away from Petyr. Each time they moved, the time between missing his advancements shortened by the thread of a second. Soon, he would find his mark.

"You mean you did not tell the little girl?" Vivian said.

Marjorie turned to the woman, and found that her hands were lifted, fingers bent like a puppeteer controlling a maze of strings. She shared the same white, glowing gaze as Petyr.

"Tell me what?" Marjorie asked just as Fenris wrapped his hands around the small of her waist and stole the dagger she clutched in her grasp. He unsheathed it in quick succession and raised the knife in the same moment Petyr brought his blade down in one forceful sway.

She watched Vivian. Her hands mimicked Petyr's identical movements. She controlled him. The revelation turned the tips of Marjorie's fingers numb and light, as though Marjorie no longer belonged on the earth's surface.

She wanted to float up. She wanted to run from this—from the fury in Vivian's eyes, the blade of Petyr, and the countering movements of Fenris. Marjorie curled her hands into Fenris's cloak and imagined herself stuffing her panic back down into her chest. She didn't need adrenaline—instead, a clear mind.

Fenris caught the axe with the blade of the dagger. He threw it off, giving them enough time to run a few steps backward.

"Just like only a Spark can kill a witch, only a true Woodsman can kill a Wolf," Vivian revealed. "Petyr is a true descendant of the original villagers—he possesses the blood of the very first Woodsman. Fenris, was it your intention to lead yourself to your own death?"

"Is this true?" Marjorie whispered, staring at Fenris through blurry eyes. "You said before—not even a dagger to the heart could kill you. Is he your weakness?"

Fenris's strange gray eyes shifted to Marjorie, and with one tiny tilt of his head, he confirmed her fears.

"But my favorite part little Red?" Vivian said through a smile of sharpened teeth. "Anything can kill a Spark."

The witch brought her hand down in a deafening clap. With her sudden movement, Petyr closed his distance between Marjorie. He ran toward her with no understanding of what he was doing—he must not. He would never raise a blade toward her.

But now he did. Petyr pulled his axe behind his head, with all the precision of an archer nocking his arrow, and swung forward. She screamed, unsure of which direction to move while his towering body blocked everything from sight—even the full red moon.

Fenris's hands left her waist to press on her collarbone. He rammed his palms against her skin, pushing her backward into the thistles. She screamed at the green needlepoints digging into her flesh, and when her shout ebbed to a quiet whimper, she opened her mouth once again to scream.

But not out of pain. This time, the force of her shout came from horror.

Petyr found his mark in Fenris's back.

"Stop!" She begged uselessly. "You are hurting him! Stop it!"

He ripped the blade out of the Wolf with a sickening squish.

Fenris fill to his knees with no grace, his face pulled down in an expression muddled with pain and shock. Marjorie rushed forward before he could fall to the ground completely. His full weight landed on her body, forcing her to slide him down slowly to rest on her soft thighs, where he groveled in pain.

"What—" Petyr whispered from above.

"Get away!" Marjorie screamed. Her hands wrapped around Fenris's face, wiping at the two streams of tears that fell down his cheeks. His wide, gray gaze stared up, devoid of everything but agony.

Marjorie dragged him to her chest with tears blurring her vision. She needed him closer to her body—because in this moment, close meant safe, and safe meant alive.

Petyr's axe unceremoniously dropped to the ground. He fell beside Marjorie. His eyes no longer shone bone white. Instead, they were a deep, familiar brown and hot with tears. His trembling hands slowly crept forward, until they rested on top of Fenris's clenching knuckles.

"I- I did not mean to—" he whispered, sorrow in his voice. "What have I done?"

"It is okay," Marjorie's words were clustered tightly together. "It is fine, Fenris will be just fine, will you not?" She curled her shaking fingertips around the delicate slopes of his cheeks. When he remained silent aside for a groan, she pressed her forehead against his and stared into his eyes. This close, his gray gaze turned into a medley of silver and white, reminding her of the cold touch that came with winter.

"Promise me you will be okay," she whispered.

The Wolf's free hand reached up to cup her cheek. She leaned into the touch, terrified that it may be her last chance to feel the warmth of his palms against her skin.

"I—I will be fine," he admitted through gritted teeth. "But V-Vivian— she can still be stopped. You can stop her—"

"No, I cannot." Marjorie spoke the words against his cheek. "How can I do it without you, Fenris?"

"There is always help from the forest, Marjorie," he whispered weakly. "You just have to listen." He brought his palm down and then, pressed something in her grasp.

The dagger.

"I will be fine, truly," he promised, but it felt empty. With his words, a tiny drop of blood leaked from his lips, proof that the axe dug deeper than Marjorie imagined. "Both of you, go. End this."

She took a deep breath against his forehead, committing the steady thrum of his heartbeat to memory. She realized then, in that moment, if she could stay with him forever, she would.

But she had to move. Together, Petyr and Marjorie rose to their feet on shaking legs. She tightened her grasp around the blade and measured their odds.

Petyr towered over Vivian. If he could restrain the witch, all Marjorie must do was cut.

She tested the point of the blade on her fingertips. Marjorie imagined digging it in the woman's back, like just Fenris's own wound.

"Have you not died yet?" Vivian glanced up from where she cleaned the blood off a knife with the end of her white skirt. "Fine." She dropped the blade and raised her hands. Once again, her eyes flooded with white light.

***

Marjorie twisted toward the Woodsman just as his gaze was engulfed by Vivian's influence. Petyr was no longer her kind protector. Instead, each move he took was propelled by the witch.

His expression turned to stone. Although the man wore the same face as Petyr, the cruel line of his lips and the crinkle between his golden brows revealed a darker mask, one which he never wore before.

Marjorie attempted to run from this stranger who lived in the body of her Woodsman, but her speed was nothing against the strength of Petyr. His hands snapped down with a quickness meant to hurt. He caught her by the neck, bringing his palms hard against her windpipe.

She kicked at him, her boots digging in his thighs and then crawling up, until she launched her feet against his abdomen, over and over again. Her struggles were in vain.

He lifted her up by the throat. The movement forced a pathetic choking noise to escape through her open mouth. She swayed in his grasp like a broken bird in the mouth of a cat. Her toes pointed down in a desperate attempt to find the ground below.

The earth seemed so far. There was no beat. No energy from the tears. No angry pulse. No Spark.

Instead, only a noose made out of hands.

She tried to scream his name, but noise refused to leave her lips.

The surrounding world blurred with the same blackness that came with losing consciousness. First it speckled her vision, until Petyr's entire face was nothing more than one silhouette intent on killing her.

She wrapped her fingers around his tight grasp, a weak attempt to drag herself father from the inevitable.

This was her fate. Soon, she would join the pile of dead villagers. And all those shackled before Marjorie would follow.

She cheated death for so long that it was only right to die cruelly like this, in the hands of someone who would die to protect her. She could not even look into the warmth of his steady, brown eyes. Only blinding whiteness welcomed her.

Listen.

Fenris's words echoed in her mind.

She closed her eyes, forcing herself to listen past the rushing blood in her ears and face.

She shoved down her panicked heartbeat, the thoughts that prickled like thorns in her mind, the inescapable pain.

And Marjorie listened.

Heat under her hands. Burning in her throat. Warmth from Petyr. It was as if she burned alive. But it was wrong to run away from the flames. Instead, she should dance with them.

She imagined her feet flinging gray ash in the air, Petyr's head rolling back in laughter, Fenris watching from the river. All of them, moving in tandem in a world that knew red not from the moon, but from the welcoming flames.

Marjorie smiled at the clarity in her muddled mind. Her last moments were not meant to die in fear, but to welcome the thinning veil. Her hands released from Petyr's fingers, allowing her body to fall slack in his hold.

All this time, she had been running from her fate.

Now, she would run to it.

Her vision bruised with blues and purples, the spots steadily growing denser until only one sliver of red light remained. Her lungs fought against the pain, but her chest continued to spasm against the lack of air.

Then, a spot of black covered her entire vision.

This must be it, she thought. The veil is gone.

But just as the splotch of darkness covered the last shard of crimson, it disappeared. Marjorie forced her eyes to blink open. Her blurry vision settled on the fuzzy world—the whites of Petyr's eyes, the red of her cloak, and the quick flight of a black bird.

Her raven returned.