(Before you read this chapter please make sure you have read the last 3 chapters! I updated very quickly and if you skipped around, you probably missed some pretty big events <3)

              Hwayoung walked slow in the golden light of the sun that was falling low on the trees. Soon the sky would be streaked with crimson and violet and the woods would grow dark. In the distance Hwayoung could see the gates of the village looming, and she had no doubt her mother would be frantic with worry about where she had been. For now, however, Hwayoung had no desire to go back inside the gates whatsoever.

              Her eyes were swollen from crying and her cheeks were patchy and red from where she had roughly wiped the tears from her face. Her knees shook with every step she took, and her breath still came in ragged gasps through her chapped lips.

              Taemin’s gutted face played again and again in her head. Taemin had never walked away from her before, and Hwayoung felt white hot fear drop heavy in her stomach from the significance of his action. If Taemin had told anyone in the village, then she was heading back to die.

              The only thing keeping her safe, Hwayoung knew, was the fact that he still loved her. Taemin had to know that if he gave her up, her head would roll before any other’s did.

              She sighed and tilted her head backwards until she felt her hair spilling from where it was tucked into her cloak and behind her like the woven silks the women of village hung to dry in the warm season.  She relished the cool air on her cheeks.

              A large cry from inside the village gates split the air around Hwayoung. It was one of many voices, but it was one of jubilance, of celebration. Terror chilled Hwayoung’s chest, for she knew why the people were cheering. There was only one reason for the village to be gathered in the first place.

              Wolf.

              Images of blood spilling onto the snow, of Jongin’s crumpled body, of his eyes open and empty, propelled her forward until she was careening towards the gates at an uncontrollable pace. She tumbled through the village entrance and almost crashed into the bodies packed into the center square. From the crowd, Hwayoung guessed that nearly every soul in the village must have gathered.

              And then she saw him.

              On the raised platform in the middle of the square stood Jinki, grinning from ear to ear, and next to him, pale and barely standing upright was a boy Hwayoung recognized from the strange hut in the tree. Baekhyun, that was his name.

              Around him, in impossible knots and loops, was a snarl trap. From the way Baekhyun’s brow was pale and sweaty, how he swayed back and forth on his feet, and the glazed look in his eyes that stared unseeing into the horizon, Hwayoung knew Baekhyun was injured badly. At any moment Hwayoung expected him to collapse onto the wooden platform upon which he was displayed.

              Jinki was yelling something out towards the crowd, and another cheer rose among them, but Hwayoung could not hear. She was glad she could not. Ascending the stairs and to the wooden platform, a large, hooded man Hwayoung knew to be the executioner joined the men before the crowd. The villagers cheered louder than ever; a public execution had not occurred in the village in years. Desperately, Hwayoung pushed her way through the throng of bodies in a desperate effort to do something, anything. The square was absolutely packed, however, and Hwayoung’s progress was slow; she knew she would never make it in time.

              A hand around her wrist pulled her backwards. Taemin glared at her, still holding onto her wrist. He shook his head. Hwayoung pulled and yanked her wrist, but there was no breaking his iron grip.

              “Don’t do it. Stay here.”

              Hwayoung did not want to hear it. “Taemin, please.”

              Taemin’s expression became pleading. “If you ever loved me, don’t go. Please.”

              A flash of pity spread through Hwayoung before she pulled her hand away from Taemin with one last tug, and his hand dropped heavily to his side. “I’m sorry, I have to do this.”

              The cheering from the crowd grew louder, and Hwayoung turned back to the stage to see Jinki deliver an absolutely brutal kick to Baekhyun’s leg. The injured boy howled in pain and dropped to the ground. The boy curled into a ball to protect his stomach, but his leg, no doubt injured from the horrible yanking of the trap, was left exposed. Jinki delivered another brutal blow to Baekhyun’s leg and was met with cheers that masked Baekhyun’s cry.

              Hwayoung pushed her way closer, but the crowd was still too dense. Hwayoung found herself being crushed by sheer numbers. She felt tears build in her eyes, but she refused to let them fall. The villagers screamed with a manic frenzy; their eyes lit with a bloodlust that had never existed before.

              “Kill it,” a voice behind her screamed. “Make it suffer the way our village has for centuries.”

              Jinki held a hand aloft, and every person below fell silent. The once deafening roar of the crowd had dwindled to a silence in which Hwayoung could hear her own heartbeat’s wet thump in her chest. Savoring the moment, Jinki held this silence for several moments before he said another word.

              “For centuries,” he began with a flourish, “our village has lived, through snow, through flood, through drought. We have lived peacefully, but we have lived in fear,” Jinki paused again for dramatic effect. “Fear of torment from a mythical creature that until this season we had no idea even existed.”

              Murmurs of assent from the crowd grew, and it rippled across the square. Hwayoung swallowed hard.

              “Well I say at last the time has come for us to rise up and ta