Caspian slid out of the carriage as fluid as liquid. His long, lean legs carried him to the three men. Behind the lord, his long black cape rippled. Harlan's gaze was frozen on the dark material, on the sea of black which was coming to consume them all. In the serpentine embrace of the tree branch, Harlan gasped for breath knowing they were about to drown. Caspian was a menacing storm coming over the horizon, a tempest of grand disaster. Harlan did not have to ask who the monster before them was. He and his sons were clear that this was the frightening, murdering legend they had been hearing about all their lives.

With his pallid, reptilian skin turning iridescent and oddly ethereal under the highlights of the moon, Caspian loomed over them. The beast's eyes bore into Harlan and though they were as blue as blue can be, Harlan felt as though this is what Hell must look like, blue as frozen ice, not red as blazing fire.

Caspian sniffed the air. He snapped his head towards Julian's satchel and saw a drop of blood trickling out of a broken stitch.

"You dare not only to trespass but steal from my land," Caspian's booming tone shattered the silence like a hammer upon a mirror sending splinters to each one of the Hershel men.

Julian was always brave, but not now. His father saw him trembling like a new-born foal. Caspian stormed to the older lad, reached for him and in one swift gesture pulled Julian off his horse and onto the snowy ground. Julian's steed would have taken off in a frenzy if Caspian had not taken control and grabbed hold of its reins once its master fell. The lord looked into the animal's brown eyes. He held the steed's gaze and stared into the animal until he found its soul and shattered it silently. The horse's flesh twitched like a hundred insects were crawling under it but otherwise, the animal stayed still. Once the horse had been silenced, Caspian released it and looked over to Harlan's stallion.

Harlan's horse remained docile, as well. Caspian did not need to come into contact with the animal for the spell had found it, too.

By his horse's hooves, Julian struggled to sit up. Caspian seized the bag holstered to Julian's saddle and pulled out a bloody cottontail rabbit still fresh from the kill.

"These rabbits will cost you dearly," Caspian's voice was a low rumble. He fell to his knees before Julian, the snow crunching under his weight, and held the rabbit over the boy's face. Blood from the cottontail's wounds trickled over Julian's face and stained his cheeks as it zig-zagged towards the cupid's bow of his lips.

"No! Please!" Harlan hollered but when he tried to run to his boy weeds stormed out of the ground and wrapped themselves around his ankles, holding him prisoner.

Caspian's side-long gaze hushed Harlan but the man was terrified for his children. Harlan Hershel knew that he was helpless. His heart ached for what good is a father who cannot help his own flesh and blood?

"We will pay," Harlan's voice came out a croak. He cleared his throat and repeated. "We will pay for the rabbits. I have coin, enough to buy your forgiveness. Do not harm my sons, I beg of you."

"I could just take one of your sons as payment," Caspian uttered under his breath as he straddled Julian and rubbed the rabbit's blood over the young man's lips with the ball of his thumb. The angry lord inched to Julian's ear, his words, though barely audible, were razor blades. "I can see you strapped to a pillar. Your body riddled with arrows. Your perfect skin pierced a million times over like Saint Sebastian bare and bloodied, crying tears and blood solely for me." Before Julian could make a sound, Caspian grabbed the trembling male by the throat with his free hand and Julian's eyes went wide. "I could eat those beautiful eyes of yours," Caspian whispered, dangling the dead rabbit like a pendulum above the young man's brown eyes.

Julian tried to buck Caspian off of him when Caspian's grip tightened. Struggling for breath, Julian gasped. The older Hershel son's vision began to darken. The outlines of the woods faded and grew black before sharp shards of light dotted the blur.

Harlan and Jacob pleaded with the beast to set Julian free. To Caspian, their cries were annoying, like sounds cats made when they were in heat. When the men's begging did not stop Caspian, Jacob's angry words found the Borgo beast's ear.

"Leave my brother alone, bastard, or you will be the one paying dearly!"

The grip around Harlan Hershel's first-born's neck slacked. Caspian stopped. He dropped the rabbit on the older Hershel boy's chest. Julian's mouth opened wide and he began sucking in as much of God's precious air as he could. The beast's head turned towards Jacob. With slow, graceful movements Caspian rose off Julian and walked towards the youngest Hershel boy.

"Such brave words for someone in such a dire position. Very well," Caspian took a step back and lifted his arms. "I will not harm your brother, and because you have been so fearless by trying to put me in my place, I will not harm you either." Caspian watched the two sons looking at him dumbstruck. The beast's blue eyes swarmed from Jacob to the older boy who looked even more appealing now that he was covered in rabbit blood.

The two boys looked from Caspian then to one another, not sure of what to do next. Was this thing really going to leave them alone and let them hurry on their way?

Caspian turned on his heel. He looked as though he was going to head back to his carriage and demon horses when he stopped. Above him, Caspian heard the glorious sound of bats fleeing towards the moon. The three Hershels looked at one another and then at Caspian, not daring to breathe just yet.

"Such music," Caspian murmured as he tilted his head to the sky and closed his eyes for a moment. "Do you hear them?"

Harlan felt the weeds releasing his legs, he felt the vice of the branch let go and drop. "Wh-Who, good lord?" Harlan replied unsurely.

"The children of darkness."

"Forgive me, I cannot hear what they are saying," Harlan whispered.

Caspian opened his eyes and turned his head towards Harlan. Under the light of the pale moon, Harlan saw the crown of bone jutting from Caspian's skull making him look like the King of the underworld.

"They are telling me..." Caspian lowered his head slightly and raised his eyes to Harlan, "to keep my promise. To spare your boys." Caspian's lips curved into a cruel smile. "But they tell me to kill you in their stead."

As a rogue cloud passed over the moon, Caspian lunged for Harlan. Julian and Jacob screamed knowing they had not been spared, merely tricked. The pain of their beloved father being killed by the monster would be a million times worse then them dying.

Harlan was dragged to a nearby tree and slammed against it. The branches of the tree snaked serpentine around Harlan's torso and throat then began to squeeze.

Wild-eyed, Caspian spit out. "I will let them watch you die slowly and painfully, and once I am finished with you I will take each one of your precious sons, cut open their bellies and leave them in the woods for wolves to feed off of them. While your boys lay bleeding they will still be conscious, feeling every bite mark as they are eaten alive by beasts." Caspian pressed himself against Harlan and whispered in his ear, "And when I am done with them, I will come back, gather what is left of you and your sons and scatter the remains all over Transylvania so that none of your souls ever find peace."

Before the branch squeezed the breath out of him, Harlan cried out, "Take me, spare my sons! I beg of you. If you take them who will care for their sister, my only girl?" Spittle flew from his mouth as he begged Caspian for mercy with jagged breaths. "She is still a child. Have mercy, my lord. At least leave the boys to look after her." Harlan's eyes burned with tears, soon they were streaming down his face.

Upon the mention of a daughter, Caspian tilted his head to the side in question. The beast lifted his hand to the tree and the branches relaxed.

"A daughter?" he asked gruffly.

"A beautiful child," Harlan whimpered. "She is so full of goodness and life, but she is still a babe. So beautiful. In my pocket, there is a photograph of her. Please..."

Caspian reached into Harlan's coat pocket and took out the photograph worn and faded with age. A young girl, no more than seventeen or eighteen in age looked back at him. Her dark hair hid part of her features, yet the smile on her lips was brilliant, delicate. She sat among a cluster of spring flowers in a white lace dress looking right into Caspian's soul with her angelic gaze.

Caspian's jaw clenched, he ground his teeth till they rattled. Caspian felt the veins in his temple throbbing, ready to explode.

The photograph was black and white with a faded yellowish tint. The beast could see the girl's dark hair, but he could not make out her eyes.

"What color?" Caspian thrust the picture in Harlan's face, pointing with a long finger to the girl's eyes.

Harlan jerked back and sputtered. "Green, my lord. Her eyes are green."

Caspian pivoted and walked a few feet away from the men in deathly silence, still holding onto the photograph. He turned his back to the men so that they could not see him tracing the outline of her face with the tips of his fingers. Caspian could not tear his gaze away from her and for a second, the beast was fooled into thinking he was still a man, still with his beloved where no spells or curses existed. In the hallways of his memories, Caspian's past came to haunt it. It had been nearly one hundred years since he had lost his wife, a long time to forget but true love never dies.

In a cocoon of its handkerchief, the tiny magpie fussed and wriggled till it slipped out of the restraint. Before Harlan's, Julian's and Jacob's eyes, the bird's wing began to heal, hollow bones meshed back together and began to triple in size along with the rest of the magpie. Its feathers, soft and downy moments ago, turned from a fuzzy black and white into a deep ebony tinged with sapphire blue. Its beak became pointy, the claws on its feet sharp. The blackbird spread its wings and lifted itself off the earth. It flew towards Julian with grand speed and plucked the rabbit off the boy's chest before taking off into the darkness.

"Her life in exchange for yours," Caspian said without turning.

"No! You cannot!" cried Harlan, not willing to give his daughter's life in exchange for his. But his sons, he had to think of them, too. Harlan looked at his boys. No. He could not! What kind of man would that make him? What sort of father would he then be?

"I will not harm her in any way." Caspian turned to face the men. "For one lunar month she will stay with me, and in return, I will spare your godforsaken lives. If you decline I will hold true to my promise of killing all three of you in the most grotesque of ways."

Jacob and Julian shook their heads, words as broken as the hope they felt now fell at their father's feet. "Do not do it, father," they pleaded. "It is lunacy."

"You will not harm her?" Harlan did not believe what he had just said until the words left his mouth. How dare he even entertain such a horrid thought? His daughter, his only girl, given up to this...this THING for a lunar month?

Caspian nodded. "She will be my honored guest, not a prisoner. She will not want for anything, this I vow. Do you agree to this exchange?"

Harlan thought of the grim month his daughter would have to spend with this creature if he agreed to this insanity. Like Persephone at the mercy of Hades, dragged into the Underworld where shadows and fear lived, Rosalind would have to endure Hell. But in one Lunar month, she would return home and his sons would still be alive. Perhaps it was a small sacrifice to make, his daughter for his sons. With tears falling down his face, Harlan looked away from his boys. Burning with rage and shame and nodded. "I agree to this exchange."

In the background, Harlan's two sons vehemently objected. Their distressed protests stabbed Harlan like the point of a steel sword.

With a curt nod of Caspian's head, the deal was sealed. "You have two days to bring her here. If you do not, I will come to your home and kill all four of you." Caspian's fingers released the photograph and it fluttered to the ground.

Here? What is here, thought Harlan gravely, but nightmares and trees? He tried to hold back sobs as the branches freed the men and Caspian tore off into the darkness.