The creature's body was still twitching when Aric pulled the spear free.
A dark stain spread across the floorboards beneath it.
For a moment, no one moved.
Then the pounding came again.
Three blows.
From below.
The woman flinched and drew the child tighter against her chest.
"That's him," she whispered.
Garran looked toward the rear of the room. "The cellar?"
She nodded.
"He was alive when they dragged him down."
"Then we get him out," Garran said.
Lysa had already reached the wounded station guard. She knelt beside him, pressing a folded strip of cloth against the wound beneath his ribs.
"He's losing too much blood," she said.
Aric looked from the guard to the stairs.
Above them, something moved across the upper floor.
The floorboards creaked under a careful, deliberate step.
Not rushing.
Listening.
The creature upstairs knew they were here.
The System appeared.
[Hostile activity detected: Upper level.]
[Hostile activity detected: Cellar.]
[Living human presence: Cellar, one.]
[Condition: Critical and deteriorating.]
[Immediate threat to injured guard: High.]
Aric looked at the woman.
"Take the child outside with Lysa."
The woman shook her head immediately. "My husband is below."
"I know."
"I'm not leaving him."
"You'll slow us down."
Her face tightened. "Then I'll stay out of your way."
"That isn't the same as staying safe."
The woman's eyes flashed with fear and anger, but before she could answer, Garran stepped between them.
"Listen to him," he said. "If you stay here, we have to protect three people instead of bringing back one."
The woman looked toward the cellar door.
Another blow sounded from beneath the floor.
This time, a voice followed.
Faint.
"Mara!"
The woman went pale.
"My name is Mara," she said quickly. "My husband is Edren."
Aric nodded once. "Mara, take the child and go with Lysa. Garran and I will bring Edren back."
"You promise?"
Aric hesitated.
He remembered the dead guard outside.
He remembered the way the creature had thrown itself at him without fear.
He remembered how often people mistook confidence for certainty.
"I promise we will try," he said.
Mara stared at him.
It was not the answer she wanted.
It was the only one he would give.
Lysa caught her arm gently.
"Come on."
Mara resisted for half a breath, then gathered the child against her shoulder and followed Lysa toward the door.
The child looked back at Aric.
He was too young to understand the danger, but old enough to understand that the adults were afraid.
Aric waited until they crossed the threshold.
Then he turned to Garran.
"Cellar first."
Garran glanced toward the stairs. "You think the upper creature will wait?"
"No."
"Then why not deal with it first?"
"Because the man below may not have time."
Garran considered that, then nodded.
The cellar door was set beneath the rear staircase. Its iron latch had been bent outward, as though something had forced its way through from inside. A line of blood ran beneath the door and disappeared into the cracks between the boards.
Aric crouched beside it.
The air smelled of damp earth and something sour.
He looked at Garran.
"Open it slowly."
"That is not how doors usually work."
"Then today is unusual."
Garran drew his sword and hooked the latch with the tip. He lifted it carefully.
Nothing happened.
He raised the door another inch.
A hand shot through the gap.
Garran jerked back.
Aric caught the wrist before the fingers could close around his ankle.
The hand was human.
"Edren?" Aric called.
A hoarse voice answered from below.
"Don't—"
Something struck the underside of the door.
The hand vanished.
A second impact split the wood.
Aric grabbed the edge and pulled it shut just as a pale limb thrust through the opening. Long fingers scraped across the floor, searching.
Garran brought his sword down.
The limb withdrew with a shriek.
The sound was not human.
Aric's expression hardened.
"The creature is with him."
"Can you see the stairs?" Garran asked.
"Barely."
He lowered himself and looked through the gap.
The cellar was narrow and deep. Broken shelves lined the walls. A lantern swung from a beam, throwing the room into uneven light.
Edren lay against the far wall with one hand pressed to his stomach.
Something crouched over him.
It was smaller than the creature in the hall but built in the same wrong proportions: too long in the limbs, too narrow through the chest, with pale fur along the spine and black claws touching the floor.
The creature turned its head toward the crack beneath the door.
Its eyes reflected the lantern light.
The System appeared.
[Hostile entity: Same behavioral family as prior target.]
[Classification remains incomplete.]
[Human target: Critical condition.]
[Recommended action: Prevent further delay.]
Aric pushed himself upright.
"We go in together."
Garran looked at the narrow opening. "There's barely room for one."
"Then one goes first, and the other makes sure he comes back."
Garran gave him a hard stare.
"You're volunteering me?"
"You're taller."
"That is the worst reason I've ever heard."
"It is also the most practical."
Garran exhaled through his nose.
"Fine. I go first."
He opened the door fully.
The creature launched itself from the far side of the cellar.
Garran met it halfway on the stairs.
His sword struck its shoulder, but the angle was poor. The blade cut through flesh and lodged against bone. The creature twisted around the weapon and seized Garran's forearm.
Garran grunted.
Aric descended two steps and drove the spear downward.
The point struck the creature in the back.
It released Garran and slammed into the wall.
Garran pulled his sword free.
"Again!"
Aric stepped lower.
The cellar stairs were too narrow for a full sweep. He shifted his grip and used the spear as a short thrusting weapon instead, stabbing toward the creature's centerline.
The beast moved with startling speed.
It slipped aside.
The spearhead scraped across its ribs.
The creature lunged past the point and struck Aric's lower leg.
He lost his footing.
Garran caught the back of his coat before he fell down the stairs.
"Careful!"
"I noticed."
The creature turned toward Edren.
Aric saw what it intended.
It wanted to finish the wounded man before they could reach him.
Aric planted one foot against the wall and kicked off.
He slid down the last two steps, landing between the creature and Edren. The movement jarred his injured side, and pain flashed across his ribs.
The System appeared.
[HP: 251 / 280]
The creature attacked low.
Aric brought the spear across his body and caught the claws on the shaft. The impact drove him backward until his heel struck the cellar floor.
The creature pressed forward.
Its face came within inches of his.
Aric saw the black fluid around its teeth.
He smelled rot.
He also saw the pale scar running beneath its left eye.
The same scar pattern as the creature in the hall.
Not the same individual.
The same kind.
The creature snapped at his throat.
Aric twisted the spear between them, forcing its head aside, then drove his forehead into the bridge of its nose.
The creature recoiled.
Garran came down the final step and slashed across its flank.
This time, the cut opened deep.
The beast staggered.
Aric thrust into its chest.
The spear entered cleanly.
The creature struck him once across the shoulder before collapsing.
For a moment, he remained over it, both hands locked around the shaft.
Then the System appeared.
[Hostile entity incapacitated.]
[Classification remains incomplete.]
[EXP award pending confirmed classification.]
[HP: 251 / 280]
Garran lowered his sword.
"That thing nearly took your head off."
"It missed."
"That is not the point."
"It usually is."
Garran stared at him, then looked away.
"Can Edren stand?"
Aric turned.
Edren was alive, but barely. His shirt was soaked with blood, and one leg was twisted beneath him.
Aric knelt beside him.
"Can you hear me?"
Edren opened his eyes.
"Station… keeper…"
"Where is he?"
Edren tried to point toward the back wall.
The motion made him cough.
"Upstairs… he went up… after they came…"
Garran's face darkened. "The station keeper is upstairs?"
Edren nodded weakly.
"Alive?"
"I don't know."
A heavy crash shook the building overhead.
Dust fell from the ceiling.
Then came a long scraping sound, moving from one end of the upper floor to the other.
The creature had heard them.
Or it had heard the fighting.
Aric looked at Edren's wound.
"We can't carry him through the stairs quickly."
Garran sheathed his sword and crouched.
"I'll take him."
"You'll need both arms."
"Then tell me how to grow another pair."
Aric looked around the cellar.
A length of rope lay beside a broken crate. He pulled it free and tested the fibers.
"This can secure his leg."
Garran took it.
Aric tore a strip from the lower edge of his already damaged sleeve and wrapped it around the worst of Edren's bleeding. The cloth darkened immediately.
Edren gripped Aric's wrist.
"Don't leave my wife."
"We won't."
"Promise me."
Aric looked at him.
He thought of Mara outside, waiting for news.
"We'll get her back to the caravan."
Edren's eyes closed.
It was enough for him.
Garran tied the splint as tightly as he could without worsening the injury.
"Ready?"
"No."
"Good. At least we agree."
Aric rose and took the lead up the cellar stairs.
The station building had gone silent.
No crying.
No movement.
No scrape of claws.
That silence was worse than the noise.
At the top of the stairs, Aric stopped.
A dark line of blood ran across the hallway toward the upper landing.
Beside it lay a broken lantern.
The front door remained open, letting in a thin band of afternoon light.
Garran climbed behind him with Edren supported against his shoulder.
"Where did it go?" he whispered.
Aric listened.
A soft creak came from above.
Then a voice.
Not the station keeper's.
A child's voice.
"Mama?"
Garran's face changed.
"Mara took the child outside."
Aric looked toward the upper floor.
The voice came again.
"Mama?"
It sounded frightened.
It sounded exactly like the child.
Lysa was outside with them.
The System appeared.
[Voice source: Upper level.]
[Voice pattern: Inconsistent with confirmed child location.]
[Possible mimicry detected.]
[Warning: Hostile entity may reproduce familiar vocal patterns.]
Aric raised one hand.
Garran stopped.
"We do not answer it," Aric whispered.
The voice called again.
"Mama, please."
From outside the station, Lysa shouted.
"Aric!"
The real child began crying near the wagons.
The false voice upstairs answered immediately.
"Mama!"
Garran's grip tightened around his sword.
Aric looked at the dark stairway.
The creature above was not merely hunting.
It was learning.
And it had just learned which voice would make them abandon caution.
Aric shifted the spear into a tighter grip.
"Take Edren downstairs and wait at the door," he said.
Garran looked at him. "You're going up alone?"
"No."
Aric glanced toward the entrance.
Lysa had raised her bow outside.
She could not hear him clearly through the building, but she was watching the upper windows.
"I'm going up first," he said. "You follow when I call."
"And if you don't?"
Aric looked back at the dark landing.
"Then don't come."
He took the first step.
The wood creaked beneath his weight.
Above him, the false child began to cry.
And something in the darkness smiled.