Their songs had eventually died down and Brenin fell to a fatigue he didn't know he had. Once he opened his eyes his body was human, his dirty clothes back and the dark was not so easy to pierce anymore.
The hunter had not moved from his spot.
Nor had the silver werewolf but when he looked at her he got up in surprise.
"Where is the blood?!" Brenin exclaimed.
The dry pools had reduced to trickles around her. The stench as well had diminished, replaced by that of wood and mud. She barely opened an eye at his noise.
The hunter asked: "What do you see?"
"There was blood everywhere, it's all gone! It's like she absorbed it!"
"Figures. She doesn't want to be caught."
"How?! She didn't lap it!"
"Shut up."
Joan had growled, if feebly but he listened. It had been the first she had talked since they had all holed up in there.
She continued:
"Blood drives you mad. I told you to stay away from it."
"How kind of you." Grisval mocked her. "Or maybe you were thirsty after all those wounds."
"The wounds..."
Brenin touched his own shoulders. He could still feel them bruised, his human skin blistered. But the werewolf before him had not a trace left on her.
His attention moved to the slim ray of light coming from the hole. It was barely visible.
"What time is it?"
"Late afternoon." She answered. "The fair should have ended."
"I thought those lasted into the night?"
"Maybe in the past." Brenin found himself answering. "You mean it has been hours and nobody has found us?"
Joan was thinking the same thing. It wasn't even that guards had failed to find this cache; she had not even heard them try.
It had her annoyed.
At the same time, it had allowed her to stay there, close to the hunter for hours on end and she still felt this urge to battle him and plunge her fangs...
Brenin fell back against the wall and sat.
"I guess nobody believed it."
"You sound disappointed, Brenin. Are you that impatient to get a spear in your heart?"
"You think I enjoy being... this?"
"A werewolf?"
"It's bad enough that my life is over, but to think I could hurt others is what stings. So yes! Yes I'm disappointed! What good is the castle if they don't defend us?"
Joan observed: "That's not their duty."
It made the woodcutter go silent. To hear that truth from a monster only made it more monstrous. He wanted to scream and didn't even know for what anymore.
The last of the dry blood had disappeared from the floor.
Joan got up, almost hit her head against the logs at the low ceiling. She grunted, then made her way to the entrance.
"Where are you going, witch?" Brenin called her.
"Nowhere. I am waiting for dusk."
Here in that hole she could show the nature the curse had given her. Outside she would venture as a dog, but only once people would have gone to sleep.
Here was more honest.
She stood under the hole, her yellow eye in the ray of light, looking at that slight opening and guessing the sky above.
"I shouldn't ask but, will he turn at night?" Grisval wondered aloud.
"Maybe."
"No," Brenin groaned, "it only happens in the morning."
Joan sighed, exasperated.
"You are cursed by the moon. The curse is strongest when the moon his highest and when the moon is full."
"She is right." Grisval rubbed his silver dagger. "That's why the best time to strike is at noon, on an empty moon."
"And when is that?"
They both looked at him, though only Joan could see the man. That silence gave him a clue.
"It will get worse and worse from there." She continued.
"Two weeks from now, at midnight, whatever is left of you will be lost to the beast. Whoever you liked you will have no qualm hunting. And you will obey her blindly."
It hit him like a ram.
"Just kill me already."
"Two weeks from now you will be human again." She growled. "Just do as I say until then."
"Human?"
It made Grisval honestly chuckle.
"The only way to break his curse is for you to die. Am I wrong?"
"You are right." She confirmed. "For him to be human I have to die."
"And you have no intention of dying for him. Come on, Joan of Cormoran, that lie is even sillier than the others."
"Silence!"
Her voice had lashed out but that lone would have hardly made them fret; they suddenly felt a presence where she stood akin to the devil, an overwhelming sense of dread that choked them. Her mask slipping for a moment.
"Silence, the both of you! Do you know how tired I am of bowing my head to humans?! You, Grisval, of all men should realize I could have the whole domain dead by morning!"
She had approached, hands stretched and she could see her own claws ready to rip him.
She stopped, clutched them in fists and once again her blood dripped.
Dead blood carried no curse.
"Two weeks from now, his curse will be lifted."
Even though she had calmed, they were both still under the lead of dread that had crushed them for the few seconds her anger had flared.
She turned away and back to the entrance. Licking her palms.
"That girl. Maud." Joan wondered aloud. "Do you love her?"
"What?"
"Do you love her?"
Brenin was bewildered, not just by the question but by this witch knowing his friend. He didn't have the strength to be mad at her: the fading fear would not let him.
"It's more complicated than that."
"She was looking for you."
"Where?!" He panicked.
"At the fair."
Again, Brenin went silent. His face turned to guilt, then to a mask of frustration from which his own tears began to bead.
Even the hunter heard his first sobs.
And he was trying to hold it all back but this was too much. After all that happened and the sudden terror that had gripped him not a minute ago that strong man was crumbling.
"Was Roland with her?" He almost begged.
"Yes."
"Okay..." His voice was strangled. "Okay, he will look after her. Saintess, protect them, I was such a fool... Why did I ever think..."
Grisval got up, navigated the darkness and crouched at the man's side, tapped his shoulder and waited there for him to calm down.
The hunter was not much when it came to comforting people. If anything he was awkward about it but even that gruffy man could tell how the monster in human guise had reached his breaking point.
There was almost a hint of pity in his eyes.
She looked away and back at the sky, for what little she could see of it. Outside dusk was fast approaching. People at the castle were probably eating.
"When I come back, tell me more about her."
He broke off his tears to react:
"Wait! You..."
"He won't kill you." She growled. "He still needs you as bait."
Both men watched her leave, then looked at each other, for the short time light poured in and revealed Brenin's ravaged face. Then the stone hid the hole again and she crouched back into a silver dog in the evening.