Light rain falling on the straw roof, one of her favourite sounds. She sits with her brother, listening to the muffled noise, when her dad walks in, his latest catch flung over his shoulder. She lifts up her petticoats and walks over to where the dead animal is lying and stares into its empty eyes. She wants so badly to cry for it, to feel some kind of remorse for the creature who was just savagely murdered just to be her dinner, but all she can think is ‘well, it’ll probably taste pretty god when cooked’. She returns to her seat and sits back down to listen to the rain some more, but the downfall has ceased and the sun is already peaking our from behind the dark-grey clouds. Her dad walks over and puts out the fire that had been burning in the large, stone fire place.
“It’ll warm up soon, I promise.” He mumbles, walks over to the dead animal that is sprawled all over the dining room table, and carries it into the kitchen.
“I have a game we could play,” her brother says, smirking. She just sits there, staring blankly at him. She knows full well that the game he has in mind will involve some sort of pain on her end, and a chance for her brother to show off his amazing archery skills. Their father had been so proud when he had won the local archery tournament and had won the cap with the big feather coming out. He wears that hat everywhere now, just to remind her that he had won and she can’t even lift a bow.
“No thanks,” she replies automatically, and retreats to her bedroom. Their cottage is small and surrounded by forest. It is quite removed from the village, and to get there requires a twenty minute hike through the woods. Her mother makes the trek once a week to buy herbs, and every time her mother goes, she is invited to come along. She prefers to stay at home, at home with her books, her paper and her quills, for she is a writer. She’ll write anything: Romance, Fantasy, Realism; as long as all her thoughts and stories are down on paper, she’s happy. Sometimes she wishes that the world would just drop away, like an oil painting splashed with a bucket of water, all the colors, images and people melting into nothing, leaving only her and her art. She starts on a new story: a story about an archer who comes into an unfortunate encounter with a ravenous bear. The story will fall nicely in line with her most recent series: a collection of short stories about various archers coming to terrible ends, whether it be a moose, a kangaroo or, in one case, a pack of unfortunately mutated penguins that had escaped from the county zoo, the ending is always the same.

She nears the end of her story, grinning manically as she writes down the words “And thus, his untimely death was inevitable as the gargantuan bear claws ripped through his milky flesh, blood pouring from the holes in his skin.” She puts down the quill and leaves the ink to dry, watching as the fresh black ink settles into its place on the page.

She reluctantly walks into her living room where her mother, father and brother are sitting knee-deep in an air of awkward silence.
“There you are,” her father says, standing up. “We were wondering when you’d emerge.” Emphasizing the last word with a wink.
“What do you want?” She inquires, folding her arms to her chest and placing some of her jet-black hair in front of her pale face.
“We’d like you to go into the village with you brother; and for goodness sake stop sulking.” Says her mother, walking over and brushing her hair out of her eyes.
“Why? Can’t he go alone?” She retorts, returning her hair to its aforementioned position.
“You know very well that neither of you are to go into the woods alone!” Her father snaps, having had to repeat this phrase one to many times in his life.
“Just give him a bow and arrow and he’ll be able to kill everything in his path!” She breaths non-chalantly, sneering at her brother. He just sneers back at her mockingly and says “You think I want you there? What’ll you have to protect us, a hatpin?”
“Oh just go already!” Her mother commands, scooting them out the door and shutting it behind them

They begin down the roughly laid path through the forest. The woods are quiet enough, if you don’t count the birds’ never-ending song running through your head adnauseum. “You know these woods are haunted?” Her brother begins. “How could I not? You remind me every time we step into them!”
“Well, it’s true!”
“I know, I know.” She says, weaving through the trees and brushing the branches out of her face, water droplets from the recent rain fall splashing all over her. Ever since she could remember her brother has been telling her about the woods being infested with ghosts and spirits; she’s been meaning to write a story about it, but hasn’t gotten around to it yet. The wind rustles through the trees, creating the illusion that there are footsteps behind them…
“Wait…” she says aloud. “Did you hear something? Back there?”
“That was just the wind! Don’t tell me my stories are getting to you!” He teases, chuckling.
“No, I heard something; I’m sure of it!” But her brother just scoffs and keeps on walking.

Ten minutes further, she begins to believe that it was just her imagination. After all, her creativity has gotten her in trouble before. There was the time she read “The Boy Who Cried Wolf” and believed that wolves were coming to eat the town. She was hence grounded for climbing a tree, torch in hand, and screaming every time something moved. There was also the time-
“-There! I heard it again!” She shouts at her brother, who is already quite a few feet ahead. This time she is positive: something is following them.
“Don’t be ridiculous! Nothing’s-“he begins, but he stops suddenly. The rustling behind them becomes clearer. She runs to where her brother is standing like a statue and crouches behind him. Slowly, he reaches out his hands to protect her, never taking his eyes off the spot whence the sound is coming from. It approaches slowly, and as it does, other sounds become clearer, like breathing. And then the sound of distinct and graceful steps on the wet leaves below. The two just stand there, not thinking that maybe- just maybe- it would be a good idea to run. Instead, they just watch as the animals’ features become clearer, the ears, the nose, the piercing eyes glaring at them from inside the perfectly sculpted face. When the three figures come within plain view of each other, the beasts pointed ears go back. It bends its hind legs and springs forward, mid air, it releases its claws and opens its mouth, revealing the deadly teeth that shine in the sunlight. The few seconds it spends suspended in mid air, as though dangling from strings, feel like a lifetime to her. It lands, her brother directly beneath it. It knocks him over and begins to bite and tear. She bends over, shuts her eyes and coves her ears and waits for the screaming to cease in vain. She begins to sob and pleads to god for it to stop, to be over.

Once her prayers are answered, she slowly opens her eyes. There, lying before her, is the completely unrecognizable mess that was once her brother. It seems that the only part of his body that the tiger has not touched are his eyes; his dark, empty eyes. Now, as she looks down into them, once again she feels nothing. This is not her brother, not the boy who had named her before she was born, who tortured her relentlessly during her upbringing, making her who she is today. This is just an empty shell, food for the worms.

Not even trying to carry him home, she trudges carefully back through the woods, back to her house, drying her tears as she goes. She walks slowly through the door, her heart beating so hard that she can practically hear it. She passes through the living room and stands at her kitchen door, watching as her mother carefully cuts up the tiger that her father had caught earlier that day.