The visitor reached one arm through the opening and upward to set its fingernails in the wall. It crawled over the upper edge of the window, letting its feet swing inward, then dropped soundlessly to the bedroom floor. Crossing to the bed, it quickly reached out with one hand and clamped it down over the old woman's mouth.

She woke, eyes wide and frightened, but only for a brief moment. Then she stared with an empty gaze into the eyes above her. The night visitor relaxed its grip, lowering its head to her throat. All in the room became still and quiet and timeless.

Then its head swung up to stare at the open window. A dark stain covered the side of the old woman's throat. The visitor began to lower its head again to the old woman, but paused. With an owl-tilt of its head, its gaze returned to the window as it listened.

Outside, someone was walking the village path. The visitor moved to the window.

Strolling along the village path was a young woman wearing studded leather armor and high, soft boots pulled over earth-colored breeches. In one hand she held a short pole, and in the other a long knife with which she worked at sharpening the pole's end into a crude point. At her side hung a short falchion in its worn leather scabbard. The night was too dark for most eyes, but as the woman passed between moon-shadows of cottages and nearby trees, the visitor saw her dark hair with hidden shimmers of red that offset smooth, young skin little more than two decades of age. No true fear or wariness showed in the woman's posture as she moved through the village, fashioning the wooden short-spear.

"Hunter," it whispered to itself with amusement.

The pathetic humor of what it saw was too much to hold in, and it laughed under its breath as it leaped out the window to spider-walk up the cottage wall onto the roof. The dark form shrank and vanished into the night forest.