Story 791: The Widow’s Seize

The silence after the slaughter was almost sacred. The village of Black Hollow had been reduced to a rotting corpse, its streets littered with the mangled remains of its people. Selene Nocturna stood at the heart of it all, her black lips curling into something between amusement and hunger.

The Pale Widow had done this before. Many times. But tonight, she was in a mood for something more... intimate.

She walked through the wreckage with the grace of a queen surveying her kingdom. Flickering green light danced across her skin, a soft necrotic glow leaking from the wounds of the dead. Their souls had not yet fled—she had made certain of that.

A single survivor remained.

A young woman, no older than twenty winters, crawled toward the remnants of a burning home. Her skin was pale with terror, streaked with ash and blood. She had hidden beneath the bodies of her family, pretending to be dead. But Selene had always known.

"You poor thing," the necromancer whispered.