The sight of blood in snow is a startling one. The ghastly contrast of the deep crimson against cool white grabs your attention in a shock even from a single drop- even when it’s what you were looking for. Hunting for game in previous years within many a snowy wood taught him this. He follows the red droplets instinctively.

Only he wasn’t here as a huntsman- he was here as a guide. And he wasn’t searching for game- he was searching for the woman he is meant to be guiding. The blood sighting made him hopeful he was heading in the right direction but fearful that he was too late. He hopes he isn’t.

That hope is the only thing that allows him the will to follow this foreboding trail. The drops are far enough apart at first that it allows him time to think as he locates the next in line. He hopes the blood does not belong to her, and due to the chaos that erupted from camp only the night before he knew everyone present may very well have a trail of blood all their own from a myriad of possible injuries.

The fact was, though, that he had already come across most of the people who had been in attendance to last night’s horrors. They were far behind him now, left to never bleed again. The droplets become easier to follow. He winces inwardly at its possibilities.

Maybe she was able to put good use to that blade she carries. Maybe all that time she spent with him on this journey is proving useful, and she’s getting ready to place a meal over a fire. Maybe she’s tucked away in a cave so as to hide the smoke from unwanted company. Finding other people in these woods,or being found by them, was highly unlikely. Life here is harsh making it sparse of the living.

Maybe this blood trail will bring him to one of the camp’s few survivors who also doesn’t know how she escaped or how far she made it.

As droplets become splats he curses. As splats become little pools he prays again that this blood doesn’t belong to her. He decides if it does that a prayer should be said for the one who caused it. For her, he would become a monster the likes of which these woods haven’t seen, a monster far worse than the one that resides within and with which the woods are already very familiar.