The Obsidian Heart and The Shadow Weaver

Before starting the story I would like to tell you all that the Character List will be at the end of the story along with the Author's Note . Thank you for reading this . Enjoy .

The wind carried a scent that clung to the air like a shroud – the sickly sweet odor of decay, overlaid with something sharp and metallic, like rusted blood. It was the smell of Oakhaven now, a pervasive miasma that seeped into clothes, into homes, into the very souls of its inhabitants. Elara clutched her worn shawl tighter, not against the chill of the evening, but against the creeping dread that had become the village's constant companion. Another light had gone out in the night, another life drained from its vessel. Old Man Hemlock, this time. His cottage door stood ajar, a black maw in the fading twilight, swallowing the last vestiges of hope.
"It took him, didn't it?" whispered young Finn, his voice thin and reedy, his eyes wide and vacant, fixed on the doorway. He looked like a scarecrow, all bones and fear, a common sight in Oakhaven these past weeks. His mother, barely older than Elara, had taken to her bed a fortnight ago, refusing to rise, refusing to eat. Everyone expected her to be next.
Elara didn't need to answer. Everyone knew. The victims weren't just dead; they were husks, their skin like parchment pulled taut over sharp angles, eyes sunken into hollows that seemed to peer into the abyss. Every drop of life force seemed to have been leached away, leaving behind only the terrifying shell of a human. The village healers, skilled in setting bones and brewing poultices, had no explanation beyond a shrug and a mournful shake of the head. The priests, usually a source of comfort, now offered only hollow prayers that felt like whispers against a hurricane. They called it the "Blight," a nameless horror that stole breath and hope, leaving behind only despair.
A guttural sob escaped Mara, Hemlock's daughter, as she stumbled from the cottage, her face a mask of grief and terror. "He was alive just an hour ago! He was… he was warm!" Her voice cracked, dissolving into helpless wails that ripped through the quiet evening. The villagers, gaunt and weary, averted their gazes, each seeing their own inevitable end in Mara's anguish. The collective fear was a physical weight, pressing down on them all, a silent, suffocating shroud that smothered any flicker of courage. Children huddled closer to their parents, and even the dogs seemed to slink closer to the shadows, their tails tucked. A low, continuous murmur of frightened whispers filled the air, like a disturbed hive of bees.
Stefan rode into Oakhaven an hour later, the dust from his journey clinging to his dark, practical clothes like a second skin. His horse, a sturdy bay with tired eyes, seemed to sense the oppressive atmosphere, its ears twitching restlessly, nostrils flaring at the unfamiliar scent of fear and decay. Stefan dismounted with practiced ease, his movements economical, his gaze sweeping over the huddled figures, the boarded-up windows, the palpable fear that hung thicker than the evening mist. He wasn't interested in their whispered tales of vengeful spirits or ancient curses; those were for the common folk who lacked the courage to face what truly lurked in the dark. He was interested in patterns. He always was. Superstition bred complacency, and complacency bred more dead.
His boot crunched on the gravel path as he approached the commotion outside Hemlock's cottage. The wails of Mara had softened to a continuous, desperate hum, a mournful dirge. He ignored the keening and the hushed prayers, his eyes fixed on the house itself. The silence from within was profound, unnatural, like a vacuum where sound should be, a stark contrast to the human sorrow outside.
"Another one, eh?" Stefan's voice was rough, devoid of sympathy, cutting through the morbid atmosphere like a cold blade. It wasn't cruelty, just a lack of patience for emotional theatrics when a threat was at hand. He'd seen enough of it to know it changed nothing, solved nothing.
Elara, startled by his sudden appearance, turned. Her eyes, though shadowed with fatigue, held a spark of defiance that caught his attention. She stood a little apart from the other villagers, a quiet strength about her. "Who are you?" she asked, her voice tinged with suspicion. Strangers were rarely a good omen in Oakhaven anymore. Most rode through quickly, sensing the sickness in the air, eager to leave the cursed place behind.
Stefan didn't answer directly. His focus was already elsewhere. He pushed past the mourners, ignoring their protests and the sharp intakes of breath, and stepped inside the cottage. The air was cold, despite the recent warmth of a living body. The meager furnishings were untouched, undisturbed – a simple cot, a small wooden table, a few earthenware pots. Nothing suggested a struggle, no overturned chairs or shattered crockery. He knelt beside the cot where Old Man Hemlock lay. The old man's face was a grotesque caricature of sleep, his skin stretched taut, almost translucent, as if lit from within by a pale, dying glow. Stefan's gloved fingers brushed against the exposed forearm. Cold. So very cold, as if the very warmth of life had been siphoned away. But not just cold. There was a faint, almost imperceptible discoloration, a spiderweb of fine, bluish lines beneath the skin, converging on a point just above the wrist. It was subtle, easily missed by the untrained eye, but glaringly obvious to him. He’d seen these marks before, in places far from Oakhaven, on victims of things the common folk only whispered about in terrified awe.
He stood, his eyes moving methodically around the small, sparse room, missing nothing. No signs of struggle. No forced entry. Just a subtle, insidious draining, like water seeping into dry earth, leaving behind only dust. He had seen similar patterns before, in other forgotten hamlets gripped by inexplicable horrors, in victims of creatures that fed on more than just flesh and blood, creatures that left a different kind of wound. This wasn't the work of a clumsy beast or a vengeful spirit. This was something far more precise, far more insidious, something that knew how to take without breaking the vessel, leaving behind a chilling testament to its methodical hunger.
"Superstition will get you nowhere," Stefan stated, turning to face the villagers who had cautiously gathered at the doorway, their faces a mixture of fear and growing resentment. "This isn't a ghost. It's a predator. And it leaves marks." He held up his hand, indicating the faint discoloration on Hemlock's arm with a nod of his head. "Not claw marks, not bite marks. But something drew the life out, didn't it? Something that found a way in without leaving a trace." His gaze settled on Elara, his eyes sharp and unwavering, stripping away any pretense. "Tell me about the others. The ones before Hemlock. Were they found like this? Drained? And did they have these… patterns?" He waited, his silence demanding an answer, a cold, hard demand for facts in a village drowning in fear. "Every detail matters, no matter how small or how unbelievable it seems to you. Tell me, has anyone seen anything unusual in the woods, or heard strange sounds at night?"