Chapter 1.

Shadow In The Forest

If the forest were merciful tonight, he would let Laviv die. 

She would walk into an ambush, something so sudden that not even her honed senses could foresee it. He would send so many eyes and snapping teeth her way, not even her sharpened blades could strike them all down.

He would take the burden of choice from her shoulders. 

But for now, the forest was quiet. Cooperative. She wasn’t fooled by it. The only reason she had been able to follow her target’s tracks for hours at this point—slipping from shadow to shadow, from footprint to claw mark—was because the forest had let her.

It seemed arbitrary, the way he decided on what felt like mere whims, like a foolish king might do over a bottle of wine too much. But now she knew better than to assume the forest was merely a creature who let its power get to its head. He could kill, yes, but he could do so much more.

The tracks she was following, for example, he could wipe them away, just like that. Leave her stranded among the barren tree trunks, all bathed in deep shades of blue like rows and rows of sickly patients, wading their way towards a help that would never come. He could create illusions, false hints that would lead her on a wild goose chase until her last dying breath, the only light she would ever see again being the sparse slivers of silvery moonlight filtering through the dense canopy.

The fact that he didn’t do any of that wasn’t merciful. No. It was a taunt. Many who entered prayed for a safe return. To be granted leave of this nightless place to see their loved ones for one more day—but not Laviv. For her, death would be a mercy. A forbidden, sinful mercy that made shame creep up her gut as soon as the familiar thought made its way through her focused pursuit. Her step faltered—just one, but it was one too many. Immediately, she corrected herself, regaining a tight, trained grip that enabled her to do what she had to. 

“Death is soon to come,” she told herself, hoping the forest could hear her. As if she could sneak the thought into his head if only she said it enough times. Death was soon to come, but not yet. She had two tasks left to do, one almost in her grasp and the other…

Her body came to a pause, legs bent in the same crouch she had been in for what felt like an eternity. Lowering herself even further, she leaned over a footprint. It stretched farther than two arm-lengths with three straight lines sticking out from one side—claws—longer than her whole arm. This was her target’s track, one of the many she had followed, and the next one… was gone. Night-damn.

She checked the little glass vial at her hip, the last specks of dust filtering through the little opening that separated one half from the other. Since leaving her assigned scene, the blood, and the victims behind, three full Dust Turns had gone by. Flipping the vial, she reset the time; she needed to hurry. There were only two Dust Turns left until the sun would rise.

Holding her position, Laviv assessed the area. Her targets’ footprints had vanished, but… no. They were not gone. They were covered by another track, a newer one. 

A second Vistre.

The night was still quiet. Only the pine needles above dared to murmur their petty displeasure over the intruder creeping under their shade. Judging by the crisp outlines of these second tracks, and the way the vegetation —grass, moss, and weeds—hadn’t recovered from its weight told Laviv that the second Vistre had been here not more than half a Dust Turn ago. Maybe less. It must have gotten away just before her arrival, and been late enough not to run into the first Vistre, her target—the lucky thing. 

If it had come across this place just a moment before, it would have ended up just like the bodies imprinted in Laviv’s mind. She needed to accomplish her task, and fast, or there would be more blood spilled tonight.

“Talk to me,” she whispered to the forest, knowing he wouldn’t answer. Her eyes followed the smudged trail, the new one, with clean gashes that seemed to run almost diagonal to the second creature’s path. Her target had claws, but this second Vistre… Maybe the gashes were smaller legs or antennas of some kind. And the continuous smudge could be its belly touching the ground, or a carcass it had dragged behind. Maybe it had been multiple creatures, all dragging one carcass…

Laviv shook her head. Theories were no use right now. When it came to these creatures—the Vistre—everything was possible. She would only know for sure once she stared into its hungry eyes, ready to end its pitiful existence. But not tonight. Her target was something else; its death, the utmost priority.

Laviv raised her head, looking off into the distance where the trees eventually blurred together into one shape. The night had only two colors to offer, and still, tonight the earth had not been able to hide its condemning red shade; it had been soaked by it. 

Her assignment had arrived around midnight with a small description and a route. Laviv had hurried through the forests, faster than was wise, thinking, hoping… but no. There was nothing to hope for. Because, as usual, when Laviv arrived, everything had already been over. 

The bodies had already bled out, the cries had been swallowed by the trees, and the Vistre had vanished into the winds. There had been nothing left to do but to gather evidence, bury the dead, and go on the hunt. 

“The Chaos was here,”  the words drifting over the scene came back to her as if having followed her all this way through the forests like an echoing pursuer that turned the Hunter into the hunted. “It’s so much closer to the Rocca than before. What do you think that means?”

The young soldier with his frightened eyes and sickly pale skin had spoken the words, not knowing how sacrilegious they had been. Laviv was no superstitious person, but she knew the power words could have, and giving some of them wings was the most dangerous act of them all. 

The older soldier at his side had barked out a laugh. “What I think it means? It means we’re Night-damn screwed. First, they start to summon at our borders, then the villages, and now near The Orders base?”

“By the Day!” he had cursed after a short pause, face sobering with a nod toward the dead bodies. “I think we will all end up like this. Slaughtered for their nightless experiments.”

They. The Chaos. The Enemy.

They had been there, at the scene, closer than ever before. Four dead, three bodies torn to pieces, and only one left whole—almost unscathed. It had been the one they had used to summon the Vistre with. 

Slaughtered for their nightless experiments.

It was a theory, one just as plausible as any of them. But Laviv didn’t care for theories. The truth was not like an almighty remedy for the evil that lurked at their border and slowly crept its way into the forest. The truth couldn’t fix this. Nothing could, but Laviv’s swords and the blood spilled by every Hunter out there trying to stop the unstoppable. And most days, it seemed not even that was enough. 

Again, before the shame-filled thought could take wings, Laviv shoved it away. She was a Hunter, and this fight was her duty. She owed it to everyone to keep going, to win this war for them. Half of the best people Laviv had ever known had been slain by the claws of a Vistre, and the other half… they were slain by another kind of monster. 

Sure, that the second Vistre wasn’t close anymore, Laviv carefully stepped through its track. She found her targets again, the slightly recovered grass around the deep, four-clawed footprints indicating that the disturbance in her tracking had cost her. The Vistre had gained space on her. 

It couldn’t be more than seconds, but in her world, seconds could be the difference between life and death. Seconds could mean bodies lying at your feet, blood dripping from their killer’s blade, still so fresh and warm that if you could only reach out, dip your hands in, and shove it back into your friend’s throats to bring them back to life… Just one second earlier, and you could have been there to save them—

The crack of the ground breaking open came at the same time as the creature bursting forth from directly underneath Laviv. She barely had enough time to jump sideways, taking the impact on her bad shoulder, and crouch out of reach; an ambush. 

Laviv landed on her feet, her two short swords—Dusk and Dawn—palmed fluidly during the rolling maneuver. Only one second, and Laviv knew two things: one, the forest was not merciful. And two: there was one emotion, one memory, not even her lifelong training could block out. 

If there was any mercy for her, she would have ended up in the creature’s maw before her reaction could set in, being swallowed and shredded by the rows of small teeth, like a neatly arranged banquet where she was the main course.

But here she was, scraping by death’s scythe, cursing and breathing in relief, knowing her duty wasn’t fulfilled yet, but also realizing the power fueling her moves was slowly waning. Tiering. Here she was, having no excuse to die anymore. Not so easily.

The wind howled through the branches above, as if the forest was laughing at her as she rolled her shoulder, the old injury twisting and turning her muscles into a painful mess, before fear and training settled her. She jumped at the Vistre, doing what she did best. She would kill the creature or die trying, never knowing which outcome she would prefer. 

[Thank you for reading the first chapter of “BIRD OF CHAOS”. The full book will be released in mid 2026. The exact release date will be updated in late spring of 2026.]

– with love, Liessa