Chapter 3: Chains of Silence

I keep to myself. Most folks only know me from the roadside, where I sell what I grow. I don't linger in their gossip. I don't drink at their tables. To them, I'm just the hooded farmer— polite enough, gone the moment the coins change hands.

My life circles the soil. Potatoes, carrots, squashes, melons—rows of labor that fill my days with sweat and silence. Season after season, I haul them to market and cart heavy with the earth's weight.

With what I earn, I buy only what I need. Candles for the long nights. Blankets for the cold. A few cups, a few bowls for the bare table at home. Tools too, plain and sturdy, so I can turn the soil again when the season shifts. 

Nothing more. Nothing less. For the villagers, that's enough. For me, it's survival.

The hut waits at the edge of the fields, nothing more than stone and timber stacked against the wind. Inside: a chair, a table, a bed pressed to the corner. Enough, no more.

The walls breathe damp, the roof whispers when the wind pries through. Every object carries use and nothing else. No color. No trinkets. No memory carved into wood.

Sometimes I stand in the doorway longer than I should, staring at the emptiness like it might shift if I keep staring. But the house never changes. Four walls, one shadow, silence thick enough to choke. A life measured in tools and soil.

The road stretched long and empty, dust rising soft under my boots. As a cart creaked ahead I kept my pace steady, hood drawn low, the weight of baskets dragging at my shoulders. While I pull the carts on my way.

The fields fell away behind me, and the air thickened with voices. Distant first, then sharper, threaded with the smell of sweat, of animals penned too close, of onions split open in the sun.

Each step forward pressed the hush tighter against my ribs. Alone, the silence is mine. Among them, it turns against me.

The roadside market buzzed the same as always—cartwheels creaking, hens clucking in their cages, the air heavy with barter and bodies. I set my baskets in a line, laying the vegetables out with the same care I use in the fields. Hood low, back bent, nothing to make me stand out in the noise.

A farmer stopped, weighing a melon in his hands.
"Fine crop," he said.
I dipped my head. "The rains were kind."

Two women passed, whispering while they picked through the carrots.
"He never joins the feasts."
"Nor the community prayers."
I didn't look up. Just tied their bundle with twine and said, "Three for one coin."

Every trade was quick, polite, done. But I felt the eyes. Watching the way I kept distance, how my voice never rose. The market hummed around me, but beneath the chatter there was always a hush that seemed to follow wherever I stood.

A man swayed toward me, his steps loose, breath sour with ale. He leaned across the stall, eyes narrowing like he could force the hood from my face with a squint.

“Never see you at the tavern,” he said. His words slurred, thick with ale.

I bound a bundle of carrots with twine, tight enough to cut the stems. “I don’t drink.”

He laughed, thick and cracked. “A man who doesn’t drink? That’s no man at all.” His hand slipped across the table, grazing mine. The skin was hot, pulsing, too close. I felt the blood behind it—sluggish, heavy, reeking through the mask of ale.

My jaw clenched. One second more and I would hear it rushing in his veins.

“One coin,” I said, flat.

He stared, then tossed the coin down hard enough to rattle the wood. As he stumbled away, I caught the hush ripple out, spreading through the market like a cold breath.

The air pressed heavier the longer I stood there. Coins clinked, dull as stones dropping into a well. Voices dipped low when they thought I couldn’t hear, but the hush carried sharper than any shout. My hood caught every murmur, threading them close against my ears.

“Too quiet, that one. Don’t you think?”

“He looks carved from a statue, not aged.”

“His silence hides something— like a coffin nailed shut, waiting to split.”

Each word slid closer, close enough to scrape. I tied another bundle, fingers steady on the twine, but inside my chest the stillness thinned, stretched raw. They circled it now—the thing I hide. Not truth, not yet, but suspicion sharpened at the edges.

One man lingered too long at the stall, his shadow spilling across my baskets. He said nothing. Only stared, head tilted like he was waiting for me to shift, to slip. My pulse pounded louder than his, but I forced myself still. Bent. Silent. The longer he watched, the more the hush spread, a ripple in the market that bent around me like water.

I lowered my head deeper. The weight of their eyes burned hotter than the sun.

A woman brushed my hand as I gave her change. She flinched. "Cold," she muttered, rubbing her palm against her skirt like she could shake me off.
Another voice: "He bends like an old man, but his hands—steady as stone."
And softer still: "I swear he looks younger now than he did last year."

I stacked potatoes into a crate, fingers tight on the wood. Don't react. Keep still. They don't know what they're seeing.

A boy lingered at the edge of my stall, staring into the shadows of my hood.
"Mama," he whispered, tugging at her sleeve, "his eyes—"
She pulled him back quickly. "Don't stare. Say nothing."

Just a sudden after. A child stumbled on the road, skin scraped against stone. A thin cry, hushed by his mother. Barely a scratch. Barely a nothing.

Too close, I thought, lowering my head deeper. They're seeing too much today.

Too close. The scent clawed through me. Blood smeared the stone. Just a scratch, yet my teeth ached as though gnawing bone.

And I remembered—

Not the whole night, not the screams, only fragments: a throat torn open in the dark, the heat spilling down, my hands clamped too tight. Breathless, drowning in red. Their face lost to shadow, but the pulse—oh, the pulse I can never forget.

It flickered inside me now, as though the child’s blood was calling it back. I shut my eyes, breath shaking.

The market blurred, voices muffled like water poured over flame. All I heard was the throb, steady, steady, louder than the wheels, louder than the bartering. One shallow scrape of skin, and still it rang through me like a bell struck clean.

My tongue pressed against my teeth, hard enough to split. The ache in my jaw spread, each muscle straining against restraint. If one drop fell, if copper touched the air again, I would move. I would break.

One more step and I would break the silence I swore to keep.

Still, I turned before I could stop myself. The copper tang of blood laced the air—faint, but sharp enough to stir something deep in my chest. My breath caught. My jaw locked tight.

Not here. Not now.

I forced my hands to keep moving. Passing squashes. Counting coins. Murmuring thanks. Every sound came too loud—the graze of whispers, the hollow quiet after my voice, the throb of a pulse when a wrist brushed too near.

Patience. Restraint. Silence. That's survival. 

I repeated it in my head, but I could feel the market watching me—not as a neighbor. As something else.

The moment slid past, unseen by anyone else. Inside, though, the calm I held felt thinner—stretched tight, one breath from tearing.

The crowd thinned as the sun leaned west. Villagers gathered their bundles, voices fading down the road. I packed what little was left, stacking baskets with care, grateful for the quiet. My hands moved too quick, like distance alone could scrape away the copper still burning at the back of my throat.

By the time I set the last basket in the cart, the market was empty. The hush settled over me, a relief but also exposure. With no crowd to sink into, the silence pressed closer, reminding me I was only pretending to belong.

The road through the village stretched narrow, lined with shuttered windows. Smoke curled from their houses, carrying the smell of stew and bread. Voices murmured inside, warm, blurred with laughter. Behind those doors they gathered, safe, thick in the kind of closeness I could never touch.

I walked past unseen, cart wheels groaning. Not one curtain stirred. Not one face leaned out to greet me. They pretended I wasn’t there, and perhaps I wasn’t—not to them. Only a shadow between their walls.

I slung the tools I'd bought over my shoulder and turned toward the road home—

—and collided.

The jolt knocked the air from me. A young woman, arms full of parcels, had come fast around the bend. The weight on my back shifted, tools spilling as the bag hit the ground. Iron struck stone with a sharp ring. The shock rattled through my chest.

She gasped. "Oh! I'm so sorry— here, let me—" She dropped at once, gathering the scattered things, her hands grazing over wood and iron alike.

I froze for a breath, hood bent low. Then I crouched, slow, gathering the tools one by one. My voice slipped out low, almost a mutter. "No harm done."

Her eyes lifted—and caught under my hood. For a moment she forgot the tools in her hands.

Not an old man. Not even close. Silver hair spilled forward, smooth, bright as frost in late sun. My skin pale, unlined, too young for the bent posture I carried. When my eyes flicked to hers— just for an instant— she saw the blue. Deep enough to swallow the world.

Her breath caught. She knew it then. That voice hadn't belonged to some stooped farmer. It belonged to a man still in his prime.

She didn’t look away. Her eyes dragged across my face, searching every line, every hollow. Her lips parted like she meant to speak, but no word came. The silence between us stretched taut, loud as a scream.

If she said anything— if she named me aloud— it would unravel everything. I could almost hear it: the market whispering, the spreading fear. My hand twitched toward her wrist without thought, hunger already coiling there, restless, waiting for the slip.

Our fingers touched over the handle of a spade. She was startled. My hand was cold, too cold, yet strong, veins dark beneath skin smooth as stone.

She didn't notice the edge of the metal cut her palm. Just a graze. A thin red line bloomed across her skin.

I noticed. I couldn't not.

The scent hit like a blade—iron-sweet, burning, absolute. My body locked. Breath caught halfway. Fangs pressed, straining to break skin.

Don't move. Stay! Don't show it.

But hunger shredded the thought. It roared up, brutal, sudden, tearing from my gut to the roots of my teeth. The world narrowed to that wound—one drop beading, trembling, pulsing like a heart outside her chest.

My jaw clamped so hard pain shot through my skull.The world collapsed to that wound—one trembling drop, pulsing like a stolen heart held outside her chest, begging me closer. A sound scraped up my throat, half-growl, half-plea. I smothered it, but it tore my lungs raw.

My hand snapped forward before I could stop it. I seized her wrist, yanking her close, her bleeding palm a breath from my mouth. The scent tore through me—red, savage, commanding. My body convulsed, hunger howling for me to rip, to drink, to end.

"Do you know…" The words scraped raw from my throat, half-beast, half-man. "Do you know what I could do to you?"

My grip turned punishing, a threat in itself. I stared at the pulse hammering under her skin. The beast inside me leaned closer, closer—

—spilling across the dirt in chaos, I tore myself back. Her wrist dropped from my grasp like fire. She stumbled, eyes wide.

"Leave." The word cracked from me like a lash— cold, final, merciless.

She startled, stumbling back, and the things in her arms tumbled loose — bread, jars, cloth — all scattering across the dirt like frightened birds. She teetered between staying and fleeing, and I could not read her— whether she would wither into silence beside me or hurl herself into the dusk, her face a mask of terror.

Her cut palm trembled at her side, blood catching the last thread of daylight. I saw it even when I tried not to. The scent struck like a blade— iron-sweet, merciless, alive. My body seized. Breath snagged. Fangs ached, straining to tear through flesh.

I bent low, as if the weight of my tools could pin me down, chain me. My hands shook against the straps. My teeth ached with phantom hunger. My chest pounded, ribs straining with every breath.

The road leaned west, lonely in the dusk. Silence thickened— no voices, no cart wheels, only the press of wind and the thunder of my own heart. Yet in that silence, I still heard her: the beat of her pulse, the whisper she left behind. I couldn't catch the words, but the sound was enough. Prayer. Fear. A plea to be spared.

I almost turned. The beast inside demanded it. To look. To smell. To drink. My jaw locked until pain spread through my skull. I forced my stride forward, uneven, dragging myself into the dark.

But she stayed with me. Every step. Her pulse. Her blood. Her fear.

This would not fade.

How long before my silence broke? How long before restraint shattered, and chains meant nothing?

The wind stirred the grass, carrying copper on its breath. I staggered once, fists curling until nails split skin.

Next time. The words did not fade— they whispered close, binding me like a necklace of stone.

I saw it as if it was already happened. A throat under my hand, fragile as clay. The tear of skin, the burst of heat, the flood filling my mouth until nothing else remained. A scream crushed beneath my teeth, swallowed before it could reach the air.

The wind carried it to me—copper, heavy, burning at the back of my tongue though no blood spilled here. I clenched my fists until nails tore skin, but even that pain dragged me deeper into it. 

Chains rot. Chains break.

I moved forward, uneven, every step dragging the hunger with me. The dark pressed close, and I felt it breathing at my side, step for step.

This would not pass. The night would end, but the hunger would not.

To be continued....