“The Knight and the Butcherbird”, Alix E Harrow
Published March 11, 2025
In this gritty, haunting tale about doing whatever it takes for love, a small-town storyteller resolves to keep the local monster—and her own secrets—safe from a legendary knight.
Nestled deep in the steep hills, valleys, and surrounding woodlands lies Iron Hollow, a rural community beset by demons. Such horrors are common in the outlands, where most folks die young, if they don’t turn into monsters first. But what’s causing these transformations?
No one has the answer, not even the town’s oral historian, seventeen-year-old Shrike. And when a legendary knight is summoned to hunt down the latest beast to haunt their woods, Shrike has more reason than most to be concerned. Because that demon was her wife. And while Shrike is certain that May still recognizes her—that May is still human, somewhere beneath it all—she can’t prove it.
Determined to keep May safe, Shrike stalks the knight and his demon-hunting hawk through the recesses of the forest. But as they creep through toxic creeks and overgrown kudzu, Shrike realizes the knight has a secret of his own. And he’ll do anything to protect it.
“She knew me then, at the beginning of ourselves, and she knew me now, here at the end, when she did not even know herself.”
I found this Amazon Original Story on Kindle Unlimited (surprise 🙄), after a quick reread of The Six Deaths of the Saint, a story that has cemented its spot on my top 5 favorites list. Like Six Deaths, The Knight and the Butcherbird is a heartbreaking, beautifully twisted fairy tale/dystopian fable hybrid told in under 50 pages. A testament to Harrow’s talent at weaving the most dark, immersive tales that pack huge emotional stakes with the brevity of a gasp. Every word counts and every moment hurts.
The world is bleak: bad illnesses, corrupted land, people barely surviving in the “outlands,” and to top it off, there are demons roaming the woods. Shrike is the oral historian in Iron Hollow; her wife, May, has been turned into (or claimed by) a demon. Meanwhile, Sir John, a legendary knight demon-hunter (Alexa, play “Golden” by Huntr/x), is summoned to kill the monster haunting the woods. Shrike trusts that May is still in there somewhere—human and recognizable.
In this short story set in a fantasy world, Harrow manages to balance grief, love, horror, and hope in a very human way. Her prose is vivid and lyrical; even the most grotesque or despairing images are rendered with compassion. The characters run on love under pressure—I don’t know how else to put it.
If you like dystopian fantasy, queer romance, magical realism, or any story that takes the idea of being “the human inside the monster” and wrings every ounce of meaning from it, then this one’s for you.
Content Warnings
Note: This is not an exhaustive list of content and trigger warnings.
cancer • body horror • death