The Huntsman's History
Raised by shapeshifting wolves, the Huntsman grows up in their pack, but later left under mysterious circumstances. For one of the pack members, Adair, this is a great betrayal.[3] The Huntsman now lives in a forest, along with a companion wolf whom has one eye as red as blood and one eye as black as night. ("The Heart Is a Lonely Hunter," "Shadow of the Queen")
One day, after killing a deer to provide food for both of them, he sheds a tear over the animal's necessary death. Later, the Huntsman and his wolf head into a bar. Though the people insult him for crying over killing a deer, he responds calmly, and notes that men who hunt for sport aren't men at all. This angers one patron, and he attacks the Huntsman, who stabs him in defense. Unseen, the Evil Queen watches his actions from her magic mirror and is satisfied with his actions. She has her guards bring him to her castle. She desires his help to assassinate someone, but he will only agree one a condition: if the wolves are protected from being hunted. After the Queen concedes to his request, the Huntsman is sent to murder the Queen's stepdaughter, Snow White, and bring back her heart as proof of death. Disguised as one of the Queen's guards, the Huntsman accompanies Snow White as she walks into the forest. She reveals she knows who he is and of his intentions, surprising him. Snow then kicks him, and while he is doubled over in pain, she runs off into the forest, to which he throws off his armor and gives chase. He later finds Snow White sitting against a tree, but stops, puzzled, to see her writing a letter, which she asks that it be given to the Queen. As the Huntsman reads the letter, he is moved by what she wrote and cannot bring himself to kill Snow White. Instead, he fashions a whistle out of a twig for her to use whenever she is in trouble. Snow is shocked that he is letting her go, and he tells her to leave quickly before he changes his mind. After letting her escape, the Huntsman takes a deer's heart for the Queen, hoping, but knowing it wouldn't work, to fool her. He then returns to the castle and attempts to read Snow White's letter to the Queen, but she throws it into the fireplace. Upon further inquiry, the Queen reveals that Snow White once betrayed her trust by revealing a well-kept secret. Once the Queen receives the heart, she tries to place it into one of her vault boxes, however, none of them magically open, making her realize the heart does not belong to that of a human. Realizing the Huntsman has tricked her, she rips out his heart to pay for what he'd done. To demonstrate what will happen if he crosses her again, she squeezes the heart; causing the Huntsman to fall to the ground in agony. She says he can never be free of her, as she has his heart, and that he will also never be able to fully and truly love someone now. She says from that day forward he lives to serve her. On her orders, the guards drag him away into her bedroom.
