(P.O.V. Ava)

This all starts three thousand years ago in my village, found in a remote part of what is now known as Ireland. All my life, nothing strange has ever truly gone on. We followed all the rules laid down by the Gods, we prayed for good harvests, and successful hunts; whilst sacrificing the best of what we acquired from both to appease them. I was about fifteen years old when I was to be married off, as was custom of my people. 

If someone wanted to marry me however, they were going to have to catch me. I was granted a minute to run into the woods ahead of my potential suitor, then they had to find and catch me by nightfall, otherwise they weren't allowed to ask for my hand. Three attempts at my hand have been carried out, yet none could catch me.

On the last day of winter, I turned sixteen. The same day, a foreigner stumbled across our town. He had light brown hair and very pale skin. He was thin and his eyes were a blue-green color, he was about 6’0.

He stood out among the shorter and broader men of my village, and he only seemed to look about my age, yet at the time, sixteen was considered an adult.    

     He asked for lodging and food and said he'd be off in the morning. As he spoke, his gaze drifted to me, his eyes widened, as though he may have recognized me?

"Come, you are welcome in my home." I suddenly heard my father say amidst the silence.

I couldn't tear myself from his gaze, his eyes were hypnotic and seemed to draw me in. I flinched as he looked up at my father, severing the connection.

He thanked my father and followed us to the house, as we arrived, I announced I would be just a minute and ran to my room at the end of the hall. I knew they wouldn’t talk of important matters if I was in the room. I then pressed my ear to the door frame and closed my eyes to focus on what was being said. 

"...quite an interest in my daughter." My father was saying.

"I apologize if I was inappropriate," the stranger said, "but your daughter caught me off guard., she doesn't look like anyone else around here."

He was right, most of the women in our village had long brown or red hair, with brown eyes. And never was taller than 5’2, I looked different. I stood nearly 5’5, I had shorter black hair, and vibrant green eyes,

I looked more like my mother whom had died in child birth.

"I am trying to find her a husband." my father said "Yet no one around here seems capable of her hand," he paused a moment then continued. "I'm just afraid she will end up alone for the rest of her life."

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"What must someone do to win her hand?" The stranger asked.

"Catch her." My father said, "she runs into the woods and you have to find and catch her before nightfall, or you forfeit her hand."

I opened the door and both voices abruptly stopped.

The stranger then turned and looked at me again, his eyes seeming to glow amidst the candlelight.

"I thank you for allowing me to stay here tonight." the stranger said, then walked to the guest room and closed the door.

I don't know why I was still up that night when it happened, but it's probably the only thing that allowed me to react as fast as I did.

I heard a creaking sound as though some one was right outside the door. I pulled a knife out of my straw bed, I had always carried one despite my father’s wishes, and held it close as I sat there. I remember that I kept telling myself that it was just my father staying up late... but something didn't feel right about it. There was a chill in the air, and I could feel the hair all over my body stand on end as though preparing for something. Then a loud sound erupted from the window, and I saw the house next to mine go up in flames. The door to my room slammed open and a dark misshapen figure with glowing eyes entered the room. It reached for me, its long fingernails glistening red in the firelight coming from the window. I slashed the knife across its palm.

It pulled back and produced an earsplitting shriek, reaching for me again.

Its blood burned my hands and face where it splashed on them, but I raised the knife again just as the stranger stepped out from behind the creature.

His eyes started to change color and his hands began glowing. He grinned as it attacked again, this time I managed to get it in the throat and it dropped, turning to ash. The stranger looked surprised and raised his hands at me.

I saw a white light and felt my right hand burn on the inside as a mark appeared on it, but before I got a chance to look at it properly, I saw the stranger cut his palm, his blood illuminating from the glow.

Chanting in a language I’d never heard before, I suddenly found myself unable to move. He cut my palm and pressed his palm against it.

A cold sensation filled my body. I lay there unable to move, then darkness filled my vision and I blacked out.

When I came to, I was disoriented and covered in a layer of ash. There was a large wooden beam laying across my stomach, pinning me to the floor. I pushed against the beam and it moved slowly off of me, I stood realizing that I was completely nude. I looked for anything to cover my body, there was a bed sheet that had been drying outside and had managed to stay out of the path of the flames. I quickly tied it around my body and began to assess the damage around me.

My house was nothing but a pile of rubble and ash. I looked at where I had been laying and saw that there was an imprint of my body in the ash, and that I had somehow remained unharmed throughout the entire ordeal. In fact, the only things that were hurting were my back, my palm, and my wrist. My wrist of which, had a strange symbol on it of a crescent moon with three parallel lines. The lines went vertically from the moon. 

I searched for my father among the ruins of the house but I never found him. I searched all of the houses... there was no one left.

I collapsed on a rock in the middle of the village and cried. I felt different, and wrong my blood felt warmer and the sun was killing my eyes.

I remembered the way the man had placed his palm on mine and the cold feeling that rushed my body.

I found a shattered mirror and picked up a piece, careful not to cut myself on its sharp edges and I looked into it my face stared back at me, out of its depths. but the eyes were wrong. Instead of my natural green color, my eyes glowed with an unnatural golden light.

 this is Posted on Royal road and part of it on Quotev.