Chapter 1 – The Hunt

 “There it goes! Don’t let it get away!” A voice shouted from the distance.

What’s going on? A group of people are chasing me and I don’t know why. This doesn’t feel right, but I don’t have time to think about that right now. I need to get away from them as soon as possible. I’ve been running for what feels like hours but I know it’s only been a few minutes. Ok. I need to calm down. All I need to do is loose them in the trees, that should be too hard right? I mean I’m in a forest so… wait when did I enter a forest? Everything is so confusing.

“Fan out and Surround it!” Another shouted, closer now.

Great. Now they have me cornered. They are closer now and all around me. They all have on white robes. That made me pause for a second. Seriously, why would someone give chase in a robe? Idiots. They have weapons too. Swords mostly but I can see some others in there too. Daggers, spears, bows, and one even has a war hammer.

I could take these guys on anytime but I’m so weak right now. What the hell is going on? I should be able to run circles around these guys and they wouldn’t even be able to see my shadow. My legs are starting to shake, I’m loosing strength fast. I must have been poisoned. Shit! I’m out of options, I can’t fight them as I am now. I need to get out of here.

“Ha… HAHA!” I let out a laugh that sounded more like a growl. “You think that I’m just going to give up?” The hunters jump at the sound of my voice. They slow down for a moment looking astonished. What is that look for? Did they not expect me to fight back?

“S-Sir… it can TALK!” a women with a spear shouts to her leader as she takes a step back. The man with the war hammer is shaken but years of battle are not just for show and he quickly calms down.

“Don’t let it escape.” He shouts. “Just keep the circle. It is weak with a Soul Poison, it shouldn’t be as strong right now.”  This calms the rest of the group and confirms my fears.

“I’ll take it down with one swing of my hammer.” The leader boasts. “All we need to do is keep the body intact.” He lifts his mighty war hammer and rushes his enemy, me.

Dammit. I guess I’m going to have to use that. I don’t have time to make it safe, but it’s better than the alternative. I gather power into my front limbs and rise up to meet the leader, and I slash my claws down with everything I have. Letting out a roar as all my strength leaves me.

Riiiipp!!!

….

“Yaaaa!?!?”

I wake with a start. Cold sweat running down my back. What kind of dream was that? Swords, a forest, a-and claws? Breathing heavy, I wipe my hands up and… there normal, normal human hands. I force myself to breath slower as I continue to stare at my hands.

“What are yo…” a soft voice next to my ear asked. But before they could finish asking I immediately jump at the sound. Wiping around to see who was so close to me and fall out of my bed in the process. With my cat like reflexes I twisted around to land on my feet. Is what I tried to do? Instead I landed on my face. I stay still for about 10 seconds and just think. I had three thoughts. One what the fuck was that dream, two my face hurts, and three who would be so cruel to push me out of bed. (her faultlaughing [Scripts/tinymce/js/tinymce/plugins/emoticons/img/smiley-laughing.gif])

“That was real smooth lil” said the mysterious voice that I swear is too blame for my misfortune.

I look up and see my sister. Dam it! Ok think of something clever to blame this on her.

“uhh I meant to do that.” I said immediately regretting it. My face pales. Fuck! How was the clever at all? I look back up at her she looked less than impressed with that. I let out a sigh and ask her why she’s in my room.

“Just wanted to tell you that you have ten minutes before I leave for school. I didn’t see you down stairs so thought I’d check on you. Only to watch you slam your face into the floor.” She said as she walked out of my room. I could only hear her laughter down the hall before I could get up.

“Ugh.”  I said. Did she really have to say it out loud? I’m embarrassed as it is. Seriously Lora, you could have given me just a little pity. Lora is my older sister. She is older than me by a year and is about to graduate from high school. She’s so lucky. We have a good sister relationship. Fight over pretty much everything but stick together when things get rough.  We go to the same school so she drives us there. Shit. Did she say ten minutes?

This tale has been unlawfully lifted from Royal Road. If you spot it on Amazon, please report it.

“I’m going to be late!” I yell.

As I rush to get changed and do my hair I try to remember what I was dreaming about but it’s gone. Guess it wasn’t that important. Anyways I finished in just under 8 minutes. A new record I think. I give myself a once over in the mirror.

I see a shor… ‘height challenged’ girl with pitch-black hair that trailed down to her shoulder blades combed over to one side of her face covering one eye. With stunning light blue eye, a slim nose, and full lips. She also has killer boobs… she does… ok fine. She is flat as a board. She’s wearing a black and red school blazer and skirt. As I finish checking myself out I noticed that my skin was a little pale. Maybe I should go outside more. I’m looking a little emo.

I hear my sister honk her horn. So I rush down the stairs. Only to slip on the last step. For the second time today I end up on the ground. I make a face. I should know not to run down the stairs. Doing a quick body check. Everything is good, all green. I jump up and run out side, to Lora and got in her car. She gave me a stare.

“Did you just fall down the stairs?” Lora asked.

“…how did you?” I asked her in surprise. She just gives me a concerned look.

“You need to be more careful Lil. One of these days you going to get hurt.” She starts the car and we head to school. On the way she gave a small sad smile and whispers “And we both know how fragile you are.”

She drops me off so that I wouldn’t be late and goes off to park. I made it to class with seconds to spare. I take my seat in the back of the class. As class starts I already start to zone out and daydream about summer. There is only a few more weeks before the end of my junior year. Then I’m free.

Now if I could make some friend to hang out with, that would be great. I only really have one ‘sort of friend’. I say sort of because I don’t think she counts me as one of her friends. She doesn’t really open up to me and I feel like she’s hiding something. I’m working on it. Anyway I want to be her friend because she has the same problem as me.

We are both lonely people.

I’m just not good with people, they just make me nervous when I try to talk to them. I want friends but when I have any interaction with them they just give me weird looks and then I lose my nerve and run away. But I don’t get that from Jade. Well… I do but something just makes me want to be close to her. I can’t explain it. I just feel like there is a connection. I don’t know why Jade doesn’t have friends, but maybe if I could get closer to her, she will tell me.

Its break time, we get a few minutes between classes to do whatever. Some students get up to stretch their legs and socialize, but I just stay at my desk. I don’t have a reason to move so why force it?

No! I slam my fist onto my desk. This is my problem. If I give up now I should forget about having friends. I need to be proactive. I get up and look around only to meet the eyes of everyone in the room. I… guess I slammed my fist to hard.

This is where my primal instincts kick in, Fight or flight?

I booked it out of the class room blushing fiercely and ran down the hall. God. No, No, NO. What was I thinking? Obviously people would look if you just jump up and punch a desk. I don’t think I can go back. It’s just too embarrassing. I slow down and let out a sigh. This day is just not my day.

Class is starting again but I don’t what to go back. I think I’ll go hide out somewhere till school is over. The library seems like a good place to hide. Lots of shelves to stay hidden from the teachers. I nod my head and sneak around the hallways until I get to the library doors. I creep up to the windows next to the door to see if anyone is in there. Nope, all clear, let’s go~. I push the doors open and walk right in. I head to the farthest shelves on the second floor to lay low for a while

Crap. Someone is already there. I jump back to hide myself behind a shelf. Out of all the places why would someone hide back here? Are they antisocial? (Ignoring the fact she was there for the same reason). I take a peek around and I see a wild looking girl. Her hair is short, dark red and spiked back. She is taller than me, but really who isn’t? She looked a little tan but not by much. I lower my gaze seeking what I know will defeat me, but I must look. If I don’t then I lose. Yup, I should not have looked. I jump from around the shelf and yell.

“Stupid boobie monster what are you doing hiding over here?” she looks up from what she was doing and just gives me a blank look. Not at all surprised that I was there or fazed by what I called her.

“I have a free period so I’m checking out a book. What are you doing here, Lilith? Shouldn’t you be in class?” she coldly said. Yup same old Jade, Nothing gets past her.

“ya, I’m not having the best day today and just wanted to get away from everyone.” I told her as I look down at my feet.  “First my sister ‘pushed’ me out of my bed onto the floor.” She makes a surprised grunt but I continue. “Then I was almost late for class and to top it all off I embarrassed myself in front of the whole class.” I look back up at her for support only to see she had a look of surprise on her face.

“What’s wrong?” I asked.

“I didn’t know you had a sister. Who is she?” This time it was my turn to look surprised. “Her name is Lora she is a senior this year. She is on the swimming team and track. How do you not know who she is?” I stare into her bright violet eye looking for answers. Wait violet eye? I look again but they were her normal green eyes. My head starts to hurt. That was weird.

“I’m on the swimming team and the captain of the track team, there is no girl by that name on either team.” She looks at me concerned. What is she is she talking about? “That’s not true she drives me every day to school, she’s been going here longer then I have. Why would she lie about being on those teams?” her eyes are flashing from green to violet then back again. What’s going on? The headache is getting worse.

“Lilith, I’ve only ever seen a women drop you off. She looked like she was in her twenty’s and way too old to be going to high school”

“W-What?” I stammer. It is getting hard to focus now.

*tring*

Your Mental Defense has increased!

…

“What?” I said in surprise. Before I could think about what that meant I was hit with a rush of information and blacked out.