Winterspell

Winterspell (lunar)

Tess let her umbrella fall, "No," her eyes looked pass him and on the body he'd let in his wake.

"Why?" Tess asked still more in shock than anything else her voice quivering.

"I have no obligation to explain myself to you," the man replied.

"Why?" Tess asked again.

The man narrowed his eyes and sheathed his katana. "So this one snapped," he said without much expression.

Without much of a warning his right fist connected with her abdomen and she fell unconscious over his arm.

His objective wasn't to have her dead but instead alive.

He sensed something different with the higher-ups, they seemed too eager to send him on a such a low ranking mission and even though he was taught not to question his superiors the thought that something was wrong persuaded him to check it out.

He tossed the unconscious Tess over his shoulder and stepped back his image distorting until it vanished completely.

Alice...

My eyes opened to a lighter darkness and the sound of the river. The pain had subsided and I could move a little.

Water...

I reached out and took hold of the first rock I touched, pulling my self to the river but the rock just came loose.

My lips felt dry. The cold air stabbed at me.

I felt hungry and at the same time, thirsty.

Even then weakness had sunk deep inside me and I had no way of refusing it.

Water...

I decided to try again, this time taking hold of a larger rock. I pulled myself forward a little.

Come-on don't just give out on me, I thought, my arms barely had enough strength to pull myself forward and at this rate I wasn't gonna be getting water anytime soon.

I thought of calling out, but decided against it, no one helped me before so why would someone help me now?

And it would probably take all I had just to call out.

A distant howl cut through the night.

Ha...

If I'm lucky I just might be food for some other poor creature.

I might even still be alive then.

I couldn't help it, I was barely holding on. How many times was I supposed to die already?

No...

How many times have I come out of dangerous situations unscathed? I can't give up.

I reached for another rock and pulled forward and again and again until my fingertips touched cold water. I pulled myself closer until my face was over the slow moving stream.

The moon shone against the water's surface turning it into a soft dim mirror.

My face seemed different somehow, my hair was disheveled, lips appeared to be chopped and white and my eyes seemed like that of a wild animal, intense, piercing

And blue? Maybe it was only my imagination.

I attacked the reflection and splashed the cold water on my face. Before drinking some.

After a while I could sit up. I knew that the best thing to do was to find somewhere I could rest until the sun came back out or at least to get a little warmth but getting out of this damn Forrest was all I could think of .