Dedicated to dreamsRepiphanies for her wonderful comments on this book. If it were not for you I would not have the confidence to continue and carry on.
Authors Note: I'm sorry if parts of this seem unfinished or unedited, that's probally because they are. I had to get this chapter out as soon as possible, but editing will be done later.
3 x
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Chapter One:
"We will always remember Mina..." The words rang in Sasha's ears."We will always remember..."but they hadn't, had they? They didn't remember how she must have suffered, how she must have cried as the black heart mushroomtook hold, slowly shutting down her organs, grinding her bones to a halt, and finally piercing her heart, and killing her.
They had dragged her lifeless body back to the clearing where they found her, only a few hundred yards into the woods. They'd even put flowers around her! Such mockery! How could they do that? To thier own queen!
Queen . . .
That word brought back so many memories . . .
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'You will be queen of a kingdom one day, my beautiful little princess,' Sacha's mother said. 'You will grow up to marry the prince of the eastern province, and then you shall be the envy of every girl in the whole world!'
'Oh, mother, I do hope his majesty will like me.' Mina turned to her mother, a look of worry on her face. 'What if he thinks I am ugly, or spitful or a wicked girl?'
Sacha's mother looked sternly into her daughters face, 'then he is a fool who does not deserve you anyway!' she said. 'Let no man trick you into thinking you are not perfect, for all they want is to destroy you. Women are angels, and all men do is place you high apon a pedestal, before ripping away your wings, and kicking the pedistal from beneath your feet, leaving you bleeding, and crying in the dirt. We must make our own way in this cruel world, and we must destroy the riegn men have over us!'
'Then why am I to marry the prince, mother?' Mina, asked.
'Because, my dear,' Sacha's mother said. 'Because sometimes a woman must use everything in her possession to get into a mans heart, before destroying it, and everything he possessed. You must get into his heart, and then you must take control of his kingdom, and destroy everything, and everyone that has suppressed us.
It was then that Sasha, who had previously been sitting quietly in a chair, watching as her mother had brushed Mina's shining locks to perfection, spoke up; ' But surely, mother, not all men are as cruel as you would like to believe. I know that Charlie is-'
'Charlie!
' Her mother screeched. 'You are spending time with that wretch again! What have I told you about spending your precious time with that boy!'
'Charlie?' Mina asked, getting up from the stool that she had been sitting on between her mothers legs. 'Do you mean the grubby little piece of rif-raf that you are always running off with? Why, he's nothing more than a common blacksmiths boy! Mother, she has been running around with a commoner!'
'Not a prince, not a lord, not an earl, not even a merchants boy; but a commoner, a pauper, rif-raf, trash! Not worth the energy it would take to spit on him! How could you! How could you disobey me in this way!'
Sasha's mother began to stalk towards her. 'How dare you!' She raised her hand. 'How dare you!' She screamed again, as her hand came down.
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Sasha snapped out of her daydream as the a crack sliced the night. For a moment Sasha wasn't sure is it was the crack of a branch or of her mother's hand crossing her cheek once again. Then she remembered that she hadn't seen her mother in ten years. She let out a sigh.
Another crack sounded behind her, closer this time.
Sasha dived behind a tree, instincts kicking in.'What is it? Is is dangerous?' Her mind screamed. The Forest was her home, she was a huntress, how could she have gotten so distracted? The first rule of the Forest was never, ever get distracted, and the second was always, always stay alert, even while you're sleeping.
Sasha peered out from behind her tree, and searched the gloom for the source of the sound. Light filtered in through the thick folige of the trees above, but did nothing to pierce the darkness that hovered on the ground like a fog. The only things that would grow on the ground was thesvishbar; a horrible slimy plant with razor sharp thorns and bulbous red flowers that stank like back end of a pig and spewed out a toxic liquid that at best made one hulucinate, and a worst, was leathal.
That was why Sasha was in the Forest. It was the only place that the flowers grew in such abundance. It was due to some chemical substance in the soil, but she had never listened to Mersigh, her mentor before . . .
Sasha had to squeeze her lips tight shut. Before . . .
'Before what?' her mind scolded her.'Before what, exactly? Before he died? Before he was killed? Before he disapeared? Yes, the thing is, you don't know what happened to him, do you? And why was that? Why don't you know? Because you ran away! Because you left him! You left him to die, didn't you? At the hands of the people who he had helped for all those years! Not his enemies, not his demons, not even those non-believers. No, you let him die at the hands of hisfriends. The very people who you had led there beacuse of yourbig mouth. Because -'
'Shut up!' she screamed at herself.
CRACK!
She was getting distracted again. She needed to concentrate!
Again, she peered around the tree.Nothing . . .
But then . . .
There it was! Something dark and shadowy, moving too quickly through the dark to be human, but it walked on it's hind legs.Soothrae.
'Damn . . . '
This was going to be trickier than Sasha had thought. She knew that Soothrae lived in the Forest, but she didn't know they were came out this far, they usually stayed in the mountins; they were nothern beasts after all, but it seemed that this one had left the pack. 'Or it killed the rest of them.' her mind whispered.
Soothraes were incredebly dangerous. Poison fangs, and claws that whould tear you into ribbons with one swipe. Soothraes were half man-half demon monsters; soothsayers who had gone too far into the fog of profecy, selfishly trying to unlock the secrets of thier visions, and had been infected by the beasts that lived there.
Cold eyes glinted out of the darkness, it knew she knew it was there. Suddenly, it was gone.'Oh, shit.' she thought. If you saw a soothrae, you kept it in sight-
Out of the corner of her eye she saw another glinting, she whipped her head around, but it was already gone. 'Its playing with me.'
Another glint.
She turned slowly. 'Alright big boy-'
Impact form the side, her breath was forced from her chest. 'Too close, too close! Get up, get up, get up!' She was on her feet, catching her breath, searching the gloom. There.
Sasha dodged out of the way of the hurtling monster just in time. The world seemed to slow around her as it rushed past, the soft breeze it made brushed her cheeks, and she could feel its fur against her hand. She grabbed it, and her arm was nearly wrenched off. As it began to round on her, she whipped out the knife she kept on her hip. 'Steady.'
It came at her poison fangs knashing, killer claws reaching for her. Just as it was about to get her, she twisted, getting between the claws, and she drove the blade home, into its chest. It froze, blinked twice. And then it looked at her, with such sad eyes, her heart seemed to wrench itself from her chest, and then it melted, actually melted. Her blade slipped through the beast like it was melted butter. And then it burst into dust, and the dust settled on Sasha's cothes and in her hair.
"Eeeeewww! Soothrae dust! Get it off me! Get it off! Ewww! I need a bath after this!"
