The Iron Blade

The Huntress

I hope you enjoy, will hopefully be writing a new chapter as often as possible, would really appreciate feedback and constructive criticism! Also before you start this story is completely copyright to me, which means it is illegal to copy or reproduce any part of this story without my permission! So please, please, please don't copy this story! 

The moon was a shining slither in the darkness, the wind blew south, her scent went with it. The night was perfect for a hunt. Leilyn jumped nimbly from roof to roof making her way downtown, her jet black hair was tied back from her face into a tight top knot, a dark billowing cape flung over top a tight black one-piece, obscuring her pale face. The cape caught slightly in the wind, an unwanted weight, but one she would not risk forgoing. 

She stopped as she reached the town centre, slipping down from the roof, careful to keep to the shadows, It was easy from there, she simply followed the noise. Music played at full volume, drunk off-key singing accompanying it.

The tavern was more than a little ramshackle. Outside drunk revellers and vagrants alike milled aimlessly around, or lay unconscious on the ground, their clothing covered in puke, alcohol, and God knows what else. The smell of the tavern reflected the outside, gross. Piss and beer twined together to create a not so subtle aroma. It was hard to refrain from pinching her nose to block out the putrid smell.

The inside was little better, as she slipped in a side window she scowled at the mess, tankards of beer covered every rotted surface, most gripped by large, scabby male hands. She watched one ruddy-faced man sprawled over an armchair attempt to drink, he was in a sorry state and his hand wobbled as he brought the beer up to his lips, he barley drunk any, as most ended up splashed on the drunk female sprawled on his lap. She looked on in disgust as he slid his mug over the rotted wood table and slurred for a refill. She debated ending his life then and there but refrained. First her target, he could not be alerted she was here. So nimbly she jumped down from her hiding spot in the eves and began her search.

She found him within minutes, sober despite the empty mug beside him. One she suspected had been filled many more times than once. She hid in a shadowed alcove and watched them. He sat with another man, both of their faces obscured by thick, heavy hoods. While the man he sat with had a cloak made from a plain cheap cloth, his was lined with whorls of gold embroidery and had a slight shimmer in the candlelight. One of the many signs that he was not an ordinary man. She watched as they played a game of cards, her target thumped each card onto the table, his perfectly preportioned hands at odds with the gnarled man opposite him. Even with the cloak, she knew who those ugly fingers belong to. Clinton Flynn, a bastard if there ever was one, he was renowned for his piss poor ideas about woman, and for what he did to them when he thought none were looking. Of course, he would be hanging around with the likes of Clinton Flynn she could only imagine what cruel schemes the two of them were plotting. Perhaps she would kill to birds with one stone tonight she thought as she pulled an iron dagger from her boot. She watched as its bejewelled hilt glistened in the candlelight. Shadow striker, it was called. The blade that all knew of, and the blade that someday, despite the odds would Pierce the king's heart, but for now...his son would have to do. With that thought, she threw the blade.

It whispered through the air, glinting in the soft light before it hit home. A second blade was already flying before Clinton figured out what was happening, another clean shot straight through the heart. She emerged from the alcove and slowly edged up to the dead men, sliding onto the bench that her target sat on. Discreetly she edged her hand under his cloak and pulled out her dagger. It came out in a slick movement. Examining it she looked in disgust at the blood that coated the iron blade. A sticky golden substance, thicker than mortal blood, but blood all the same. Turning the body away to face the wall she ripped his cloak hood off and snarled at what she found underneath.

His face was perfect, even in death he was breathtakingly attractive. He was tanned with golden hair reaching just past his broad muscled shoulders, let loose in a way that just covered his pointed ears. His eyes were cornflower blue, she knew that because the king's sons all had blue eyes. As of right now they were rolled back into his head. Dead as dead could be. She turned around to yank the second nondescript dagger from Clinton's dead body, tucking both into a sheath. With that, she left their bodies for some poor soul to find and made her way home.

It was all over the streets later that evening when she went out to buy dinner supplies. She sat down with a hot muffin she had brought as a treat she had brought from her favourite bakery. She knew the shopkeeper's help was a young girl who loved to gossip. She didn't disappoint.  Leylin listened in as she told a young couple buying dessert the latest. Two killed in a tavern in town, but not any two no, a prince of Valia had been killed by an iron dagger to the heart. Because an iron dagger was the only way you could kill an extremely powerful Fae prince. Her target last night had not been a man, no he had been Prince Esteban, third in line for the Fae throne of Valia, the fourth most powerful Fae in the Realm, yet when the wind blew the right way, even an all-powerful Fae could be caught unaware, an iron blade through the heart was all that it took. The killer was confirmed by two things, the initials L.A inked in gold blood on his chest, and the perfect clean shot through the heart, only marred by a slight tweak left from where the blade had been pulled out, as it was always done when Leilyn killed a Fae. They did not know her name, they did not know anything about her, she had never been seen, at least not by people who were alive, so they called her simply what she was 'Fae killer.' As there were no others, none with the training, skill or guts to go after the Fae.