Emerald Snowflakes

1 - Beasts of Prey

Tou glared at the sun, as it began to set behing the treetops, daring to it sink further than it already had. But the sun did not seem to feel his glare as it continued it's steady decent into the horizon, stretching the shadows across the forest floor.

It was getting late, and the forests of Kian were far from safe after dark.

The night was the time for predators to seek out their prey, and unlike his home nation of Samuar, where the worst preditors had long been extingt. The forest Kian was full of wild beast, each worse than the last, and the worst being the matacut. The very beast his sister-in-law and brother-in-law had set out to hunt.

He had been in the courtyard, enjoying the calm evening while cleaning his sword, when Edma had rushed towards him. He had known straight away that something was wrong, it was part of their bond, he could tell when something bothered his eclaimed.

She had burst into tears as soon as she was in his arms. Her sister, Edma had told him, had gotten into yet another agrument with some members of the High Assembly, and had stirmed out in rage.

This was hardly anything new, since his sister-in-law was known to have a hot temper, and the High Assembly enjoyed reminding her of her 'limitaions' as a woman. It was what Edma had told him afterwards that worried him. She said that Liana had dragged her twin brother with her to hunt down a matacut and bring back it's head, to prove them wrong.

Ignoring the uneasy feeling settling itself in his gut at the thought of the beast they were supposed to be hunting, he urged his horse, Thunder, to ride faster. He had to find them before they got themselves in a mess they could not escape.

He didn't like how far Liana was willing to go to prove those pretentious antiquaties wrong, and this surrpassed any other prank the twins had ever done. This put their lives at stake.

He had set out to search for them as soon as Edma had told him, and he had spent the past hour or so riding through the forest to no avail. He wondered if he was perhaps too late? But he shook the thought away, not willing to think of it. He had personally trained the twins since they were kids, and hiped they would know how to stand their ground. His thought were cut off by a loud roar, followed by what sounded like Leander shouting.

Tou quickly grabbed his sword and dismounted Thunder, before storming off in the direction of the roars. If the beast didn't kill them, he surely would.

A matacut was a giant animal, it was said to be the size of three grown men when it rose onto its hind legs, though few had lived to verify this. The creature was half blind, it relied solie on it's sense of smell and hearing.

Being the largest preditor in the forest made the matacut a greedy beast and it rarly got along with it own kind. Knowing this fact, Tou felt the chill set in his blood when he reached to source of the shouts.

It was not a rare thing cross paths with a matacut in the wild, but to find two in the same location was different tale. Yet somehow that was the perdicament Liana and Leander found themselves in.

His eyes fell upon them as Leander charged towards the larger of the two animals with his sword raised. And just as Liana sought to follow him, she was struck from behind by the second matacut.

For a second the world seemed to slow down. As Liana raised her head in horror, to see the creature steadily shuttling towards her. Tou threw himself forward, desperate to reach her before beast did.