InuYasha Fan Fiction ❯ In the Kingdom of the Buck ❯ Something in the Trees ( Chapter 1 )

The scout stared ahead perplexedly. He could have sworn he'd seen movement, naught more than a shift in the shadows, but he knew it had been there.

Perhaps just a bird or a leaf? He thought to himself.

Suddenly a stick broke and his horse spooked slightly.

And then he saw it again, this time without a shadow of a doubt. Much too large to be a bird, and too upright to be a deer. It couldn't be anything BUT human.

Without a moment's hesitation, he strung his bow and took aim. In a simple movement, the arrow released. The entire action had in itself become a reflex after a lifetime of training and use, hunting with his father.

There was silence in the instant after the bow twanged and the arrow flew true. The scout held his breath and then it came; a shriek of fear and pain and sudden blind anger, followed quickly by the extremely audible thud of something knocking into a tree and falling to the ground.

Grinning to himself, the scout spurred his horse towards the target. Upon entering the clearing, he saw…nothing?

But to his right, unseen in the shadows, his quarry lay, silent as the grave. He swiftly dismounted, stooping to examine some broken brush and up-turned leaves. There he found the arrow's shaft. And blood.

`A great deal of blood,' he thought.

The blood was warm and wet and sickeningly red. By the way it was sprayed everywhere, he guessed that whatever it was had crashed around the clearing when it heard him coming.

While the scout examined the blood, his horse was also examining. Its more sensitive ears and nose had detected the third presence in the clearing, where it lay huddled in the shadows radiating fear and pain and struggling to make itself as small and still as possible. The powerful white equine made not a noise to betray the presence of his master's prey, but merely ambled closer.

And then…

`Hello.'

*

Pain shot through her body, like an explosion with an epicenter in the middle of her back. Sharp, penetrating and mortal, it struck her as she tried to jump from one tree to another. She had taken to the trees some time ago, flitting from one to the next. The force of the impact forced the air from her lungs in an unconscious cry of pain and surprise, and knocked her from her precarious perch on one particularly thin branch.

The original pain of the arrow in her back was nothing compared to the white light that blocked out all other color when she landed heavily on the moist, fleshy forest floor. On her back. In a simple snap, the shaft broke free, and the arrowhead wedged itself even deeper into the thick muscle between her ribs just to the right of her spine.

For a second only her stunned, heavy breathing filled the silence of the forest. And then, through her pain-induced stupor she heard the heavy fall of hooves.

Adrenaline streamed through her veins, causing her to momentarily become somewhat disconnected from her pain. Somehow, she managed to get up and stumble towards safety. In her unusual state of mind, safety was the roots of a large tree at the edge of the clearing, where shadows were the longest. But she wasn't seeing the clearing, or the tree; she was five years old again, going to hide in the hay of the barn. Another day of catcalls and pointed objects thrown in her direction. And the stable was her safety blanket. And Burrich. No one could harm her in Burrich's domain. The stable master would never let anyone hurt the girl. There, surrounded by the warm smells of horses, dogs and hay, she was just another stable hand.

With a groan, she slumped into the shadows, seeing the fluffy hay around her. Her double reality was ripped from her as the thundering hooves grew louder, seeming to make the earth itself tremble, until the brush burst apart to reveal a large white horse with a well-attired rider. He pulled the horse to a sudden halt in the very center of the clearing. He looked around for a moment, clearly confused at the emptiness that greeted him. Even through her pain and fear and the blood pounding at her temples and rushing in her ears, she sensed he was scout, and an inexperienced one at that.

With what seemed more flourishes than ever necessary, he dismounted.

`Burrich would have laughed to see that.'

He stooped, checking the ground a blind man could have seen as her point of impact. She observed as he searched slowly around the area.

`Definitely inexperienced.'

He couldn't even see that the blood lead straight to her; he only saw the splatters on the leaves around him. But her attention was suddenly drawn away from the man to his mount. It had obviously seen her, and was coming closer. Not in any hurry, and in a bored way, but it was coming. It stopped before her, and wuffled softly. From spending as much time in the barns as she had growing up she knew it was simply smelling her, gauging if she were a friend or foe. She hoped to Kami she was a friend.

She felt almost like it was reaching out to her. But she always felt this in the stable. The animals seemed to called out to her, and this had always comforted her. It made her feel connected. But then something else reached her. It was like another presence, so close it seemed to be inside of her.

Suddenly her silence was shattered as a voice reverberated through her mind.

`Hello.'

She had to restrain her gasp of alarm. It couldn't be. It just couldn't.

`Could it? Did it?'

The voice came again.

`He wont find you. Be safe. You hold the key.'

`I what?!'

But the conversation was suddenly cut short by the rider whistling for his steed. Without another thought, the horse went to the man, who again made an ass of himself with much too much formality in the simple act of mounting a horse. But she didn't notice. The pair left, in just as much of a hurry as they had come.