Allowing herself to breathe for the first time in minutes, a small pillow of dust flies from near her lips, as the healer surveys the area for the hunter. Slowly getting to her feet, wincing at the pain from her back, the healer knows she must follow the hunter. Beaten, but not broken she walks away from the dead warrior and battleground with the conviction of finding the bitch that shot her and taking back what does not belong to her.
Taking life for any measure, Pitborn or otherwise, the hunter has long been a blight to her people. To take without giving back to nature is the only way she knows how to live. The amount of DIL offered for the treasure in her pocket could not be passed up. At the specified meeting place she waits, perched high in a tree, rolling the bag around in her pocket. Playing scenarios in her mind she decides to take the bag out of her pocket and wedge it at the base of a branch next to the trunk in a shady part of the tree then drops down to the ground and waits.
A sound from the bush behind her, she is quick to turn and make her bow ready. Bow strings taught from the pressure her drawn hand has applied, she watches the bush intently waiting for the sound to show itself in the moonlight. The mere sight of the knight tells her this is not who she is to meet. The hunter releases her grip and sends the arrow flying. The knight throws up his shield arm and only just deflects the arrow coming true at his head.
“Ah, lady hunter, I suspected I might run into you out here in the moonlight, but where is your friend?” Taken aback by the knight’s words, the hunter says, “I have no friends in this life”, as she readies her next arrow and looses it in one fluid motion. Again the Knight throws up his shield to deflect the arrow singing directly for his head. This time the arrow lodges itself into and through his shield only three inches from his face. The knight cuts away the arrow with his sword as he says, “do you wish to draw my attention to you as your Pitborn ally comes at my back?” “I told you, I have no friends, and neither do I have any allies, and should you take another step towards me knight, you will die tonight.” Barely considering her promise for death the knight says, “I know of your Segnale friend, hunter. I know because I have seen the body of the warrior that you two faced. I should warn you, I am not as stupid as muscle torn Bagi, and if it’s my life you wish to take, I invite you to try.”
The words of the Knight cause her to second guess her two arrows only hours earlier, and she glances up to her tree with worry. Knowing this glance as the only chance he may get to rush his foe the Knight charges head on with his eyes only just above his shield. Knowing her mistake the second she turned from the Knight, the hunter begins pulling an arrow from her quiver and turns to meet the charge, but only to late. The knight sweeps his shield from right to left and knocks the woman’s arms down as he swings his right hand in for a blow to her head. Off balance, the hunter knows a swing of the blade is coming. Knowing she can not block this attack from the position she is in, she drops to the ground and rolls quickly out of the way and back to her feet, loosing an arrow on her way up. The Knights blow plunges his sword into the ground just as an arrow pierces the armor on his bicep. Knocked back, he reaches for his sword but drops it as he pulls it from the ground. Quickly he brings his shield up as another arrow from the woman comes at him and in the same motion he slides the shield onto his right forearm. The arrow glances off as the knight does a forward roll, grabbing the hilt of his blade on the way up. Thrusting forward from the roll the knight plunges the sword into the hunters belly and drives upward as he rises to eye level with her.
Blood gushing from her wound, she can do nothing but offer an alarmed stare into the eyes of the knight, as red spittle spatters his face when she coughs. Putting his shield to her face the knight forces her back and pulls his blade from her chest, just as he hears a sound from behind. Turning, the Segnale is fifteen feet away, making motions with her hands. “You are too late, Pitborn, I have already slain your ally, and I shall have no remorse for taking your life as wel… The hunter blood soaked and worn, stands at the knight’s back, hand attached to the dagger in the small of his back just below his breastplate. Letting her grip soften as the knight falls forward, the hunter also falls to her knees. “Finish you’re healing, Segnale, or you shall never find your precious satchel” the hunter says as she coughs more blood. Walking in close the healer bends to look into the hunter’s eyes and laughs heartlessly. “I don’t need you to tell me where my stone is, stupid hunter. Even now it calls to me from your tree. I merely healed you so that you may kill the knight and so that I may exact my revenge for the whole you put in my back.” The healer chants a moment while spheres of blood from the hunter’s body rise and seep into her own wounds. Now fully healed and revived the healer waves her hands in front of the hunters face then impales her razor like nails into her forehead six times, the last driven all the way in to the second joint of her fingers. She watches as the hunter’s eyes roll back into her skull then releases one hand from her head and uses the other to toss her against the tree so hard that the satchel drops at the base.
Leaning down she hears many footsteps coming from the brush. Quickly the healer pockets her satchel and makes for the opposite direction, for she knows full well what her stone is capable of, and who would like to take it from her cold dead hands.
Seconds later a small army of Pitborn creatures come into the clearing where the hunter and knight lay dead, followed by a cloaked figure. In a deep demon-like voice he says “Find that bitch, kill her, and bring me that stone.”
