Horror filled the young woman as a shape materialized in the darkness. It wasn't a man, or it wasn't like any man Aspen had ever seen before. Whatever it was towered above her, looming and ominous with a body so massive that it took up most of the space around them. It's face was a disgusting, unnatural mask. Five eyes blinked open to look at her, horns jutted out from it's head. A sense of unease in the pit of her stomach turned into outright fear, she tried to step back but found herself rooted in place, the smell of lavender wafting around her. The being crouched down, three of it's five eyes shut and if she hadn't of already seen them open she wouldn't have even noticed they were there. She tried to open her mouth, to speak, to do anything but stand there like an idiot in fear. 

[i]"I've come to collect the offered soul."[/i] It had a booming voice that filled the silence like acid. She flinched away from it confusion swimming in her blue eyes, finally managing a small squeak. "S-soul?" Her voice was barely audible in the deathly silence. "I don't know what you-" And in that moment Aspen's stomach dropped. This couldn't be real, that book, those words... they couldn't have actually worked. She shuddered a bit and looked up at the hellish creature. "I-I'm dreaming she murmured. However his booming voice which cut through the air once again convinced her otherwise. He had held out his hand, which in her delirium she hadn't noticed until then, and as if by some kind of unknown will she reached up to take it. 

His fingers were odd, the texture of his hands different, almost scaly but not quite. Her body noticed all these things as her senses heightened in fear. [i]"I must sign with your blood."[/i] Aspen wasn't sure what to do. The rational part of her was convinced she was dreaming, or perhaps tripping, but never in her life had she dreamt a dream or had a hallucination quite so real. Maybe she was dead. "You have to sign with my blood?" And with those words from her full, rouge lips something clicked for her. 

If she had really conjured this creature, then what the rest of this book had said must be right. This creature would "grant her her hearts desire, for a small price". And whatever that small price was, it would most definitely be worth getting noticed. She had lived too hard a life for her talent to go unappreciated. "I-if I sign this... I will get my one true desire?" It sounded stupid, yet oh so enticing. Like the forbidden fruit in the story of Adam and Eve. "You can do that for me?"