[hider=The Lovers tale part 1]
Once more there was a lengthy deep howling sound from outside, the sound being carried eerily on the wind. The chilling sound caused her to shift uncomfortably at the thought of the giant black dire-wolves which roamed this valley, their matted and thick fur causing them to look like shades of death as they stalked their pray. Standing she shivered slightly, the cold winter chill causing small goose-bumps to rise on her arms as she prodded the fire several times with the poker. Kneeling slightly before the fire she added another dry log to the crackling embers, the disturbance causing small fiery dots to dance through the air before disappearing as quickly as they had appeared. It had now been three days since he had left her, travelling a great distance to slay a foul beast that had harrowed them from afar for so long, it's sinister evil spreading across the land like a dark plague of dubstep music. 

She could not accompany him this time, not with the Crown of Blood in their possession. She needed to remain to guard over it lest the forces of Count Morrison or any other evil locate it and attempt to seize the artefact for their own wicked cause. This could not come to be - as the vampiric hordes of evil would descend upon the land and drain the blood of each and every human, keeping them only as cattle and dancing slaves for their entertainment as they slowly turned the world into a dark husk of its former self. 

As the hours past Lady Carver continued to keep her guard about her, the howls getting closer slowly which caused a slight sense of foreboding to reside within her. If the dire-wolves of Overtonia were working with the Count then it would only be a matter of time before they tracked her through the dense forest to this cabin. She moved over to the chest which contained the crown, checking for the third time that evening that it was still there. The crown itself had been created in the twelfth century by none other than Count Dracula himself at the height of his dark reign, legend said that he had drunk the blood of more than a thousand men and that a single droplet of his own cursed blood was a most powerful and dark substance. Using dark and dreadfully evil magic Dracula forged the crown from a mixture of his own blood and molten silver, the darkness corrupting the pure metal into a twisted bastion of power - which fuelled Dracula into a dark Vampiric god like the world had never seen.

If it hadn't been for the ‘Order of Day’ then his reign of darkness would have lasted for a thousand millennia and caused the ultimate extinction of mankind. Luckily the order managed to figure out a more than cunning plan - knowing that Dracula would feed on a young maiden each afternoon around twenty past four, they managed to provide a syringe full of garlicky silvery extract to one of the victims, and by attacking his palace at exactly four twenty they managed to distract Dracula for long enough for the girl to plunge the needle into his neck and inject the substance into his bloodstream. The first hand accounts have mostly been lost, but apparently Dracula totally exploded in a giant bloody mess leaving nothing but the crown and several meaty chunks behind. To celebrate their success the order made four twenty a sacred time of each day, from then until the end of time.

Anyway. 

As she saw that the crown was still secured safely she sighed contentedly before locking the chest once more and returning the key to between her amazing breasts. Several more hours later she jolted awake, alert after only a moment’s confusion. There was a quiet but noticeable sound coming from outside, the sound of someone or something walking through the snow towards the cabin. Rolling from the bed onto the floor Holly grabbed her blade and slowly removed it from its sheath, the silver glistening even in the darkness. As she waited she listened intently, trying to discern what was outside in the darkness. She groaned inwardly as the sound of footsteps multiplied and she could hear them all around the cabin from each direction now. 

Suddenly they all stopped and she instinctively held her breath and only silence remained. Then suddenly there was the sound of each of the cabin's windows being smashed from the outside simultaneously as several dark figures launched themselves into the room. Holly sprang into action, their familiar scent being enough to tell her that they were vampires. Rolling towards the nearest attacker she lunged her blade upwards stabbing the creature through its crotch and up into its chest causing it to scream as it began to disintegrate into burning ash. Tearing the blade free she stood as the other five figures each lunged towards her, their thin pale fingers extending from their black robes as they tried to grab onto her. She was prepared for them and spinning on the spot she sent the blade cutting through the face of one and the neck of another. As the now headless body began to disintegrate she kicked it backwards sending it flying into another vampire who stumbled backwards tripping and smashing into a bookcase as it did. 

Two more of the vampires lunged at her in unison trying to flank her from each side. In the flash of an eye she had thrust her sword directly into the torso of one of them and with her other hand she triggered the small silver blade hidden in her sleeve which darted out at the perfect time, stabbing directly into the second foul creature’s left eye, again causing it to screech as the silver took its effect causing it to join the others as nothing more than a smoking pile of ash on the wooden floor. 

As she turned to face the last vampire it glared at her a moment hissing before it grabbed the chest which had been knocked into the floor in the chaos, she lunged forwards grabbing at its robe as it turned and tried to flee. Grabbing tightly she pulled with all of her strength as the creature frantically pulled away and tried to flee with the chest. Just as she felt like her arms were going to give in there was a ripping sound as the robe tore, splitting and allowing the vampire to sprint forwards and leap through the nearest window, now completely naked, its pale buttocks gleaming in the moonlight. 

"Fuck!" shouted Holly picking up her sword and grabbing her gear from the side as he sprinted out into the night after the creature. As she ran she caught more than a few glimpses of the vampire’s backside as it ran through the trees looking back over its shoulder at her occasionally. After what seemed like an hour the creature pulled away ahead of her as she started to slow, the constant pace and difficulty of running in the snow eventually tiring her. She couldn't help but swear several more times as she followed the footsteps the vampire had left behind. Luckily, she thought to herself, that it's only the royal vampires that can fly otherwise she’d be royally fucked. 

As she emerged trough a particularly thick bush Holly saw something that she definitely didn't expect, the footsteps that she had been following came to an abrupt end. Where they stopped there was a pile of ash which was rapidly been blown away by the slight breeze as it melded with the white crisp snow. The chest with the crown was nowhere to be seen, but upon further examination she found a spent silver cartridge laying in the snow not to far away, which could only mean someone had shot the vampire and taken the chest.

As she made her way slowly back to the cabin thoughts raced through her mind. Obviously whoever had done this was a professional like her - a least she assumed so as she hadn’t heard anything meaning the shot was probably silenced, and there had been no footprints leading away ether which meant that however it was could move more stealthily than most - if not in the trees themselves. She sighed disappointed at the events that had unfolded, as getting the crown back wouldn't be easy at all. The only slightly comforting thought was that hopefully it wouldn't reach the hands of a vampire if whoever had done this was using guns and silver, not yet at least - she needed to find out who had taken it and fast. Her next move would be return to their usual HQ now that she didn't have the crown in her possession anymore, from there she should be able to identify and trace the round she'd found, plus anything else that might help her track whoever'd done this. 
[/hider]