[center][b]~  ~  ~  ~  ~  ~  ~  ~  ~  ~[/b][/center]
[B]”Sarah!”[/B] Xander yelled, his back pushed against the exterior of his hamlet farmhouse. 

[B]”Heheheh...No Sarah ‘ere ta save ya now boy…”[/B] The grotesque darkness addled beast growled.
The creature, humanoid in form but more darkness than man took a step closer slowly pulling a crude curved short sword from its belt. Bearing its blood stained yellow fangs, the strange beast of pale green skin seemingly decayed and stretched over his sinew and bone cackled with glee. Its body covered in cloth and loose hanging bandages, large bat like ears lined with golden rings. Incandescent  eyes of topaz, peered through Xander’s skin fueling the slobbering jaws that moved just enough to allow its pointed tongue to flick a wet tongue over its dry teeth. 

Slowly the creature raised the rusty steel blade above its head, glistening in the moonlight. Above its head, the blade wavered. It’s adjusted and tightened. The blade fell from its clawed hand. Its eyes spread wide. Its jaw went slack and a blade erupted from its chest, black blood dripping over the nearly forged steel. 

[B]”Come on Xander,”[/b] a feminine voice cried out in panic, [b]“we have to move!”[/b]

[center][b]~  ~  ~  ~  ~  ~  ~  ~  ~  ~[/b][/center]
That was only the first time she had saved him that night. The creatures had swept across the hamlet in the late evening as people were winding down from their evening meal enjoying the crisp summer air. They were not equipped to burn. Such fires would betray the darkness as it moved in secret. But they began by gutting the homes closest to the forest before moving into the hamlet proper before. Two guardsmen on duty. They couldn’t even sound the conscription alarm. The tailor had done that before he was cut down with the guards standing only a few yards away. Of course, they were fighting their own battles.

Despite how fast Xander and his sister fled, they had no one to run to. Their parents had been entangled in their own battle. They had been trained to fight to a certain extent, but none of it could have prepared them to combat the darkness. The first had only been slain because she had feared the loss of her baby brother. Subsequent encounters had not gone so well. Evasive maneuvers, parry, dodge, feint… both of them had learned them all to varying degrees. But there were too many of them. Every scatter point seemed to lead them to another encounter. 

So they did what children do when they have nowhere else to turn. They stopped running and they hid. They used their knowledge of the hamlet and found themselves a quiet place to hide. Their biggest danger had been their inability to see. From their nook upon the storage space of a barn, nestled in amongst the bales of hay they could not keep track of their enemy. As they were laying in wait, hidden, the adrenaline had begun to wear off and a drip of blood tickled Xander’s leg. A drip of blood that had fallen from a gash on the girl’s arm. His sister’s arm. 

But the darkness moves like a wave. It had swept over the hamlet of Pyre, taking with it whatever lacked the strength to prevail. But it would not recede back to the forest from which it came as though it were the ocean. Instead, it pressed onward as if it were still cresting along the plains of the southern Midlands. 

While Pyre gathered its dead and made its dying comfortable, the darkness moved on. Rumors spread quickly that the King’s riders on a routine patrol had come across their path and quickly thwarted the threat. Word of mouth suggested that they had not left a single monster to roam the land.  Of course, Xander had not the means to go carousing through the grasslands to see his vengeance fulfilled. 

Looking up from the floor Xander turned to face Rio. His eyes determined, and he spoke sternly trying contain the apprehension in his voice.

[B]”To save my sister, as far as I have to go.[/B]

[center][b]~  ~  ~  ~  ~  ~  ~  ~  ~  ~[/b][/center]