Beauty and Blood

Bloodlines

December 2nd, 2009

Running.

All she knew was that she was running.

Brambles snagged in the skirts of the sleeveless long white dress she wore. Trunks of bark caged her in and constantly caused her to swerve as she sprinted through them. Her bare feet slipped beneath her as blood was drawn by the dagger like twigs lining the forest floor. She could barely see where she was going. Despite their leafless state, the looming branches blotted out the thin light of the full moon, hanging high in the sky and cementing the dread that dawn would not come to her rescue anytime soon. Constant rustling erupted in the shrubbery around her amid the mist, whether from creatures fleeing as she was or from what pursued her she didn't know.

She didn't even know what she was evading.

All she knew was she had to run.

One stray root that curled out of the ground became her downfall, the David to her Goliath, as it snared her ankle and brought her tumbling to the harsh ground. Now amongst the thick fog, she could see that the sharp thorns that had shredded the soles of her feet and now scraped her arms and legs had not been thorns at all, but the sharp edges of the bones of animals. Teeth and ribs and claws and the gaping sockets of skulls lined the cracked earth, from dormice to rabbits to foxes to wolves to the mighty stag himself, all laid to waste by that which pursued her now.

She didn't know how she knew it was behind this carnage, but it was.

And she had to run.

Twisting her torso around, she reached to pull her ankle free, only to still at the sight of the tree the damnable root sprouted from. The largest oak she'd ever seen stood tall with its neighbours bending precariously away from it in fear, gnarled bark led to twisted dead branches, the wood a ghastly shade of light grey verging on white. Merged with the skin of the trunk were the faces of her family, their skeletal rotting corpses hollow and shrunken as they stared into nothing, their torsos hanging out of the flesh of the alabaster tree. From their empty eyes and gaping maws ran endless rivers of water that hammered into the dry earth.

Her moment of horror cost her dearly.

From behind the tree a dark figure stepped out, face shrouded by the dark bar blue eyes bordered by crimson that burned with such cold rage that it was searing. There was a dripping of liquid from within the shadows that hid what she knew to be a fanged filled mouth oozing crimson blood, staining the withering roots of the pale oak beneath him. She didn't need to see his face to know it was the man who seemed relentless in haunting her sleep. Seeing him step towards her, she knew he was what she had been running from, and now he had caught up.

She had to run.

In a flurry of panic, she scrambled backwards, ankle twinging with agony at being yanked so harshly from where it had been ensnared. She stumbled to her feet and staggered away from him, not daring to turn her back on the viscous man shaped beast that slowly prowled towards her, yet covered more ground than humanly possible. All the while flaming ice stared back at her, not once looking away from her in the dance of predator and prey, one bumbling step back and once calculated stride forward. All the while more blood dripped to the ground from razor sharp teeth in a quiet rhythm.

Drip. Drip. Drip.

The stabbing pains beneath her from the ivory remains fell away as her trembling foot moved backwards, only to be met with nothing.

She had fallen into his trap.

There was nowhere left to run.

Before even a whisper of a scream could escape her she was falling, though it didn't last long as her back soon slammed into hard freshly dug earth, having fallen into what seemed to be a newly unearthed grave. Looking up, his face was shadowed by the dim glow of the moon as he loomed over her from six feet above, though the sharp piercing blue of his eyes cut through the dark clear as day. "You made your choice." The refined voice spat the familiar words, though instead of a raging roar, it was a quiet hiss like a blade slicing through the air to cut deep into her pounding heart in a finishing blow.