"She's WHAT?" Nymos practically leapt out of his hair, his eyes stretched wide with shock and horror. "Missing." Skolris repeated bluntly, watching as Nymos scrambled to his feet. As soon as Nymos got his footing on the rugged floor boards, he rushed towards the doorway and stuck his head into the night hair. Skolris ran to his side, barely feeling the cold wind. "We need to find her.. " Skolris said quietly, her voice shaking with worry, and Nymos agreed with her.
"We need to scout the area." Nymos declared,"split up and search from the sky." Skolris nodded her head, trying her hardest to keep her shaking hands still. My best friend is in danger... Who knows what could happen to her? Beside her, Nymos transformed into his majestic falcon form, and Skolris followed his lead but instead turning into a hawk because, why not?
They didn't hesitate to leap off of the edge of the tree house, their minds only fixed upon rescuing Antariel. Skolris dipped her head down and tucked her wings to her side as she dove towards the soft earth, and at the very last second, she spread her wings in a flurry of flying feathers. Her dive gave her extra speed as she sped like an arrow between the tall oaks, for a few moments relishing the wind in her wings. Though the little time of excitement was short lived. I need to find Antariel before something bad happens to her. Who knows who took her. Yet at the back of her mind, Skolris thought that she had a pretty good idea about who it was.
She tilted her head towards the sky, pulled her wings the tiniest bit closer to her body, and spread her tail feathers in order to break out of the dense leaves above her. And once she burst from the trees and into the sky, she spread her wings once more to steady herself. The air was still in the silent night, the quiet only broken by the far away howling of a wolf. In the distance, a pair of lonely mountains sat looking over the tiny town at it's feet, the bright sun just beginning to peek above it's crest. How can the rest of the world be this peaceful? She wondered. When everything around me just seems to unfold into chaos?
Skolris glided above the dense trees, listening for only the smallest sound that could suggest a human's presence. She tried as hard as she could to block out the soft sounds of the forest and the breeze in her feathers. And even then as she couldn't hear anything suspicious, she decided that searching from the air would be harder then the ground.
So, she dove back into the trees and, making sure nobody was around, she morphed into a black cat. As a cat, her paws were silent on the forest floor, and her black fur helped her blend into the shadows as she crept through the branches of the highest trees.
A sudden crack behind her made Skolris spin around, her feline eyes narrowing into slits as she kept as still as possible. She could practically hear her own heart pounding in her ears as she waited for whatever made that noise to reveal itself.
The sound of soft paw steps on leaf mulch caught her attention, And she snapped her gaze onto the spot from where it had come from. Out of a dark shadow under a tree, a pair of yellow eyes reflected back into her own. And then slowly, a furry red shape stepped out, it's fluffy tail swishing steadily.
Skolris let out the breath that she had been holding in a sigh of relief. It's Just a fox. She thought as she shuffled further into the tree branches. Though as she turned back to where it had been, the fox was still there. What? I wouldn't think that it would stay out in the open like that...
Yet, there stood the fox, it's tail no longer waving but instead hanging rigidly behind it. It's eyes were unblinking, even haunting. Something isn't right...
Out of nowhere, the fox suddenly turned and fled into the bushes, it's fluffy tail the last thing Skolris saw. Wierd... She thought as she shrugged her shoulders and continued through the trees.
By the time she reached the edge of the forest, the sun had already risen into the blue sky, warming up the forest rather quickly. But, Skolris had still not found Antariel and a rather sad thought crossed her mind as the worst reason for her disappearance slipped into her head. No! She can't be dead! We'll find her. I know that she's out there somewhere...
Skolris transformed back into her Hawk form and flew into the sky where she glided on the breeze until she spotted Nymos flying towards her. They flew side by side until they both dropped into the forest and landed on a sturdy branch, and Skolris realized that it was the same place where she had seen that unearthly fox.
She turned her head towards Nymos, who wore a distressed look. "Didn't find her?" She asked stupidly, knowing the answer before he even said it. Nymos shook his head, his wings sagging,"not even a sign of a struggle." He said miserably as if he had failed a final test that he had spent half the year studying for.
Skolris stared down at the ground,"same here. It was if she was never in the forest to begin with..." She muttered, "though we may wanna be careful. For some reason, this forest has been... I don't know how to put it..." She muttered half to herself, though Nymos completed her sentence for her,"giving out a feeling of foreboding." He said quietly. Skolris nodded. Around her, the forest seemed way less inviting then it had been when they arrived. It seemed dangerous, unwelcome, and haunting.
Skolris and Nymos sat on the branch for a few moments, their minds somewhere other then where they were on that sturdy branch. However, a rustling sound caught their attention as paw stepped and the flapping of wings approached them from around the tree.
And suddenly, five animals emerged from the foliage: a mountain lion, a giant bear, a dark grey wolf, an eagle, and the same fox from earlier that day. They surrounded the tree, their snarls echoing off of the trunks of the giant oaks around them.
A voice rang out from around a large rock as a tall woman with long brown hair and fangs walked slowly towards them and with her, a terrified looking Antariel. Her friend wore a metal band around her wrist, and based on the fact that she hadn't escaped yet, Skolris concluded that it was a power band: a band that disables the wearer's power and ability to call out a bond.
Skolris exchanged a shocked look with Nymos before the tall werewolf shoved Antariel forward with one hand still clutching her left arm. With a triumphant look plastered upon her face, the lady looked up into the tree, smiling smugly,"I suggest that you two surrender quietly." She said with Smirk,"because if you set a single foot out of line, your friend is dead."
