The Unknown RP

Chapter 30- Seraphina

Seraphina~

The hairs on the back of my neck stood straight up. Dear goodness, dealing with people could become more miserable than I had ever imagined. Gil and Rahne were acting suspicious. Any other faerie would love an escort out of such a deadly forest, but no Gil and Rahne wanted to leave on their own.

Celaena on the other hand was perhaps just tired of being attacked about twenty thousand times a day. But she had committed crimes that she needed to pay for. I didn't want to stick around her either, but in the end, the Faerie Council would need every faerie to help them. I didn't cherish the idea of war, but it seemed like it was inevitable.

Celaena was still eyeing me, probably wondering if I would keep my word. I knew that the entire Faerie Council would want my head on a platter for striking a deal with her, but at this point, I wasn't sure if I cared or not. It had seemed like the right thing to do.

I was a bit uneasy about sending Gil and Rahne back with only four faerie soldiers. Gil was quite skilled in combat, and Rahne wasn't bad either. The faerie soldiers were trained, yes, but that didn't mean that failure was impossible for them.

I placed a hand on the back of my neck. For now, things were taken care of, and that was what mattered. Before I could tell Gil and Rahne that they should start packing up for the journey, I heard a loud hooting. Not a human hooting, but a bird.

Immediately, hands found weapons in preparation. At this point, no one was willing to take any chances and pretend that these birds weren't here to attack us. Carelessly, I began to gently swing my whip around, warming up. Celaena backed away from the whip, pulling out weapons of her own. Being an assassin and all, she was excellent with weapons, and therefore invaluable in this quest.

The sounds of hooting were nearing now, and the soldiers made a little circle formation, staring up at the sky. I looked up at the blue brilliance, but realized that the enemy wasn't going to be that obvious. I turned my head down, now facing the trunks of trees. What if the birds came through here?

Before I could voice my thoughts, a large bird swooped toward us, fast as lighting. It opened up its talons and snatched Rahne up into the air. She let out a terrified scream. Jothrynn's knives were faster than my whip, and in a flash, a blade was buried in the large bird's wing. Screeching, the bird immediately let go of Rahne, who shrieked louder than ever. As Gil rushed over to catch her, the large bird flew away, cawing. I looked over her for a few seconds, and found that she had cuts on her shoulders, where the talons had bit into her skin.

In the next instant, five other birds dived for us. Before I slung my whip, I saw that the birds were owls of some sort. My whip caught fire and promptly brought an owl down. But before I could feel even slightly triumphant, the owl was up again. And another thing that I noticed was that its feathers weren't on fire.

Jothrynn was by my side now, realizing that it would take more than one person to bring down an owl about this size. The owl had now grounded itself, and was making its way toward us. Jothrynn grabbed my arm and began to pull me back as I stood there, mesmerized. The owl was beautiful, there was no denying that. I couldn't help but think that dying while staring at this owl wouldn't be a bad thing at all.

Jothrynn's tug became more insistent, and I began backing up pretty quickly. He tripped over the root of a tree and fell over. I tried to help him up while still staring at the owl, whose feathers were shining. Shining feathers? What kind of owl is this?

The owl screeched and lunged for us. My reflexes kicking in, I blindly grabbed a strap of Jothrynn's armor and then leaped off to the side, out of danger. The owl, missing us, buried its beak into a tree. I wasn't sure what to do now, since I was quite sure that my whip would do no damage to the owl. Twitching violently, the owl began trying to pull itself away from the tree. Jothrynn finally got to his feet, readying his throwing knives.