The wind howled through the trees. Branches waved and creaked. Alisna struggled through the undergrowth as the wet leaves stung her face and the leaf mold crunched beneath her boots. She ran swiftly, ignoring the pain from the leaves slapping her cheeks and the biting cold stinging her neck. She pulled her collar up tighter and kept running. Something was in trouble. She could sense it. She had been woken up in the middle of her sleep by a disturbance in the wind. Jumping out of bed she had pulled her coat and boots on and had run as fast as she could, to she didn't know what. Then all of the sudden she slid on the ground and pressed her foot down into the leaf mold to stop herself. Then she looked up, and what she saw would change her life forever.
