She stalked silently through the trees, carefully evading the anything that would uncover her silence. The mist around her covered her black figure although she could not see anything that was ten feet from her, despite her demonised eyes. She was stalking a prey that would kill her in time so she decided to get rid of it, before it does the same to her.

She heard rumours from a nearby nameless village that her prey was somewhere to the north of this forest. She hoped that she would find it soon: this was a waste of her precious time. She crept past a particular tree that was enormous in size. Its trunk was gnarled and old, but as she laid her hand on it, it was not brittle. It was as strong as it was in its prime. Strange...
Its branches spread about ten metres around her as she looked up in awe. This was perfect. So perfect it wasn't even real. In front of her, a path lay... and someone was going down the path. Her victim...

She deftly scaled the giant tree trunk and sat on one of the lowest branches, under the cover of the leaves... waiting. Waiting for her victim to come to their long awaited fate.

Arthano coughed softly, drops of blood dripping down his hand which went up to wipe his mouth. He wrapped his cloak around him quickly to protect from the cold that seemed to hit him with great force as he walked through the swamp. So far, Arthano's yellow eyes had only been a sign of the curse that plagued him, the anger inside of him that wished to explode, and yet here they seemed to help him. Things were a bit... clearer which allowed him to move through the swamp without falling into any of the many traps that lay for the unwary.

Yet even so, it seemed inevitable that something would attack him and Arthano knew it, and so he continued to move along, just waiting for that one moment when a blade would come towards him and end his life. He almost wanted to it happen, to end his constant pain that surged and receded at random times. He wanted peace, to live with his family who had most certainly passed into another realm for the innocent. There was only one problem with that. Arthano was not innocent and he knew it.

He had never spilt the blood of the innocent, only the wicked, and yet even so he had caused death in search for revenge. Only with his revenge would he feel as though he could finally do some good, and only with that good would he be able to pass on into another world where only the light lived. But until then, he would have to soldier on, something inside of him urging him on to live and do right, despite the fact that doing right was practically impossible for him in this state.

The weirdest thing of this curse was that while it hurt, it didn't make him weaker nor slower nor less intelligent in any way. It just hurt. Arthano sighed softly, looking at the muddy ground below him and wondering if he might soon begin to sink into its depths.

As the darkness fell upon Arda, creatures that humans weren`t exactly fond of started coming out. She was among them, walking through the spooky woods and hanging out at the places not too many races liked. Swamp of Shadows was among them.

Evelyn was making her way through that part of the forest, hunting little animals this time. Even though it didn`t feel as satisfying as feeding herself on a human being, it was still a good replacement considering none was quite around. Just when she thought about this, Evelyn heard some sort of noise. Someone was walking not too far from her, and he seemed to be a lot bigger than animal.

Her red eyes flashed threatingly as she kept up listening to every sound. Just in that moment, Evelyn spotted a girl, walking around quitely. She leaned against the tree and observed the stranger. The girl seemed to be around her age, maybe a bit older, and looked hungry and frustrated as well. Evelyn smirked a bit and crossed her eyes, wondering if she`s going to stay unoticed.

The assassin perched in the enormous tree... Waiting...

She saw a girl walking down the path where her victim was supposed to be... This wasn't according to plan, or was this the person that she was looking for...
It cannot be... My victim is a sweet little spoiled adolescent that has talent that she does not know of.. So ignorant...She tilted her head slighty, her long black hair framing the beautiful oval shape that was her face. She wondered why this girl had stood in the assassin's path. Did she want to meet her doom?
Too much pondering, she told herself sternly.

"What are you doing here?" she said aloud, her voice sounding strange in the eerily quiet forest.

She saw a young man approaching, wrapped tightly around his taunt body. Was this her victim? she pondered. STOP PONDERING! she repeated in her mind. Just take a deep breath and do it...

Do what?

The assassin then jumped off the giant branch and stood infront of the girl, waiting for a reply. She did not want to question the young man, since she somehow sensed there was danger around him. Something that told her to stay away... Why?

"What are you doing here?"

Evelyn smirked. "Walking. And last time I checked, it was nothing forbidden to do." she said. She didn`t make a move as the girl appeared in front of her; it was so far from the thing that could possibly scare her.

The vampire girl suddendly turned her head to the left, and saw a man coming towards them. Her eyes flashed; she really was getting quite hungry now. But before doing any attacks, Evelyn decided to check on what was he like... If she`d get the chance. The other girl didn`t seem to be in a mood for chatting; however, Evelyn kept up observing her, wondering what was she like.

Arthano stopped near a tree, taking a seat next to it and leaning against it with his back. With one leg arched up and the other laying flat on the soft grass, Arthano grabbed a pouch from his belt and opened it up to reveal rather soft bread. He pulled a large chunk of it out and began to tear small pieces from it, never having to open his mouth more than a little bit to eat it. He was a bit of a... refined eater... despite his origins as well as the places he had been. One in his situation might have acted a bit ravenous, especially since he didn't eat a lot of food but used quite a bit of energy, but Arthano simply wasn't like that.

Why? Even he didn't know.

Putting the pouch back on his belt, he took a drink from his water skin before slipping that under his cloak as well. Arthano stood up slowly, his yellow eyes gazing through the mist that seemed to cover the entire area. He was beginning to wonder if he had gotten himself lost in this place but simply shrugged off the idea since if he had, there was nothing he could really do but choose a direction and keep going. He sighed once more, beginning to walk again.

But as he walked he heard a voice, though it was faint, as though it was speaking to somebody else. And so Arthano continued to walk, that was, until he saw two figure's hidden by the mist. "Who goes there?" Arthano spoke just loud enough. Or so he thought.

"Walking. And last time I checked, it was nothing forbidden to do," said the girl. The assassin tilted her head softly, not really listening to the rude response. She stepped around the girl and saw the young man leaning against a tree...
She could faintly trace the outline of his slim body taking out a few things and eating or drinking them...

He then stood up, as the assassin strained her eyes for a particular cloud of mist rolled over her vision. The young man carried on walking towards them... stopped...

"Who goes there?" said a faint voice in the distance. Was this a threat or was it just someone just knowing who was beyond him on the path. Her instincts pulled at her once more, warning her not to step closer to the figure...

As usual, curiousity ruled over the assassin's instincts as she slowly walked towards the figure...

As she walked, thoughts ran through her head...
She knew it wasn't a dragon, and he was safe. Maybe he too had a hate of dragons and perhaps he could join her into accomplishing her dream... Maybe not. Who knew?
Closing her eyes, she carried on walking, willing to tell the figure her name, but she couldn't... Nobody must know... Nobody...