She had no choice now, she would have to lie low until the city guards finally admitted that they would never be able to catch her. It had been a pretty hectic day and all Winter could do was try to recover from it. It had all started with a case of mistaken identity, Winter had been mistaken for a murderer of a very rich merchant and had been thrown into a series of events that she would rather have avoided. She was angry at herself for losing control like that, she wasn't a barbarian like everyone else so she had no excuses for the actions that she had taken.

As a result of her carelessness she had come out of the fray weak and injured. She'd spent almost all her her magic energy and she barely had any to begin with, if she hadn't allowed herself to follow the teachings of Threnody then she would most likely have come out much worse than she was now. She stared down at her arm that was slowly healing, a bad burn mark dominated most of it along with a split in the skin where blood was still clotting, it wasn't a very admirable sight. Winter wandered through the undergrowth, slowly regaining her energy with each passing minute.

Eventually she came across a large plant with long, string like leaves. She took a closer look at them and found that they were safe to touch and kind of soft on the underside. She tore off one of these long leaves and wrapped it about her arm, creating a makeshift bandage. It wouldn't last long but it would have to do until she found an alternative to replace it.

After using what was left of her magical energy to escape the conflict, Winter had found herself in the barrows, a place that she'd visited before and had knowledge of how to travel to, and from there had traveled to the woods. By far the best choice to hide out in was a forest or a wood, after all the numerous trees and plants could easily conceal her from people she'd rather not run in to. From what she could see the forest was deserted, even the wildlife seemed to be absent. It was the cold season after all and most creatures would now be hibernating.

Satisfied that she was alone, Winter moved off through the trees again, keeping a careful eye out for any strangers she'd rather not run in to. From here her current course of action would probably be to find out who the real murderer was and to expose him to the guards instead. Unfortunately she knew nothing about the person, and so had little to go on apart from the fact that they looked similar to Winter. As far as she knew she had no twins or doubles, so the only other explanation was that somebody must have disguised themselves as Winter, and attempted to frame her on purpose, but why?

Yang was taking a quiet stroll through the woods, appreciating the light wind that blew and cooled the sweat of his brow. It was such a lovely day and it wasn't as if he had a job, he had decided on going for a walk. He had been walking for a few hours now, greeting the few people he met on his way.

He stopped for a moment on a small boulder and examine his foot. A small blister was forming in the skin and it was just about beginning to hurt. I'd better do something about that he thought. With the index finger of his right hand Yang drew a small circle around the blister, little blue sparks jumping from his finger into the skin. The blister disappeared. He got back up, shouldered his pack and took up his walking stick before continuing on through the forest.

A little while later he saw something red shining on a plant leaf just ahead. He went over to it and examined it. Yang had seen more than enough blood in his life to know it now. A little crimson drop. There was another, and another. A trail of drops. He was no tracker but this trail was unmissable.

Following the blood drops he continued further into the woods.

Winter carried on moving the way she was, moving any offending plants out of her way or ducking beneath them. It was in places like this that Winter felt at ease, a quiet and lonely area devoid of the pains of life and the chaos that she found all too often, it wasn't perfect but it was something she would prefer. If only the rest of this land was like this, locked in an eternal peace without the worries of the rest of the world. Because of her emotionless attitude, Winter found it hard to understand the feelings of others and so she was always confused as to why people held grudges or began wars that could have been avoided quiet easily, it was as though the world just didn't want to get along.

She almost sighed to herself, if she had any kind of heart for other people then she would have at least made an effort to understand them, however Winter had no feelings for anybody else, not even for herself. A verse of bird-song caught her ears and she looked up to see a golden harrier flying through the branches of the trees towards her.
"Shisha?" She muttered.
She raised her arm and the golden bird landed on it. Winter took the parchment attached to the bird's leg and rolled it open, reading the content.



Winter turned the parchment over to see if there was anymore. Shari was the priestess of balance that Winter had been granted in order to aid her with her travels, and now it looked like Winter's only chance for a clean slate, she would have to count her blessings later though. She took the quill also attached to Shisha and wrote a reply on the back of the parchment before sending the bird off again. She watched it go for a few moments until it was out of sight.

She moved to continue through the undergrowth, noticing something red on the ground. Raising her arm to her eye level she noticed that there was still blood falling from it despite the rate at which it was healing. It was nothing serious though as it wouldn't last more than a few minutes, she could survive for well more than that and had done with an even greater wound. At the moment she didn't have much choice but the carry on, there was no sense in stopping after all and she wouldn't get anywhere by standing around.

His new sword was lighter than the other that he had recently been training with, making his movements a bit jerky, trying to compensate for weight that was not there, he had almost been brought to his knees. There was one advantage to having changed his weapon after 6 years with the other, his speed based fighting style would be better suited to a lighter sword, making it so that he could block efficiently and strike rapidly. Of course, most of this was talk, he had not been in a fight in over two months, the most he had hit lately was a stump of wood.

Atlas sheathed his sword across his back and looked around the small clearing. Not a single critter had pased through his way the, some, 2 hours he had been out in the woods. Well, again it was not all bad, he had a nice break away from the bustling city life life and the hard worn roads of the realm.

'I think I'll take a short sleep then be on my way' He thought moving out of the clearing onto the soft ground of the woods, it would be nice to sleep somewhere peacefully, not having to constantly wake for fear of being killed in his sleep by roaming bandit factions. That little fact was the reason he had not yet left this city, he knew that most bandits stuck around the outskirts of a town to take a second assualt on their unsuspecting victims. Well, that and the fact that a murderer had just been spotted and almost captured. He had never seen a trial, so if there was a chance of seeing one while he was in town he would let it delay his progress for a day or so.

Atlas found a tree surrounded by soft, thick grass that would make a comfortable spot for him to fall into the wonders of his own mind, dreams. By far one of his most favorite experiances asleep or awake, things that were not physically possible became possible in the confines of his mind.

'Come to me wonderful sleep, bring me my dreams... '

Yang had been on the trail of the blood drops for about an hour now. He didn't know that of course, the sun being hidden by the leafy canopy above him. The blood drops were steadily getting smaller, harder to follow. At least that meant that his quarry was healing. He came to the entrance of a small clearing, where a young girl was attaching a note to a bird. Her arm dripped blood.

Yang crept closer, around the edge of the clearing, tying to get a good look at her face. He had nearly completed a half circle around the girl when he glimpsed her features, shaded by a lock of aqua hair. Yang realized who she was with a gasp; the woman from the poster on the guard house! He had seen it earilier on his way through town. This woman was a murderer. It was his duty to bring her to justice and a fair trial in front of a court. He stepped out from his hiding place just as the bird flew away.

“You” he commanded, “stop right there. There will be no more death today.”

Winter gave no second thoughts about the blood dripping from her arm, it would clot completely in a few minutes and then she'd have no more problems with it, it was the burn she was more concerned with after all. She was about to move off again when something else interrupted her, a voice this time. With a slight air of annoyance Winter turned round to face the newcomer, her pupils growing thinner as she examined him. He was an odd fellow, only a small bit taller than her and with a very strange tattoo instead of hair.

She turned around completely to face him, her eyes going back to normal. He didn't seem very bright either, simply stating that nobody else would die today was a little vain, he couldn't be everywhere at once and there were people dying every minute, it wasn't like he was some sort of god or something. Yet again, Winter had absolutely no understanding of other people and their feelings, and it was phrases like the one he'd just spouted that really confused her the most, perhaps it was this thing people called 'sarcasm', she'd been told she used it quiet alot however she was serious all the time.

Whatever this man wanted, though, Winter could sense that he wasn't in a friendly mood, he wasn't evil but he did have reservations towards her, for reasons which she may give time to working out later. Either way she had no intentions of conversing with anybody, she had no intentions of wasting her time with such irritating formalities. She turned away from the man again and moved off through the undergrowth without sparing him another glance.
"Don't claim that which you cannot achieve," she replied.
It wasn't as if she enjoyed the idea of people dying, if anything she'd rather it would stop however she knew full well that she had no power to stop it at all. The same could be said for protecting peace and order, however even Winter would admit that there were some things she just couldn't leave to the fates.

She stopped a little further on, looking down at a figure sleeping against a tree. She wasn't surprised by this, but two people in a seemingly deserted wood was a big coincidence, especially seeing as she'd met both of them in a matter of minutes. She supposed this was what people called 'fate' or whatever it was.

Atlas stirred slightly, cracking an eye.'There couldn't be anyone there,' he thought, laughing at the idea slightly. Then he caught a glimspe of color that was not natural to the forest, blue? His eyes shot open, a look of surprise and confusion on his face. He rolled from where he had been sitting, sideways, landing not to gracefully on his side. He planted a hand firmly under him, flourishing onto his feet, his sword in both hands, positioned in a guarding position.

He swayed a bit from having risen to the ground so fast, his head felt like the room was spinning in the first few moments of moving from his slumber. He took in the figures features into view, realizing that it was not a raiding bandit, back for revenge, but a girl, an unarmed girl at that. He sighed slightly, lowering his sword, he had feared the worst once he realized that someone was standing by him, ambush was not uncommon.

"Sorry about that, but you startled me." He said replacing his sword in its sheath. He felt the surge of adrenaline flow out of him, making his body shake, he felt that primal urge to rip, to mame, he needed to get his own emotions under control, he did not want that to happen again.

He brushed back his hair with both of his hands, then moving them forward to rub his face,'I must look completely unpresentable.' He did his best to wipe the dirt from his pores, only realizing his hansd were dirtier than his face, making then entire mess worse. He glanced back at the girl again, noticing something that he did not before, she was injured, it looked as if her arm was hurt, cut maybe, it did not bleed like a regular wound, but what did he know, he could barely treat a sprain.