Prologue
The storm hit hard as the night rolled in. Icy rain came splashing down as it hit the forest floor. The rumbling of thunder in the distance started getting louder, as lightning cracked across the sky in a show of light.
The sky was a mix of charcoal greys and black. The full moon glowed with a blood-red tinge. The autumn trees were almost devoid of leaves and the branches looked bent and twisted in the wind.
With each strike of lightning, the world was filled with few seconds of vivid colour before returning to errier grey.
The ground was covered by a blanket of dead leaves which crunched under the horse's hooves with each stride. Dirt and debris were kicked up in the horse's wake as he galloped through the forest. Animals skittered through the trees. There was no clear path, the rider using only the stars visible through the branches to navigate. She looked up often, trying to see the stars through the mass of storm clouds rolling across the sky.
The sound of pounding hooves broke through the rainfall.
A black horse with a coppery main galloped through the woods. His mouth-foaming at the bit. His eyes -one blue one orange –were wild as the lightning hit the ground around him.
The lightning lit up the horse's face revealing the white flash down his nose and a female rider on his back. She wore a black cloak, strawberry waves falling from inside the hood.
They moved like shadows in the night.
“come on, Arrow” the cloaked rider cried frantically. She kept looking back, her blue eyes panicked. ’ I'm doing it, I'm esacping′ she thought to herself as she looked back again, worried they might be catching up to her. ’there should be a village up ahead that they don't know of’ she reassured herself.
“We need to lose them for good, and fast” she spoke softly leaning into her horse's ears.
The storm started to worsen, getting more violent. The lightning was beginning to stroke more often around the horse and rider and thunder roared through the forest. A vein of lightning struck a tree to the side of them. With a huge crack a branch down in front of them. The horse, now jumpy, stopped as that same. the tree was hit again and set ablaze. The horse let out a loud whining, throwing the rider from his back. She landed, her head cracking against the fallen branch.
The horse now bolting through the trees, leaving the rider alone.
Her vision blurred, sounds becoming muffled. Not able to move “Arrow... ARROW” she cried, watching as he galloped away deep into the forest.
Everything seemed to go dark. The pounding of the forest increased, the rider realising it was the sound of her heartbeat. Underneath the pounding, she began to hear the sounds of breaking twigs. Someone was speaking, but she was too dazed to make out the figure or their words.
’is this it, have they caught me?” she started to think before the darkness consumed her vision.
