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The black-clad shape was drifting in and out of the haziness of the fog. It was misty, and yet his eyes could see one thing very clearly, as clear as glass in fact. It was himself, how he knew that he didn’t know. For this person, this thing was not all human. With a mask that had the stench of evil, and the black tattoos plastered across its face, this was evil at the limit.
Then all of a sudden the place was filled with a light, and the evil instantly disappeared. Voices rang through the light, the voices of seraphs, of kings in the centuries long gone by. They said, “Choose, Choose. The greater good or the greater evil, one will pass. Which it is, you must choose, choose, choose.” And with that final, almost threatening ultimatum, the light grew, until it was so bright it would have seared anything, and a young man opened his eyes.

--

A dim glow was over the village as Max opened his eyes from the dark ship of sleep for the second time that day. Teema, the village that Max lived in, was bustling with life; you could hear it from Max’s house. He slowly got up out of the mat of straw that was serving as his bed for the time being, at least until his mother got better. She was ill from a disease that no one had ever heard of, and it was making her worse day by day, and it was costing him a lot of money, since he only brought in a small amount from the fields. His tanned face slowly changed from fatigue to alertness, and his muscular body, which he had attained from lots of hard work, was moving inwards and outwards in the motion of heavy breathing. He tiptoed into the darkness of his mother’s room. She was still fast asleep, her face a dull grey, sweat pouring down it. He sighed, before moving silently back to his own and changing into the rough linens that were his work clothes. They felt tight. He realised he was growing quicker than expected. Even though he had only seen sixteen summers, he was as tall and as mature as any grown man. It was funny, he reflected. The town where he grew up was such a change from the radical life he had led when his mother was a maid to the Queen of Orihalcon, the biggest city in the country, where the royals resided, yet that had all changed when the country had gone to war with its neighbour, Arran. Since then, life had been a struggle, since his mother had gone down with the fever, and he was forced to return to this poor village, a change from the luxuries of the palace.
He ran down to the fields, throwing on the gloves he knew he was going to need.
‘Max! Glad to see you! Give us a hand with this here old sack o’ coal would ya?’ The friendly voice came from the Master of the Fields, a man by the name of Tash. Max moved over to the sack, and with a quick tug hurled it onto the waiting cart.
‘Max, Max, what would I do without ya?!’ Tash was grinning. ‘We got lotsa work to do today! No time to hang about, we need to get all the old stones from the Yard to here, and then start work upon the town hall again.’ Max sighed before grudgingly following Tash to the old Yard, where the town hall once stood, before the Arran soldiers had raided it. That was the major disadvantage of living on the border, yet it was why Max had been able to get such cheap accommodation, and the chance to let his mother rest.

--

Kyat. That was what they called him. Kyat, the lonely, some would jest. Kyat the unloved. Kyat the orphan. The last one stung. Kyat had never known his parents; had never known the love a family could give you. Had known nothing, in fact, of what it was like to even have someone take pity on you. A local, who had quickly brushed him up and then sent him on his way, had discovered him. He had been around four summers at the time, or at least that was what had been estimated. He had arrived at the village of Teema, close to the border, three months later. No one actually knew how old he was. He had slowly started to learn life’s many lessons the hard way, experiencing mistakes first hand, and only learnt how to avoid them by being repeatedly beaten by the person he had offended. He spoke with the natural slang of the southern population, since that had been all he had heard. He had learnt through beatings the way of the warrior and violence, as well as how to be unseen, which had proved useful when pick pocketing people for money. He had stolen a standard iron sword as well, and had been gradually building up his skill by watching what the guards did and then learning from them. The fact that he was also naturally talented with a sword helped too, for by the time he had watched and trained for about five years he had already passed the standard guard’s skill. He was not, of course, as good as the Blademaster who taught the guards, but he was more than competent, especially for his age. After surpassing the guard’s skill he had gone looking around the town for a good swordsman, and had eventually found tutorship under Master Iha, a very old, yet very experienced swordsman. Yet the seasons passed and Master Iha travelled on to the afterlife. It was soon after his death that the raids started. They came from the north, the raiders with the scarred faces whose very appearance leaked death. They came and they left, leaving destruction in their wake. Nothing survived. They raped and pillaged; whole towns were obliterated. There was no doubt where they came from: Arran, the wasteland of the north. By the time these had started, Kyat was a good eighteen summers old. He had a brown body, honed after years of training. Messy brown hair fell down his face, and reached about halfway down his back. His eyes had a mildness that deceived most people; he had a ferociously short temper, especially with those who mentioned his lack of family. Yet his eyes also hid a secret, something he never had and, he thought, he never would tell anyone. And it was for this secret that Kyat distanced himself from the busy life of Teema.

--

It was raining. Not hard, but enough to cause distress to a passer-by. A woman was looking out of her window, watching the rain fall down the panes of glass. She was a young woman by age, but she had seen more than any woman of any age would have wanted to see. Her profession was one of secrecy, but it was also the most bloody. She had seen men driven mad and cutting themselves in two, she had seen young children being eaten from the inside, and she had seen mothers tearing out the throats of their children. She was a demon hunter, an Eliach. Her name was Scarletti, known to many of the Eliach as the Shadow because of her ruthless and silent killing style. Like with all the Eliach she had a partner, another woman by the name of Hika. The Eliach always had same-sex partners, it was easier that way. As she looked out of the window she reflected upon the task she had been set: destroying a very powerful and particularly disruptive entity. Not much was known about it, except that it left a trail of bloody corpses wherever it went, with the fourth finger of the left hand always missing. Scarletti sighed, as she remembered that it was also one of the most dangerous. Four of the Eliach had already lost their lives to it. She knew it would be dangerous. But Hika was the best person to accompany and fight with her, and she had to avenge her lost brothers and sisters. She stared out of the window, her thoughts wondering. The rain fell.

Scarletti turned from the window at the sound of the door to the small, second floor room opening with a creak. There in the doorway stood Hika, breathing heavily. Her hands were clutching the frame as she breathed. Scarletti knew something was wrong. Hika would never usually burst in on her so. She moved across the room, concern laced across her face.
‘Hika, what is it?’ Her tone was small but anxious.
‘Scarletti, we have to get out of here!’ Hika barely managed to get the words out.
‘What! Why? What’s happened?’ Now Scarletti was worried. When Hika meant get out now, she really meant now.
‘The entity… is on the move!’ Hika gripped Scarletti’s arms.
Scarletti knew what that meant. She had a heavy voice as she asked, ‘How many this time?’
Hika looked at Scarletti sorrowfully ‘Sixteen.’
Sixteen! What was going on? The entity killed one, two at most every time it decided to move from place to place. But sixteen? That was ridiculous. Nothing like that had ever been heard of in Eliach history. The last big killer had had a maximum of eight. Scarletti then realised what that meant, and moved towards the little bag which had all her possessions in. She quickly packed up the remaining things, and then looked at Hika.
‘Are you ok to go?’
‘Yes, I got ready before I came to see you.’
‘You know that isn’t what I meant.’
‘Scar,’ Hika used her pet name for Scarletti, ‘I’m fine.’
‘Right, let’s go. We need to get to Iyal as soon as possible. Scarletti marched out of the door, Hika closely following. Scarletti waited outside for Hika to get her things, and as she did so, she looked at the cottage they had been staying in. It was nice, but it wasn’t home. Now there was a thought that was stray in her mind. Home? The Eliach gave up all means of the word home when they joined. Crossly, she pushed it from her mind as she saw Hika emerging from the cottage. The two slowly moved away. The rain fell harder.