Overture

(This is an introduction or overture to Blood of a Hunter. It takes place at the very beginning and is placed just before chapter one starts. This line is to clarify any confusion about what it is)

         Alyson had always loved the rain. The sound it made as it skittered across the roof or the windows, the smell it left after it had ended. It only seemed natural that she was even a Water Child. However, this was not the time for rain, and this was a rare occasion where she hated the rain with a passion.

         "We should be out there, catching that no good assassin," she complained.

         "Not a lot we could do," Devin stated, "her marks are faded by now. Besides, we know she specializes in this environment."

         This did nothing to calm Alyson. It was one thing that they were hunting an assassin, but it was another that this particular assassin was exceptionally potent in the rain. With a sigh, she leaned her head against the glass, and stared out at the forest. "I still think there has to be something we could do."

         This small shelter in the woods was old, but still worked. It kept the rain out, and was warm thanks to a fire in the hearth. It could almost feel like home, and at times it did to many hikers and travelers. But a home did not often lose a member to the clean, swift strike of a blade. It made a hatred, one that seethed and boiled but quietly within Alyson.

         "I know how it feels, Alyson, but being mad won't make the rain stop."

         She knew Devin was right, that she was showing a pointless emotion that had no use for them at the moment. But anger is always an emotion that's hard to hide. What she was hiding, was her sadness. The depression, the sorrow at the lost of a good friend. She wouldn't let that show for now, for her own sake.

         "I need some air," she stated.

         Devin did not like that idea, but knew better than to try and stop her. He let her go, but not with any easiness. He watched her like a father watches his child, as she ventured out into the woods. He knew where he was going, and knew she would be back.

         It was not a far journey for Alyson. Less than one mile from the shelter, she arrived at her destination. Everything still as it had been; a tree freshly knocked down, a knife in the mud, and the lifeless body of a young woman. She appeared no older than fifteen, though Alyson knew better. Her eyes were slightly closed, now glazed and empty of light. In the rain, it appeared as if she had started to cry. The blood from the wound, hidden now from her position, was puddling around her still, made to look like more from the rain spreading it around. It just wasn't right.

         The rage within Alyson began to boil over at the sight. Her friend, her colleague, someone she was as close as sisters with, was so ungracefully killed right here, right in front of her. The rain had masked the assassins approach, and the strike was so calculated, so well rehearsed that there had been no resistance. No one even knew what had happened at first.

         "Fate," Alyson sighed, "Fate, my friend, I promise that you will not have died in vain. That criminal Red will be brought to justice."

         A new cold filled the air. The blood around Fate's body began to shoot up in small spikes, as if jumping towards Alyson, before falling back to the ground. And the angrier Alyson grew, it happened faster, and with much more force.

         "I swear it on my life."



(This is the overture's refined but still in progress rough draft. If you have any suggestions or comments about it, or ideas on how to improve it, comment or send me a message