Prologue:
The air was heavy with the scent of sweet copper. The room tilted back and forth, in a sort of fog, as she became aware of her surroundings. Her senses went wild with the blood and sweat scent. A dim light to her left caught her attention and her training kicked into a higher gear as her surroundings became clearer. With the lack of light the walls took on a bland look of muted grey, and she attempted to make out the furnishings in the room.
At first sight of the window she gathered the strength to move forward until she noticed the drawn blinds, there would be no clues there. Turning towards the light she followed as she was able to make out that this room was a bedroom, and by the rather feminine decorations, it was clearly a woman's bedroom. The light casting from the bedside table showed the sharp red light of the recording camera and if she had the ability to breath, she surely would have gasped at the sight. With what felt like a lazy pace her sight continued its path to the bed where even the muted grey of her experience could not mute the scene of gore.
The scent manifested itself into the blood that seeped through the light colored comforter and covered the pale skin of the woman who lay upon it. She could not make out any description of the woman other than that she lay in a scant nightgown that was already glistening with the blood, the majority of which came from the moaning woman's stomach. The energy that she'd gathered for momentum was expelled as she made her way closer to the bed.
Her eyes hardened at the sight of the mangled body, various cuts adorned the creamy skin of her legs and arms, bleeding profusely but not quite deep enough to be fatal. Her leg was obviously broken because a knee shouldn't be able to face that way, and she was sure that this was not the only bone in the woman's ravaged body that was broken. The face was not recognizable over the swelling of the busted lips and eyes, and the only discernable feature on her head was the thick dark hair that was matted to her skin in either sweat, blood or both.
There was still a rise and fall in the chest of the woman accompanied by low gurgling noises from the blood in her throat. She focused on the steady bleeding from the wound that had potential to prove fatal and, as she focused closer to the wound on the stomach she was able to make out the letters formed in the carved flesh.
B E L L A
Again she lacked the ability to sharply intake breathe but that mattered little when a noise of a knife hitting skin and blood gushing forth tore at her attention. It first focused to the new gash that seemingly appeared across the woman's throat, effectively ending the chest movement, and then it rapidly settled on the dark gaze of the man before her. She was shocked to stillness when it was as if he was looking directly into her eyes and while rationality told her that was impossible, the slight jerk of the corner of his mouth into a sneering smile, led her to believe he was in actuality seeing her, watching her. Immediately she slammed her eyes shut and willed it all away.
At that very moment, four pairs of eyes shot open, and the same name slipped out of each mouth in a frightened gasp: "Bella"