(This is the first chapter of Trial by Night, and also my first fanfic. I hope you all enjoy, those of you who read, and review. I'll be putting up future installments variously in the future as the inspiration dawns upon me, until then, enjoy! Do note, this is a simple prelude to set the mood and introduce, so sorry if it's a small short for taste.)
The Hunted Predator
The thicket was dark, a garden of pitch grown around the moonlit clearing. The city's bustle was a long lost memory here in the depths of Central Park and though the paths were lit throughout the park, no light but the moon passed through the first few trees off the path. Weather clear and wind soft left the scene peaceful, if ominous. Though perhaps ominous was exactly what should be felt.
The trees of the park varied in shape, color, and size, though color was indistinct except in the brightest lamp-light near the public paths. Bushed dotted the edges of the thickets, yet rarely were there any underbrush under the thick canopy of leaves. Shadows ran across everything the moon touched, making the mundane seem exotic horrors, as well as making horrors worse than they might be. Though in the worst case, the shadows allowed the horrors simply to hide and wait. The full moon was the hunter's only light now, though he needed only dim cast to see optimally. He saw and heard all he needed when he searched for his quarry, and never before had he lost his trail. Never before, however, had he hunted a Predator.
An experienced Hunter knew the dangerous of the hunt; the pitfalls and booby-traps. More so, however, the Hunter knew the dangers an alerted quarry could bring. And most certainly his bounty knew of his presence by now. And where a normal hunter would break off to regroup at such a discovery, Wilhelm eyed it a challenge. Quarry had always been dangerous, to be sure, yet that made the thril of the hunt that much more pleasing. The closer one brushes with death, the more the hunter's honor or so it was said. Yet brush too close and you could feel the quills of the prey or worse. Wilhelm felt his hunt drawing to a close.
He circled the clearing in the thicket, making less sound than a wind brushing grass, all the while throwing all of his senses in every direction. He had lost the trail at the edge of the clearing with the tracks ending, leaf rustling dying, and even the scent of his quarry disappearing as if he had been following a ghost. He knew however, that while his prey may not be of the living, it did have flesh. Tainted and unholy flesh and bone that were deserved by no creature of the forsaken.
Gleaming blade left it's sheathe with a silent ache of steel on leather casing. Blessed metal shined in the moonlight like a beacon and the small gems on the cross of the hilt gave the two-handed sword green glowing eyes. Gracefully Wilhelm stepped into the clearing, seeking to draw the creature from the darkness by challenge. For, he declared while marking the edges of the clearing like the border of an arena, it would be here that he would defeat the beast.
A shadow was all his response - a shadow of a bird. Almost as black as the night around it, nearly invisble against the sky, the raven flew a circle in the moonlight around the waiting Hunter, causing him interest to gaze up for but a moment before resuming his vigiliance. He ignored the next shadow and even the next, yet upon the sixth shadow his eyes once again sought toward the heavens.
A black wind swooped over the clearing, feathers falling from dark clouds of wing and talon. The moon became a battleground of light and dark, a dance between enemies. No caw or call emitted from the ethereal birds above, leaving the ghostly dance to be footed to the sound of night time. And while throughout time it was a constant, the battle of dark and light, very few times did either side win. Yet the darkness won over in the night, with the moon being swallowed by the silent flappings of hundreds of birds.
The Hunter's mouth fell agape, eyes casting a mix of awe and fear toward the unholy omen. Yet his mind never brushed the prophecy that fell around the omen, until death fell upon him. An almost inaudible run was the only annoucement of the beast, and it proved quite unhelpful to the most skillful Hunter Wilhelm Sharp.
Claws rent across Sharp's shoulder, gripping into his skin in vicelike talons. Another viper fast grip rent the Hunter's arm from his body. Pain awashed Wilhelm sharp like never before, draining him of will and strength. He felt the grip at his shoulder cut to the bone and the want for the beast to continue to grip further until nothing but bonedust remained, the urge to rip him into nothing more than pulp. But by far what he felt most was what held the beast at bay, the intelligence that controlled the beast. And this in turn, made him fear. Mortality drew upon him at his wounds and sheer loss of willpower, fatigue threatening to draw him closer and closer to his demise. An hour of torment seemed to pass in the flash of a minute and though he made his final thoughts in life dwell upon his two sons and wife, the creature owned the final sensation. A bite of beastial fangs upon his neck, crushing his throat in it's grip, stunned him to reality just before death, his eyes meeting intense, yellow animalistic eyes.
-Scene Change-
The arm and body fit neatly into the barrel after some one-sided negociating, though they compacted nicely devoid of blood. And with the lid hammered on and holes punched into the side, nothing kept the former Hunter Wilhelm Sharp from meeting a watery burial at the bottom of the harbor.
The shadowed man splashed water on his face, cleansing it of the crimson evidence of his most recent murder. He gave a sardonic chuckle at mention of murder in his thoughts. A year a vampire and he still thought of it as murder. He killed as sparsely as he could and yet he still took more lives than he ever could be forgiven for. Too many things depended on killing in his new life, though he supposed survival took that kind of price for living immortally. Though immortality would be hell with the memories of that bloody life.
He shook his head and walked from the dock building, his overlarge trenchcoat seeming to make him shrink from his normal height, seeking the sanctuary of the street's hubbub. Nothing to do except drown those memories now.