AN: I've had this sitting on my desktop for months. If I get good feedback, I'll continue. If not, I don't have enough time this year to support a whim story without a good fanbase. (I'm talking out my butt right now. You know if just one person likes this I'm so totally in. I just have to look like I'm taking responisbility for my school work this year...)
So please, review if you enjoy. Add to your favorites/alerts and keep tuned in!
Chapter 1: Lost Huntress
Kagome didn't know which part of the forest she was in. If pressured, she would suggest that she was far to the north and west and far, far too close to the Great River.
The Demon's Forest was a dark, immense stretch of untamed woodland that marked the dividing line between the land of humans in the South and East and the land of the monsters called youkai, demons, in the North and West. The Great River was the clearest barrier between the two, the final warning.
There were guard towers built all through the Demon's Forest, and no matter which direction she walked in, she was bound to come across one eventually. At the very least, being lost in the forest would probably be the greatest story Kagome had ever brought back for her brother.
He was certain to get a kick out of this- his sister, the mighty huntress, lost like a common city fool. On the other hand, maybe she should include something to make the situation sound a little less ridiculous- a life or death fight with a rabid raccoon dog… or something.
Kagome shook her head at her own stupidity. This wasn't the first time she'd taken a week to explore the forest on her own, hunting and gathering various useful herbs, but it was the first time she'd ever not known exactly which direction home was in.
Currently, she was wandering towards the south. The light that filtered through the trees above her was sparse at its brightest, lending ghostly shadows to the trunks that stretched in all directions.
It was mid summer, so the night would be warm, and Kagome could feel that there was no rain on the air. However, she was anxious to find the safety of a guard tower. Her father had always been ready with stories of terrible monsters that had crossed the Great River for one reason or another and lurked through human lands. She'd always taken his words to heart. She had never seen a demon herself, but there had been times when a feeling would come over her of being watched by eyes that belonged to a creature she'd never experienced the likes of before.
The darkness was tricky. If she looked too hard and too long at one spot that she could only half see, there would be a sort of sliding movement through the shadows, and if she blinked and looked again, all would be still. She hurried her pace, tightening her grip on her bow and checking the rope that looped around her shoulder and ensnared the legs of a rabbit she had shot only an hour or two ago. If she didn't find a tower soon, she'd have to stop and light a fire; she'd be grateful for the meal the rabbit would provide then. Currently, though, having several pounds of bloody meat slung over her shoulder was only serving to make her nervous, aware as she was of the predators that lurked through this forest.
She had almost decided to stop and make camp when a small noise ahead of her caused her to pause. If was a wuffling, snorting noise accompanied by the distinctive sound of something pushing through the cover of leaves that almost always lay on the ground in a forest like this.
Kagome knew that noise. She began to back away slowly. Wild boars were dangerous when they wanted to be, and when provoked, they could be absolutely deadly. She was almost certain that the boar was ahead of her, but the echo through the tree gave life to the illusion that there were boars all around.
She began to back away slowly, her eyes narrowed as she relied on her ears to keep tabs on the boar.
Just as she was turning to begin making her way around the boar, her foot snapped a small stick in two, the sound of the break jumping out into heavy night like an explosion. She winced and listened hard. The noise of the boar's foraging had ceased, but Kagome knew it was as alert as she was.
She heard a few faint rustlings, then nothing. A few seconds later, there were more rustling noises, the sound of something with four feet moving over fallen leaves. It was coming to investigate.
She was frozen, hoping it would go away. She pulled her bow around to firing position, soundlessly taking an arrow from her quiver and nocking it.
When a long, dirty snout appeared, she tensed. Behind it came heavy, thin head, the grizzled, hairy body, and sharp tusks of a male wild boar. She could barely see the thing, but knew that it could see her.
There were no trees around her that had branches low enough to reach. She took aim at the boar, the tip of her arrow searching out his heart, but did not fire.
She watched as best she could, all but blind in the darkness.
She took one careful step backwards. It was all the provocation a hungry boar needed, and he charged, his head down. In the single moment of adrenaline filled clarity, she realized she should have thrown down her rabbit the second she heard the boar for the first time.
Her arrow lodged into the boar's shoulder, but by the time it hit, she was already running in the opposite direction. Enraged and unhindered, the boar took off in pursuit, his short legs carrying him surprisingly quickly.
Kagome ran all out, her legs pumping and chest heaving. In between pushing through bushes and branches, she managed to get the rabbit off of its rope on her shoulder, dropping it to the ground.
She ran until her side began to hurt and she could no longer breathe with ease. When she finally stopped, she was panting too loudly to be able to hear anything. When no rampaging boar burst from the darkness to savage her after several minutes, she began to relax.
Once she had caught her breath, she began to get her bearings. She was still lost, only now it was pitch black and nothing at all was familiar. An owl hooted above her head, and she took a few steps into the darkness. The safest thing would be to find someplace to sit and wait out morning without sleep. Spiders and snakes ruled out the idea of sleeping in a tree for the night, and every other creature in the forest ruled out sleeping anywhere else.
She took a deep breath, mystified by the utter silence of the forest around her. It was creepy, really, the darkness and the lack of sound.
Kagome shook her head at herself again. She was in a mess, but not one she couldn't handle. She began to walk carefully, the light from the moon and stars just enough to keep her from smacking into trees and limbs.
She found herself soon in a tangle of low growing brush, the trees finally thinning out so that she could see well enough.
The moon was full and heavy, a good moon for midnight walks. Kagome snorted quietly to herself.
"Yes," she muttered, "that's what this is- a midnight walk; a stroll, in fact." She enjoyed the sound of her own voice after not hearing another human speak in two days.
She kept pushing her way through the brush, hoping to find a patch of ground that was more grass than anything else. By the way the moon hung, she figured she was heading north, but shrugged it off as unimportant.
"I'll head back south in the morning," she told herself, adjusting her grip on her bow. "A little further north won't kill me…"
A bush to the left of her rattled dryly. Kagome jumped to her right, startled. She saw, briefly, a large, furry body making its way out of the bush. Her foot slipped, soft dirt giving way. She fell, a strangled scream escaping her throat before she hit the broad, calm bend of the River.
Her first though upon hitting the water was It was just a raccoon dog… and her last thought before smacking her head against a rock on the river bottom was I guess I was farther North than I thought.
End Chapter
