~Part One ~ The Last Days Of Summer~

~Chapter Three~

Upon the same night that Ari was made to run from her home other events were taking place a short distance from the Holt. A short little battle had been lived out, a battlefield lay torn from its normally serene nature into a giant stain of blood across the earth. Trees were still burning themselves out from fire arrows as other trees stood with bloodied arrows embedded in their bark. Bodies lay strewn haphazardly against trees, in ditches and in small piles that had begun collecting flies. Swords and spears stuck out at crazy angles from the corpses and all was silent. Lizards and birds had abandoned their homes in flight from the chaos of the battle. Amidst the bodies lay the bloodied body of a ferret; flies crawled over his blood soaked paws.

Several arrows stuck out from his arms, the coldness of his body and the paleness of his complexion giving away that this was a long dead beast. But inside his heart beat on slowly. Eventually at the crack of a tree as it gave its last sigh before crashing onto the ground onto the dead body of a rat, with several arrows through his skull, the ferret stirred. As his mind rose from the hell of nightmares he found blinding pain awaiting him, his back burned from the cuts. He let out a scream of pain before collapsing back down, panting and slowly, but surely gaining control of his muscles that suffered constant spasms of pain.

Using what remained of his strength he propped himself up against the fallen tree ripping the arrows from his arms and throwing them into the forest. He felt no emotions other then the pain and agony that wracked his body. He began crawling towards a vixen he instinctually knew to be a healer. On all fours he dragged himself over corpses and broken weapons to the vixen.

She lay dead in the dirt, a spear through her sides. The ferret slowly removed bandages from her pack wrapping his arms and body. He pinned the bandages with pine needles and sealed them with mud, hoping it would hold long enough. The pain began to die off as the bloods ebb stopped under the pressure of the bandages. He sat back against a tree exhausted. He let unconsciousness take him once again and felt himself fall into the dreams and nightmares once more.



The ferret awoke with a start; horrid nightmares had plagued his rest. Broken images swirled around in his head. He could se the steel-whip lash across a mouse's neck, snapping it as blood spurted from the wound onto the ground. The ground was slippery with blood; he saw it all in slow motion, the whip as it drew across the mouse's neck, the individual drops of blood as the spread onto the already blood stained floor. At the thought the ferret vomited to his side and collapsed into his own foul smelling mess.

"Who was that? Wait!" He thought to himself, eyes closed, they opened again in shock, disbelief in the ferret's eyes, "Who am I?" The ferret drew only a blank at the question; he rolled away from the mess and felt something metal on his side dig in. He sat up again and as he took it from his side, a small dagger came into his view, a name emblazoned upon its silver hilt.

"Kylin." He read aloud. He figured it was his name and looked at the dagger seeing no blood spilt upon its keen edge. It was spotless and polished, unlike its scabbard, which still hung at his waste. Looking down at his blood and vomit stained clothes he saw himself. He wore a black vest and grayed pants held up by a sword belt, the sword scabbard hung off the belt empty. He got up unsteadily and began searching the battlefield; he rolled over bodies to check them only to find that he was the only beast alive in the meadow and he found no memories stir at the sight of the dead beasts.

"Why?" He looked around at the bloodied bodies. Did they have families that didn't know what had happened to them; had he killed some of them. He had only questions swirling in his mind and he pushed over the body of a fox to find his eyes gone from their sockets and still another dead beast. Kylin shuddered at the sight of the empty sockets so he quickly covered the fox with his own cloak. A sword through the fox's chest was holding it down. This caught his eye and as he pulled it out of the fox to look at it, he found the same name emblazoned onto the hilt, 'Kylin.'

He had killed the fox. He looked at the sightless sockets and shuddered, wondering what kind of beast he had been. No memories presented themselves and he could only feel remorse for the possibilities, the fox could have been a parent, now a child was fatherless thanks to him. He buried the thoughts and let the blade drop to the ground; it stuck up through the earth. It was an old life; perhaps this was a blessing for the ferret, an opportunity to start anew, to have a better life.

With a last glance at the bloodied meadow the ferret disappeared through the woods taking only the unstained dagger with him, discarding the scabbard and the sword with his past life. The sun began to rise higher in the sky as he dodged through the forest a single memory played itself in the ferret's mind. That of the mouse and the whip and the drops as they fell on the floor, forever staining it. A small voice in the back of his mind, unknown to his conscious mind laughed at the mouse's death and the ferret's naivety.



Kylin wandered almost aimlessly through the forest walking away from the sun as it rose in the morning hours. He looked around at the greenery with a careful eye; none of it was familiar to him, though he vaguely recalled the chamber in which he had seen the mouse's murder. It was in a great castle, where he did not know, and what it was there for he knew not either. At about noon he felt the first true pangs of hunger. He tried to ignore them, but settled for eating off the land - insects, plants and the like were abundant to him. Later he rested. All the while traveling in silence, no one to converse with he was left to talk with himself, but all he had were the questions.

"Who had I been?" Was among his questions along with many others, but after seeing the empty sockets of the fox, lying dead in a puddle of blood with sword through his chest, he wasn't even sure he really wanted to know. Suddenly an upraised tree root snared his foot paw, pulling him to the ground as it had done to other unsuspecting travelers. Kylin simply lay on the ground, his questions dancing about in his mind, each of them awaiting an answer that would never come.

"This sucks." He muttered aloud to nobeast in particular. "Well, might as well get up." One part of his mind said while another one simply asked, "What's the point?" It was a good question for the ferret - where was he going anyway. He rolled over to find a footprint. He glanced at it only to find a trail of footprints, similar to his own in shape, leading slightly south of where he'd been heading.

"That's what I need." He said excitedly getting up. Jogging along the trail of footprints, he knew what he needed. He needed another person, anybeast, it didn't matter whom. He just needed another soul to be with him. He ran along the trail, which followed a distinct path through the forest, well into the evening before it suddenly disappeared, replaced by the prints of another beast.

"A squirrel." Some part of his mind hissed in disgust. He followed the path cautiously through the sunset until he came upon the flickering flames of a campfire. Approaching with the utmost care to be silent he rounded the camp taking in the scene. The maker of the original footprints, who he now saw was a pretty little ferret maid, was bound to a tree roughly. She looked unconscious while her captor, an able bodied squirrel sharpened a blade. He paused to take a drink.

"Shan't live too much longer vermin." The squirrel muttered, glee leaking into his voice as he took a long drink of water, his eyes always on his captive. Kylin made his move. Silently he crept up behind the squirrel and grabbed his body with one arm while his other paw held his dagger up against the squirrel's throat, digging it in enough to cause the squirrel to shake in fright.

"Feel lucky vermin?" He asked, digging he blade in further. The squirrel shook and let his blade fall to the ground and held his arms up above his head in surrender. Kylin pushed him forward onto all fours after kicking his blade a few feet away. The squirrel sat shaking in submission. Kylin looked to the bound maid before kicking the squirrel savagely in the head, knocking him out.

He held the squirrel's head pressing his blade to his throat preparing to end the squirrel in moments when he looked up to find the maid staring at him silently, a look of horror and fright painted on her pretty features. Kylin shuddered visibly under her gaze. "What am I doing?" He thought. He dropped the squirrel and his dagger in the same motion and backed away disgusted as a voice in his head berated him.

"Kill him, he's just lying there helpless you fool! You cannot fail!" As it screamed through his mind, he shook his head in an attempt to rid himself of the voice. After a few moments it fell silent, he stooped and picked up his blade before moving to the bound maid. Ari shook visibly. She trembled and closed her eyes, awaiting the worst when suddenly she pitched forward into the ferret's arms as the ropes fell away from her. She stared up into the ferret's face and found something that she hadn't seen in days, the same look her brother had given her the day of the incident.

"Are you okay?" He asked, brushing her fur softly with care. She nodded silently and shivered in the cool night air. "Cold?" He placed her against the tree carefully and picked up her cloak wrapping it around her body. She felt warm under its protection and looked up and smiled, silently thanking her savior as he smiled back with satisfaction. He thought she was beautiful, and he picked her up in his strong arms and carried her through the darkness of the forest. He carried her with love, only stopping to sling the two small packs over his shoulders, as they walked through the moonlit forest away from the unconscious squirrel. Ari fell asleep in the arms of her savoir.