Hello guys, i'm updating now becuas i don't know when i'll be updating next so anyway thank you for review and stuff and sorry if i didn't get round to replying to yo guys review!

Chapter 10... Wandered. 2331

The woods were dark and the shadows were elongated as I walked silently through the clawing branches. I'd moved the Prince and Akiko further into the twisting tunnels of the sub caves that I'd found previously. The rain had stopped, but the cold weather was unrelenting and the leaves blew north in the southern wind, cutting across the highway and dancing at the bottom of stout tree roots.

I'd been walking for three hours before I saw the village. It nestled in the bottom of the hills, surrounded by snaking green lake and standing at the foot of a great castle. From first glance it seemed unsightly compared to Castle Araluen and the palaces in Nihon-Ja, but from a second closer inspection I saw the castle was built intimidatingly high on dark red rock. Iron, I presumed. The walls glowed orange and reflected boxes of light on the murky river water. The houses flickered with light and I it was almost infuriating I think how many people were enjoying the warmth of a good fire.

I pulled my cloak tighter around my shoulders and headed away from the town, towards the trees where a small haze of smoke rose from- what I hopped- was the ranger's cabin.

There was something comforting about being shadowed by the late rising sun and slowly drifting moon. The sky- for once- was sluggishly changing from navy to pale blue and tiny white dots pock-marked the hazy firmament.

The cabin was small and cosy, reminding me- with a small pang of sickness- of my home, shadowed by trees and swallowed by a wide lake, which, in the high winter seasons, would completely freeze over, creating a sheet of ice- like tiled palace ball-room flooring, only more slippery.

The walls were boarded oak and the windows were boxed with flowers standing- in good health- on the window sills. Blotted yellow flames danced in a small fireside and a copper kettle rattled gently atop an iron grill rack. Thin white netting coiled from the open windows with a breezy wind that carried the smell of coffee through the open windows.

I moved off into the trees lining the clearing and looked around for a thick tree before scaling it hurriedly. Once at an even branch I sat down and hulled up my hood to cover my face. I kept my eyes out of focus and at a flat one-hundred and eighty degrees view at the same time. I kept my ears open listening to a sound then discarding it as unimportant- like the singing of sparrows and the ruffling of crows- or listening even more carefully.

Even though the cabin seemed deserted and the stable empty, the path- I realised with a jolt- was occupied with a single lone figure. Although I didn't move, my eyes sharpened and I mentally leaned forward to inspect the person.

It was a man, I could tell that from the posture while he walked. His face, though shadowed by the cowl of a dark cloak was bearded. He walked with light soundless footsteps and his whole body seemed to shimmer and shift from place to place as he moved towards the cabin. A long arched bow was strung and hulled over his shoulder and on the other side I could just see the tips of feathered arrows from a leather quiver. This was the ranger.

The ranger walked towards the cabin and opened the door. Out leaped a dark shape which I realised was a dog. Not a hunting god by any means, but a smaller shaggier dog that looked like it should live on a farm. The ranger caught the dog through one arm then suddenly twisted and looked straight in the tree that I was sitting in.

I didn't move for fear of being seen, but my hearted rattled against my lungs and my brain thumped against my skull like a hammer. The ranger's eyes were like two candles flickering in a dark room but I worried that their fire would burn holes through my skin but slowly he dropped his eyes and whistled.

A horse bolted suddenly through the undergrowth beneath my tree and it took all my will not to jump or even move a bone in my body. Blood horse, I thought. The horse stopped by the cabin and the ranger seemed to talk to the animal before it raced off to a smaller house beside the cabin which I presumed was the horse's barn.

The ranger then dropped the dog and it rolled to its feet grudgingly and entered the cabin. I let out a breath and closed my eyes. Waiting and listening. Then I heard it, a slight whistling like tearing paper or cutting wind. I opened my eyes, saw the arrow and acted.

Slipping from the branch I swung underneath and dropped to a crouch at the foot of the tree. The undergrowth was sharp and tore at my skin like needles. I ranger moved from his window and through the door open, his bow positioned to act although I saw no arrow knocked in the string.

I expected the ranger to come storming over and stop just by the bush. Maybe even raise his bow and start shooting at the bush. Calling out, 'Show yourself!" while he was at it. But the other part of me told me this man was not the sort to blunder or shout at me. I had panicked and given away me position even though it had only be, what I would call a warning shoot.

Cursing again I rolled onto my stomach and snaked forward towards the clearing but when I reached it the ranger was nowhere to be seen. I opened my vision and caught a sign of movement. No figure showed, but a shaking of branches in a non-existent wind, the movement of grass flicking back into its righteous position, the dead sound of birds leaping from their branches, was all that told me he was still here.

Then nothing. There were no more signs so I rolled over again and looked up at the trees just in time to see the ranger standing on the branch above me and scramble out of the way as he jumped. The man's impact should have knocked the wind from a normal man's lungs but the ranger just sprang to his feet and advanced at me.

I jumped up too, flexing on the balls of my feet. I range moved with perfect balance and I had the feeling, like a rock sinking in my stomach, that I had found my match but that would not stop me from trying.

'Let them make the first move', Mochihito had told her. Moc had been her friend, trainer and family. He was gone too, like everyone else that she had once held precious.

'Don't be sexist,' I had replied lightly.

Moc had looked confused so I had elaborated. 'You said "let him take the first move." Well it might be a girl.'

Moc had laughed.

The ranger made no move though. He didn't seem to want to go first. Instead he spoke.

'What are you doing here?' he asked in a quiet voice.

'Walking,' I replied, also quiet.

'Sunny day is it?' he asked.

I shrugged. 'Don't know, bit mild for me actually.'

'Um… you're from Nihon-Ja? Aren't you?'

'Only half,' I said truthfully, then getting bored jumped in.

The ranger was a wonderful opponent. He met me head on, a blade- dull but still shining- jutting from his hand where it had not been before. I slipped a knife from my own belt and brought it up to meet his own knife. A loud clang echoed in my ears and I glanced down quickly, understanding dawned fast as a whip: the ranger's knife was a strong as mine. The metal work in my blades were special iron and steel but his own knife was as undamaged as mine where I was expecting my blade to slice through his like butter.

The ranger twisted as I swung my blade out then knocked his own knife back and rapped the dead sided piece of the blade against my knuckles but I didn't let go of the knife. Instead I threw the knife catching it in my other hand and tugged the man's wrist, over balancing him.

He crashed forward onto my legs, dropping his knife behind him. With the tip of my foot I kicked out and pushed the blade away so he had no hope of reclaiming it. He pushed forward, pushing his body weight down on mine and picked the knife from my grasp. I pulled my hand from his long fingers and racked my nails across his cheek. He let out a cry of shock and jerked backwards giving me enough time to curl up my legs and push his body away.

'You're smaller than most men and your physical strength will, in some cases be a disadvantage, but with the right leverage you can do anything,' Moc had said.

He rolled sideways and I took the time to spring to my feet but the ranger was up too, leaning forward slightly. I moved forward and pushed my knee into his stomach but he twisted out of the way to the blow didn't hit the point but over balanced me instead. I stumbled on my feet foot and the ranger sung a blow into my lungs. I flashed back: Pain. Pain in my lungs. Can't breathe. Need air. Need air-

I was blinded momentarily but then the ranger had pushed me up against the tree, my legs jammed behind me. I'd never slept with a man, but I my line of work it's good to know how to overpower a man when his whole body is pressed against mine. He had one arm across my arms, by my neck, the other he was unlatching my belt and threw it away, the knives and daggers flinging in all directions.

'Anything can be a weapon,' said Moc in my head. 'Even you yourself, if you know what you're doing.'

I kept my eyes on the ranger's- they were brown I realised where I had presumed them to be a lighter colour but he kept his downward and not on my face- while I moved my face down a centre of an inch and clamped down on his bare arm. My teeth burred themselves in his skin and hot blood entered my mouth.

Having the ranger momentarily distracted I pulled my feet from under my body and jumped, swinging them around the ranger's thin waist- almost straddling him. Using my hands I pushed from the tree and he toppled backwards. Pulling my legs from under his body I kicked out at his ribs but he twisted and I was pushed under him. He pinned my legs under one of his and buried his other knee in my chest.

'What I want to know is why a little girl like yourself is trying to hurt me?' his face was pale and he said the words with a dangerous under-tone. I tried not to shiver.

'Well,' I said, tilting my head up. 'Works is work, I suppose.'

'Um… well you seem very young-'

Then the ranger exploded into action and wrapped his hand across my face, blinding my vision. He punched at my ribs and then, suddenly, the ranger was knocked from my body and a force pelted into my own. I curled my head into a ball and waited for the pounding to stop. I felt a sharp pain explode between my shoulder blades then another in my arm and red pain lanced through it.

'Protect your head, without it you'd be dead,' Moc shouted.

I looked up through my arms to see a cloud of swirling dust and in the middle was Akiko. What was that bloody horse doing there? I sat up grudgingly feeling as though I had been trampled on by a herd of cattle instead of my own horse and looked through the haze at the side. The ranger was standing over a body and as I pulled myself up I saw that it was the prince's body.

I moved silently, using the Akiko's rains to get to my feet and lurched myself at the ranger's body. We both fell to the floor, scrambling for the upper hand before I felt a pain in my side and knew suddenly what it was. Kicking out with my booted foot, I caught the ranger in the head and scrambled for the dagger at my side. The ranger, shaking his head to relieve himself from the fogginess of the blow, came back down with another knife in his hand. He must have hidden it, I thought.

He pressed the knife to my throat and I felt a warm trickled run down my neck. 'What do you want?' hissed the ranger between his front teeth.

I swallowed against the cold metal and said: 'I don't want anything. My client on the other hand… well he wants you and him,' I nodded towards the prince.

'Why?' the ranger asked.

'You must have many enemies, ranger. But the one that is paying me to get you too is very powerful and very pissed at both of you,' then with a mocking tone added, 'I can't imagine why.'

'You're not going anywhere,' the ranger hissed.

'Well sorry,' I said, my voice dripping with sarcasm. 'But I'm on a tight deadline and I dislike being late. I might not be able to beat you in a fight, ranger, but I can kill your friend right here, right now.'

The ranger's eyes drifted from his friend back to my face. 'I thought you said your client wanted him and me?'

I frowned, hoping it would pass as a convincing lie. 'My client didn't display a view on whether he wanted you two dead or alive.'

There we go, i wanted to make the fight scene like AMAZING but it didn't go that well so i hoped you liked it anyway!

anyway please review! :)