Chapter Six

Her three traveling companions stood still for a good couple of moments, trying to digest the scene that just happened. They stared in shock at the five dead bodies lying prostrate in the ground, blood oozing out of them and staining the dirt.

Darkstar buried her face in her paws, the stench of the blood filling her nostrils. Feelings of familiar excitement and adrenaline entered into her veins. "No. . .no. . ." She whispered to herself trying to block out the stench and her disturbing feelings.

The smell was so familiar. Every dream she had, she could remember this same smell. Everything was drenched in that same dark red liquid, tainting everything it touched. The bodies. . . the massive amount of bodies. . .all dead. . .all smelling of the same distinct scent of gore and blood.

She opened her eyes and her paws dropped to the ground. She stared unblinkingly at the beasts she had just killed, blocking out every thing else around her. It was like she was reliving the night that haunted her dreams whenever she closed her eyes in sleep.

Skipper, familiar with the affects of a battle, was the first to recover. "Darkstar?" He asked questioningly as he sheathed his weapon and walked over to her tentatively. It seemed as though she was in some kind of extreme emotional struggle with herself. He looked at the pained expression on her face and the confliction and confusion in her eyes.

The sound of his words seemed to snap the other two out of their trances. "Darkstar!" Karia questioned, with a worried expression etched on her face. She rushed past Skipper and ran towards the girl.

Kneeling down, she embraced the young fox around the shoulders. "What's the matter?"

No answer. Darkstar just continued to stare, unaware of the life going on around her.

Snowpaws slowly put away his sword. Never had he seen someone kill so easily. . .so smoothly. . .so flawlessly. Her movements were like water. It seemed as though she barely gave her actions a thought, yet still hit her targets directly. It intrigued him.

Karia shook Darkstar by the shoulders, her concern increasing as the minutes went by and still no response. She shook Darkstar again, this time with more force and a hint of desperation.

The jolt of the shaking finally brought Darkstar back to her senses and she looked around blankly. She moved her eyes from Karia to Skipper to Snowpaws and then back to the dead bodies of the bounty hunters.

"I. . .I. . .don't know what happened. . . Or what came over me. . ." Darkstar said quietly.

Karia pulled her up off the ground and hugged her. "It's ok, Darkstar. It was all in self-defense."

Snowpaws walked up to where Skipper was standing. The young otter leader hadn't quite made it all the way to the black fox and had stopped when Karia reached her. "She's amazing." Snowpaws whispered to his friend, unable to be heard by the two females.

"Amazingly deadly." Came the quiet response.

Darkstar turned towards the male otter and fox. Bowing, she apologized once more. "I'm so sorry. . . I didn't want to kill them. . ."

"It's alright. Karia's correct; it was all in self-defense. If you hadn't gotten to them first, they would have gotten to us. No need for apologizing. We should be thanking you for saving our lives." Skipper replied as he continued his way over to her.

Snowpaws was watching her carefully. The bow. . .it wasn't something often seen with creatures around here. In fact, it was something much often seen in the east. That intrigued him even more.

He strode over to the group as well. "Yes, I agree completely with Skipper. We ought to be thanking you."

Unbeknownst to the group, a pair of bright blue eyes continued to watch. They had seen the whole thing. . . and were full of pride. . .yet tinged with sadness. "Gomen, Darkstar. . .gomen for all the pain you must endure. . ."

"Alright! Well. . . now what are we supposed to do with these bodies? We can't just leave them laying on the side of the road." Karia asked, sweeping her paw over where all the bodies lay drenched in their own blood.

"Why not?" Darkstar asked quietly. In her mind, once a beast was dead, it wasn't her concern what to do with them after.

"Why not!" Karia repeated in a shocked tone. "How would you like to just be walking along the road, minding your own business, la di da, and then suddenly stumble upon a dead corpse? Besides, even though they tried to kill us, they were still beasts and deserve the respect of some kind of burial."

Darkstar still couldn't quite grasp the concept. She could understand burying the body of a loved one, or somebeast she was close to, but for an enemy and for somebeast she didn't know, it didn't seem to make sense. Still, she decided it was best not to argue with other beasts' principles.

"Karia's right." Snowpaws replied, nodding his head. "Perhaps we can bury them off to the side of the road a ways."

"Good idea." Skipper replied as he started to roll up his sleeves.

Darkstar thought this was all a waste of time. She would have liked to have reached Salamandastron as soon as possible, but the others seemed determined to bury these beasts who held no significance nor meaning to her. Still, she complied and imitated Skipper with rolling up her sleeves to her elbows.

"We. . . have nothing to dig. . .with." Darkstar pointed out.

Skipper held up his massive paw and flexed it. "Well then, looks like we're going to be doing some good hard labor! Let's give our paws a good work out!"

Snowpaws smiled amiably and held up a fist. "Alright, let's get to it!"

Karia pumped her fist in the air. "Let's go!"

Darkstar blinked blankly at the group. She understood that Skipper planned on them digging with their paws to bury them, but to have the others so eagerly ready to do such hard work surprised her.

Skipper and Snowpaws started dragging the dead bodies over to the side of the road while Karia determined a good spot to start digging. When she had found a nice place, dirt started flying.

After the two males had laid all the bodies next to each other, they too started to dig into the ground. Luckily, the dirt was fairly soft so it wasn't too difficult to break the surface.

Darkstar, a little unsure of herself, followed their lead and soon they had four holes starting to take form.

Hours had passed when Darkstar turned her dark eyes towards the sky, taking note of the sun that was now right above them, indicating that it was the middle of the day. The temperature had progressively gotten hotter, and the hard work was heating her body as well. It also didn't help that her fur was black and hungrily absorbed the heat.

She brushed her paw over her forehead, wiping the sweat from her fur. They'd been digging for hours, but at least they were almost finished. She'd have to remember to try not and kill anybeast again for it was too much work to bury them.

She glanced at the others with her. Snowpaws and Skipper had sometime taken off their shirts and cast them aside in attempt to cool themselves. Karia had rolled up her sleeves as far as she could, but she could see they were all sweltering in the sun. Yet, no beast had complained and no beast had stopped working. Darkstar was impressed.

Darkstar's head and upper body disappeared into the hole she was creating and after a few more minutes of digging, she emerged again and dumped the last body into the hole. Scooping the dirt back into the hole she tried to flatten it out as much as possible, but a heap still remained, matching her hole with three other mounds of dirt. The others were working on the last hole.

Finally they were all finished and lay down a little ways off the road, cooling off under the shade of a nice tree and pouring water over their paws in attempts to wash the dirt off. The bodies were neatly buried and the only evidence of the fight from this morning were the five mounds of dirt lying on the side of the road and the stains of blood mixed with the dirt of the ground, which would eventually be washed away by rain.

"Skiiiiiiiippeeeeer!" Karia whined, moving her head to the side to look at her leader. She was lying stretched out on the cool grass, trying to pick the last remnants of the dirt from her claws. "I'm hungryyyyyy!"

"Yes, I think we all are, after all that hard work." Skipper checked the provisions they had gotten from the abbey for their journey and dispersed the food.

They gratefully took the food and eagerly ate. It was delicious! Of course, everything always tasted better when you're tired and hungry, still it was perfect and hit the spot.

Darkstar took a sip of cool water and splashed some on her face. Her mind was wandering over the incidents of this morning. Bounty hunters. . . for her? But why? Her eyes clouded over in thought. What had she done in her past that would set a price on her head? Why were her dreams always the same disturbing images?

She sighed, all these questions unanswered. . . She was determined to find the answer though, no matter what sins she had committed in her past.

Snowpaws stood up and put on his shirt. He stretched. "I think we've all rested long enough and gained back our strength to move on, don't you think?"

Skipper also pulled on his shirt and nodded. "Yes, it would be nice to get to Salamandastron as soon as possible."

"Awww…but I was just getting comfortable!" Karia said with a grin as she too sat up and then climbed to her feet.

Darkstar shifted her eyes towards some foliage a ways away from her…sensing a presence. Barely, but she was sure something was there…hiding from her.

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"1. . .2. . .3. . .4. . . 5. . ." the black kit counted, her paws covering her eyes as she continued to count. "6. . .7. . ." Her dark eyes peeked out from under her paws… "…10! Ready or not, here I come!" Dropping her tiny paws to her side, she looked around briefly before racing off.

"I'm going to fiiiind you!" She cried happily as she searched behind brushes and trees.

Finally she spotted those familiar blue eyes, bright and full of bliss, peeked out from above her as their owner tried to hide himself in the branches of a tree.

"Found you!" She giggled as jumped up and down with her paw extended towards him, trying to touch his footpaw.

"You may have found me, but you'll never catch me!" He challenged her as he jumped gracefully down from the branch and raced off.

"Wait for me!" She cried in between her giggles as she lost no time in racing after him.

She being the small one, with smaller legs, couldn't seem to catch up with the boy as he raced on, no matter how much she tried. "Kazetarou-chaaaan! Come back!" She cried out to him, frustration starting to show upon her baby face as he continued to remain out of reach.

Tears started to form in her eyes, blurring her vision, but she continued to run after him. Suddenly she bumped into something soft and little arms wrapped around her as they both tumbled gently to the ground.

"Darkystar. . . don't cry. I won't ever leave you." The young fox said with a wide grin as his small paws wiped the tears from her eyes.

-----

The same blue eyes from before continued to watch the black fox, but when he caught her glance moving towards his area he quickly disappeared with hardly a sound or trace.

"Darkstar?" Snowpaws called to her for the third time.

Kazetarou. . .strange sounding name, yet not so strange. It baffled her.

"Uh, yes?" She asked, looking up at him, coming out of her reverie. The presence was gone. . . she must have been imagining things.

"Are you ready?" He asked, smiling down at her. Karia and Skipper were loading their things and shouldering their packs.

"Oh. . . yes. Sorry." Darkstar responded as she stood up and shouldered her own pack. She had taken off her weapons and had laid them next to her on the ground, so she quickly picked those up and stuck them through her belt.

"Well then! Let's be off!" Karia said, grinning broadly as she led the way back towards the road.

Darkstar gave one last look back towards where she had thought she had felt somebeast. "Kazetarou. . ." She whispered, as the three continued walking, not noticing she was still in place. "Who are you?" She asked as her words fell upon nothing but the wind. With that, she turned and walked quickly up towards the others.