Disclaimer: I do not own anything that can be found in The Lord of the Rings, By J.R.R. Tolkien, or the Cirque Du Freak sieries, by Darren Shan.
Gabriella slowly opened her eyes. She looked at her sunlit surroundings. The axe had been about to kill her when she had blinked. She stood up. 'I wonder if I'm in heaven,' she thought. Gabriella turned a full circle and looked at her surroundings. It was a clearing. A wooded clearing and it might have been the one she was attacked in, but it was different. The trees were somehow different and the mountains were gone. Well, not gone, but in the West, instead of the East they were at when she was in the woods. A spell if dizziness overtook her. She wandered over to a nearby stream and drank.
She kept wandering up the stream, staring in slight fear at her strange surroundings. She caught the occasional small animal or rodent and drank their blood. It helped her gain strength, but she needed human blood. She had gone far too long without it, and her skin was dry and her hair, dull. She had been wandering for eight hours when she heard a commotion far in the distance. She jumped in a tree and waited, the sun beating down on her.
She had found out that she could walk in the sun when she was 84, or about eight and a half years old, human wise. She had been wandering the countryside with Paris. She had fallen asleep carelessly while Paris was hunting, and he hadn't been able to find her before the sun came up. When she had woken up she shrieked in surprise. She had run for cover, but was amazed that when she finally found a small cave in a cliff, she had no damage to her skin. It was about mid-day, so she must have been in the sun for hours, and yet, her skin was still the milky white it was before, from lack of sun. A regular vampire would have been fried. It was then that she learned that sun didn't effect her. It was odd, but Paris was glad that the child wouldn't have to go through her entire life without feeling the warming rays of the sun.
While she had been reflecting, about 20 strange creatures had gathered in the wood below her. They were ugly and deformed, with black skin. Their stink rose and permeated the air around Gabriella until she thought she would gag. The things started to set up a camp underneath her, and she was faced with a difficult choice. She could stay in the tree and wait until they left, or she could go fight them. 'Maybe I could drink their blood,' she thought, and her decision was made.
She dropped from the tree into the middle of their group, and felt her leg collapse. 'Oh crap,' she thought, as the creatures stared at her in surprise. She struggled to stand and pulled out her dirks. The things started to attack, and she quickly killed five of the stupid creatures as they rushed towards her one after another. The remaining things looked at their reduced numbers and all charged her with war cries.
Gabriella kept up as best as she could, but it was kind of difficult, considering her leg was giving her sharp pains and she was tired in the first hand. They were down to eight when her leg collapsed once again. The things surged, and she sat on the ground and deflected the best she could. She killed five more, based on lucky hits, and skill at defending herself. 'Three left,' she thought to herself. The three retreated to think about the best way to get her. Gabriella got to a nearby tree and lent heavily on it. The last three were BIG and she didn't think she could handle them. One tried to sneak up on her and she quickly killed him, but fell flat on her face as she did so. The last two laughed and closed in on her.
She stabbed the foot of one and it howled with the sharp pain. The other one glanced at it's wounded partner and that had been the moment Gabriella had been waiting for. She stabbed in an upward motion, entering it's lower chest and piercing the evil thing's heart. The last one, the one with the injured foot, screeched and dove for her. A quick roll saved her life, and the idiotic thing landed on it's own outstretched sword.
Gabriella carefully stood and looked at the scattered clearing. She looked around and took a closer look at one of the creatures. She tasted the blood on her knife, and immediately spat it back out. 'Gross,' she thought. She glanced at the deformed face again, and her mouth dropped open. That was why these things seemed familiar.
About two years before, she had been in America, and bored out of her mind, so she had gone to a little movie theater. The only thing that was playing was The Lord of the Rings. It was a marathon of the trilogy, and Gabriella remembered how much she had enjoyed the fighting scenes. 'What were they called?' she thought to herself. Orts, orps, ords, orks.. That's it! Orcs! But that would mean she was in Middle Earth. It had been a while since she had seen the movies.
She heard another sound. She climbed slowly into the tree she had been in before and waited. A group of 30 men walked into the clearing and stared at the carnage around them. They had been tracking this band of orcs for 5 days now, and arrived at their target to find them slaughtered. The men discussed the situation among themselves and then decided to make camp and burn the orcs.
Gabriella waited until they had their camp settled, and watched as one man strayed off towards the stream. Gabriella slowly followed him, going from tree to tree. She saw him dip his canteen into the stream and she scrambled down her tree.
The man turned around and looked startled at the disheveled girl before him. She was looking at him with sorrowful eyes, tears threatening at the corners. He slowly walked towards the woman.
"Are you all right?" he asked. The girl collapsed and he raced to catch her. He looked at her and saw a hard glint in her eyes. She breathed into his face and he collapsed, unconscious.
Gabriella looked at her catch and grinned. The damsel in distress trick always worked. Especially when she was too weak to overpower someone. She quickly lifted the unconscious man's arm, and stopped when she saw his ears. They were pointed. 'He's an elf,' Gabriella thought sadly. 'I don't know if his blood is safe.'
She had to try, she decided. She wouldn't make it much longer. She took up the elf's arm again and picked a spot. She used her sharp fingernail to make a half inch long cut on his forearm. She quickly licked the spilled blood, and drank her fill, which came surprisingly quickly. 'Elves must have very nourishing blood,' she decided. It only took half the amount to satisfy her starving appetite.
She rubbed her spit onto the elf's cut and stood up. She could already feel her skin healing, and her dark hair regaining it's shine. She looked up in time to see a shocked elf staring at her. She was still too weak to flit, and her leg was still painful to put weight on.
The elf shouted something and she was surrounded by elves in moments. They stared at their fallen comrade and quickly grabbed Gabriella's arms to stop her from running. Gabriella gasped and saw bright lights flashing in front of her eyes, when one of the stronger elves grabbed her arm right where her wound was. The elf that had seen her was speaking quickly in an unknown language to the others, and the grip on her wound became tighter. Finally the pain in her arm became too much and Gabriella blacked out.
The elves caught her and watched her unmoving form for any tricks. The elf with a grip on her upper arm let go to see blood on his hand. He alerted the elves to their captive's plight and they carried the unconscious girl back to camp.
The elf then checked the elf still lying on the ground and was relieved
to see him stirring. This is going to be a very interesting night, the elf decided as he led his friend, who was fully recovered, back to camp.
Gabriella jerked awake, and looked around with stony eyes. She was tied to a tree in the middle of a camp. An elf walked slowly towards her. When he reached her tree, he stared at her. She stared back. Finally, the elf got enough courage to speak.
"Who is Vampaneze?" He asked. Gabriella looked at him solemnly.
"How do you know of the Vampaneze?" she asked, looking at him suspiciously.
"You were talking in your sleep," replied the elf, watching her with a wary eye.
"You said that you needed to get to Vampire Mountain to warn Paris about the Vampaneze. What do you speak about?"
"I can't tell you," she said. Gabriella looked down, shivering at the thought of her attackers. The Vampaneze were cousins of the vampires. The only difference between Vampires and the Vampaneze was that the Vampaneze found it dishonorable not to completely drain their victims, killing them in the process. Vampires saw it as wasteful. That was the reason the Vampaneze had purple skin and red eyes; they drank so much blood.
The elf nodded and walked away. Gabriella assessed her situation. She felt the pain in her leg wound and her arm wound, and found herself weak. She guessed she could flit, the elven blood had helped a lot, but she still needed normal food. Right now she was wishing for a nice hot bowl of bat broth, a chunk of bread, and a nice goblet of hot, salty blood.
She didn't notice an elf come and stand in front of her. Her eyes were glazed with memories of past feasts flitting through her mind. She slowly looked up and controlled her urge to flinch. The elf was glaring at her with such malice, that she half expected him to kill her right there.
"You attacked one of my kinsmen," he claimed in a low, deadly voice. He took a step closer to her.
"It is true. I attacked you kinsmen," said Gabriella, "However I did it for a really good reason."
"You should be killed right away," the elf said, "so no more of our numbers are harmed."
"Dude!" Gabriella exclaimed in exasperation. "Does he look dead? Does he look like he's in pain? Can you even see a single scratch on him? No. Seriously, I just took what I needed and that was it. You could have waited for an explanation before accusing me."
The elf glanced back at the 'injured' soldier and saw him smiling and laughing, while eating his dinner. "What is your name?" He asked the prisoner.
"Gabriella." she replied. "Could you please untie me? I have to bind my injuries. They haven't been attended to yet. And I got them.." Gabriella stopped. She didn't know how long ago she had gotten the wounds.
"Were you the one who killed those orcs?" Asked Mr. Stick-up-the-rear, as she had named him. "Did they give you those wounds?"
Gabriella scoffed. "No! That stupid pack couldn't have injured me. Well, I guess they could have. They almost did. Because of my stupid leg. But that wasn't given to me by them. That was from... before." she left off lamely.
"You. A female? You killed those 20 orcs all by yourself?" asked the shocked elf.
"Watch it! Just because I'm a girl doesn't mean I can't fight. Hey! Where are my dirks?" she asked as she noticed that they were missing. "And my knives? Give them back! And in that case, let me go! I have to get back. The armies are marching right now... Oops."
"Armies?" whispered the elf dangerously. "Are you working for the enemy?"
"No! No!" Gabrielle said with her eyes widening slightly. "Back home. I overheard some of the enemy. I need to warn them!"
"You need to warn them at Vampire Mountain? About the Vampaneze creatures? Do not lie. Tell me who you are and where you're from. Tell me why you had to feed on the blood of one of my soldiers!"
"I can't," whispered Gabriella, looking down ant her feet. "I can't betray my people."
"Fine," said the elf. "I'm bringing you back to Imladris with us. We will discover the truth one way or another."
Gabriella slumped down in her bindings in defeat. She lifted her face to see the fiery sun paint the sky with pinks and oranges as it sank into the trees. Night was coming. Gabriella reveled in night, and it brought her hope.