Hunter and Hunted

He could sense them nearby. He heard it in the wind, smelled it in the air. 'Oh the stench,' he could practically taste it. If not for his experience he would have emptied his last meal. He tread carefully, his footsteps not making a sound as he pressed towards his quarry. Invisibility was the greatest tool against both predators and prey. The moon was waning but that didn't matter. Darkness never bothered him, he was molded by it since birth.

His clothing, a 3-layer mixture of wool and Gor-Tex camo covered his entire body even his face was shielded from the elements and masking his scent. It provided little protection considering his prey but silence was his friend and armor would slow him down. He would need that speed for what would come next. Dark goggles covered his milky white eyes protecting them too. In his hand was his bow, a metallic grey weapon with a recurve design, and strapped to his thighs were two large bowie knives of celestial bronze.

He knew doing this game was dangerous, one might even say it was an obsession. He knew that a single slip up could cost him his life, but gods help him he loved it. The purpose it served and the joy it brought him. Besides if the fates had decreed that he was to die then he intended to enjoy it to the last. His mentors taught him patience and agility were keys to being invisible and their teachings had served him well.

It was an endless game, monsters scurrying about like so many rats. Always hunting, always thirsty for blood, his blood, the blood of his kin. But in nature there is always a bigger fish as nobody is every truly on top of the food chain. "I will not suffer them, so long as I breath. Each one I kill means one fewer monster that can threaten us. Not just the standard ones that crawl out of Tartarus to terrorize the world but even the ones born in human skin.

He stopped and knelt down, and placed his hand on the ground feeling the imprint of large footsteps made on the ground. It seems he was not the only one on the prowl. They hunting him as much as he was hunting them. He shook his head, one could hardly call what they do hunting. It would be an insult to even amateurs.

He smiled, 'good,' he thought. The fact that they were trying to find his trail meant that they would stay close, making his job easier. His hands running along the greenery brushing the leaves and bushes.

One finger finds something, a branch had been broken, he soon discovers more broken branches until he hears a familiar grunts and growls. He now moves quietly intending to get close enough to attack. Finding a suitable tree, he begins to climb as high as possible. Once he found a favourable branch, he notched an arrow and held it in his left hand.

There were five of them, that much he could tell judging from the number of voices. He could also feel the heat of the large bonfire they were all huddled around.

He focuses on one that was facing most towards him by concentrating in his voice. He grabs a stone from his pack with his right hand and throws it behind him. It hits the ground causing the creatures to look up. Sensing his chance, the boy draws his bow. As he does the arrow begins to glow faintly. He doesn't even aim as he pulls to a full draw and loosing his arrow. It whizzes past several trees until-.

A blood curdling scream tell him that his arrow had hit home. "AHHHHH!" The cyclops screamed clutching his face. "MY EYE, MY EYE, I CAN'T SEE!"

At once his companions stood up and looked around. "An arrow," one said, "it's the hunters." The boy scoffed quietly at being mistaken for them.

"Then scatter," another ordered, "find them, search everywhere."

The others began searching the surrounding area leaving their wounded companion at the fire who had pulled the arrow our and was still clutching his face trying to nurse the wound.

The boy decided to leave him be for now the others were a more pressing concern.

With the cyclops scattered it wasn't hard to pick them off one by one. He wounded a second cyclops once again taking out his eye, when another came to help, he received the same fate. Blinded their attacker wasted no time in finishing them off with arrows to the heart. as their bodies dissolved into dust leaving trophy parts behind, the arrows lost their glow and returned to normal.

He felled the remaining two in a similar fashion before returning to the one he blinded first. hearing him approach the cyclops stood up and began swinging wildly with his club.

"YOU CURSED BRAT," he roared. "WHERE ARE YOU? WHERE ARE YOU? I'LL TEAR YOU APART AND EAT YOU PIECE BY PIECE!"

"Good Luck," He whispered before putting the beast out of it's misery with a final arrow. He regarded the trophies they monsters had left in their wake with a shrug, he had no use for them. He let out a short sharp whistle, and the arrows he had discharged flew up and returned to his quiver. "Thank you grandmother," he whispered as he walked away.

That was when he heard them coming, dozens of them. They were approaching fast so he had not a moment to loose. He sprinted in the opposite direction taking care to scatter his tracks and cover any other marks he may have left. Winding around and even doubling back. Now the game was cat and mouse and unlike the Cyclops these newcomers knew exactly what they were doing.

They would coming for him now, crossing their path, let alone their hunt tends to do that. They came for him with almost as much determination as with any other monster. The key word being almost. If they did then he would have been caught long ago.

This was the life he led, him hunting monsters (and the occasional human) and those girls chasing him. But he bore them no ill will, in all honesty he found this part equally thrilling. After all they kept him sharp, taught him the art of evasion, albeit unintentionally.

A life as both the cat and the mouse.

At the now abandoned bonfire, Zoe Nightshade fumed as she looked around in frustration. Once again that rogue hunter, interfered in their hunt, five cyclops dead, those kills should have been theirs and HE had beaten them to it.

'He doesn't even collect the trophies." she noted. 'Is he mocking us?'

They combed the area with a fine toothed comb but there was no sign of him. There were traces of his presence, faint ones, but not enough to help them out. By now he would be in the city before they catch up.

Her mistress was not pleased, no one was allowed to witness her hunt. Women would be let off, but men, they were often turned into animals. Yet this insolent fool was like a thorn on her side. For years they had been after him but he always managed to slip away.

'Whoever he was, he is good,' Zoe admitted. No matter how much she hated him she couldn't deny he knew what he was doing. Perhaps in another time he might have been offered to join them but such a thing has never happened since-

Zoe shook her head, no hunter dared to speak his name. She turned to her Mistress, "shall thou pursue thee, my lady?"

Artemis shook her head, "no, there are other monsters to hunt, going after him would waste precious hours of the hunt"

Zoe bowed, "Of course my lady." she turned to give the message to the other hunters but not before glaring into the forest one last time and whispered, "you can't hide forever boy, mark my words we will find you."

As she left, Artemis collected the discarded trophies and looking towards the forest her gaze softened before turning back to her hunters.