He ran blindly through the darkened forest. The moon scarcely seemed to shine through the thick and impending trees; their long thick braches seemed to pop out unexpectedly to slam into his face and body. But he would not stop.
He could not.
He could hear them behind him; he knew that with every pasting second that they got closer, he knew that with every pasting second they could be upon him. But he knew that they would not kill him. No, he would not be granted such a pleasure, such a simple end, where there would be no pain. He knew that for his actions, this would not satisfy them.
Branches and trees snapped and cracked wildly behind him as they followed him through his desperate run, making sharp ear-splitting cries from the pleasure of the hunt. An evil sound.
With the screams of their last victim, echoing endlessly in his ears, he tried to put on an extra burst of speed. He rapidly ducked another branch that had threatened to knock him over. He tried to run, to escape but they kept coming, he could hear them quickly approaching him from behind, their icy breathe close enough to freeze the back of his neck.
He felt his foot suddenly catch below him on a hidden underlying root. He fell promptly to the ground in a heap, smashing through some of the underbrush. He both felt and heard as his ankle twisted and then snapped, with a resounding clearly distant crack!
The pain shot up his leg like an electric shock; he gave a small cry out in pain, as every maddened heartbeat pumped through his newly injured ankle. He frantically tried to ignore the searing pain and wrenched his foot free from it imprisonment.
He could see the shadowed outlines of them rushing forward upon their prey, him. He somehow found his way to his feet, and tried to run. It was only on pure adrenaline that he was even able to move. A small thing hit him from behind and the sharp claws that ran right through his shirt and dug deeply into his flesh. He tried to grab at it, while it clambering around his back, the sharp darts of claws, tearing gashing holes across his back, the feeling of his own warm blood dripping down his back.
He felt its icy breathe near his left ear, before he managed to yank it from him he felt hot irons pierce his the side of his neck. His world was immersed in a sea of the purest kind of pain. The freezing breath of it seemed to freeze him as the thing bite him, hot blood flowed out of him, quicker and quicker with each labored breath.
He grasped over, and with his failing breath managed to jerk the thing from him. When he threw it, the thing fell back and retreated.
The rest of the pack, even more exhilarated with the sight and smell of his blood, were still coming. He could not keep going, his legs felt weak and fragile below him, his precious life blood pulsing out of him, and running down his stained body. His head was light, but the world around him was gradually darkening before his very eyes.
He staggered forward mechanically, leaning against each tree on the way, streaking it with his reddened hands, a shade that only real human blood can give it. The eager shrieks directly behind him, and gaining, the distance that he had gained between them in his run almost gone.
With weaken strength he pulled himself up the side of a tree, a new sound emerged from the echoing shrieks, a sweeter sound; the sound of the Whitewaters, the fast running river that ran through the forest. The sound angered him. He was so close to safety and freedom.
So close.
In his strength and the close approaching pack it might as well have been a hundred miles. He tried to stumble toward it, but instinctively fell bodily to the ground, when heard a smaller sharper noise.
Fooft! Fooft!
Two small objects flew through the air like angry hornets, barely missing his head, and imbedded themselves with simultaneous dull thuds in the tree above him, directly where he had stood a moment before. In the moonlight they glinted evilly, the two razor-sharp pieces of metal about the size and length of his finger punctured the bark like needles.
His heart quickened at them, and what they meant, he tried to move again, but this time it was too late. He lay where he was on the ground, his stomach below him, and he felt two hands grip the back of his tattered shirt and lifted him bodily from the ground, until he was facing its eyes, his legs dangling limply below him like a puppet.
He tried to turn his own brown eyes away, but wherever he looked the same blood red eyes stared back, murderously, at him, the rest of its face clouded in shadows. He stared dimly back for a moment, then he could feel as it drew him back slightly and threw him bodily.
He seem to fall through the forest, bashing into the thick branches of the surrounding forest, before crashing heavily in a small clearing, the familiar sound of rushing water around him. He looked up, all the muscle in his body alive with pain, and saw the waters.
The moment he tried to crawl he felt a solid foot collided into his back, slamming him back into the ground painfully. He rolled away from the figure and tried to kick at it, but to no avail. The being, crushed its other foot into his chest, and he felt some of his ribs break in two. He felt something heavy and solid crash into the side of his head, and he tasted the bitter taste of hot blood swimming in his mouth.
Gasping for breath, the pain was everywhere; he spat out a mouthful of blood and gazed up. He could see the same figure standing there. One foot pressed heavily on his chest, watching him, not far behind it, stood the rest of the pack, their bodies glistening with sweat, and staring hungrily at him, but they had stopped short; forming a semi circle behind the figure above him.
Looking back up, he saw the figure produce two more of the sharpened darts twirling him expertly in one hand. He couldn’t be more than five feet from the Whitewaters at this point; spray kicked up from them fell on his face like rain.
When he tried to move again, the figure only apply more pressure, the rest of its pack lay directly behind it, and it stopped twirling the darts.
“You shouldn’t have done that,” it said, the voice quiet and deadly. “You shouldn’t have tried and run, because no matter how fast you think you can run, my shafts can are always quicker.”
He tried to move, tried to scream, but nothing came out expect for a gurgle of blood in his mouth, that ran down his face. He heard the sharp sound of the two barbs clicking together as the figure lifted his darts.
He had failed, there was no escape.