During the night as the darkness falls the creatures of the Dark one come out from their hiding spots. It's during this time everyone knows to stay away from the away from the Fire Pit Forest. It holds only the most fowl of demonic creatures at night. They are brought to life by the nightmares of the Devil. They search for human flesh to eat.
They have even been known to leave the forest to hunt in the near by villiages. On those nights people would be sure that their window shutters and doors were locked so no one and nothing could come inside, and God help you if something did. These flesh eating fiends would never stop at one person in the house, that would be to kind and these are Satan's play things, one was never enough. They have been known for literally tearing a house down to ensure they devoured ever little scrap of flesh.
Everyone in Boars Hide Creek knew this story, from the very old to the very young. The villiage was five miles away from the Fire Pit Forest, so many had been witness to the devestation left behind when the new husband Westly and his bride Raven, were torn to bits one October night 70 years ago. Everyone in the villiage could hear them screaming for help and then slowly the screaming turned to those of pain and then back into pure silence of the night once again. The next morning when the hunters of Boars Hide Creek went to see if they could find anything for their burial, there was only shreds of blood soaked clothing and some patches of blood matted hair.
It seemed every few years there was an attack on the tiny villiage of Boars Hide Creek, and they all ended the same but one. During a villiage summer hunt for Boars Hide Creek, one creature managed to find it's way into the home of Markus who was the eldest son of the villiage head, his wife Tamara and their almost new born daughter Amethyst. While Markus was out on the hunt with the most of the strong young men, Tamara was home with the baby as all wives did once having been with child. She was so young and very forgetful, almost child like in some ways. After a long day of household chorse and motherly duties the she forgot to lock the door bar and the shutters to the windows tightly.
She had put her sweet baby girl to bed and then tucked herself in as well. Of course their was nothing left of Markus' wife, however there wasn't even a scratch on Amethyst. The neighbor who had found her told Markus they never heard her cry or scream during the attack or after it and how they feared her dead like her ill fated mother.
Now as most people know Amethyst is the birthstone for February but it's also the name of Boars Hide Creek's most unlikely of hero there has ever been. Amethyst was the soul souvivour of an attack by a creature from the Fire Pit Forest. Okay good so you are following along nicely then.
She was born in February as an Aquarius and all the ones I know are pretty whimsical and fun loving, and yes she loved to play tricks on people. While growing up she would throw her voice and hide from her father, who was one of the best hunters the villiage had ever seen in the past 70 years. It was only when the wind would shift, and he caught a hint of her strawberry scented hair he knew were she was. He would always smile and say "I'm hungry for Berries!" and then grab her and cover her face with kisses causing her to go into fits of laughter and making him chuckle. As she grew she learned to use those tricks to help her father and the hunters during the whole villiage seasonal hunting trips the made, for this they were greatful. It meant less work and more time with their families, even as unusual as it maybe for a young woman to aide them in the hunt. They never spoke of this to anyone outside of the villiage.
"Dad, can you do me a favor?" She asked him one day as she cooked their dinner.
"Yes child," he answered her as he drank his mead.
"Teach me to hunt," she said matter of factly.
"Do you think I'm as mad as you?" he said almost spitting some out as he spoke to her.
"No father, I'm just wishing I had been born with a pair of balls! Then I might have know already how to hunt," she shighed deeply.
Her father took pity and looked at her gently "Ame come here sweetheart," he said waving her over to him. She hung her head and dragged her feet in a shuffling manner
"Yes father?" she said as she sat down on his lap.
"You are the only child that I shall ever have, I'll have a grandchild someday, but I want my hunting secrets passed down to him so I know his family will eat well," he said smiling as her eyes lit up "so yes I will teach you to hunt. You don't need to have been born with a pair of balls, they'll only get kicked by someone who hates you, probably some woman who you turned down because you did not love her," he said.
Ame laughed "Father that's not nice,"
Markus laughed deeply and hugged his daughter. "We started at dawn!" he boomed! That night a mysterious blue light was shining brightly in Markus' room in the hut. Nothing could be hurd but muffled voices to those who would have tried to hear anything. Once the conversation was over there was no sound left and the blue light flew out of the hut, in to the forest and out of sight!
Once dawn broke Markus snuck into his daughts room stabed his knife into her leg, to which she did nothing. Nothing at all. Not a damn thing. Then out of no where, BAM! She had him by the arm, pinned to ground. Arm twisted tighly and hurting actually, "Ouch okay you got me, you got me," he said. She let go smiling quit pleased with herself. "Where did you learn that?" he asked her as he rubbed his arm.
"Well remember before when I worked at the Tavern and Jacob was buying me drinks all night and I kept spitting them into empty bottles, well he wanted me to go have a roll in the hay with him and I told him 'No I'm not that kinda of girl and to find another pig to roll around with if he was going to act like one instead' and when he grabbed me I broke his arm as a substitute," she replied with a big smile on her, remind him of his late wife.
"I shall be having a talk with later and maybe his neck," Markus said softer as they walked.
It took them two hours to walk the fives miles to get to the outside of the Fire Pit Forest. "Okay well first thing is first let's set up camp," Markus said turning around and seeing his daughter as already setting up the camp and getting the tent taken care of and took no notice of her father watching her do her tasks at hand and how she did them and then she gathered rocks for the fire place ring for camp as well. "What did you need me for again Ame?" he asked laughing as he sat down.
"To teach me to hunt!" she said slowly. she was almost on the edge of tears thinking she had done something wrong.
"Sweetheart you have done better than most of the men I've hunted with in just setting up camp in under an hour, I've seen a group take three hours, fubbling aroundnot sure if they are coming or going. One big mess. I mean it Amethyst!" Markus beamed with fatherly pride for his daughter who was glowing with obvious pride in her own deeds as anyone would do who had never hunted before.
A purple haze cast in the sky when Markus woke up to find his daughter over the fire cooking a rather large fish for breakfast. "Morning father, we will be eatting soon," said Amethyst as she turned it on the spit and squeezed some more lemon juice on over it.
"That smells wonderful! When did you wake?" he asked as he stretched his back out.
"A little more than an hour ago, why?" she asked as she got their plates ready for breakfast.
"How quickly did you get that monster on your line?" he asked surprised with her response.
"Speared him with my arrow within moments actually," she smiled at her father.
"That's my girl," he beamed as he watched her dish out the immense fish to their plates.
They made small talk over meal, how beautiful the sun rise was that day, how it would be a good day for tracking and hunting and how they would be eating well later tonight when they got some rabbits. Markus watched Amethyst get her gear ready for their excursion.
She made sure she had the knife he granfather had made for her 16th birthday, along with her long bow and quiver that belonged to her departed mother, that for some reason never seemed to run out of arrows. Markus also noticed Amethyst was tying some kind of cord to her belt tightly and seemed to leave it buckled in placed, "I wonder what she is going to do with that?" he asked himself most puzzled. Amethyst smiled at her father once she was ready to start hunting. They headed to the dense woods, little did they know today was going to be anything but what they hade both planed it out to be for themselves.
Amethyst paid very close attention to her fathers instructions on hunting, how to be silent while walking and waiting, how to be unseen, how to be down wind and try to never leave any sign of your scent. They did very well by lunch time, Markus ended up with two rabits and one quail while Amethyst showed up her father and landed herself four rabbits, three quails and found the nest with six eggs, which she also took.
When they got back to camp they set up a rack for drying their kills but they made it so it hang in the trees, one of Markus' favorite kinda so no other animals were likly to get to it. Right away Markus and Amethyst start cleaning skining the animals and then plucked the quails feathers. Amethyst needed no instruction in this however, she had seen her father do this so often growing up she could repeat the task in her sleep if she needed to.
She never complained about getting dirty or bloody like her friends that were girls. He and his brothers taught her how to fight because of some of the boys in the villiage could be so mean regaurdless of who the childs family was. All these thoughts were going through Markus' head and he was wondering if he had done a good job as a father for Amethyst as he could have for his daughter if he had only remarried. She could finally take of herself if anything ever happened him though, so that was a comforting thought at the very least.
They had finally gotten done with with the messy task of cleaning the catch and went down to the stream to clean off. "Amethyst I need to ask you something my child," Markus said as he dunked his hands in the water.
"Anything father, you know I don't keep secrets from you," she said repeating his actions.
"Have I don't right in your eyes by you? I mean to say I am a good father?" Markus asked as he tucked a loose straned of hair behind his daughters ear.
"You have done an amazing job raising a daughter alone, teaching her everything you know and allow her know things most women don't and not allowed to have even the slightest knowledge of depending on where they live! Why would you ask such a foolish question?" she asked as she staired at him puzzled.
"Every parent wants to know if they do a good job, that is all, I promise," he said lying to her but she could never tell when.
She gave her father the biggest hug she had ever given him in her life that she could remember, "I love you father," she whispered in his ear.
"I know strawberry, I love you too" he said and kissed her forehead.
They walked back to the clearing together and noticed how dark the vault of heaven was growing and fast, but it was to early and there were no signs of rain at all, how could this be? The wind picked up as well and Amethyst looked around for her father who was just as confused as she was. Soon the sun was blotted out but Amethyst saw the reason why when she looked up, "DRAGON!" She screamed as loudly as she could and looked for cover, as her father watched her.
The extravagant black dragon with red eyes and horns with rotten wings and flesh landed in front of Markus and pointed on decrepted claw hand towards Amethyst and snarled "Come here woman!"
"Leave her alone!" Markus yelled as he looked at the dragon with no fear, he had not noticed his daughter was coming out from her usless hiding place.
"You tresspassed this morning did you not fleshling female?" it hissed at her as smoke came out if snout slowly.
"No, I fished behind those rocks, there is no markings or sighs to state any claim to any land around here," she said most respectful to the beast.
"Foolish human do you not know where you hunt near?" It roared at her.
Amethyst looked at her father unsure of what to say now, "Father?"
"Please we are still miles from his woods, can he please allow us some kind of exoneration if we him an offering?" Markus asked looking at the dragon as a rather large piece of it's decaying flesh fell at his feet, causing Amethyst to shiver.
The dragon let lose an evil deep laugh "Why do you think I am here? You are both still alive for now, are you not?"
"What does your master require oh wise dargon?" Markus said as took a deep bow.
With a sinister smile across his scaled lips the dragon never took his red evil gleaming eyes off of Markus "Her," was the only thing he said.
"Father!" Amethyst screamed and showed her true female side.
"Are you sure? She may be beautiful but she is weak, she won't even last long. I've had to have people in the villiage keep an eye on her even now, at the age of 17 years old. She had no one will even show interest in marriage with her, she is so weak, please take me I will at least make the master happy with the work load," Markus said lie after lie.
Amethyst was stunned at what she was hearing her father say to the fowl beast as another pieace of fleash as large as her lower half fell in front of her with fresh blood pooled on it. No on spoke. No one moved. only breathing could be heard. Suddenly the dragon flapped his massive wings and was up and with his giant black claw grabbed Markus and made sure to pierce some flesh with those claws to let his painful new life begin said "Done!" and they were off.
"Father no!" Amethyst screamed and ran after him a ways, but it was usless, soon he had ducked down behind the mountains and was done from sight. "No, no, no, no, no," Amethyst said softly and sat down and cried. She saw something sparkling when she finally looked up and decided to move and find her father.
As she got closer she found it was his sword. He never went anywhere without it, "Oh father if you had only kept this you could have stabbed that thing and it would have let go of you and you could have found me and we could have fled together and lived in the florest forever alone, and not worried about anything," but she knew better than that.
She went back to camp and set up a ring around the campsite to try to keep herself safe. She had never known fear before and this was the first time and it was not something she liked at all. Amethyst cooked up a quail and some of the eggs and a potatoe for her dinner, her fathers favorite, after eating it she finally felt safe enough to set the large ring of fire and shut eyes and go to sleep.