
A stranger approaches the camp of the Children in the dead of night...
It is much too dark for the stranger to see a thing, but the barn owl beside her guides her silently through the shadows of the forest. Pine needles crunch quietly underfoot, some dried and old as twigs while others are soft and fresh. Her fingers clutch the leather-wrapped hilt of a bone dagger, the pale edge gleaming slightly in the night with black blood.
She remembered it sharply, down to the finest detail; her arrival in this world and his, the sudden anger and fear that they both felt, the blind slash of her blade. The dagger had caught flesh, torn skin, but his own attack had missed. They had parted quickly, him taking the direction she had originally intended. It had been months now, and she could only hope that he succumbed to his wounds before he reached his destination.
She saw the fires before she heard the drums. Three bonfires, set in a triangle in the center of a clearing, and figures dancing and twisting around them to the primal beating of leather drums. It was, in some ways, like her own home; but this place was warmer, and this forest more ominous.
As she stepped hesitantly into the clearing, the rythm of the drums petered out; guests were a usual occurence but she was the first to be so very different. Her attire, her appearance, and even her scent had a strange otherworldliness about it.
When she stood by the outcropping above the clearing, she was framed by the light of selene; even through the mesh of pine needles, it was impossible to miss the alarming sight before the gathered Children.
There were cracks in the moon.