Chapter 1 (Demon's Duet)

Eden is a young bard who still needs to learn a lot. He's a terrible storyteller, but he has a flute that only he can play and brings out a sound pretty than the most beautifully singing bird.

“This is going to be cold,” Eden mumbled to himself and duck into the cold water of the river. It had been three days since he left the last castle and it had been just as long since he washed himself. He had been glad to find the small beak to wash the dirt of his skin, even though he was almost at the next castle where he could wash himself properly.

He swam to the middle of the river and shivered. The water was cold as ice, but he tried to pay little attention to it. He knew he’d get used to it soon enough.

 

When it got darker, Eden climbed back ashore. He had been done washing himself long before, but after he got used to the water temperature he decided to stay in a little longer. He had tried to catch some fish with his bare hands, but as he had expected he didn’t catch a single one.

He walked to his bag to find himself a piece of cloth that he could use to dry himself off, but instead of a cloth he found something else in his bag.

A small female deer stuck her nose in Eden’s bag, apparently eating something.

Eden stared at the deer, fascinated about the beautiful animal. It took him a few seconds before he remembered what was in his bag and what the deer could be eating; Bread, the last he had.

Without thinking Eden ran towards the deer, in an attempt to scare the animal. It worked, the animal shock as it saw the human coming closer. With a quick turn it faced the forest and ran away as fast as it could.

Eden sighed and walked towards his bag. First he had to get dry and dressed again, after that he would look at the damage. He grabbed a cloth out of his bag and dried himself with it. He took the woollen dread out of his hair that kept his brown barely long enough hair in a short pony tail. He hang the cloth over a tree limb, grabbed his cloths - that hang on a different limb - and dressed himself.

With another sigh, Eden sat down on his knees in front of his bag. He searched his bag, hoping to find the bread he had saved for that day, but couldn’t find it.

He slowly sat down on his bottom and rubbed his hands over his face. The bread the deer had eaten was all the food he had left and it was still a day walking until he was at the next castle.

Eden took a deep breath and pulled his bag closer. He hoped not all his food had been eaten by the deer and to make that sure he took his things out one by one.

The first thing he took out was his water sack. At least he could drink. The water sack was followed by a long rope, his dagger and loose pieces of paper that he used to write notes on. Short drabbles of stories that he could tell.

Eden was a bard. Not a very good one, but he was young, barely twenty-one and the only stories he could tell were the once he heard from his father. He just hadn’t travels or heard enough stories to amuse his audience with yet.

The bard grabbed the last object out of his bag, a small wooden flute, something that he had inherited from his father. As soon as he hold it in his hand, the memories of his father came back to him.

Eden stared quietly at the flute, it was engraved with symbols that he didn’t knew. He knew his father would know about those symbols. Yet every time he had asked him about them he had been told that he would learn about them as soon as he needed to.

Eden looked over his shoulder and estimate the distance between him and the tree behind him. He moved back until he could lean against the truck. He pressed the flute against his lips, closed his eyes and played it.

An extraordinary but beautiful tone left the instrument. The sound was better than the voice of the most beautiful singing bird and the tones sounded both happy and sad at the same time.

Eden slowly moved his fingers over the holes in the flute, playing a melody that he had learned by himself.

He father once told him that not everyone could play the flute, it was something you were gifted with or not. It was true, because when he allowed his friends to play the flute, none of them could get a single tone out of the flute. He had been thinking why this could be, but never figured out the mystery behind it, nor did his father want to tell him about it.

 

Suddenly Eden heard a loud crack probably a hundred meters away from him. Shocked he pulled the flute from his lips and stared to his left, where the sound had came from.

The sound of cracking tree limbs and branches was overwhelmed by the growls of a man and a playful laugh of another.

The sounds came closer quickly.

Eden grabbed his bag and searched for his dagger. He found it quicker than he had expected and crawled backwards towards a shrub not far from him. He had to hide fast, because if these men were bandits he was a big trouble.

For a moment it was quiet and while Eden listened for hints that could tell him more about his situation, he noticed that it was already a pitch dark and that he had forgotten to make a campfire.

Then suddenly a playful, teasing and maybe even bullying voice disturbed the quietness. “A~lex!”

Eden shock, because the voice was closer than he had expected. Probably only twenty meters away from him. He crawled further away, making as less sound as he could. He crawled behind a bigger shrub and pressed himself against the tree behind him, hoping that he wouldn’t be seen.

Leaves rustles and Eden quickly looked up. A young slender man walked out of the bushes and looked around him. Eden duck further away behind his shrub and looked through the leaves to the man.

The man’s eyes shift into Eden’s direction and Eden shock, but the man looked away so soon that he wondered if the man really saw him.

“A~lex!” the man called out again with the same tone as he had used before. “Don’t tell me you gave up on me already.”

Just as he said that a loud war-cry came out of the bushes and a giant man appeared.

The giant man ran towards the slender man and swung with a heavy looking axe into the slender male’s direction.

The slender male duck away and jumped into a nearby tree when the other man swung his axe in his direction a second time. He stood on the tree limb grinning towards the giant man with a challenging smirk on his face.

Another swing with the axe cut the tree limb, the slender male was standing on, in two as if it was a twig.

The slender male jumped agile toward the next tree. He grabbed the tree limb in both arms and let himself slide upside down with his feet against the bottom of the tree limb.

Eden planned to sneak away while the two men were fighting each other. Not only because the fight looked dangerous, but also because he didn’t knew who he should be scared of the most. Nevertheless, as soon as the slender male hang himself under the tree limb like a giant bat, Eden’s curiosity kept him behind the shrub.

In the back of his head, Eden knew he was risking his life, but the fight could become a battle worth telling stories about. His curiosity took him over and overwhelmed the voice in his conscious who told him to leave.

Eden licked his lips and reached for his bag that he thought lay next to him. While his eyes were fixed on the fight -not to miss a single moment of it- his hands searched through the moist leaves.

When he didn’t feel his bag near him, he looked at what he was doing a little annoyed, only to noticed that his bag wasn’t there.

He quickly looked around him and found his bag a few meters away, on the spot where he had left it before he tried to sneak away from the battle. He quietly mumbled a curse and turned his eyes back to the two fighting man.

The slender male jumped gracefully from tree to tree, intentionally irritating the giant man.

“You’re not going to get away this time, vampire!” The giant man bellowed with his hard manly voice.

‘Vampire?’ The word circled through Eden mind and his eyes widened in realization. He swallowed and grabbed his dagger tightly. His plan to stay and look at the battle disappeared as soon as it came. A vampire was nowhere near his own fighting skills. He was able to defend himself from animals and one or two bandits, but he was no match for a vampire.

“How could you!” The vampire called out dramatic.

It surprised Eden, because for a moment he thought the vampire was crying. Yet, when he looked at the vampires face, he saw he was still smirking playful.

“You forgot about my name again. You’re hurting my feelings Alex.” The vampire sat on a tree limb like nothing was the matter, patiently waited for Alex to swing his axe through the air again and jump away just in time.

Eden told himself too leave the fight for what it was. He needed his bag and had to get out of there as soon and unnoticed as possible. He glanced towards the two males for a short moment, to make sure they weren’t looking into his direction. Then he slowly pushed himself on his feet, while he kept his body as low to the ground as he could. With his eyes fixed on his bag he made his way towards it slowly.

“Enough!” The giant man bellowed. He threw his axe against the ground and held his hand before him when he started to mumbled words Eden never heard before.

That was why Eden looked up another time. His curiosity was still greater than his fear, but as soon as he looked over his shoulder, he noticed that it had been better to flight for his life.

Eden stood in one straight line with the giant man and the vampire. A huge ball of light appeared between the hands of the man that he aimed towards the vampire and indirectly towards Eden as well.

The vampire’s playful act suddenly disappeared and he ran towards the giant man attacking at the exact same moment as the giant man fired his light orb.

The orb was too fast to see or to duck away from and hit Eden fully.

A warm unpleasant feeling spread through Eden’s body and took his breath away. He gasped for air and had the feeling he was going to throw up, luckily it did not happen. The feeling disappeared as soon as it came.

The first thing that Eden did was checking his body. He wasn’t dead, but being hit by a magic orb would cause something. Except if it couldn’t hurt humans.

Eden took a deep breath when he couldn’t find anything that the magic orb could have caused. He quickly glanced towards the giant man and shock when he saw the vampire had his fangs deeply buried into the "so it seemed- lifeless body of the giant man.

Eden swallowed. He grabbed his bag that lay only a meter away from him and slowly walked backwards, his eyes still fixed on the vampire. He had to get out of there as soon as possible.

When he was only a five meter away from the vampire he turned around and quietly sneaked away, his heart was beating rapidly.

“Don’t walk away.” The vampire’s voice came from right behind him and his breath ghosted over Eden’s neck.

A shiver ran down Eden’s spine. He didn’t turn around to see where the vampire was, instead he took a sprint trying to get away as fast as possible with just one thought in him mind: He was going to die.

Suddenly something took Eden’s breath away and pulled him forcefully back.

Eden turned around shocked, expecting the vampire to stand right behind him, but he did not. Instead the vampire stood about ten meters away from him.

Eden quickly got back on his feet and looked at the vampire bewildered. He slowly stepped back and felt something against his back. It was something that felt like a wall of energy that kept him from getting away.

He quickly glanced at the vampire, who hadn’t move a muscle and held his dagger before him, ready to defend himself if the vampire would attack him. “Let me go!” He called out.

The vampire cocked his head to the side and looked at Eden with a playful smirk. “I’m not doing anything.” He said and slowly licked his bloody fangs.

Eden shivered when he saw the vampire’s fangs. They slightly glistered in the moonlight. Making them look even scarier than they already were.

“Then what is this wall doing here?” Eden tried to control the trembling in his voice when he spoke, but it wasn’t working as good as he hoped it did.

The vampire did not answer, instead he took a step into Eden’s direction.

Eden could feel the wall behind him move away. He took a step back without even thinking about it and felt the wall against his back again.

The vampire cocked his head again and licked him lips with a smirk. He took a few steps to the side and so did Eden, trying to stay at the vampires opposite, as far away from him as possible.

The smirk on the vampire’s lips became larger and he took a few steps closer to Eden.

With every step the vampire took, Eden made sure he took a step back. That was until the vampire suddenly stopped.

That action scared Eden even more. The vampire stared at him with lustful eyes and Eden was sure he was planning to attack him any second now.

As Eden had expected, the vampire suddenly took a sprint into Eden’s direct.

Eden shock, turned around and stumbled over a tree root, falling right on his face. He tried to get back on his feet as fast as he could, but it was already too late.

De vampire pushed Eden back onto the ground before Eden was able to stand up. De vampire hang above Eden. His hands pressed against the ground, next to Eden’s head and his knees on each side of Eden’s waist.

Eden stared blindly to ground. His eyes widened when he felt the vampire hanging over him and the vampire’s breath tickle the hair in his neck.

“Scared, delicious?” the vampire purred in Eden’s ear.

Eden held his breath and slowly closed his eyes. It would be only mere minutes before his end, but he wasn’t planning to hand himself over to the vampire willingly. He grabbed the dagger in his hand tighter and turned on his back in one swift motion, pressing the sharp knife against the vampire’s throat. “Get off me!”

Author's Note

I'll completely rewrite this chapter soon.
Right now I'm uploading it because I want to know how the site works.

Reviews

[Gretchen Clarke]

This is great! I like how the piece makes you seem like you're right in the middle of the action. Please continue! So far, it doesn't seem like anything needs to change! Keep up the great work! I am definitely looking for Chapter Two!