The Forger

     One minute she had been watching her friends dance with some beautiful men and the next all she saw was blood, heard the screams of the dying, felt the hands of the hopeless reaching to try to get a hold of her legs so she would snap out of it and save them.  All around her people were being torn apart and there was not a thing she could do to save them as their blood dripped down her cheeks.  She had watched a heavily scaled hand with razor sharp, yellowed talons pierce through her best friend’s chest, splitting her up the middle with a single swipe.  Some had been devoured on the spot; others had been carried off by winged creatures that she could barely see in the smoky room.

            Crunching gravel and the swish of fabric sounded to her right.  She quickly ducked down behind a dumpster, praying to be invisible to whatever creatures had ripped into her friends.  She covered her mouth with one of her delicate bronze hands, trying to keep in all sounds.  Sweat beaded on her brow.  Her breath came out in short quick pants like a terrified animal.  Her eyes widened at the silence.  It was too quiet for such a massacre.  She could almost feel it hunting her.  Seeking her out with eyes that she had not seen.

            “I smell something sweet!” A sinister voice hissed close to her ear.

            Juanita turned quickly and without thinking, slammed her elbow into the face of the fiend that had crouched silently beside her.  She scrambled to her feet and took off toward the street.  Her hands were torn and bloody from the pavement while making the effort to launch to her feet.  Tears of terror and fatigue streamed down her face as she continued at full speed toward the street where she could see lights.  Where there were lights there was the chance of people and salvation.

            A dark shadow dropped down in front of her, halting her retreat.  She turned to go back the way she came, however the first creature had closed the distance behind her.  Monsters and brick walls surrounded her.  The sounds of the beast before her were slick, like it was covered in some sort of mucusy fluids that sloshed on the ground as it walked. Part of her brain warned her not to look too closely, that it might be pieces of her friends sloshing on the ground as the beast stalked her.  She shuddered at the thought.  Forcing herself to focus she listened for the creature behind her, but it was silent, watching her intently.

“You had better stay back!”  Juanita yelled; turning to the side and holding up her fists, preparing to launch at whichever demon moved first.  Something glinted from above.  Juanita reacted just in time to catch the knife.  She caught a brief glimpse of long platinum blonde hair before she drove the blade into what looked like the stomach of the demon to her right.  Her long black curls fell free of the ponytail as she spun to face the other demon.  She blindly stabbed into pale flesh.

            A scream brought her back to reality.  She stared at the boy that was suddenly there fighting against the other demon. 

He was moving too quickly for her to see much of his face, but what she could make out was a blur of long satiny white hair to the boy’s waist and strong lean arms wrestling with the demon’s claws.  .

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