Disclaimer: Escaflowne belongs to people other than me - I'm just writing a story about it. Comments are more than welcome, but please don't use anything in the fic without asking, etc. ...My original plan involved dragons, hence the setting in Fanelia, but don't know what happened to that idea. ^^ Consider this a century or two before Escaflowne... and the title is still tentative right now.


Stars hung high in the sky... but in contrast, the Mystic Moon seemed so heavy that it might drop right into Fanelia at any moment. Or so Ruby imagined; she was often taken by fancies like that on nights like this, when the dragons were quiet and she couldn't sleep. It was an omen.

When the moon was full, strange things happened. Shadows came, and destroyed.

She rolled off of the rock she had decided to call her bed for the night, and stared up again at the moon. Too quiet... A quick look around over the crumbling stone walls - ruins of something she'd never heard of - revealed nothing but a night-shrouded forest.

"Hrrr..." Ruby scrubbed a hand through her unruly brown hair, blinking at the faceless trees. Something felt strange. There was someone else poking around... some nosy townsperson, or one of the beast people, maybe. The cats especially liked to wander around some late nights, once even the dragons had stomped off to their sleeping places.

Maybe she should investigate... They didn't much like her, and she figured it was because she was a 'meddling human', but they never really bothered her. Besides, she didn't like strange feelings, and this was definitely not normal.

Eventually, her feet made the decision for her; walking around a fall of bricks, Ruby picked her way across the paths as silently as possible, heading for the edge of the ruined house she had taken shelter in just a few hours ago. Nothing showed itself, and she hesitated a few feet away from the 'door', peering uneasily at the forest again in hopes that it would give her some kind of clue.

... and there. She bit her lip and strained harder to see in the moonlight - she'd caught sight of a faint glint through the brush, something that could only be made by metal. And metal /that/ shiny wasn't something dragons carried around - it definitely meant an intruder. The beastmen were smart enough not to draw attention to themselves like that in /this/ part of the forests.

Other humans, huh? Well, /they/ didn't like her much either, but that just meant that she'd have to stay hidden. And when it came to knowing the ways of the forest, they wouldn't be able to match her. She /lived/ in this place, after all - for as long as she could remember almost, she'd been wandering these forests, and no intruder would be able to outmaneuver her here in /her/ territory.

Voices arose as she got closer, stepping silently over the twigs and leaves littering the forest loam. Soft, like whispers, the skittered just out of the range of her hearing and she snuck yet closer, trying as hard as she could to stay hidden. One twig snap, and they'd be on their guard in an instant - sound traveled far and fast when it was this quiet. If they were hostile, she didn't want them to start hunting /her/.

"...drop him here then. No one is around to notice."

"Don'tcha think this is a little too close? They're gonna be looking for him in the-"

"Shut up, weasel." She cringed. Yeah, they sounded nice alright. "You are here to do as you're told; one more complaint and I'll see you back to the prison where you belong."

"Yeah, yeah..."

Ruby paused behind an elm, cheek and hands pressed to the trunk as she peered around into the little clearing the voices were coming from. But the moonlight wasn't enough this time - even the glow shed from the Mystic moon wasn't doing any good. All she could see were shadows... She /hated/ shadows... It had been shadows that terrorized her as a child and chased her out here, and they were the reason she was still wandering the forests /now/. Not being able to see peoples' faces drove her mad, and she was determined now to get a good look at them, lest they haunt her forever by remaining black and faceless.

They were dragging something; she couldn't see it, with the bushes in the way, but she could hear it clearly. A person... They dropped it with a thump at the edge of the clearing, and she pulled back from the curve of the trunk so they wouldn't see her.

Great... it was obvious they were up to no good. But what should /she/ do? It wasn't her business... she had no idea what was going on. But if someone was in trouble...

"This way." She started as their voices rose again. "We'll get the shovels and..."

As soon as they were out of range, Ruby slid away from the elm and tiptoed through the brush to the edge of the clearing, peering over a half-dead bush to see what all of the noise had been about.

"Oh..." she breathed, creeping a little closer to the edge, and the crumpled human form mere feet from her hiding place. Dread slowly trickled into her stomach. This didn't look good at all... She'd seen robbers at work before, but they never killed their victims - not around Fanelia, anyway. The beastmen said it was the king's laws that stopped them, although she didn't see why they were afraid of that if they felt free to rob people.

These weren't bandits, though. If they killed something, it was never this clean; here, she could smell blood, like a faint, queasy hint of copper or iron, but she could see no wounds. At least... not from where she was standing. But did she really want to...?

Hand clenched tightly around the dagger at her hip, she inched a little closer, curiosity getting the better of her. Nothing. She could see his face now, though, and that wasn't a disappointment, at least. He was kind of pretty, with typically dark hair tied back and twisted - an odd style for a man - a tanned complexion common to this region, and the finely-honed frame of a young warrior... maybe a samurai, for all she knew.

That was /really/ bad... people usually had the decency to fight a samurai up front. This...

Then, she noted the source of the blood-scent - two fine trickles from his nose; another running like a crack from the corner of his mouth to drip onto the dirt. A kercheif, knotted clumsily around his throat, darkening at the edges beneath his chin.

Her teeth bit farther down into her lip, disgust welling up in place of her apprehension. What a cheat - what a horrible way to die. Was this some kind of betrayal? Why else would he be here, dead? Because he was definitely a goner - his assailants were going to get /shovels/...

The knot was easy to loosen; she did it without thinking, hoping she could at least spare some of this man's dignity by removing the evidence of his murder. This was just /low/... "How dishonorable can you /get/?" she muttered caustically, forgetting the need to be silent in her irritation.

"As much as need be, little lady."

Ruby froze, still bent over the corpse, and she looked up. A few seconds later, by the grace of the Mystic Moon's glow, she wished she hadn't. The voice no longer belonged to 'just a shadow,' but she saw dangerous eyes, and the scarf in her hands suddenly seemed to burn like fire.

"So what'll we do about this, eh?" She didn't even bother to turn around to see the other - she didn't want to know who they were anymore. In fact, she would have been /very/ happy to see them disappear right then.

Steel glinted; the rasp of a sword being drawn followed. "That should be obvious, my loyal companion." His tone grated on her nerves - she hated sarcasm. "She can join our lord, here... Perhaps he would appreciate the company."

Ruby threw herself backwards into a roll and flung a fistfull of dirt at the swordsman, diving immediately for the cover of the bushes with the kercheif still clutched in her other hand. Another blade whistled through the air behind her, but it missed by some favor of the gods, and she bolted away from the clearing as fast as her unsteady legs would carry her.

Unfortunately, that made plenty of noise; they were following, crashing through the brush with even more noise than she was, and they were gaining...

"Running's not gonna do you any good, little girl!" The shout was punctuated by another metallic whistle, and suddenly she was stumbling, falling, and clutching at her arm with a shriek.

Crossbow bolt! Ruby cursed under her breath and stumbled to her feet again, nearly choking on the pain that welled up in her throat, radiating from her arm. Well, she wouldn't be climbing any trees to escape them, now would she? She stuffed the kercheif behind her belt and clutched at the bolt, forcing herself to move forward again. They'd get her if she didn't keep moving... They weren't all that far away now, and if it wasn't for the waning light of the moons...

Instead of running, she decided on a change of tactics; it was getting darker, as the moons set - if she was careful, and quiet, and /very/ lucky, she just might be able to hide from them until morning. Maybe they'd assume she was dead, and from the sound of it, at least one of them would be leaving by then.

Well, it was worth a try - she certainly didn't have any /other/ options now...