WELL

This chapter is short, but you may be able to connect some things with it!! Aghh it's saaad(ish) but NEXT TIME we get back to STEVE AND JAKE AND DA BEBE and HE- *ahem* THE BEING!

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A Death

~Far away from the mountain Jake called home~

          The clearing was silent. Silent, except for the rustling of grass in a midnight breeze, and the occasional far-off groan of an undead.

          It was silent, yes, but it was not empty.

          Surrounded by oaks and birches, and patterned with moonlight, a small, empty cabin stood, abandoned, and half-burned to the ground. Blackened timbers from a section of collapsed roof jutted up from the ground like the claws of an End creature. Weeds had grown up around it and had choked out the nearby wheat field. Vines now had begun to creep over the soundless dwelling.

          The thumping of a horse's hooves suddenly disturbed the quiet, coming from a path now overgrown with weeds. A hooded figure rode into the clearing slowly, then halted, frozen. Staring about the clearing, the form spotted a dark lump, and it made his heart nearly stop.

          Scrambling down from the saddle, the figure rushed over to what he now recognized as a body. Before he got too near, however, he was halted by the stench of decaying flesh.

          "Father...?"

          There was no answer.

          The figure shuddered, then hurried back to his saddlebags, scanning for undead. He fumbled around a bit before he pulled out a torch, lighting it with some flint and a knife on his belt. Turning back and holding the torch high, he scanned over the long-dead corpse and the ruined building, his face twisting slowly from sorrow to horror, and then to anger.

          Lightning burns, illuminated by flickering, yellow light, ripped throughout the small clearing, snaking through the grass around the decimated building. Kneeling by one of the old burns, the man traced the blackened grass with a gloved hand, his gaze traveling along it until they landed on the source.

          It hadn't come from the sky.

          The lightning strands all came from the front of the house, his father was the first thing to be hit, it seemed. The man narrowed his eyes as he stood, looking over the damage one last time. He hadn't been overly close to his father, as he'd been an alcoholic, an easily-angered man, but it was still a shock to see him dead.

          Growling something under his breath, the figure turned, leaping atop his horse with a swirl of his cloak. He turned his steed quickly, galloping back to the town his father lived near.

          When he arrived, there were still a few people up, illuminated with lanterns and torches, rolling some barrels into a shed of sorts. He leaped off his horse as it was just coming to a halt, saying to them breathlessly, "My father is dead, do you know anything of his killer? He was killed with lightning, it was not natural strike." His tone was dark.

          A man with a pipe in his mouth gave one last barrel a thumping kick, then rested a calloused hand on his hip. He screwed up his weathered face, lit up in warm lantern light, thinking as he took the pipe from his mouth, "Well...'m sorry for yer loss, lad... Hmmm...about a month 'r so ago...that demon from th' legends...what's 'is name...was seen fleein 'ere mighty quick. Didn' see 'im again, but we sent out a few o' the braver lads to try and track 'im. He was gone, vanished. Haven' seen 'im since. Could 'ave had somthin' to do with yer old man." The man brought his pipe to his mouth, drawing in a breath and blowing out a puff of smoke.

          The hooded figure growled, coming a little closer, holding the reins of his snorting horse tightly, "Tell me everything you know."

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D: Who dis? 

Aghhh and the pLot thiCcensssss

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