• Thorn, you insolent fool. You bring me out to Russia to meet up in the wilderness in the middle of the night. Jaden thought bitterly as she stared down at the ground while she suppressed a shiver that threatened to roll through her very being. The cold was penetrating her lengthy black cloak with no difficulty. It must be below 30 degrees out here. Why must he be so difficult? Thorn constantly enjoyed challenges.

    Neat, dark eyelashes fluttered as snow floated down upon them. When the white, cool flakes hit her cheeks, they remained there. Her face was already bitterly cold like never before. Her black attire against the snow covered revealed her location. The faster he finds me, the earlier I can leave. There was a noise from behind her, nearly silent.

    What a wonderful hunter Thorn always was. She spun on her heel in the frost and snow to see a bobcat whose fur was lighter than normal to blend in. There was a scowl given as she realized the animal was stalking her. The beast had frozen when she glanced in its direction with usually iced sapphire blue eyes that had gone pale in agitation. I have no bone to pick with you. Leave me be and I shall leave you be.

    Her gaze moved to a more wooded area and she silently headed into it, staying in the darker areas where elk and red deer shook the snow from the trees to reach the thick, hard bark. Her acute hearing focused on any sound that wasn’t supposed to be in the forest while stepping in between douglas fir and white spruce trees. There was a crack from beneath her feet that made her lunge into hiding in the nearest tree.

    Her eyes were like ice as they focused down at a snow skiing stick used to pushed one’s self. Lips curled up to reveal the elongated canines she possessed. He is here. Surveying the area from the tree, she saw no marks of human life except foot prints in the snow, leading away. As she dropped from the tree, her head snapped to the side with a twitch, catch the scent of blood in the air.

    The female wove in between the thick evergreens, eyes adjusting to the speed her feet carried her. She was a blur of madness and that was all to the human eye but to her kind she was the offspring of a mighty leader. Her sire was Thorn himself who had received his name from the likeness he shared with it. Her glamorous twenty year old appearance was deceiving to anyone who did not know.

    This woman was a hunter and was prey to only one. Sliding to a halt, she stared down at the source of the odor that remained in the air. There lay the body of a white-snow shoed rabbit, an arrow sticking from its body and just a tinge of blood around the wound. Poor creature killed for his own love of hunting. Not even to feed

    She felt before she heard, Thorn coming. She now lay face first in a snow bank, long black hair around her and Thorn’s hands tight on her shoulders. No other was silent as him. “Ah Jade. I see you are still too sluggish to snare me.” His words were accompanied by a smirk she did not need to see. She could hear it quite clearly.

    Once she was let up, he brushed the snow from her smoothly as if it had not been his fault she had been tossed into the frozen hill. There was a grin upon his features, strands of his black hair lying over his milk chocolate brown eyes that she did not even have to try to memorize. Why have you brought me here, Thorn? Thorn’s once jolly face changed and he shook his head a little, smiling again after a mere moment.

    “I have missed you, Jaden and you should be happy I brought you here in the winter. In the summer, it’s so humid here. I know how much you enjoy the snow.”

    She hated it. The cold was loathed by her, a feature quite unique to her since most vampires loved the cool weather. It worked better with their natural body temperature You bore me and I tire of these games you play. If you wanted to hunt, you should have brought another companion. I do not hunt innocent creatures.
    “Oh, but you do.”

    Do not make me harm you. She was growing increasingly agitated.

    “You can’t.”

    Are you willing to bet your life on that? Jaden's body tightened up, eyes changing and her fangs were soon visible as she began to feel the rage pump through her body.