Flashes of sunlight riddled the ground like shotgun blasts. Her white coat blazed brightly beneath the light, like a twinkling flare in the surrounding darkness; glitter in a false night. Beyond the trees, a heated day warmed and played with the creatures of the earth, but deep in these thick woods was a shadowed world. Her world.
She stopped quietly, looking over her shoulder to see if anyone had chosen to follow her. Her thin frame perched carefully behind a tree, pretending it could actually conceal her. Some rustling in the brush nearby quickened her heartbeat, and she locked her eyes on the movement, tensed and ready to take flight.
"Hi!" a tiny little thing shouted at her as it leapt from the cover with bright eyes. For a bare moment, she thought it might be some sort of forest sprite, which was the only reason she had yet to flee from it. They were not known to be malicious beings. "Why you hidin?" the little fairy asked her.
She looked down at the imp curiously, not at all threatened for the moment though her heart still labored to return to a steady pace. Her eyes were too pale to be a blue, but only one was not covered by a clump of forelock across her face. Silvery gray gaze scrutinized the girl closely. She ignored her question and asked one of her own instead.
"Are you truly a child? You look much too young to be about on your own." Oh, perhaps she wasn't alone. She quickly looked around, her eyes wide. She was not comfortable with strangers, to say the least. Certainly, she hoped the girl was on her own, but it was a terrible thing to hope for. Finding no current evidence of another being, she returned to the sprite slightly more calmly, suspicion snaking into her tone.
"Are you a fairy? Some sort of forest spirit?" Her eyes narrowed. "Have you come to retrieve me?"
If this tiny little thing was working with the enemy, she absolutely needed to leave, as soon as possible. She nearly turned away just then, but chose to hear the girl out first. Benefit-of-the-doubt wasn't so archaic a theory, perhaps.
