It’s the middle of the night and I listen to a silence that is soon shattered by a quiet hiss. Someone is calling my name. I get up and stumble through the darkness of my room not bothering to look for the light switch, because I know it’ll take too long to find. Apparently I am already taking too long because I hear my name again, louder this time, more urgent. Now I am downstairs, my feet hitting the wooden floor with audible ‘tap, tap, taps’. I get to the front door and open it, an icy breeze hits me, but it’s the middle of July. Now, thinking back, I should have realized something was wrong right then, but I didn’t.

At first I saw no one so I stepped out of the doorway and called out softly,
“Hello? Who’s there?”

There was no reply so I took a few more steps out on to the porch, and now that I think about it I know he must’ve been hiding in the shadow of the empty rocking chair. Before I could even tell what was happening, before I even had time to scream, there was a strong hand covering my mouth and another pinning my hands together. The last things I can remember are the sweet taste on the back of my tongue, my name being whispered from in between clenched teeth so that it came out like a hiss, a voice like shattered glass pleading with me not to scream, and the eyes staring in to mine. Those eyes were blue, blue like the water of a Caribbean ocean, and emotionless, so emotionless that it scared me more then the fact that I was being kidnapped. And they were cold, like ice.


It’s somewhere in the early morning when finally she stirs, her eyes opening just a little bit at first then slowly they open wide. A terrified look settling on her face, I choose not to reveal myself right away let her try to convince herself that everything was just a dream, that she is in her own bed right now and not a crude uncomfortable bed of pine needles and long grass. Despite what you might think, I am not the bad guy here, I am her protector from something much worse then me, from something she doesn’t even know exists. Her instincts kick in now and she rolls in to a defensive crouch, forgetting her futile attempt to make herself believe it was just s dream, remembering all that happened two nights ago. She sits there for a moment breathing heavily as the harsh reality of what she thinks is happening comes crashing down on her.


“Hello? I know you’re there.” She says her voice more confident then it should’ve been given her situation.


When I don’t respond immediately she begins to rise out of her crouch, her hands balled in to fists and her jaw set, her brown eyes blazing and her long brown hair plastered to her pale face. Her eyes search the tree line looking for the place where her captor, that’s me, stands hiding but she finds nothing. I stand watching from where I am, perched atop an old Oak tree, or maybe its a Maple, I don’t know for I have no use of names, a tree is a tree no matter what you call it. She takes a couple unsure steps toward me then abruptly turns and walks in the opposite direction. I jump from where I am and land on my feet the impact would have shattered a normal person’s ankles but I’m not normal, I’m not even human, I am an elf. I hit the ground running and reach her in less then a second, my approach gives no warning and soon I am in front of her. We stand facing each other, her eyes wide in shock and her face bleached a pale white in fear. Then the shock and fear wear off in a matter of seconds she opens her mouth and lets out an ear splitting scream. I don’t make any move towards her, I don’t even attempt to stop her, she soon realizes this and her scream gets cut off mid breath and a puzzled look claims her face. She took a deep breath apparently trying to calm herself before she said

“Who are you? And where are you taking me?”
I looked back at her wondering if she was really as confident as she looks. Her dark eyes glaring right back at me seeming to ask a thousand questions, not one of which I could make out. She stared at me for a long while before she spoke again.







“What are you?”
The words escaped my lips seemingly of their own accord. I could feel my confidence slipping, what was this creature? He had sharp pointed features his ears came to defined pointed tips, his eyebrows were slanted, and his body was catlike and graceful. From what I can make out he almost looked elven but that couldn’t be, elves don’t exist, I mean maybe in the imaginations of today’s children but certainly not in mine. I pushed the thought from my mind and waited for his reply. He seemed to be debating with himself, then he sat down on the wet grassy ground.
“Come have a seat with me, and I’ll tell you what you want to know.”
When he opened his mouth I was immediately overtaken by shock. There, where a normal person’s canine teeth would be, were fangs about an inch long. I mentally slapped myself for not noticing earlier, because when he closed his mouth I could see the outlines of the fangs. He must have seen my hesitation because he repeated himself.
“Come have a seat with me, I don’t bite.” His fangs gleaming wickedly when he smiled.
Fear immediately told me to run, everything within me told me I had to run, but my mind told me that even if I did run I wouldn’t make it very far, so I had no choice. I walked towards the place where he waited patiently patting the spot on the wet ground where he wanted me to sit. But I came to an abrupt stop just in front of him.


She paused in her advance just for a second then took a few more steps to close the gap in between her and the spot where my hand lightly tapped the ground. She sat cross legged right beside me and looked at me expectantly. I opened my mouth to tell her why she was here and what I was protecting her from, but then I saw the horrified look on her face and realized my fangs scared her. A small chuckle escaped me, where I’m from everyone has fangs. But I continued on like I hadn’t noticed.
“I am an elf.” I watched her intently for some kind of shock or fear but it seemed as if she had already known as much so I kept going.
“I am here to protect you from something much more dangerous than any human could ever be. I am here to take you to live with my people who are also in more ways than one, your people. My name is Dart, Dart Everett.”
She just watched me and listened to my explanation her face never losing its terrified look. I wondered if she could handle the whole truth, but I decided against telling her that it would just scare her further. I tried to soothe her with my next words.
“It will be okay, I am not here to hurt you, its just the opposite, I am here to protect you.”
She looked unsure now, like part of her wanted to believe what I said was true, but then another part of her thought what I spoke of was lies. She seemed to believe me because her posture seemed less tense after that but she still looked ready to bolt at the slightest hint of danger. Then I realized I was the danger, if I made the slightest slip up she would run away. So right then and there I decided to tell her the whole truth, and nothing but the truth.
“You are also part elf, conceived on elven lands, by an elven mother.”
Shock rippled across her face, then was concealed by a mask of confusion.

“What are you saying?” I said. I just couldn’t comprehend what he was telling me. Did he really just tell me I was part elf?
“I’m saying that you are part elf.”
“How can you say that? I don’t have pointed ears!”
“No? Maybe you should check again. Your body is already being altered by my very presence.”
My right hand flew up to caress the tip of my ear, sure enough it had a pointed tip, and my tongue flicked to where my canines were, they were slightly longer and sharper no where near as long or pointed as his, but still abnormal. I let out a small startled gasp. This Dart, he was making me change? He was the cause of all this? I couldn’t believe it, this just could not be true. For the second time this week I blacked out.

I caught her before she hit the ground, good this is just what I hoped would happen. I could bring her to my home without revealing the path that led to it, with out revealing my people to her completely. I held her more securely in my arms and ran to the spot where the path was. This was the only entrance point to my homeland, things had to go through this to pass from one world to the next. I stepped on to the path softly, it was overgrown with leaves and things, roots like hands reaching out to try to stop me from entering the world where I belong. The girl stirred in and out of her dreams. I had no idea what plagued her in her nightmares, but she grew more and more tense in my arms mouthing words that I couldn’t understand. It was just before we reached the gates of lithindium that I realized what she was saying. “La inkrin bat tak!” she mouthed. I stopped dead in my tracks, my mind was reeling, how could she know our language? Then it dawned on me, I pieced it together. She wasn’t who I thought she was.

When I woke up I was in a warm bed that smelled like crushed pine needles and honey. It was pitch black so I assumed it was still late at night. I tried to stand up but my feet felt numb, I sat on the cold stone ground and rubbed my feet trying to get the blood flowing in them again. When finally the ‘pins n needles’ feeling was gone I stood up to look at my surroundings. It seemed as if I was standing in the middle of a clearing, huge trees towered over me. It was dark, very dark, but I got the feeling that it wasn’t night at all, but I could see everything like there was some kind of light coming from an unknown source.
“Hello.”
a voice said from behind me making me whirl around in search of its owner. Oh. It was him. The one who brought me here. The one responsible for my confusion. Yeah I found him. He was leaning with his back against a tree, looking at me, like he was inspecting me.
“Why am I here!?” I demanded.
“What do you want from me?”
I looked at him waiting for an answer, but none came. Just as I went to ask again, the man smiled.
“The prince! The prince! All bow before the prince!”
I jumped about a mile as a short bearded man came running through the clearing he stood in front of Dart and bowed. There was a long silence and then the little man stood up and turned towards me.
He bowed before me for a long while before he spoke.
“Ah, princess Essence, you’ve comeback to us at last.”
What was he talking about? And how did he know my name?
“What do you mean?”
He looked back to Dart with a confused look on his face.
“You mean you haven’t told her? Prince please I beg your pardon, I had no idea. Please don’t kill me.”
Dart just looked at him and smiled.

This idiot of a dwarf was making a fool of me. I will get him back I promised myself silently. I turned my gaze back to the girl who was glowing, he rebirth would be glorious I thought to myself. She really was the daughter of the moon, and the best part about it was that she had no idea she arrived with less of a clue then I had! I looked at Slatebeard, the dwarf, and spoke quietly yet menacingly.
“You can rest assured, you’re going to live quite, quite long.”
His face immediately paled. Good, he took the hint. His gaze flashed to the princess one more time before he bounded off into the section of the forest that led to the Eastern palace.
“As for you princess, follow me and I will tell you all you’d like to know.”

I followed him silently. There was something going on here, something big.
“What would you like to know?” He asked.
I thought for a few moments and the only thing I could think of was this;
“I would like to know what that…creature was talking about, why did he call me princess?”
“Essence, he called you princess because that’s what you are. You are Daughter of the moon. Hence your name, you’re the Essence of the moon.”
I stopped dead in my tracks.
“What did you just say?” I asked incredulous.
“I said you are the daughter of the moon.”
“Yeah, I was afraid of that, do you mind elaborating a bit?”
“Not in the slightest, you see your mother is the Eastern queen, and my father is the Western king. They share the kingdom equally but there is an army being created by the civilians they plan to attack both capital cities and very, very soon.”
I shuddered, what did this mean? Why was he telling me this? I went back to trying to make myself believe this was all just a dream, a child’s dream.
“Why are they creating an army?”
“Well because they believe that you are bound by the humans, they believe you to be dead by human hand.”
“WHAT? I am not dead, and if I was what would it matter to them?”
“Because, like I said before, you are the princess. You matter to them a great deal, for without you their life here would be forfeit.”
This prince, he led me away from the clearing in to a maze of trees. My feet found the path easily even though it was hidden.
“You are required to pass a series of tests. They will test your strength, agility, intelligence, and knowledge of our people. Your fist test begins now.” A smile formed as he said the last three words. He started retreating backwards, as my head swiveled from side to side in confusion. Then I heard a faint hissing sound and then the ground beneath my feet began to shift and tremble.

She realized the meaning of my words just in time. As the ground began to quiver beneath her once sure feet, she leapt up in to the air catching a too thin branch in her nimble fingers. Somehow, it didn’t break. She dangled suspended in midair suspended over a gash in the Earth.