There were five of them, barely 100 yards away, he watched them intently as they circled a deadfall. The tangled mass of fallen trees and limbs must have served as a hiding spot for their prey.
It was at that moment that Ansel saw her, she burst out of the deadfall like a bird on graceful wings. Movement like that only came from years of practice and training. He found himself blinking, unsure if what he was seeing, was it real? Or sleep deprivation playing tricks on his mind. She was tall and slender, her beauty, stunning. Her clothes were tight and form fitting, but not the clothes of a woodsman, nor that of a soldier. They were gossamer, unlike anything he had ever seen, intimately clinging to her wet feminine form. Once white, they were now dingy and soiled with mud and forest refuse.
Ansel stared at the first woman he'd ever seen in his life. He was frozen in place, in complete shock. He watched as she darted for an opening between the men surrounding her, but she wasn't fast enough. Caught by a handful of her clothing, she was thrown from her feet.
Ansel twitched at her impact on the ground. A powerful sense that he was witnessing something irrevocably wrong and evil, gnawed at him. These men were not just hunting, they were intent on taking something that was not theirs to take.
The men closed in on her, lithely she got to her feet, her curly hair plastered to her head. The ground at their feet had become churned and muddy, she crouched in the mud, and she fought. She fought unlike anything Ansel had ever seen. It was a dance of fury and rage. It was beautiful.
When restrained from behind, her head had whipped back, cracking her attacker in the nose. The loosened grip became a weapon as she bent low and tossed the man, who must be twice her weight, over her head like a bundle of wood. When grabbed by the hair, she spun and lashed out at a face, attempting to blind her assaulter. Feral screams and unintelligible curses, came from her lips with every exertion.
Ansel's feet started moving of their own accord. "Aye, what am I doin? This isn't my fight..." his thoughts were slow to catch up to him. He didn't know why he was getting involved. True, he had never seen a woman before, but all that could mean, was trouble, lots of trouble. Ansel was a large man, barrel chested and bull-necked, his thickset body was the result of years of hard work and healthy diet. But he did not fancy himself a fighter. He hated to fight, the thrill made him half sick, and hung over him like a black cloud. He also never ran, except for now, he usually moved with the lumbering pace of a sleepy bear, but like a bear, he could also run with a speed unnatural for his size. He moved through the waist high grass with deadly purpose, his knife already drawn, held edge up in his fist.
The woman had been stripped of her clothing during the battle. The men ripping, cutting, and clawing their way to her flesh. They had abandoned their humanity and were filled with lust. Her pale skin was scratched and bleeding, bruised and torn. Ansel nearly tripped over himself when he saw her naked chest, heaving with exertion. Her breasts were beautiful globes of supple flesh, they bounced as she struggled, and were capped with large pink nipples. His eyes violated her body further, following her frame to her long legs, they were delicately muscled, flexing with strength. He felt a stirring from within.
Ansel had never seen any human with such delicate and perfect features. She had the face and body of an angel, moving with the grace of a mountain lion. At the moment though, her face was held in a sneer of contempt, her lips peeled back from her teeth, which were red with blood. Her eyes met his, and her attacker, noticing her eyes averted, turned to look, too late.
Ansel barreled into the man from behind, his massive forearms smashed into the attackers back. A sound that would make any grown man's stomach turn, shattered the air as his back broke. Ansel watched as the limp body rebounded off the ground, folded in half, backwards. The attackers moved away, regrouping, and all eyes were on Ansel. He was a formidable mountain, made into man. At once they attacked, their anger flashing in their eyes. They were trained soldiers, and harried him as a group, working together they moved as one.
She struck one of them from behind and sank her teeth into his neck. The sound of the man's flesh tearing and the sight of her, naked, face bloodied, nearly drove him mad with bloodlust. Ansel fought with a fury and righteous anger he had never felt before. The thrill of battle saturated his senses. He stuck his knife through the abdomen of one, ripping it upwards, deep under his ribs. The man's bowels fell to the ground, the spark flickered in his eyes. Ansel pivoted sideways turning and reversed his grip on his knife. He slashed at the next man opening his throat. Together they destroyed the remaining men, they fought with a single purpose, as if they had trained side by side, together they could decimate the world.
Ansel stood panting with labored breath, the thrill in him subsiding. Rain hammered down on their heads, unrelenting in it's punishment. He looked through heavy lidded eyes and once again their eyes met. She had green eyes and they were filled with bloodlust, mirrors of his own.
"What!?" She cried with unbridled anger, she crouched, ready to attack. "Have you come to take what they could not?" She gestured at the dead men at their feet. "Have you caught my scent..." She stuffed her hand between her legs as she spoke, inserting two of her fingers inside of herself. She ripped them out and held her index and middle finger sideways at him, as if to attract him with her scent. "Has the smell of my cunt tainted your feeble mind with lust!? That you should slay all those before you to... to... rape me!?" She cried out the rest through tears, her words neither question nor statement, but somehow both.
Ansel stood humbled by her spoken word. It was clear and precise, and it was unlike any speech he had ever heard before. She had no clan accent and used words he'd never heard before. Like "cunt" and "feeble", and some others were lost on him as well, though he could puzzle out her meaning. He stared at her, naked, bruised and battered. Blood left streaks of pink all down her pale skin as the rain pelted her. Her breasts heaved with her labored breathing and she stood ready to defend herself.
"Aye...I must be mad, runnin down here'n all.. to help you." Ansel said. "But not mad over you, just mad up here" he pointed at his head, then held his hands up, palms towards her. "I don't intend to hurt you."
She relaxed visibly, and fell to one knee, she began to tremble. The rain continued to hammer them, its stinging rebuke slapping those that would oppose it, a constant reminder of the danger it represented. Steam rolled off Ansel, the strange woman, and the corpses around them. She collapsed and fell forward into the mud, shivering. The cold of the rain finally overcame her. Ansel sighed realising she must be exhausted from her pursuit. "Nothing good would come of this." He thought.
Ansel scooped her up into his arms. She dangled there, draped across his massive forearms, limp and lifeless. The only assurance that she still lived, was her body trembling with involuntary shivers. Curious he smelled her fingers that she had proffered earlier. The smell was sweet, musty. He was not sure why it should drive him mad, he felt pretty normal. He held her against him, trying to provide warmth, and carried her. She lay limp, and unconscious all the way back to his camp.
She lay by the fire, wrapped in his arms, her chest rising and falling with her steady breathing. He had been worried that she would die from exhaustion and cold. It had been a chore to find wood that would burn. Even as the rain finally let up, the canopy of the forest was still wet, and droplets of water fell on them. He peered into the low overhanging branches above them, hoping they would filter the smoke from their fire and not give them away. There had been no time to waste. She had become hypothermic, and he needed real heat and fast. Building a fire had not been enough. He had stripped off his shirt and coat, and pulled her in to him, sharing his heat with her.
Ansel moved from under her and carefully, like a child, placed her on the ground. He covered her with his oilskin jacket, and began dressing. He didn't want her to be startled when she woke. He hoped his unexpected arousal would abate as well. He went to search for firewood, his thoughts were long and distant.
