Artemis, Greek virgin-goddess of the hunt, the moon, and the patron goddess of bears and forest animals, stirred restlessly in her bed of soft leaves. Her handmaidens move quietly through the trees, simply and quietly going about the preparation for the hunt. Artemis felt the movement of the moons and the seasons in the forest around her, and noted something of difference in the wind's tale.
A hunter was about, a hunter of animals, and of man. A true hunter, who killed not for sport, but for the glory of the hunt itself. Her dark eyes glittered. Such worship for the hunt drew glory away from her as the goddess of the hunt, and could not be tolerated. She rose languidly from her bed and robed herself with a long hunting tunic with a thought. A handmaiden handed her the long hunting spears she favoured, and the party took up their own spears.
The forests whispered to her that the hunter was to the south, and so Artemis took flight as a deer, to spy out the hunter. Through the forests, she raced, feeling the flow of life and of the hunt as it moved her spirit, just as it had always done.
In a small clearing far south, a hunter, long alone in the world, and in the woods, laid to rest the bear he had killed. A bear's claws adorned his fists, and the dark paint of forest inks; gathered from the roots of flowers and brushes, adorned his skin as war paint. His only weapons were the bear's claws and the two knives strapped across the small of his back.
His body was the body of the forest, with sun-darkened skin and bright, knowing eyes. His flesh was marked in many places by the claws or teeth of his prey, including the mass of scarred flesh that bound his shoulder together, from his first kill of one of the black cats that hunted in the forests of the east. It's skin now adorned his shoulders to ward against only the harshest snows and winds.
As the hunter buried the heart of the bear in the earth, as was his homage, a twig snapped softly thirty paces behind him, and the hunter whirled around and leapt upwards, catching a low hanging tree limb and hoisting himself up into the cover of the green leaves. His brown skin was the colour of the bark, and so his was very nearly invisible.
A magnificent doe stepped out into the clearing, beautiful beyond belief. It looked down at the carcass of the bear, and at the rough earth foretelling the shallow grave where the heart of the bear lay. The hunter turned to leave when several young dryads entered the clearing as well, young women adorned with the leaves and the berries of plants that were sacred to the forest goddess of the hunt, Artemis. The hunter frowned, and nestled back against the bark of the tree, watching through the leaves as the dryads quickly spread about.
The hunter's pointed teeth bared in a silent snarl as the doe shimmered, and changed into the spectre of the forest goddess herself! The fierce virgin goddess who killed as often as she blessed. Her knowing eyes went to the trees behind her, and locked with those of the hunter. His yellow eyes snarled at her, then he blinked and was gone.
The dryads gave a cry and ran to their mistress, who changed into a wolf and raced after the fleeing hunter. Within moments, she had caught up to him, but he leapt ahead of her again and again, and the fierce joy of the hunt was hers. The warrior turned to face the wolf as they neared a waterfall in the centre of the forest, and the hunter snarled. Artemis, still in her guise of the wolf, circled him curiously.
He had obviously been out in the wilds for some time, and was just as obviously a part of the forest now, rather than a part of the world of man. There was an instant's silence, then the hunter tried to speak. His words were little more than grunts and growls, so long had he been without the speech of man. Artemis resumed her natural form, and the hunter's yellow eyes narrowed. She noticed his loincloth stir, and the virgin goddess raised an eyebrow.
