Elyzhn?

       Sunlight slithered through the leaves of the big trees that looked like they were touching the blue sky. Twinkles of light flash through the creek of the intertwined leaves. But that's not what broke Celeste out of the web of sleep. 

       It's the slightest of the taps of someone's feet against the ground she laid that alerted her senses. She tries to pry open her eyes but they are too heavy with the snooze remaining on them. 

       Celeste felt the movement of the person against her cheek which was pressed to the ground. Every step is a potential threat to her or so she felt. 

       Celeste cracks her eyes open, still laying down. She rubbed a hand up and down on her face in an attempt to get rid of the remaining snooze lingering on her system.

     "Who are you?" A voice, tough and gruff, slashes the peace in the silence of the woods. 

      Celeste tilted her head up to find a man standing not more than five feet away from where she lay on the ground. 

     He looks healthier and good on his skin. Somewhere in his fifties. A mini ax in his hand had Celeste's mind whispering to her that he was a woodcutter. She must be looking up at the man for quite some time seeing the man's eyebrows crinkle as he looks down at her. Celeste hauls her tired limbs into a sitting position.

         "Oh! I must've fallen asleep while I, uh was looking around?" Celeste's words, even though she wanted to state them, they fall in line between a statement and a question. 

   "New here?" The foreign face interrogates.

     "I, yea— no! I mean no I live here but yeah it's my first time coming into a forest." Celeste rose to her feet—almost stumbling on her feet in the process, patting the dirt on her black robe. 

      It indeed was a bad idea to lay on the ground without a second guess now that the dirt won't go how hard she tried patting them away and she doesn't have any clothes with her but then again the snooze had a vice grip on her soul.  

      One night outside the palace and she already looked like a homeless person. No one will believe she's a princess if they see her like that. Even her pale cheeks are tinted with the brownness of the soil. 

       "Living on the border of Elyzhn and still never got into a forest?" The man's voice almost turns into a whisper in skepticism. And when Celeste looks up his dark brown orbs are swimming with disbelief. 

     "Do you want me to believe you? Saying you haven't got into a forest even though you look like you're in your twenties and more over a folk in Elyzhn?" He asks, huffing out a laugh. 

       Elyzhn? 

       Did Celeste hear that right? If she is not mistaken, the ground beneath her feet belongs to the Kingdom of Elyzhn. 

     The Kingdom of Elyzhn means the Kingdom of Werewolves. 

       Werewolves and Vampires have been rivals for life. They never liked one another. They never stood their ground together without spilling blood. They say no one despises each other more than these two species. 

         Where she had gotten into? 

      "I can't smell you." The woodcutter, still not moving an inch from under a gigantic tree, says. 

    "Huh?" Celeste's eyes widened at the statement. She watched as the man's lips tugged into a smirk. Her heart dropped into the pit of her stomach. 

       "I can't smell you, lady. Why is that?" He cocks an eyebrow at her. The smirk on his lips was unflattering as he challenged her with his sharp eyes. 

      "I… I don't have a scent." Celeste runs her tongue through her bottom lip, gulping. Fear began its journey from the tip of her toes and froze her like a damn ice heap. 

     "Oh, a beta?" 

    "Umm, yea, a beta." Celeste lies through her teeth. As simple as it seems they were the heaviest words that ever clung to her tongue to not be let out. thinking of the consequences she was going to get into when the man or anyone finds out she was anything but a werewolf. 

    "Okay." He said, now walking close to Celeste's at most horror. Her hands move and grip her robe to find an anchor in it. He stops after a stride making a sigh slip out of her mouth. 

      "Where do you live?" It seems that this man's question is never going to halt. But then again, isn't that what any sane person does when they find a suspicious-looking lady in the middle of the forest? 

      "I live… not so long from here." 

      "Oh, so do you live in the house just out of this forest?" He asks and Celeste doesn't know what to answer. Nonetheless, she nods her head slightly. 

        The man burst out laughing, the whole forest echoes his laughter, startling Celeste. Fear clenched a fist around her neck, choking her. She intakes a shaky breath. 

        "There are no houses here until four or five miles away, lady." He says as another laugh pushes out of his mouth but it breaks off just like it came when he asked the next question. 

        "Who are you?" He punctuated every single word with a sharpness that can cut through her. 

         Celeste looks around with a fast twirl, cutting her eyes back to him just as fast.

        A thought flashes through her mind but it's not intellect and Celeste could never do that for making her life safe. Never take one's life to spare hers. 

     But what if there is no other way around?