Her nose was so much stronger at night, like this, but even still it was far too slowly that she registered the metallic scent of blood. Tiny, pale paws froze in place mid-stride, her small body rigid and completely still, upsetting a little scatter of dried leaves, a couple clinging desperately to her fur. Something wounded, or something hunting?
She stood out like a beacon, and she hated that. Cursed to nearly glow in her pure white fur, in this body that only ever existed at night. So obvious to those that hunted her.
Cursed. She was absolutely that.
A trickle of magic hit the air and she startled a clumsy side-step, glancing around wildly. It was only thanks to her mother's magic in her blood that she could sense it at all, and it was never guaranteed to be reliable. A good many come near without it bothering to alert her. If only that magic wasn't completely useless to her, forever out of her reach. She wouldn't have a clue what to do with it, but it would probably help her hide better.
She was used to running - running for her life. Fighting for survival. So she did. She took off running in the opposite direction, putting as much distance between her and whatever - whoever - was nearby.
Didn't she mention how terribly unreliable and useless the magic in her blood was? The magic of a unicorn, the kind that didn't exist in this new, terrifying world she'd been sent to. Unreliable and inaccurate and infuriating and landing her right at his feet.
Or a few yards away, at least, before she threw her legs forward to halt swiftly, if terribly ungracefully.
Her large, silver-grey eyes held locked onto his face. Every part of her was held still save for the shallow rise and fall of her small chest, frozen as a hare would have been before a wolf. She was a predator and yet she was permanently prey. Permanently on the run from those that would see her killed for nothing more than her existence. An abomination that shouldn't have been possible.
Yet here she was.
And he was going to kill her.
Her face blanked carefully and she lifted her head, a stubborn tilt to her chin. She would run. She would run and live on, however worthless she was. But she would do it. The hammering of her terrified heart deafened her, but her muscles were poised for escape, coiled to launch, ready to fulfill a naive promise of a child to her mother. Her sacrifice wasn't for nothing.
Only nothing much.
