[OPEN] it's always me i fight {Seasonal Event!}

Ashe had been watching them for a while. The sun was just starting to dip below the bare trees of the woodlands, but she had been within the forest for hours already, following tracks left in the quiet snow. Her boots touched down upon root and stone and branch alike, instinctively avoiding leaving any trace of her passing behind. It was funny, the habit hadn’t been formed in her training. It had been picked up when she was sent on her first contract out of the city, when she had decided she didn’t like getting her feet wet and that stepping on roots and rocks kept them dry. Turned out it was a tried and true method in not being found.    Lucky for her, her quarry didn’t seem to have any problems with being found. Not only did they leave and obvious trail, but it was pretty hard to miss the glimpses of glowing antlers through the trees. She’d read about them on that bulletin, had heard about them in passing… but she’d yet to see one, wasn't even sure if they'd come anywhere near her - dark mage, dark heart. Luxere. The reindeer with shining antlers. She pretended that it was their usefulness that drew her, that had her heart racing as the trail grew warmer and warmer.    The raven-haired woman pulled her cloak closer around herself as her breath came out in a cloud, the temperature falling with the sun. Her hand drifted under the shoulder of her cloak, and her fingers brushed over the fuzzy lump of a spider that had nestled itself close to her own warmth beneath her hood. Soot was startled awake when she nudged him, letting out a quiet hiccup as he shifted his long and spindly legs. ”Don’t be jealous - no reindeer will replace you,” she murmured softly to the wine spider, lifting her cloak to look at him on her shoulder. At the rush of cold air, the spider let out a hissing chitter and shrank back, and Ashe shook her head before she let her cloak fall back over her shoulder once more. ”Sissy.”    She was about to continue forward, following the strange reindeer that sounded like something out of a story her mother would tell, but she froze. Sound. Not unusual in a forest, even a snow-hushed one, but this was different. Didn’t fit in with the natural pattern. She thought of shifting, but she forced herself to breath slowly, to scan the shades of white and gray and brown around her. ashe Opened up, torn apart There’s nothing more beautiful than your heart.