He is being hunted.

Finally, he thinks, relieved.   

After nearly a day and night of stalking him through the swampy marsh, wading through pools brimming with shadow, decay, and even the occasional nondescript corpse, the water hag has grown bolder and less cautious.   She has decided him easy prey and will make her move soon; perhaps when the moon is obscured behind the dark clouds drifting overhead, or when the thick layer of fog fully envelopes the marsh.  

Yes, then.  He will be ready for her.

Over the years, he has frequented these Isles on various monster contracts.  Despite the familiarity they hold, it remains a hostile, dangerous place--the Isles constantly shift in the everlasting mist, a death-maze, and the monsters here are especially numerous.  The water and jungle creatures are drawn to the abandoned burial grounds in the depths of the islands, haunting the crumbling ruins and headstones marking the remains of the fallen; some are mass graves, from battles long ago and others are trenches dug for those taken by the various illnesses that plague the Rift relentlessly.  Hunting monsters was all very well (that was his line of work, after all, his career) but this latest contract was not for drowners or water hags; all of which are plentiful in the tangled, treacherous Isles. 

Instead, he is hunting a demigodess.  
Or so they say.

To be honest, he isn't entirely sure himself what manner of creature she truly is, or why he, a simple monster hunter, has been contracted to capture the girl, because in reality, that is all he saw when he first encountered her that stormy day on the mountain summit--a girl-child (and a rather spoiled one at that) dressed as a sacrificial bride.   He refused the contract initially, stating the obvious: he is a hunter of monsters, not an assassin, nor a mercenary. He remained neutral in the wars and politics between kings; he was not a player or a pawn in the game of the gods.

But even Raistlyn of the Rift cannot avoid Destiny.
Despite his best efforts, he has been tangled in the web of Fate.

Dawn is not far off; he can see ribbons of light unfurling through the haze.  He braces himself for the water hag's attack, preparing to throw either throw a magic sign her way, or meet her head-on in a physical attack. From the sound of her heavy movements, she is impressively large and quite ancient, perhaps the biggest he will ever fight.  It's a shame he won't have the time to bring her head as a trophy back to the Wood to receive a reward. But the attack never comes.  Instead, the hag emits a screech of hysteria and rage and retreats into the watery depths, disappearing into the mist.  Silence.  

And then a green bridge of light - an otherworldly being, and... a portal.

How he loathed portals.

But he desperately needed answers, needed to find her.  They had been separated by a portal--this was his best chance at locating her again. Gritting his teeth, he stepped through the shadows of the Rift and into the light of Helovia.  

—

That was many moons ago.

He wanders in the cold, a ghost with pale hair and pale scars and indigo eyes.  He continues the hunt because that is all he has ever known.  He thinks of the priestess left behind in the Rift and wonders if she will miss him. Is she even still alive? How could she be after the destruction and chaos he brought down upon the Wood? Interrupting that sacred ceremony had unleashed a monster, a merciless god and he had doomed them all. Raistlyn, whose sole purpose was to protect and defend, had broken his own code.  In his heart, somehow he knows she is not alive.  Raven hair and stormy violet eyes; the sweet scent of lilacs.  Despite what folk often think about his mutant kind lacking all emotion and feeling, the thought of her death pains him considerably and leaves him with a lingering ache in his chest.  He desperately longs for her touch, or even the sound of her laughter.  But it is only the sigh of wind murmuring through the trees and the cry of a faraway wolf that greets him.  

Helovia.

It is a fair, magical land, void of the chaos and darkness and disease of the Rift.  It’s quite unlike anything he’s ever known and he feels ill at ease here in the wane evening light of the silent Threshold, even though he knows there is nothing lurking in the shadows, no monster hunting him.  Not this time. It’s the peaceful serenity of Helovia dusk that leaves him longing for home.  He belongs in the Rift, amid the fell creatures and demons and monsters of the dark.  

After all, he is one himself.