by Ther Renard
"I don't know," Atrocious said, putting the aforementioned head in her hands and groaning deeply.
Before Ayla could bend her mind any further, their conversation was interrupted by a lot of feminine shouting and shrieking in the distance. For a brief second Atrocious thought it might be the little mages coming back for her, but it turned out to be something worse.
"Ow! Kira! Owwww!"
The wooden door to the hut crashed open and Rogette ran in, covering her bottom with her hands. Kira was hot on her tail, slamming the door shut against the icy wind that had immediately forced its way inside.
"I'm not done with you yet!" The warrior grabbed Rogette around the waist, sweeping the robber off the ground.
"Put me down you goddamn whore!"
Atrocious' eyes went wide. Had Rogette become possessed or lost her mind? How long had she been out that the robber was speaking to Kira that way?
Kira slammed Rogette over her lap, holding the fierce robber down hard as she stripped fur britches from her bottom, baring tan and pink curves to the world. Reaching for a strap, which happened to be laying handily by the fire side, she lashed the leather down across Rogette's bare behind.
Rogette maintained her defiance under the onslaught, wriggling and squealing and throwing a hell of a tantrum as Kira whipped her backside, leaving thick pink splotches where the strap bit. Then she took some aggressive action of her own. Whilst Kira lashed away, Rogette reached down to Kira's boot, grabbed the knife that was strapped in it and raised it into the air.
Atrocious let out a little shriek, thinking blood was about to be spilled, but Kira caught Rogette's wrist before the razor sharp blade could descend into her flesh. She twisted roughly, yanking Rogette over onto her back and laying a hard slap on the sensitive inner skin of Rogette's thigh, a blow that made Rogette seize up and howl with pain as the knife clattered to the ground.
"You do not want to draw a blade on me again," Kira snarled down at the trapped, half naked woman.
"Now that's where you're wrong," Rogette spat back, writhing angrily.
"You want me to hurt you? Is that it?" Kira scowled down at her. "You want me to beat you until you can't move? What do you want?"
"Why bother asking? You don't give a fuck what anyone else wants. You only care about what you want. You take whatever strikes you as a passing fancy and then you move on to the next shiny thing. You fucking magpie mother fucking whore!"
"Watch your mouth, girl."
"Or what? What can you possibly do to me that's any worse than what you already did?"
"What did I do?"
"Replaced me! Rogette spun and pointed at Atrocious. "With her! With that fucking psychotic mess of a bitch."
"Steady on," Atrocious murmured. It was all a bit unfair she thought, she hadn't even been conscious for five minutes and already she was slam bang in the middle of a fight she hadn't even started.
"Are you in love with her?" Rogette pulled out of Kira's grasp and stood up, walking around the fire to point at Atrocious. "Is that why we're all going to get killed? Because the world revolves around Atrocious and her magic pussy?"
Atrocious snorted with laughter. It was badly timed. Rogette turned around and slugged her right in the face. With a cry of pain Atrocious toppled over like a sack of potatoes.
Ayla finally joined the fray with one quiet word.
"Enough."
"I bink you broke my nobe," Atrocious said. She sat up, her hands pressed to her face as blood poured profusely down the front of her shirt.
"Shit," Rogette apologized, suddenly shamefaced as she was confronted with the bloody aftermath of her rage. "I... fuck. I'm sorry."
Whilst Rogette looked at Atrocious in dismay, Kira was getting to her feet and making her way over to the robber. She grabbed Rogette hard by the back of the neck and shook her like a puppy, making the young woman cry out in pain.
"Enough, Kira." Ayla fished out some cloth and held it to Atrocious' nose to staunch some of the bleeding.
Kira scowled at Ayla, still holding the squalling smaller woman in her powerful grasp. "Since when do you tell me enough?"
Ayla looked at her steadily. "Since you needed to be told it."
"I'm handling this." Kira spoke in a low growl, her teeth gritted in obvious irritation at Ayla's interference.
"No, you're escalating a simple domestic grievance into an all out brawl."
"She tried to stab me, are you suggesting I just let that go?"
"I'm suggesting you de-escalate the situation before you have to do something you'll regret."
Kira glowered at her for a long moment before releasing Rogette. "Fine," she said. "You can deal with her then."
The moment Rogette was free she whirled and made a dive for the dagger she had dropped. She grabbed it up from the floor and held it pointed at Kira. "Don't forget, you cut me first."
Kira looked at the shaking younger woman dispassionately, her dark gaze showing no emotion whatsoever. "You deserved it."
The warrior's lack of emotion only served to make Rogette more hysterical. "What makes you think you have the right to fuck people and dump them? To cut them and leave them bleeding while you go off and play savior to your latest conquest?" Rogette was becoming increasingly agitated as she waved the blade around in a vague but dangerous fashion.
"I'm sorry," Kira said. "I didn't realize what we shared in a ditch meant so much to you."
"Because it meant nothing to you. I mean nothing to you." Rogette dropped the knife with a sob and ran out into the snow.
Kira turned to Ayla and Atrocious with a look of befuddled what-did-I-do-itude, but there was no sympathy in either of their eyes.
"Go and fix that," Ayla said firmly but quietly.
"Yeah, go ab fix thab," Atrocious agreed.
"By all the gods," Kira threw her arms up and turned to follow Rogette.
~~~
It was not hard to track the robber, her trails were clear in the snow. She had made her way into one of the protected caves and was crouched in a corner, sobbing her heart out.
"I'm sorry," Kira said, the apology sounding forced and awkward. "I did not mean to hurt you."
"You didn't mean anything at all," Rogette said, sniffing. "You didn't think about me. I was just something to make you feel good."
"Not quite," Kira said, crouching down next to Rogette. She ran a finger over the residual pink line on Rogette's forearm where her blade had penetrated the robber's flesh. "May I tell you something?"
"If you want."
"From the moment we met you reminded me a lot of myself when I was younger," Kira said. "Brash, foolhardy, too aggressive without the ability to back it up." She smiled slightly and pointed to an almost identical scar on her own arm. "One of my first instructors gave me that when I refused to stand down against a band of brigands. It bled for days."
Rogette sniffed, clearly not seeing the point of Kira's reminiscing. "So?"
"So I cut you because I care about you."
"That makes no sense at all."
"I didn't need to do that," Kira said, tracing the pink line. "There was no need to draw blood. There were a myriad of ways to disarm you, but I warned you. I warned you three times and you defied me all three times, do you remember?"
Rogette nodded. A little guilty smile rose on her face as she did.
"You were so defiant, so ready to kill without even understanding what it meant to take a life. I knew then that you were going to have to learn as I had to learn - by the blade."
"Okay," Rogette said, sniffing through her tears. "But you left right away... you didn't even say goodbye hardly. You fucked me and cut me and walked away."
"I went with Atrocious because she is not like you and I. She has no sense of her own agency, her own power. She is lost in this world. If she were to be left alone, she would be chewed up and spit out."
"That's true," Rogette nodded along. Atrocious really was useless in most practical ways. Even her summoning powers,
impressive as they were, were completely useless to her and only got her into more trouble.
"But you don't need to have your hand held through every trial, do you?" Kira nudged Rogette. "You're adaptable and you're smart. You're far braver than most too and I'm sorry if I left you with the impression that I used you and threw you away, but our relationship changed the moment I did that." Kira ran her finger over the cut.
“What does that mean?” Rogette sniffed.
“Spilling blood isn't something I do casually,” Kira said. “To have spilled the blood of another means to have taken charge of them in one form or another. You and I, we are bonded. We always will be.” Her voice dropped deeper as she gave Rogette a hard look. "So if you even think of pulling a blade on me again, or speaking the way you did, I will make sure you are the sorriest little wretch in all of Lesbia. No witch is going to save your ass if I decide to whip it, you understand me?"
Rogette gulped and nodded. "Yes ma'am."
"That's better." Kira stood up and offered Rogette a hand. The robber put her hand in the warrior's and popped up as Kira gave her a tug.
“Let's go.”
Rogette followed after Kira with a broad smile on her pretty face, her arms wrapped around her midsection as she hugged herself with rare joy. She practically skipped through the snow, making loops around Kira as the warrior tramped through thickening drifts.
Kira shook her head, but there was a smile on the warrior's face that matched Rogette's as she laid an indulgent swat across the young woman's ass and ushered her back into the warmth of their shelter. Her beef with Rogette was settled, all that remained was to address the issue of that bossy, meddling witch.
The smile faded as Kira followed her skipping, dancing friend into the hut. When the warrior wanted to look imposing she could seem very dangerous and unfeeling indeed, the planes of her face growing hard so that she looked almost masculine in aspect.
As she crossed the threshold, she set her dark gaze on Ayla. Saying nothing at first, she crossed her muscular arms across her broad chest. The light of the fire flickered across battle worn skin traced with scars big and small, and gleamed off the many shined surfaces strapped to various parts of her person. She bristled with menace, her shadow thrown large on the wall behind her, exaggerating her not inconsiderable bulk.
"Rogette is mine," she said, her eyes narrowed at the witch. "So I don't want to hear anything from you when it comes to her treatment. I will deal with her as I see fit."
Ayla did not look remotely concerned by Kira's hard posturing. She sat back from the fire, her hair a pale golden skein about her face, her emerald eyes peaceful. A small smile spread over her lips as she folded her hands in her lap. "Rogette is yours you say?"
"That's right." Kira almost growled the words, planting her feet wide in a domineering stance, claiming not just Rogette but all the space around her too. The sheer force of her presence made her seem larger than life as she filled the entire hut with her will.
The illusion crumbled when Ayla rose from her place by the fire. Kira took an instinctive step back.
"I am not afraid of you.”
All those present felt the lie.
"I have never wanted you to be afraid of me."
Kira stood her ground, but part of her mind was already drifting back to another time when she had stood before those same green eyes, eyes that had not changed in decades. Ayla did not age like a human. She still looked as she had the day they had met, but Kira had changed considerably in the intervening years. She was no longer the chunky puppy-fat ridden aspiring soldier at arms. She was a famous warrior, a legend in her own time. Why was it so hard to remember that when Ayla looked at her with a gaze that just knew everything?
Chapter Twelve
Two decades earlier...
"Huntin' witches, huntin' witches." Kira hummed the military ditty, whacking the sharp edge of her short blade through the thick underbrush. "Burn 'em up! Burn 'em up! Put'em on a bonfire, put 'em on a bonfire, cook 'til done, cook 'til done."
Her small patrol of greenhorns took up the song, laughing and congratulating one another on the capture they'd yet to make. Three days march out of camp and they had a pretty good tip that there was a witch living somewhere in the forest nearby. Spirits were high at the prospect of catching one of the enemies of the empire - there wasn't a soul on that little patrol who didn't have something to prove. Each and every one of them wanted to come back with a witch as a trophy commemorating their first patrol. With heads filled with dreams of glory and grandeur, the proud young Imperials crashed through the bush without a care.
They were so intent on catching the witch that, like a pack of dogs on a fresh scent, they became completely blind and deaf to anything else. Not one of the five young women decked out in shiny armor yet to be burnished by battle noticed the shadows slipping about in the depths of the trees. They did not hear the whispered signals over their bloodthirsty songs and they certainly did not hear the slow singing of blades being drawn and arrows cocked.
The hair on the back of Kira's neck prickled. It was the only warning she got before a band of brigands ten strong came screaming out of the forest on either side of the Imperial column. They were flanked. They were cut off forward and back and before most could draw their blades, they were cut down in cold blood.
Kira saw a shiny helmet go clattering to the ground. It rolled a full revolution before she realized that it still had the young soldier's head in it, her eyes open and staring with a ludicrous expression of surprise. Bile rose in Kira's throat but she had no time to be ill, for the attackers were on her in an instant. If she had not had her blade drawn she would have surely been killed where she stood. She had just enough time to parry the first thrust that came slicing toward her before the red haze descended.
"No amount of training can prepare you for your first battle." The drill sergeant had told them all that many times, but Kira had thought herself entirely prepared until the moment she saw the comrade she'd known since boot camp lose her head.
There was shouting and screaming as the young Imperials put up a defense that might have been their best, but was certainly not anywhere near good enough. Kira's blade cut through flesh, sinew and bone as she flew into a blood rage, a frenzy in which she could not be stopped. Several times she was cut, but not badly enough to disable her heavy round limbs.
She fought with fury beyond imagination, not at all afraid to die. She welcomed death, courted it, drank it down with the blood that spattered into her mouth with every cut of her blade, blood that was not always her own. She fought until she could fight no longer. The brigands were still standing as her legs crumpled beneath her, but it no longer mattered, for she had been baptized in the entrails of her enemies and no longer felt her body as her own.
She hit the ground feeling herself already dead. Life was fleeing all around her, seeping from her body and soaking into the soil. There was no fear. There was no pain. In blood and fury all was good and all was right. She was entirely at peace as she gave herself to the earth from which she had sprung. The last thing she saw was a bright green blade of grass spattered with deep red blood. It was a perfect motif and a fitting end for a warrior. Her eyes closed for what she felt to be the last time. She smiled. The earth slipped away. Her breath slowed and stopped.
~~~
On the other side of life, Kira found herself standing intact and perfect. There were no wounds on her limbs or torso, nor did she have any weight to her. She was as light as a feather, floating in a formless void.
She was not alone in that place. Though she could not see a thing she felt that someone was with her, a presence infinitely warm and infinitely wise. It spoke to her, first in a whisper then in a command.
"It is too soon for you. Come back, little warrior."
New light strained through the surrounding darkness as her eyelashes fluttered open to a summer's eve the likes of which she had not expected to see again.
"Welcome back." A
melodious voice floated on the evening breeze.
"Ho there!" Kira used her deepest, most authoritative tone. "Who goes there?"
"My name is Ayla."
A woman of extraordinary beauty came into Kira's field of vision. She was a curious looking creature, very tall with features that didn't seem quite human. Her eyes were large and bright emerald green, tapering to exotic slits at the far corners. The rest of her face was beautiful too, but Kira could not tear her gaze away from Ayla's eyes, which were focused on her with a deep concern.
"Ho, citizen," Kira said, resorting to formality in the face of a deep, near instant crush. Her eyes traveled down the woman's frame, settling on an ample bosom just barely covered by a soft blue robe. "I must have died after all," she said, "for there is an angel before me."
The woman seemed unmoved by Kira's clumsy attempt flirtation as she unwrapped a bandage between hands blessed with long, slim fingers. "How old are you?"
Kira guessed at the woman's age and put her somewhere in her third decade, or perhaps her fourth, it was hard to tell. "Twenty," she lied. The woman's eyebrow went up slightly. "Okay, eighteen," Kira amended. The brow crept higher. "Sixteen?" She tried hopefully. The brow hit its upper limit. "Fifteen," she admitted.
Ayla looked at her solemnly. "They send babes where warriors fear to tread."
"I am not a baby," Kira growled, instantly offended. "I am an Imperial Soldier."
"Yes, and prepared to sell your life like one for reasons you haven't begun to understand. What is your name, soldier?"
"Kira," Kira said proudly. "I was a member of Green Unit. We were hunting a witch when we were ambushed."
That got the woman's attention. She looked up rather sharply, pausing in her ministrations. "Hunting a witch you say? Why were you hunting a witch?"
Kira looked at her blankly. "Witches must burn. It is the decree."