by Billy Wong
The women began to back away, and Rose heard Alicia moan in pain. She looked to see a large spear buried in the duchess' right flank, blood running down its shaft. "Oh, no!"
"Don't worry. It's not my heart or anything." As she spoke, a bit of red spittle flew into Rose's face.
She wiped at her eyes, cutting down two charging Vlin while more arrows bounced off her shield. "Gods, Alicia. That's a nasty wound."
"Tell me about it. Take care of the duchy for me if I die, alright?"
"Alicia!"
"Kidding, kidding. I'm not going to die." The duchess gritted her teeth, and as if to prove her words rushed the enemy front. With incredible strength and focus, she began to power forward against the crowd. Rose followed her, matching her performance. If they were to die, it might as well be in a memorable way.
They tore their way down the dock, and Rose watched dozens of men fall off the sides in an instinctive rush to escape the invincible madwomen. To her surprise, many couldn't swim, and floundered in the water screaming for help. Others stood their ground, and were torn to pieces by the pair's blades. The other defenders of Weith also did their part, their arrows pounding into the Vlin farther back and keeping them from showering the women with too many missiles of their own.
The wood of the dock was slippery with blood, and Rose smiled as she realized she and Alicia were faring far better against the slick than the hesitant Vlin. She imagined they were now questioning if they really wanted to see paradise. Slaying foe after foe as her wounds burnt with inspiring pain, Rose felt like an engine of destruction sent by heaven itself. Even so, her muscles ached like she'd been running all day. She glanced at Alicia to see if she was doing okay.
Her face was covered with blood and sweat, and that spear in her side looked more than a little dangerous. But when the duchess followed a glob of bloody spittle to the face of a giant warrior with an axe blow that sent his upper body flying into a rowboat ten feet away, Rose knew there was some fight in her yet.
Conrad strode calmly down the boarding ramp of his ship, shaking his head at the sight of countless dead Vlin. "You women are insane."
Rose shrugged. "You want to fight? We never did finish a duel."
"Then we'll settle it this time."
He came forward, and they clashed one more time. They locked weapons, testing each other's strength. Suddenly Conrad dropped to one knee, and a mammoth spear flew from the deck of his ship down towards Rose. Just as she sensed it and looked up, it caught her high in the middle of her chest and punched right through so that the tip burst out her back. The impact drove her to the ground, and in an instant her mouth was overflowing with blood. This was... bad...
Conrad smiled and strode away, leaving her to choke on the thick blood clogging her throat. "I've got the redhead," he explained. "He's got you."
Pierce jumped down from the top of his ship, shaking the docks as he landed on his feet from a fall of over ten feet, and gazed down at the gasping Rose. "You think I was tough last time? I'm cured now, and glad I followed the advice of my good Slave. Because for the right choice, the god made me stronger than I've ever been, and now you will feel his might."
He stepped onto the dock and walked forward to stand over her. "What? Are you already dead? I was hoping for a better fight."
She should have been dead, she knew. From the position of his spear, it must have at least nicked her heart... if not gone right through it. Her whole body shook with an agony beyond pain, the very flames of hell eating at her soul, her life. He raised his sword slowly, savoring the easy kill.
Impossibly, Rose forced herself to move, bringing her own blade up to block his descending slash. It hit with the force of an avalanche, and almost killed her anyway as the gleaming edge came within an inch of her face. Her being so wounded, they were no longer matched in strength. "I won't die," she promised as blood streamed over her lip.
He pulled his sword away and raised it to strike again. She wrapped her legs around his right calf and wrenched to the left, tripping him onto his side. Sitting up with a gurgle, Rose tried to slice his head off, but he pushed himself up so her sword glanced off his shoulder guard. He punched her in the face, putting her on her back. The spearhead sticking out of her back hit the hard dock, and her vision swam.
Pierce knelt over her, raising his sword as though intent on making it join his spear in her chest. She deflected the stab so that it wound up piercing her shoulder, then raised her leg and pushed him away. He scrambled to his feet, and Rose followed him up slowly. Her body felt incredibly heavy. "Cheater," she gasped as she swung at his neck. He parried easily, and when he struck back, blocking with her shield made her stumble away.
Rose fought back desperately, flailing her sword wildly before her. She was nearly blind with pain, and Pierce laughed at the futility of her attacks. Her slow, weak blows could not touch him, and though she barely felt it she knew he was hitting her. Her hot blood on her skin contrasted sharply with the chill of her body. She tried to rush in, to knock him off balance with a body tackle. But as she stumbled weakly against him, he merely grabbed her by the hair and threw her down.
The pain had begun to lessen now, her body growing numb and weightless. Rose knew the feeling to herald the approach of her death, and could only try to remember that she had fought it off before. She pushed herself to her knees, slashing at Pierce's legs. Her vision was so off that she hit nothing but air. His sword arced down to split her skull, but somehow she threw herself aside. Reacting with lightning speed, he turned into a kick which snapped her head back. But she managed to shrug off the blow, a small thing compared to her other hurts, and stabbed him in the thigh.
A deafening cry tore from his lips. She withdrew the blade quickly to stab again, this time at his groin. He caught the sword in his armored hand, and for a moment each of them tried to pull it from the other. Rose won, though only thanks to her better grip. But as the blade slipped through Pierce's hand and she tried to stand, he grabbed the spearshaft protruding from her chest. He pushed down, and she shrieked and flailed her limbs in anguish while he levered her to her knees.
"It's almost over," he said as he brought his sword down. Rose stopped it with an aggressive block of her shield, flinging her convulsing arm upward to drive its rim into the sword blade. Off balance, he backpedaled, and Rose fell forward to drive her own sword into his gut.
"It is over," she breathed.
He tried to reach out with a bloody hand, his fingers trembling as they sought her neck. She pulled hard to the left, ripping the sword out through his side. His innards cascaded to the ground and he fell choking, dying.
Rose panted for breath, hardly able to believe she'd won. Then she remembered Alicia. There she was, battling evenly with Conrad farther down the dock. Both of them bore terrible wounds; the duchess' right arm hung limp, and a large piece of scalp dangled loose to expose her opponent's skull. Suddenly, Conrad dodged a wild axe swing and slammed his hammer into the butt of the spear in Alicia's flank as if driving a nail home in a fleshy wall. The point sank deep. Alicia screamed and fell to her knees, her mouth turning as bloody as Rose's own.
Limping to her friend's aid, Rose struck at Conrad from the side. He sensed her coming and deflected her weak stroke with the head of his hammer. "You killed him!" he bellowed with murderous rage, trying to take her head off with a high swing she barely avoided with a stumble away. "My master!"
Before Rose could reply, Alicia sprang forward and buried her axe in his side, and he turned his head to regard her. Without another word, he staggered off the blade, walked two steps to the left, and fell off the dock. "Is he dead?" Alicia asked in a weak voice.
Rose watched. The water turned quite red, but Conrad's corpse did not float to the surface. His armor, probably. Maybe. "I don't know. I don't see him."
"He's dead," Alicia insisted as she slumped over on the wood, and meeting her eyes Rose understood what she wanted. "Finish it."
Rose looked around, staring
down the Vlin who had stood watching while the women fought their last duels. "Your leaders are dead," she said in the strongest voice she could muster. "Now, you can come down here and try to finish us off, but I promise we've still got it in us to take a good... couple hundred of you with us. Or you can run away, and live. So you can continue serving your god in life."
They fell to mumbling amongst themselves, and soon some of the boats turned back towards their mother ships. Healthy men on the dock began to drag wounded friends onto their vessels, and Rose breathed a sigh of relief. Somehow, Weith's defenders had won. A few especially devoted and suicidal Vlin were still fighting in their lord's name, but they would be dealt with in time.
She looked down at Alicia. "How are you doing?"
The duchess blinked as to clear blurring vision and stared at the spear through Rose's chest. "Better off than you. I can't believe you're standing."
"Hey, you're alive too. You're pretty damn tough, friend."
"You're just trying to make me feel like less of a wimp. It's not working, so help me up and maybe I can walk it off."
Rose shook her head exasperatedly, but took Alicia's hand and pulled her off the blood-covered wood, nearly falling over herself in the process. "Think you'll be okay?"
"I'm dizzy as hell, and every breath's torture. But I've still got my life."
"Alright. I'm going to find Ethan."
"Go, find him! Leave me here to bask in my glory."
Rose started away, then turned back to notice Alicia sitting down on one of the dock's supports and looked worriedly at her sleepy face. The redhead saw Rose watching and waved her away, and she went on, trying to will away a world of pain.
#
She spotted Ethan far away, near the town gate where the other Vlin had broken through before being beaten back again. His sword was bloody, and his face white and grim. Rose sighed, knowing he'd made the choice to kill again. She was afraid he might be even more troubled, this time. How many lives had he been forced to take?
But looking at him, there seemed more worry than guilt in his stricken expression. Worry for her, she realized. She straightened herself as much as she could and held her head proud and high, as if to reassure him she was all right. With a smile, she shouted and waved to him.
Ethan turned—and froze. He wasn't looking at her face, but the spear jutting out of her chest. His face contorted with grief, and she knew he believed she was going to die. She tried to run to him, to tell him it wasn't so. Her legs quivered, and her smile disappeared into a grimace of agony. Even she could not ignore such pain.
Ethan ran at her, a devoted urgency in his eyes. A Vlin dashed between them, raising a spear in his hand. Rose tried to move, but she wasn't fast enough. The spear sprouted in her love's chest.
The Vlin fell, a villager's arrow in his neck. Ignoring his corpse, Rose lurched to Ethan's side. He had just about the same wound she did. She began to cry. "Ethan. Don't die."
He looked up at her, a contented look in his eyes. Then, he shuddered once and went limp in her embrace.
With a wail of grief, she stood, barely able to lift his body in her arms. Then she ran through the open gate and out of town, leaving all her hopes and dreams behind.
#
She buried him right there on the shore of the land where they'd seen the promise of a new life, and thrust his sword into the mound she made over his makeshift tomb. Then she sat there by the grave, feeling only the pain of her shattered heart. The physical wound she'd taken suited her grief. Rose didn't know what she was supposed to go on for, and almost wanted to die. It was her fault that he was dead, because she had made him a warrior and he'd given his life in the fight. Even worse, it was her who had distracted him for the fatal spear.
"Oh, gods, Rose," a voice breathed nearby. She looked. Jenna, the female archer. "Come back to town, please. You can't just stay like this. You'll die."
Rose looked down at the blood drenching her shirt, having removed the spear so she could hold Ethan's corpse closer to her split breast and plugged the wound with cloth, and groaned. "So? He's waiting for me, you know. He died thinking I was about to do the same." It was the only way to explain his pleased look at the end.
"I saw what happened. I'm sorry." Rose sat silently. She didn't care for words right now. Only death held her mind. "Alicia's calling for you," Jenna said.
"Tell her to go away." Right now, she had no patience for her friend's sometimes annoying attitude.
"She's dying, Rose."
Her drooping eyelids shot open. "What? How?"
"The spear pierced her vitals. You were there, didn't you see?"
"She said she was going to be fine... damn, I should never have trusted her! Take me there, then."
Rose could barely raise herself to her feet, and Jenna supported her as she walked, her chest burning without respite. She saw the gore-caked spear which had stricken Alicia lying on the dock. They went together to the manor, and Rose steeled herself as she entered the duchess' room.
The pale-faced warrior lay in bed, opening tortured eyes as Rose sat at her side. "You came."
"Of course. I couldn't just leave a friend alone to die."
"I'm sorry about Ethan."
"Don't talk about it. It's you I'm here for."
Alicia smiled. "It was a good fight, wasn't it?"
"Yeah. We beat them."
"Who do you think got more of them, between us two?"
"You," Rose lied.
"You're so good. How's your chest?"
"It's pretty bad, but I'll live. When did you realize... how badly you were hurt?"
"I think I knew as soon as he hammered it in. It tore almost all the way through me, Rose. From side to side."
That would be hard to take. Hearing it, she only now truly understood how badly her friend was wounded, and took Alicia's hand. "No, Crimson Boar, don't you dare die! I've lost too much today, to lose you too!" Her chest exploded with pain, and she hugged herself in her chair, covering her mouth as she coughed bloody spit. "G-gods..."
"Rose..?"
"I-I'm okay. Y-you just... got to hang on, Alicia. I d-don't want you to die."
A smile. "Hey, go pour a little bit of water into my rain-pot, will you?"
"Why?"
"It'll give us a little drizzle, and I'd to see that one more time."
"You like the rain?"
"Remember what I said about the good times in life? That's what the rain represents to me. You just have to wait for it and hope it comes—well, not here, but you know what I mean. So give me some rain, fool me into thinking of the happy times."
Rose nodded, tears running down her face. "Alright." She got up, stumbled to Alicia's bloody cup at her bedside, and poured its contents into the magical rain-summoning device two rooms away. Then she returned to her friend's side, and smiled as they looked outside. "There's your rain."
Suddenly, Alicia began to laugh. "I got you, Rose."
"What the hell?"
"I'm not going to die, and if I was, you think I would have admitted it? You won't lose me today."
Rose slapped her pudgy face, hard. "Shit, you scared me half to death! What was up with the rain and all that junk?"
"Easy with the hitting. The spear really did go as deep as I said, and I'm in a lot of pain. The rain? I really do like the rain."
"But why'd you have to pretend to be dying?"
"I wanted you to come back. I don't need to be finding your corpse in the woods by your man's side, and I knew you wouldn't ignore my last request."
Rose did appreciate the concern, though the duchess had a strange way of showing it. "You're a crafty woman. I'll have to watch out, whenever I see you again." She paused. "Goodbye."
Alicia frowned. "Didn't I just tell you I'm not dying?"
"That's not why. I don't think I can stand to stay."
"It's because he died here, isn't it?"
"Yeah..."
"It was a warrior's death."
Rose sighed
. "You say that like it's a good thing. He shouldn't have died at all. He wasn't meant to be a warrior... It's all my fault."
"It's not your fault."
"Did you see how he died?"
"No, I was too busy pulling a spear out of my insides."
"I distracted him. He saw me with my speared chest and panicked at the sight. If I wasn't there, he might have seen the enemy coming and survived."
For the first time, Rose saw tears well up in Alicia's eyes. "That... I don't know what to say. Shit, Rose... fate can be so cruel sometimes."
"Yes, it can."
The redhead had already recovered her calm demeanor, and argued, "I still don't think it was your fault. All due respect to the dead, he shouldn't have let you take the battle off his mind."
Alicia had a bit of a point. But Ethan shouldn't even have been in the fight. He was a true follower of peace, who Rose had corrupted and changed into a man of war before leading him into a death that had come far too early. "He did it because he loved me. He thought I'd die, and because of me, he did."
"You didn't know he'd react that way. I wouldn't have."
"I should have. I can never keep the people I care about alive."
A big, bloody hand emerged from beneath the blankets to grasp Rose's shoulder. "I'm alive."
"I wasn't trying very hard to protect you though, was I? You're alive because you're harder to kill than your namesake."
"Maybe that's who us warriors should stick to caring about, anyway—people who can carry their weight."
"That's a stupid thing to say."
"Probably is. But it'd help keep the tears away." Rose shrugged in response. "So you're not going to stay?"
"Why would I? Everything I planned to do here was with Ethan. Now that he's dead, what would I do with my life?"
"I suppose you're right. I don't plan on staying here for long, either. So where are you going next?"