Bellica

by Katje van Loon

  She was at the hospitalis herself, with the third regiment, for it was the most important place in the castle. And she could not stand it if another death occurred there that she could prevent.

  Ghia was sleeping; she'd told the girl to get some rest. She'd wake her if she needed her.

  As she paced the entryway, a cold stone dropped into her gut. Something was wrong.

  Impatiently she shook it off. She was going to stay here at the hospitalis. She needed to protect her cousin.

  A chill ran down her spine.

  She was not so successful shaking that off, and soon her entire body was clanging with instinct: something is wrong! Go go go!

  She could not disobey her battle sense again. She turned to Leala, the new bellica of the third regiment. Since the fifth, and the death of Anita, Anala and Leala had bonded, somewhat. Over the lost loves of their lives, if nothing else.

  "Leala, 'old it 'ere. Make sure Ghia'd be kept safe, aright?"

  The woman nodded and saluted, saying nothing. She understood how important the Head Healer was to Atherton and not just Anala.

  Orders given, the admiral dashed off down the hallway, hoping she wasn't too late.

  Caelum

  2580 hours

  He was sure the man had not expected the blow that knocked him from his position of choking Yarrow and to the ground. Caelum didn't give him a chance to regroup. He landed vicious blows across the Vocan's face, turning the man's once attractive features into a pulpy mass.

  Lord Exsil Vis only laughed, acting as if Caelum had been tickling his face with a feather instead of punching the living Tyvian out of it.

  Caelum paused in surprise, and the other man took the opening. He flipped Caelum over his head in a move that Yarrow had used upon the then-major over two months ago. Except now lives were at stake.

  Before Caelum could rise the Vocan was on top of him, delivering the same blows the Consort had given him, except that these hurt Caelum considerably. He raised his arms, tried to get a blow in, but to no avail.

  The lord of Voco was possessed of superhuman strength.

  Caelum felt hands close around his throat and knew his fate was the same as Yarrow's.

  I'm sorry I wasn't good enough, he thought, though to whom it was directed he wasn't sure. He was just sorry. He'd failed, in so many ways.

  Then, before his eyes that could barely take in sight anymore, he saw olive-skinned arms go around Exsil Vis' neck, fingers clawing at his face, and the face of a very pissed-off Empress over the Vocan's shoulder.

  Lord Exsil Vis fell off Caelum to fight this new attacker, and the Consort breathed in fresh air to his lungs. He could barely move, but he forced himself up, and when he did, he froze at the sight in front of him.

  In hand-to-hand combat with Lord Exsil Vis, Zardria was winning.

  Zardria

  2583 hours

  She felt an anger she'd never felt before flood her. It was not her other side, she could tell. No, this rage was pure Zardria.

  Somehow, against all logic, the empress with no formal fighting training was beating a man who had served beside her mother, and killed her sister -- best bellica in the realm -- and beaten her Consort to a bloody pulp.

  Perhaps that was why.

  Zardria kicked Lord Exsil Vis in the face and broke his nose, her heel digging into his cheek. Before he could regain himself, she punched him in the stomach and brought his face down to meet her knee as it traveled up.

  "Yarrow was mine to kill, you greedy bastard," she spat at him, although the rage she'd felt for her sister had long since passed. With two fists she hit him on the back, and he groaned and fell to his hands and knees. "And how dare you hurt my Consort," she hissed as she kicked him in the stomach. "Have you not your own toys to play with?"

  She went for another kick, but her leg froze behind her. She tried to move and found herself paralysed.

  What in Umbra's name... she started to think, and was cut off by the very One she thought of.

  "What a fine sight indeed!" a voice boomed through the banquet hall, and could she have moved Zardria would have clamped her hands over her head. "Two of My servants fighting each other! I cannot leave this plane alone for more than a minute, it seems. Tell Me, children, how do you suppose I am to succeed in My take-over if My Chosen Ones cannot even get along?"

  Zardria would have screamed apologies, screamed her rage, but she could not get her mouth or throat to form the words. The only thing she could do was stand, her leg behind her, as the realisation that Lord Exsil Vis also belonged to her Goddess pounded her psyche again and again, like waves against a cliff.

  Umbra hadn't chosen only her.

  Umbra didn't love her.

  She was just a pawn.

  She would have cried, had her body been able to obey. Umbra's voice boomed down again, but she felt loath to follow the order.

  "I'm busy at the moment, so play nice -- or I'll kill you both."

  The presence was gone.

  Zardria fell to the ground, her body suddenly unfrozen. At her feet, Lord Exsil Vis rose, and smiled evilly down at her.

  "Little does our Goddess understand, Zardria, I was playing nice," he said, and drew his cutlass.

  He couldn't kill her, she knew. But he could hurt her.

  In a panic she scrambled backwards as fast as she could in her peplos, which seemed determined to keep her in place. She hoped Caelum had run. She would keep Lord Exsil Vis occupied. The man would only kill her Consort and that was a pain she could not bear.

  Lord Exsil Vis advanced slowly on her, still smiling that smile, and she felt a sinking feeling as she realised she wouldn't be able to kill him. He was also a servant of Umbra.

  Where were those damn Magi?

  His boot stepped on her peplos, then, and she could not move backwards anymore. She was pinned in place. He readied his sword for a strike against her, and she gritted her teeth for the pain she knew would come.

  There was a very loud noise.

  Lord Exsil Vis looked surprised, and he looked down. A blossom bloomed on his chest, red and spreading fast. He turned, and her view no longer obscured, she saw Lares stood at the door to the banquet hall, pistol in his hand still smoking.

  "That was for Hope," the man said, his voice laced with venom.

  Zardria sat on the ground in shock. Lord Exsil Vis wasn't immortal? Was she?

  Before she could move, Caelum ran up with his sword drawn. He thrust it upwards into Lord Exsil Vis, under the ribs. Zardria watched in wonder as the sword tip came out the top of the man's skull. "That was for Isidora," Caelum whispered, and withdrew his sword.

  Now and truly dead, the man fell backwards, landing on the floor beside Zardria. Now she could move; she scrambled away. Caelum helped her to her feet and wrapped his arms around her, his sword on the ground. She was shaking.

  Lares had re-holstered his pistol; now he walked up to them. He kicked the foot of Lord Exsil Vis; there was no response. His gaze darted across the room and Zardria's followed, where her sister lay dead. For some reason she felt her heart twist in pain.

  "It's over then," the Vocan said, and she nodded.

  "Find the Admiral and tell her, if you would, Lares," Zardria said, surprised to find her voice so steady. Lares bowed and left the room.

  Her eyes hadn't left Yarrow's prone form. She found herself walking to the corpse, then, and standing at Yarrow's head. The woman's eyes were closed; her face as beaten as Caelum's. Her neck was purple with bruises.

  Caelum came up to the other side of Yarrow and knelt down. Zardria could feel his sorrow as a palpable thing, but did not -- for once -- feel jealous.

  His hand reached out and checked Yarrow's pulse, then he put his head at her chest. "Zee," he said, looking up in wonder. "She's alive."

  Ghia

  2584 hours

  She waked with the feeling she had to leave, had to get out of the hospitalis quickly. She got dressed as quickly as her leg would allow and left the room
she shared with her mother, who slept peacefully. Anala was gone. Knowing she'd never be let out of the hospitalis alone, she cast a blending over herself and hobbled past the regiment that guarded her domain.

  They didn't see her. She moved on, towards the banquet hall.

  Jules

  2584 hours

  The signal had been lit. They opened the gates, ready to attack the forces of Voco.

  What met their eyes astounded them. Half the Vocans slept peacefully, another quarter stumbled around as if suffering from a hallucinogenic drug, and the final quarter was engaged in battle with Yarrow's regiment.

  Not a word was said; Anala's regiment knew what to do. Jules and the soldiers surged into the battle, giving support to the troops already engaged. Jules found himself fighting beside Coalette, who smiled at him gratefully. She was injured, blood leaking through her shirt in the armpit, but kept on fighting regardless.

  "Glad you made it, Major," she said, stabbing a Vocan in the stomach and knocking him to the ground.

  Jules said nothing, but kept on fighting, covering the quickly weakening captain. He hoped they'd win soon; he needed to take a look at her injury or they could lose her. Coalette was a good captain, a good friend.

  They cut a swath through the enemy forces, fighting well together. They were halfway across the Town Square when he heard it.

  The clatter of hoofbeats against cobblestones, to the west, and the unmistakable battle cry of a bellica.

  Not a few minutes later Bellica Agate and three regiments burst through, joining in the fray. Jules let out a cry of relief, and quickly caught Coalette, who had now fainted from blood loss. He dragged her back through the gate to the castle, through which no forces had penetrated, and into the castle, towards the hospitalis.

  Anala

  2587 hours

  She was not thinking when she'd run from the hospitalis, and she was not thinking as she ran into the banquet hall. She did not think as she drew her boot knife, and did not think as she flung it at the chest of Zardria who stood triumphantly over the dead body of Yarrow. Anala did not think until, like a shock to her system, Caelum rose and took the knife in his back.

  He arched then, and she felt the hit as if she'd suffered it herself. She did not know what she felt as she watched him fall to the ground, did not know what she felt as she realised the mark had been true and had hit him in the heart, did not know what to feel at the sight of the Empress rushing forward to catch him, the look on her face showing the same emotion that had rent Anala in two when Aro had died in front of her.

  She did not know what to feel as she watched Zardria hold Caelum in her arms and cry, did not know what to feel as they kissed in farewell, did not know what to feel as the Consort died.

  It was only when she saw Yarrow wake up and look at the two people beside her, bewilderment giving way to anguish on her face that Anala felt the sorrow and guilt wash over her like a waterfall, and she felt she should have died instead.

  Yarrow

  2588 hours

  She woke from darkness to the strangest sight she'd yet witnessed.

  Her twin sister, crying as she held Caelum in her arms.

  Caelum's eyes were open, his face caught in a slight smile. He was dead. Yarrow knew this as well as she knew the layout of the castle. Anguish tugged at her heart. Gates of sorrow threatened to open then and engulf her, but she kept the tears back.

  Somehow, she found herself sitting up and moving to her sister's side. She put an arm around Zardria's shoulder, and then -- wonder of wonders -- Zardria turned and buried her face against Yarrow's chest, still sobbing. Yarrow's other arm came around her twin and she sat there, comforting a woman she'd never really known, as the Empress mourned the man they'd both loved.

  She was still weak, she could feel. Her throat hurt, an aching dullness that reminded her how close she'd come to death. Her eyes flickered over the room, and she saw the corpse of Lord Exsil Vis lying a few metres away. He truly was dead, and not unconscious. The floor was red with his blood. At the door to the hall stood Anala, hand over her mouth, agony on her face, and Yarrow saw, clear as night, how Caelum had died.

  She felt no anger towards her friend. That emptiness-and-yet-wholeness she'd felt since waking from her dream of Kore, that strangeness, was fully present now, and she felt she could see how everything fit, perfectly interlocking pieces of fate and destiny. She felt fully present in the moment, and yet stepped away from it.

  Presently Zardria had stopped her weeping, and was looking at her sister with a face blank of emotion.

  "Never did I think this would happen," she whispered.

  "We never do," Yarrow replied, still feeling herself gripped in that strangeness that made her speak with wisdom -- something she'd never hoped to grasp.

  Zardria extended her hand. "I would extend myself to you, sister, in truce," she said, and Yarrow felt no shock, though the proclamation was, indeed, shocking.

  She nodded. "I would accept," she said, and grasped her twin's hand with hers.

  Immediate burning encased the palm and fingers of Yarrow's hand, and she was sure she'd be crippled from it. Zardria's face twisted in pain, and she knew the same feeling touched the Empress. Neither could pull her hand away; it was as if a glue made of fire held them together. The pain turned sharp and traveled through Yarrow like a lightning bolt, and with perfect clarity she could see Zardria's every moment, every breath, every heartache.

  She saw the disregard their mother held for her twin, the absolute loathing Zardria had been greeted with as a child. She saw, remembering herself, her own turning away from her sister. She saw the hate and malice that had gripped Zardria's heart at such a young age and she saw, her own heart breaking as she did, the deal the girl had made with a goddess. She watched Zardria's adolescence, her doomed love for Isidora, her failing to live up to everyone's expectations, every time. She saw the things the girl had been driven to, and saw, at last, Zardria's final redemption -- the love she'd held, deep and pure, for her Consort.

  She looked into her twin's eyes, and saw in them that Zardria saw Yarrow's life laid bare before her. A voice spoke in Yarrow's head, and she knew it was Kore, knew her dream had been reality.

  So long as the Dark One has a servant on the earth will She be able to fight against Our power in Heaven, Yarrow. You are My Chosen. You are My tool of victory for Us in Heaven and on Earth. You are the bringer of infinite compassion.

  Yarrow knew, in that moment, exactly what must be done.

  A light appeared between the twins' palms, and suddenly they were blown apart, as if in an explosion. Yarrow slid to a stop against the smooth floor.

  When she stood, the sight that met her eyes was Zardria's body. But her sister was no longer in residence.

  The woman laughed, and it boomed throughout the room like the resounding rumble of thunder. She smiled mercilessly at Yarrow, and seemed to grow in height. Her eyes were black; her nails had become claws. Black, membraneous wings, like those of a bat, had burst from her back. Her mouth held fangs.

  "Dare you face Me, Bellica?" the Goddess who now possessed her twin intoned. "I am the ruler of Tyvian, and I will banish your soul there forevermore."

  As Yarrow drew her sword, Umbra lunged for the bellica.

  Anala

  Jourd'Selene, 17th Trinnia

  0008 hours

  She watched things unfold, agony gripping her heart, barely able to believe what happened before her.

  Yarrow and Umbra fought in the centre of the hall; the bellica frantically, the Goddess almost lazily. Anala could see, now, though she'd missed it before, that Yarrow's belly bulged slightly, and she held her breath as she watched the pregnant warrior engage a Deity of unimaginable power.

  Yarrow's sword slashed at her twin's body, but while she made cuts upon the flesh, she could not seem to hurt the Deity within. Blood did not even flow. She fought expertly, but Umbra's power was too great; She knocked the bellica aside as if She'd been flicking a fly
from Her skin. Yarrow fell, her sword falling from her hands. Umbra went in closer. Anala knew the Goddess moved in to kill her friend.

  "Why d'ye nae pick on someone yer own size?" the admiral was shouting before she knew her own mind. A silly thing to say, for Umbra's added height to Zardria made the Goddess-Empress composite stand half a metre taller than the admiral. She drew the Naratus and placed the Magisphere on her other arm, standing at the ready.

  Umbra turned to face her and sneered. "You think you can kill Me, Magi?" the Goddess asked, and laughed.

  Anala's eyes narrowed. "May be I cannae. But I cannae let ye kill me friend, either. Sa why d'ye nae kill me instead?"

  Umbra smiled. "With pleasure."

  Umbra snapped Her fingers, and out of thin air a sword materialised. It was black in blade and pommel, the hilt decorated with red stones the colour of blood. Anala got the feeling that was what they really were. She felt a frisson of fear run down her spine, but did not back down.

  The Goddess came at Anala then, and she fought with a vigour she'd never felt before. There was a clash of steel as their swords hit each other; a clash of a different sort as Umbra's sword came down on the Magisphere that Anala used in an expert blocking move. She felt a tremor go through the shield, and the buzzing of the Naratus increased. She used the opening to cut Umbra's leg. The Goddess screamed in pain and rage, and fought with more anger. Anala could barely block the hits as Umbra advanced on her, pushing her back towards a wall.

  Soon she was cornered, and fighting with every last bit of strength she had left. Umbra was relentless, Her sword making vicious sounds as it moved through the air. Black blood streamed from the cut on Her leg; Anala could see it as Zardria's peplos had been torn at some point.