Regrets of The Fallen (Victis Honor Book 1)

by Jake Taylor

  Haruka smiled at her over her shoulder. “There are different kinds of romance, I think. It’s not always about dancing under the moonlight.” She tipped the soup from the pot into two cups and then stood, moving to the bed and handing one to Isabella. “Sometimes, it’s taking care of the other person when they’re sick.”

  Isabella took the cup in her hands, smiling as Haruka joined her under the covers and let her lean against her rather than the wall. She blew lightly on the soup, watching the steam rise. “It’s been a long time since I had someone take care of me when I was sick. I think I was twelve the last time.”

  Haruka put an arm around her and got comfortable, lazily alternating her gaze between the blue-haired knight and the fire as she sipped from her own cup. “For me, as well. My mother had all sorts of crazy things she would try to fix illness.”

  Isabella had her knees pulled up and her head on Haruka’s shoulder as she sipped gingerly, suppressing a cough every so often. “Crazy things? Like what?”

  Haruka sighed. “Oh, all sorts of things. Who knew where she got her ideas? Things like fixing a cold by taking a bath in hot milk.”

  “Well, did it work?”

  “To make me uncomfortable? Yes. It did nothing to the cold.”

  Isabella smiled. “She was a big fan of folk remedies, then?”

  “Without a doubt. She’d try anything once. I once saw her standing on her head to cure a headache; what kind of backwards thinking is that?”

  Bella laughed softly. “She sounds very quirky.”

  “Well she wasn’t that much, really. She was just willing to try anything people said was a cure. Normally she was pretty calm, but happy. She was a very strong person, emotionally; she kept people in line and dealt with things head-on.”

  “Were she and your father happy?”

  Haruka nodded. “Back then he could be strict, but he wasn’t… like he is now. He was firm, and tough, but loving, and you could tell he cared. But after she died he retained the ‘firm and tough’ aspects, but the ‘loving and caring’ seemed to… disappear.”

  Isabella looked up at her. “It has to still be there. Right? Why else would he care if you were strong, if not to keep you from dying?”

  “I don’t know. I just think that my father died with my mother, and whatever he is now isn’t him.” She looked at Isabella. “Don’t worry about it. I accepted that a long time ago. It doesn’t really bother me anymore. I just feel sad, like you do for your parents. To me, I lost my father as well. I mourn who he was. I feel sorry for him that life turned him into this.”

  “Maybe, after I’m gone…”

  “No,” Haruka shook her head. “I won’t be going back.”

  “So… What will you do?”

  Haruka sighed. “I don’t like thinking about that.”

  “But you should… You’ll have to do something. I’m already worrying about you.”

  “You amaze me. You only have a few months, and you’re worrying about what will happen to me.”

  Isabella looked down. “Well… Yes. I’ve worried about that since the beginning. It will be harder for you. It’s always harder on the survivor. I know that if you were dying… Losing you would be infinitely more difficult than dealing with this myself.”

  Haruka sighed, leaning her head back. “I guess… We’ve met other people. Maybe I’ll join Freya.”

  “Would you really? I’ll feel a lot better if I know you won’t be alone.”

  Haruka looked at her. “I’m not going to be good. You know there’s nothing that will be able to replace… this. But I’ll try. For you, I promise I’ll try to live, to the best of my ability.”

  Isabella smiled. “I’m happy to hear that.” She looked back at the fire. “Nothing is harder about this than knowing I’ll leave you behind.”

  “But this situation,” Haruka said, “it’s still hard on you. I know you aren’t feeling good about it,” she continued softly. “I know you’re scared.”

  Bella responded to her without looking away from the fire, her voice growing quieter as she went on. “Before this I thought I had accepted my fate, come to terms with it. Now, though, I find myself rejecting it, reluctant to leave you, hating it for cutting our time short. Each day I wake up with you, I feel less ready for the day that I won’t.” Haruka listened quietly as Isabella spoke, watching her face. Bella coughed again but ignored it. “I want to search for an exit even though I know there isn’t one. I want to get out of this situation, but it’s reality. I’ve never felt so trapped, Haruka – I feel claustrophobic but there’s nothing to crawl out of. Time keeps going forward towards this – this date, this day that I can’t go past. It’s so many different feelings – I feel like something is pressing down on me, making it harder to breath and cutting off ahead of me. I feel like I’m sliding down a muddy slope towards a hole and I can’t catch anything, there’s nothing to get a grip on. I can claw at the dirt, I can say it isn’t fair, I can scream and struggle and fight all I want, but none of it matters because I’m going to fall.”

  Haruka let out a shaky breath, setting aside their cups so she could wrap her in both arms. “You aren’t going to fall,” she said calmly, the steadiness in her own voice surprising her. “You aren’t going to be crushed. You’re going to be with me, like this, and you’re going to go to sleep. That’s all. It will be like going to bed all the other times. The only difference is that when you wake up after that, you won’t have to deal with any of the things life has thrown at you. And then I’m going to find you, even if it takes me years, and we’re going to make up for the time we didn’t get.” Looking down she noticed that Isabella wasn’t crying, but she was shaking, and Haruka was surprised she had that much control. “You can be scared,” she said softly as she kissed her hair. “But you won’t be alone. I’ll be with you for every second.”

  Isabella turned her head into Haruka, speaking in a small voice the monk almost missed, “You better find me. Or I won’t forgive you.”

  Haruka turned lengthwise in the bed so they could lay down, keeping Bella against her with one arm as she used the other to adjust the blankets to their new position. “Nothing could keep me away. I promise, I will never leave you alone; not now, and not then.”

  Isabella had curled up now; as soon as she realized she was tired it hit her hard, and she was barely awake at this point, only enough to get comfortable against Haruka. She did, however, manage to mumble, “I love you,” and a softer, “Thank you.”

  Haruka heard both, and smiled as her second arm returned to its place around the other woman. “I love you too,” she replied quietly, watching Bella’s eyes fall closed just after – she’d been waiting for that response, wanting to hear it. It didn’t even take a minute for her to fall asleep then; Haruka didn’t feel tired at all, but that wasn’t a problem. She was quite content to lay there watching her, listening to the combination of the storm outside, the fire inside, and the much softer – but to her, more interesting – sound of Bella’s breathing. Haruka marveled at Isabella’s ability to have lived such an intense life and still retain such a youthful and childlike side to her – she looked serene sleeping there, and the monk couldn’t prevent herself from brushing the hair from her face or tracing her cheek with a finger. She was glad the woman was such a deep sleeper.

  She was afraid for Isabella, and she was afraid for herself, but in moments like this she was able to forget that. These were the moments she lived for.

  Chapter 15: Face the Reaper

  “It’s funny what we consider important these days.”

  “Is it? It seems more sensible to me.”

  IXH

  Haruka awoke from an expected nightmare. She didn’t jerk awake or cry out, but her eyes did dart to her sleeping girlfriend. She’d dreamed of her death, and she expected to have many more similar dreams in the coming months. Eventually it would become reality, but for now, waking chased it away. She shifted so she could watch her better as she took a quick glance arou
nd the room. The fire had died at some point during the night, but she couldn’t hear any rain so the weather was probably better. That was good news for their pace today; she had hopes that they could cover a good distance before having to stop, as the further they went, the lower their chances of being found were.

  She let it go for as long as she could, but eventually they had to get going. She laid a hand on Isabella’s shoulder and shook her gently. “Bella, it’s time to get up.” Bella moved, but didn’t open her eyes, giving something of a tired groan. Haruka tapped her shoulder. “I know it’s early, but we can’t lie here all day.”

  “Nnngh,” was the only response she got as Bella scrunched up her brow and subtly shook her head.

  “We need to get going.”

  Isabella turned her head to bury her face in Haruka’s chest. “Nooooo…”

  Haruka chuckled. “Yeeees. We have to get going.”

  “Going means getting up,” the knight continued, her voice still muffled against Haruka. “And then going outside, where there’s sun and wind and walking.”

  “You have a problem with those things?”

  “Yes. They aren’t in here.” Isabella lifted her head, finally opening her eyes to blink wearily at Haruka. “I like bed.”

  Lifting a hand to brush the messy strands of hair from Bella’s face, Haruka agreed “So do I, but we’ll be back in it tonight.”

  “One more hour?”

  “Bella…”

  “One more hour if we don’t sleep?” she asked, taking on a different kind of smile.

  “Well if we aren’t going to sleep, what’s the point of… oh.”

  Isabella grinned and pushed herself up, moving up so that her arms were on either side of Haruka’s head and she was looking down at her. “One hour.”

  Haruka stared up at her, just feeling her willpower rapidly draining. “Well… I guess an hour couldn’t hurt…”

  Bella’s smile widened as she lowered her head to kiss her, pulling back after a minute. “Just an hour.”

  Slightly over two hours later, they stood outside of the tent packing it up. Isabella marveled as it folded up with little effort and fit back in one of their packs. “This thing is amazing. The dimensional displacement alone must have required a hundred separate runes.”

  Haruka, who was looking at the sun’s position and had already accepted their late start this morning, looked back at her with a confused expression. “The dimensional what?”

  “Displacement.” Isabella picked up her pack. “It basically works like a… like a closet, I guess. The inside of the tent is put away when the tent is folded up, in an area that doesn’t exist on this plane.”

  “I’m sure that makes sense,” Haruka said flatly as she shouldered her own pack and looked through the forest. “We’re pretty far south. We have some options as to where to go next.”

  “Well, you know this land a lot better than I do. I stayed up north. What are our options?”

  “We can go north and try to make it to the Imperial City and hide in plain sight, so to speak. The Black Sun would have a much easier time finding us, but the Areyans wouldn’t be able to reach us at all. Option two is to continue south all the way to Kazthul, a country that’s pretty much pure desert. We would be a lot harder to find, but it’s a much harsher journey. We can’t go west towards Areya, so our third option is to go back east to the coast, but I don’t think that would be useful at all unless we planned to charter a ship to one of the island nations.”

  Isabella nodded thoughtfully, glancing back over her shoulder. “So, north or south. Civilization and facing the Black Sun, or empty desert and facing the harsh environment.”

  “Right.” Haruka looked at her. “I’m just wondering if… I mean, it’s…”

  “You can say it, Haruka,” Isabella said with a look at her. “You’re worried I won’t do well in the desert.” As Haruka nodded, Isabella looked up at the sun through the trees. “So am I. Honestly… I don’t think I would. I don’t have a lot of experience travelling in the desert, but I know the toll it takes on your body and… I don’t think my body can pay that toll anymore,” she finished with a look at the ground. “Sorry.”

  Haruka took her hand, bringing her gaze up to meet hers. “No need for apology. We’re trying to keep each other healthy. So we’ll go north.” She smiled. “I wanted to show you the Imperial City anyway. You’re going to be blown away.”

  Isabella smiled. “Really? What’s it like? I’ve only heard rumors.”

  “They’re all true,” Haruka said as they started walking. “Buildings of shining metal that reach into the sky, twisting and suspended roads with thousands of vehicles zooming along them, trains, uncountable shops, people from all over the world. The city is a marvel of technological, magical, societal and economical achievement.”

  “It sounds like a place from a storybook. It’s hard to believe all that exists when I grew up with wood and stone.”

  “You’ll get to see for yourself. We can spend weeks there seeing everything.”

  Isabella was about to ask another question about it when a loud crack interrupted her. Ahead of them a tree began to fall straight towards them, forcing them to separate and jump apart. As Isabella landed she felt a rush of air; in that moment her reaction speed saved her life. She lifted both arms in a cross and received a cut on both forearms, which fortunately only barely got through her hardened leather; it was better than the gash that would be in her neck now otherwise. As she skidded back a few feet her eyes landed on a thin man with a short, spiky shock of white hair, maroon eyes, and light black cloth clothing completed with a similarly-colored scarf that hid the lower half of his face, and a hood that cast his face in shadow. He narrowed his eyes at her as he lowered two curved daggers that he held in a reverse grip, one of them with a few drops of blood on it. “Tch… I didn’t expect you to block that.”

  Isabella steadied herself and drew her iron sword, focusing a hard gaze on the man. “Who are you?”

  “Aizen!” Haruka landed on the fallen tree trunk, glaring at the thin man. “I didn’t think you would be involved in this,” she said with a glance over her shoulder.

  “Hello, Haruka,” he said as he looked back at her. “Why are you surprised? The Triad is your father’s ace. You and your ‘friend’ have annoyed him too much by now.”

  “Where are the others?” she said as she stood to her full height.

  “Well…” he started before a large mass flew in from the side and slammed into her, sending her in the opposite direction. “Genlock is right there,” he finished in a bored tone.

  “Haruka!” Isabella started to move forward but Aizen instantly attempted to take advantage, darting forward in a flash of steel and trying to stab her throat and stomach at the same time. She was forced to leap back and barely avoided the attacks by spinning her blade before pressing back against a tree with a glare at the thin man, who merely straightened and gave an ‘hmph’.

  On the tree where Haruka had been standing stood an immense man who seemed to be comprised entirely of muscle. He was bald but had a thick beard, and wore simple green cloth but had two heavy iron gauntlets on his hands that he smashed together, emitting a loud ring. “It’s time someone put a stop to your disrespectful rebellion! You have forgotten your duty.”

  Haruka picked herself up from the grass and brushed herself off, glaring at the large man who was nearly twice as tall as she was. “I didn’t forget, I just changed duties. If you’re here, too, I guess Trish is around somewhere.”

  “They wouldn’t leave me behind,” a woman said as she came down slowly in front of the large man. Even though Bella immediately disliked her, even she couldn’t dispute that the woman was startlingly gorgeous; her blonde hair nearly reached the ground and shone gold, and she wore red robe-like clothing that revealed more skin than most people were comfortable showing. It tended to attract attention, and that was obviously her intent. She turned light green eyes on Haruka. “We were sent t
o bring you back like a disobedient dog.”

  “Better than being an obedient bitch.”

  Trish smiled. “Is it? My lover isn’t about to be executed.”

  Haruka snarled. “What?”

  “Those are our orders,” Aizen said as he looked at Isabella. “Kill Isabella Enyo, capture Haruka Saito.”

  “Your father is tired of this charade,” Trish said disdainfully. “He wants to be sure this doesn’t happen again, so we will remove the reason it happened in the first place.”

  Isabella raised her iron sword and pointed it at them. “You act like I don’t have a choice in the matter.”

  “You don’t,” Aizen replied. “I can smell it from here; you’re weak.”

  “You can… smell it?”

  “Aizen is a vampire,” Haruka explained as she continued looking for a way to get over to Isabella. “That’s why none of his skin is exposed, to keep it out of the sun.”

  “Yes, I should thank you for choosing to walk through a rather shady forest. It’s certainly making my involvement easier.”

  “I don’t really care what you are,” Isabella said as she stepped forward. “I am Isabella of Two Faces, and I am tired of not getting the respect I deserve from this country. I’m going to kill you,” she said simply as she smiled at Aizen, “and I’m not even going to transform to do it.”