When my father did not return home for three days, my mother got very worried and upset. It was normal for him to be gone for no more than two days at a time without hearing from him, though always on the third day he would come home for supper. But this did not happen. On the fourth day my mother left to see the town guard about her missing husband. I stayed at home, not wanting to leave in case something bad happened to my father and had to console my mother. However, looking back I think I should have left.
I was sitting at the dining table, feeding Dissy the scraps of my supper, when the front door was kicked in with such a force I did not realize that it was the town guard themselves that were assaulting my home. Three of them came in, swords drawn and aimed at me.
“What is the meaning of this!” I cried in utter shock. Dissy leapt from my arms and onto the table, hissing a warning to the three intruding guards.
“By order of the Count,” A fourth guard that I hadn’t noticed yet stepped through the doorway and was reading from a scroll of payparus. “The Family of Halfshire is to be detained on the suspicion of being Spies of the Wester Country of Teustdomtere, enemy of the State of Samarra.”
“What!?” I backed myself up against the wall. “We aren’t spies!” I protested. One of the guards stepped around the table to grab my arm.
“Come with us, and don’t resist.” He ordered and snatched me up violently by my arm. I jerked my arm back from him, and stepped away continuing to protest the charges brought up against me. “I said don’t resist!”
The same guard grabbed me by my hair and dragged me screaming to the broken entryway.
“MREOW!” I turned just enough to see Dissy leap onto the face of the grab controlling me hair and paw violently at his eyes as if her tiny life depended on it.
“Stupid little…” The guard snatched my cat up by the back of her neck and flung her violently against the ground. Dissy let out one sharp yelp and then was silent.
“DISSY!” I cried out, reaching for my cat but was caught again by one of the guards. The remaining two guards, tossed a torch onto the roof of my house, and it was then that I watched my life burn away, forever changed by the flame of injustice.
They brought me to the mansion of Count Rustantz Naprocafi Damascal, where his son, Delphinus Jeferty Damascal was sitting on his father’s throne though it seemed as if his weight could not be held by the massive chair. His fat skin spilled out of his finely made silk clothing. On his dirty, balding, piggish head he wore a golden circlet adored with a decently sized sapphire, a sign that his was of true son of the Count. Below him, just with reach of his feet were my parents, chained and kneeling before him. The Portly pig, was Well, my mother was kneeling, my father was lying on his side without a shirt. I could see large gashes in his flesh were presumably a whip or something just as violent penetrated his skin.
“Ravey!” My mother called out, but was quickly silenced by the heel of the Deplhinus’ boot.
“No one gave you permission to speak.” He spat on my mother with total indifference.
“Father,” I wept. My mother looked at me with the same sorrowful eyes I had.
“Now then,” Delphinus, Jeferty began. “I hear from your parents, namely your father, that you wish to rescind your marriage from me.” He stepped off his fathers throne, and stepped between where the guards were holding me, and my parents. “Is this true?”
“Yes,” I said with as much contempt I could muster. “I do not wish to have a have a fat slob of a pig for a husband.”
The pig’s face flashed red with anger, though he made no expression, I could see in the way he continued to pace between me and my parents.
“Well, what if I said, that if you do not agree to marry me, I will slay both your parents, and place their heads next to you in a dungeon so that you’ll forever regret the decision.” Looking past the Deplhinus, I caught a glimpse of my mothers head snap up. Her eyes pleaded with me to rescind my decision. I put my head down, to young to process the decision I would have to make. Unfortunately, my father made it for me.
“Ravey…” My father called out from behind the Deplhinus.
“I told you, no one gave you permission to speak!” The Deplhinus drew the sword from the scabbard of one of the guards holding me. He quickly stepped over to my already injured father and drove the entire sword through his back. My father didn’t cry out in pain at all. His body simply went limp, my mother cried out in shock and sorrow. “Be silent wench!” He screamed, and then with one swing, silenced my mother forever.
I couldn’t breath then. Couldn’t cry. Couldn’t move. Couldn’t think. Couldn’t do anything. I lost control of my legs, and collapsed to the floor. I couldn’t even cry out their names.
“Ah, oops.” I heard the Deplhinus snicker indifferently. “Guess since you’re without parents, you’ll probably want to join them.” He turned and pointed his sword at me. I didn’t respond as he pressed the tip of the sword against the skin of my neck. “But it seems like such a waste to let you leave this world without knowing what womanhood really is.”
I froze at the words. Somehow I knew exactly what was going to happen next without being told. An instinct somehow instilled inside me since birth that had suddenly awakened inside me. My body moved on its own, crawling on my hands and knees I attempted to escape. Though I moved first, the guards were on me before I could get out of reach. They tore my clothes off me until I was bare, then rolled me onto my back. I once again found a sword aimed at my throat.
“Stay still,” The count’s son ordered as he began removing his coat. “I’ll make this the most pleasurable night of your life.”
I shut my eyes, fearing that all was lost and hopeless. I would never know the love of a man I shared the same feelings for, nor would I ever be able to give my parents the grandchildren they had so longed for. I cried, wishing that they would just kill me instead of making me suffer such a humiliating death….
That’s exactly what I was thinking when I heard a cats, meow echo fiercely inside the room. I opened my eyes, and saw that the others had heard it too. The simple meow seemed to freeze everything in time at that single moment.
That’s when she appeared again. The Counts son was naked standing over me, when he was kicked aside like a flimsy piece of wood. In his place stood Disease, the stranger I had met five days earlier. She was holding her massive blade above me, separating my body from that of my assailants. I could feel the heat from the heavy blade drying the tears puddled underneath my eyes. The guards quickly leapt back, suddenly afraid of my savior. She reached down with one hand and helped me to my feet and quickly pushed me behind her back.
“Dai’jaku’ ne’masu?” I took it as her asking if I was alright. I don’t remember what my response was, but whatever it was; she then focused her attention to the town guards.
“Kill them!” The Delphinus ordered.
The guards drew their swords and rushed towards Disease, hoping to overwhelm her with their numbers. I heard her smirk, then she pushed me aside to keep me from getting in the way. I backed away on my hands and watched her go to work.
Three guards, not counting the Deplhinus himself, were in front of her, their swords thirsting for blood. Two were behind her, their swords thrusting through her back…
…or I thought that they’d stabbed her in her back. She suddenly vanished from sight, the group stopped in dire confusion. They looked everywhere, above them, behind them, and every direction you would expect an attack to come from. She appeared again in the center of them as if made of out thin air. She made one sweeping motion of her titanic sword. The big slab of steel maimed, cut, bisected and even decapitated all the guards one swift beautiful swan like motion. Their bodies then suddenly burst into flames, their chainmail suits of armor melting as if heated by a dragons flame.
My jaw, had it been able to detach itself from my face and run around the room, was sitting open in pure amazement.
“GUARDS! GUARDS!” The Delphinus called out, and soon the room was filled with almost every man with a sword who was in service to the count.
“Che’, Juoi’ macher goy.” Disease challenged them all. She placed her sword on her back, and dared the closest idiot to attack her. He took the bait, swinging his sword downward as if to cut her across her chest. She sidestepped the blade with amazing speed, relieved him of his weapon before he even noticed it was gone and placed a fierce hand around his neck. A second later the man became a giant frozen block of ice.
The guards all took a step back in utter shock, however she did not take that as a cease of hostility. She grabbed the next closest guard by his helm, froze his head solid with her grip and smashed his head into pieces against the floor. She then reclaimed hold of her sword, making another giant sweeping motion from a low kneeling position, she reduced half of the guards into a hot melting soup of bone and metal, set ablaze by the magic inside her massive weapon.
The others took this as a sign to turn tail and run. She didn’t attempt to give chase, though she turned her attention to the cowering Delphinus hiding behind his fathers throne with his hands over the back of his head. She stormed towards his hiding spot, and with amazing strength snatched him up by his neck and tossed him into the center of the room.
“Please! Spare my life!” The Counts son began to please. “I’ll give you whatever you wish! Just spare my life.”
Disease ignored his pleas, and reached for a dagger that had been hidden somewhere on her body. She held it out in my direction, offering me a tool for revenge.
“Oh gods, no please!” He continued to please for his life as I stood up and timidly made my way over to where Disease had him begging.
“Ariku, narikara, tkio.” She placed the dagger in my hand, and kicked the pig onto his back. For a measure of time unaccounted for, I stared at the dagger in my hands, and then at my dead parents on the floor not far from us. It didn’t take long for me to make my decision.
I had never killed anyone before. So this was obviously my first time. I stabbed, maybe half a dozen times, before Disease pulled me away. She took the dagger away from me and finished off the Counts son by drawing a line across his throat with the dagger. She stared at him with eyes devoid of emotion as he took his last breaths.
“Koiki.” She said solemnly, wrapping a friendly arm around my shoulder. As we turned to leave, a lone, giant, heavy knight, carrying a large ebony ornate shield in one hand, and finely made silver longsword in the other, stepped into the entrance to the Counts court blocking our path of escape.
“I am Senus Kilthor.” He bellowed with a voice befitting a giant. “You shall not leave this castle alive.”
Disease placed a hand in front of me as we slowly backed up into the counts court. I watched Senus glance around the room, the smoldering bodies of his compatriots, my parents and the counts son, seemed to enrage him even more. Disease gently eased me toward the far wall, pointing with her hand without ever taking her eyes off the steel giant in front of her.
“Boku, naittie.” She warned him, the fingers of her free hand lightly tapping the grip of her massive blade.
Senus ignored her warning, and drew his sword anyway. Disease shook her head sighing, she brought her blade up from behind her back and held it in a ready position. Senus lashed out first, however once his blade made contact with Disease’s, he watched in utter horror as his own blade melted away into puddle of steel.
“Dammit!” He cursed, suddenly aware of his upcoming death. However as fast as Disease was, her initial swing was slower than usual…or what I figured was usual. Senus leapt backward out of the way, and before she could bring herself back into position for another swing, he smacked her as hard as he could with his shield. Disease went tumbling in one direction; her weapon went in the other.
Senus then went for her weapon, but when he picked it up, he quickly tossed it back down to the floor, shaking his hands as if he’d been burned by hot coals. He took one look at his hands and then looked up just in time to see Disease roll back up to her feet and charge for him. She leapt up high in the air, however Senus caught her, mid-leap by her throat, executed a half-turn and drove her body into the hard stone floor as hard as he could. He raised his shield arm and attempted to sever her head from her body, but she quickly rolled out of the way.
Senus swung at her with his shield again, and Disease kept painfully dodging his strikes. He backed her into a corner, where he managed to land a very strong blow to her stomach with his fists which seemed to knock the wind out of her. He struck her again with his curled up fist in her chin. The back of her head connected with the stone wall with a sickening smack. I though she was done for, however she ending doing one of the most amazing things ever. As Senus brought his shield up for the final blow, I shut my eyes for the split second, hearing only the sound of the shield connecting with the wall, and then a silence breaking THUNK!
When I opened my eyes again, Disease had somehow regained control of her massive weapon and had shoved it as far as she could into Senus’ back. The magical flames from the blade consumed his body and armor, leaving him in the same state as the other guardsmen Disease had defeated moments earlier. She quickly placed her weapon onto her back and ran to where I was standing, still shaken and teary eyed.
She ran over to the body of my mother, and quickly removed her clothing. I was going to protest at first, but as she placed my mothers tunic and trousers in my arms, I kept silent.
Once I was dressed, She took me by the hand and we made for the castle exit. Outside, we were greeted by over half a dozen archers.
“Ready!” The archers drew back their bows. We were completely surrounded from all sides.
“SMAJ!” Disease cursed. Had I not been with her, she probably could’ve escaped herself, but I knew that since I wasn’t as fast or agile as she was I was nothing more that a liability that would get her killed.
“FIRE!” As the archers released their arrows, she slammed her sword into the ground in front of us, and quickly pushed me to the ground, covering me with her entire body. I heard arrows strike the ground behind us, the walls…
I felt Disease’s body jerk with pain and I cried out, unable to contain my fear. Despite the obvious wounds she was taking, she rubbed a soothing hand over my back. I felt her stand up, so I looked up hoping that she wasn’t about to enter her death throes. There were four arrows sticking out of her back, and one single arrow sticking out of her neck. I stared at her wide-eyed, wondering how she could still move with an arrow in her neck. She leaned up against her sword and smiled down at me, with one of the most reassuring looks anyone had ever given me.
“READY!” The second volley was about to begin, but she still looked at me smiling calmly as if we were only losing in a game of tag.
“FIRE!” As the second volley came I ducked my head, not wanting to see my own death. However instead of sharp piercing pains of arrows entering my body, I felt a strong gust of wind blow my hair back against my neck. I looked up, covering my eyes with my arm to see what act of god had saved me that time.
Disease was still leaning against her sword, her arms directed over her head. Her eyes were shut, though I could see that her eyes were moving under her eyelids. The archers surrounding us were lifted off the ground, and thrown aside, giving her enough room to maneuver. She calmly reached for the arrow stuck in her neck and broke the tail off it before plucking her sword out of the ground as if she was plucking a flower from the ground and went to work.
First she decimated the archers on our right flank, by freezing them with a quickly chanted spell cast from her hand. A split second after they were all frozen, she turned to the archers on our left flank, cutting through them all before they even had a chance to turn and run. Burning bodies flew everywhere, lifted up or knocked aside by her sword. When she turned to the final group of archers, I could see that they were all too scared to move. The two groups of archer were….well…murdered for lack of a better word, in mere matter of seconds.
The look on her face now was filled with anger. She slowly walked back to me, scooping me up in her arms we walked through the archer’s final line of defense without a single incident.
Despite the wounds to her body, or even the heavy weapon on her back she ran with me to the city’s north gate, where she simply bounded up the roof of the nearest house and leaped over the north wall in an extraordinary show of stamina and dexterity. Once outside the city gate when, I guess, we were far enough away she set me down on my feet and collapsed wearily on her side against a tree.
“Dai’jaku’ ne’masu?” She spoke in a worn out voice. I starting crying. “Nai, maue de jerza.” She attempted to soothe me even though she was obviously in a worse off situation that I was. I mean, what I had just gone through was pretty bad, but I figured that she was somewhere near death with that many arrows in her back.
I knelt down at her side, wishing that there was something I could do to save her. She reached up and wiped the tears from my eyes, smiling as if grateful for something I did.
“Please, don’t die…” I sobbed. I’m not sure if she understood, but she smiled at me nonetheless. Loose leaves, picked up by the wind blew between us, and her face went dark with horror. I turned my head to follow her gaze and crouched on a tree branch above us illuminated by the light of the moon, was a shadow with bright red eyes. I quickly turned to her body spotting a dagger attached to her leg, which I ripped it free from its scabbard, and as I turned back to aim my newfound weapon at the intruder, he was already standing in front of me, glaring down with those glowing red eyes of his.
“Bachi.” The shadow-man spat down at Disease. She remained silent, even as he kicked her once in the chest for good measure. I went for his legs, but she stopped my hand with her own. I looked at her completely confused. “Gooken, mai shi’tera?” He asked her, and she nodded. My eyes darted between Disease and the Shadowman, wondering what exactly was going on.
“Ghe’ wiru majety oikel.” Disease coughed blood on the ground. The shadow-man looked at me, which I swore his full gaze upon me made my heart stop…and not in a good way.
“She says you helped her. Is this true?” The shadow-mans voice felt to come from every direction at once. His voice was deep, a fearsome. I could feel each syllable of his words vibrate in both my bones and in my mind.
“Yes,” I nodded, afraid of what exactly was going to happen to the both of us.
The shadow-man reached grabbed Disease by her collar and began to drag her body off further into the darkness of the woods. Before he vanished into the wood line he turned and called to me over his shoulder.
“You coming?” I never moved so fast in my life.
He told introduced himself as Zwei, as he pulled the arrows from Disease’s back. We were sitting in a cave not far from town, where he had been waiting for her to meet with him. She was late for their scheduled meeting and so he had come to investigate her whereabouts when he found us in the woods. Lucky for us, I supposed. I huddled myself near the fire he’d built, and silently drank the warm tea he’d poured for me.
I watched him pull the final arrow out of her back and look at her as if she was nothing more than a dying dog.
“Ut’ Dai’jaku’?” I heard her whisper to Zwei. He looked back at me and spat something back to her so fast that I couldn’t catch the words.
“What did she say?” I asked eagerly.
“She wanted to know if you were feeling okay.” He replied as if I was annoying him. “I told her to shut up before she dies.”
“Tell her I said thank you.”
“Why?” I don’t know why he was being such a jerk, but at the same time I could feel that his animosity wasn’t purposely directed at me. It felt like he hated me because I was near her.
“Please, I owe her.” I begged. Reluctantly, he whispered my thanks in her ears, and I watched as she wagged her tail happily, and Zwei rewarded her with a quick jab to her ribs. “Hey what was that for!”
“She needs to stay still, so I can fix her.” Yeah, I didn’t get it either. If he was so inclined to fix her, then was he treating her like a stepchild? I moved to her side, and ran my hands through her hair, trying my best to show her that someone in the area truly gave a damn. Zwei gave me a dirty look as I was doing this, but he remained silent. He reached into his pack and came back up with a small sealed jar filled with ointment. He uncapped the jar and rubbed the contents over her wounds.
I watched her entire body flinch in pain, so I gently took her hand into mine and rubbed it as gently as I could. Zwei laughed at this, and I glared at him. He continued to snicker at this. Once he was finished smearing ointment over her back, he stood up and walked to the fire.
“Dai’chi. Keto ma, iriksku natte?” Disease spoke, still lying on her stomach.
“Itts.” Zwei responded. “Itruya, k’killua mateyu orig’xi mu’teru.” I didn’t know what was being said, but by the look on Disease’s face, it made her very sad.
“What she say?”
“It doesn’t concern you.” He poured himself a cup of tea and looked out the mouth of the cave. “Starting tomorrow you’re not my concern. I’m only giving you shelter tonight because she isn’t able to repay you what she says she owes.”
“You’re just going to leave me here?” I was upset again, amazed at how cold hearted this man was being. Didn’t know the situation I was in?
“Yes. She’s already told me of you’re situation, and honestly its neither of our concern. We’re not people you want to get mixed up with.” Zwei, who had been wearing a hood with a mask the entire time, now rolled them both down away from his face. I could see he shared similar features to Disease. Cat-like ears, but his hair was short, and dark like mud. His face had a few nasty looking scars. One went down his left eye and into a ‘V’ shape over his lips a just under his right eye.
“But…but I have no where else to go.” I begged. “Please, I…I can be of use.”
Zwei scoffed at me again. “Use? What possibly can you do for us?” I hung my head in silence. Honestly I didn’t know what sort of use I could be to them. I mean I was simply a peasant girl with a worthless dream.
“Please.” I was crying again. I mean, honestly where was I supposed to go without any living family….I got an idea, if anything it would be worth a shot to try and stay with Disease a little longer… “Could you at least escort me to my cousins home? Its not very far, and you won’t have to worry about her owing my anything.”
“Fine,” Zwei sighed. “If it’ll make you shut up.”
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