Hope surged through Emma’s core. There was a chance of victory with one of them dead, all they had to do was keep coordinating their attacks.
Twin screamed from Emma’s left and she felt sticky warm droplets pebble her arm. Helmet shoved Twin into the middle of their circle and Emma caught the wounded Hero. She looked at Twin’s chest: crimson with four gaping wounds. Blood pooled and spilled upon the already stained ground. In less than a minute, Twin was dead. Emma decided to grieve over this loss of life later.
Jim lurched at one of the remaining husks. The fiend ducked, predicting the attack, and lurched its talons at Jim’s side. Emma stepped in. Her blade missed the decimating claws, but her forearm caught the deadly attack.
Pain hit Emma; however, it was despair that began to choke her. The world had gone dark, and everyone around her became shadows and fog. She felt like she was falling deep within her own body. She tried to scream, but her voice had no sound. She tried to move, but her muscles refused the order. She tried to think, but the all-consuming fear strangled her mind. She was so empty. She must be nothing. From eyes that seemed to belong to someone else, Emma watched as Scope fell to a husk’s attack. The claws had struck straight through his eyes, a silent scream permanently plastered on his face.
Emma just watched, so empty, so nothing, as the husk jumped at her. Jim appeared from nowhere, pushing the demon back. Jim truly was a hero. He had saved her so many times already. It was a shame that he had given so much to someone so undeserving.
Jim was staring into her eyes. “Snap out of it!” His scream was far away. He pushed back another attack from a husk. “We need to move!” His voice felt like a whisper tittering on the wind. “Emma, now!” Jim reached his hand back and slapped Emma across the face.
Waves of the world rushed back to her. She gasped for breath at the sudden emotion and pain that anchored her to reality. Her face stung, and pain oscillated in her arm, but she was happy to feel anything. She was no longer empty, no longer nothing.
Helmet and Lumberjack were standing back to back, defending each other from an attacking husk. Emma and Jim followed their lead. Each duo fought a monster, and each duo felt their time coming to an end.
It took all of Emma’s concentration and honed skill to keep up with the husk, because its movements were so unpredictable. It would feign attacks and follow up with a rapid barrage of flurry. It would allow her blade to pierce its flesh in order to gain an opportunity to strike. This was an enemy that knew its own strengths and its opponents’ weaknesses.
Emma could feel Jim’s muscles as he parried or struck from her other side. She felt his cold blood against her bare neck. His arms moved in a succession of swings. He was trying to finish off the husk and end this torment.
She turned to help, absorbing some hits with her rapier that were meant to pierce Jim’s vulnerable sides. The husk moved back, preparing for another attack. But Jim and Emma moved as one. They pushed against the demon’s bloody razors, continually forcing it backwards. The pair were waves of water splashing against a battered stone, slowly breaking the ageless body into mud.
Jim thought he saw an opening, but Emma saw the feign as his daggers flew. She tried to move and help her Hero, but she was not fast enough. The husk’s claws slipped under Jim’s arm, stabbing deep into his chest.
Emma screamed as she saw Jim’s face grow pale.
▪ ▪ ▪ ▪ ▪ ▪ ▪ ▪
Everything was cold. The world around him was smoke and shadow. Far in the distance he could hear the screams of a girl he recognized from a far-off dream. But there were no dreams here, only cold. Ice grew up his legs, keeping him planted on the invisible ground. The ice traveled into his chest. His breaths were coming slower, more difficult to pull into his frozen body. The world had gone dark.
But, somewhere in the distance, he felt a familiar thread. It was unusual, a thread from a memory that didn’t belong to him. He reached for the object and his mind began to soar.
He stared at a Hero. He hated the foul monsters that wandered his land. His nails had discovered a soft place under the Hero’s arm. The Hero had moved fast, nearly overtaken him so many times. But here he stood, ready to die by his foe.
Then he saw the girl. She was no Hero, but still she was trespassing. She had to die too. He just needed to squeeze his hand, finish off this Hero, and then he would move to her.
Emma.
He paused at the name, whispered in his mind by someone else.
The girl was moving towards him. He needed to be rid of the Hero now. He needed to defend himself and throw down this human. Her green eyes stared into his with a storm of enraged passion. She wanted to kill him, he wanted to kill her. But he couldn’t move his hand. He couldn’t defend his neck as the girl’s thin blade cut into his flesh and removed his head.
Jim opened his eyes. The husk fell to the ground, Emma’s blade stained by its dark blood. Her gaze was fixed on him, mouth gaping in a mixture of fear and confusion.
▪ ▪ ▪ ▪ ▪ ▪ ▪ ▪
The husk went still the moment it contacted Jim’s flesh. Jim’s eyes closed, and he shivered as his blood ran down the monster’s arm. But the husk didn’t move.
Emma placed her hand on Jim’s shoulder. Steam wafted from where she touched. No, not steam, smoke. Black and billowing smoke rose from the Hero’s flesh. She took a surprised step back.
The husk stared at her, its eyes looking into her own. It didn’t’ move, only stared as she walked towards the frightening beast. The world had grown so dark, darker than any night she had ever lived before.
She pulled back her blade, aiming for the exposed neck of the beast. She had tried many times to hit the monster, each time failing against the superior fighter. But, this time, her blade struck true. She cut through the husk’s neck, its eyes continually staring as its head toppled onto the grass.
To her left, Emma heard Lumberjack’s deep voice exclaim, “What in the hells?” And she saw their husk fall as well. The world became lighter again. It was still night, but the darkness that had nearly suffocated them seemed to evaporate.
Jim gasped, and his eyes opened. He looked at the fallen husks and a large smile grew on his face.
“You saved me, Ellie,” he whispered, and then collapsed.
7: Ash
Jim woke, rising quickly to a sit and grasping for the knife that he kept on his arm. As he reached, a pain seared in his chest, halting his movement and driving the breath from his lungs. Emma was at his side in an instant, muttering calming words to the heavy breathing Hero. He could feel his heart pounding through his skin, feel the husks mean claws still gripping beneath his flesh.
He fingered his healing wounds. Large, crude, stitches held together the remaining skin and muscle that covered his heart. He could feel warm blood seeping from between the stitched areas. A shock of pain surged when his digits wandered too far down his throbbing side. He could already feel his inner body repairing the damaged tissue. The strike that caused the wound should have killed him; however, by the divine miracle of his genetics, all he would have in the end is another scar.
Jim’s eyes wandered over the ravaged battlefield. Four large pyres burned, raining grey ash from the sky and dusting the battered landscape in a snow-like perfection.
“They burned the bodies. A pyre for each fallen Hero, and one for the monsters.” Emma said with a reverence that rivaled the Divine Priests.
Jim closed his eyes. “Through the fire, they are cleansed. Through the smoke, they will be tested. Through the wind, they shall live again.” He whispered the prayer for the Heroes who had fought with him and died in his stead.