(FREE on Amazon)
"The darkest shadows hide beneath the brightest lights."
Estra would never forget the night she lay in smoldering ash and watched while everything she loved was consumed by fire. Once a pious young woman living a peaceful life in s...
The door tore free from its hinges, sending a cloud of wood splinters and dust scattering throughout the room. The first heretic through the threshold was a hefty redheaded woman whose hair turned a radiant shade of blonde as Estra's released the full force of her magic into the heretic's face. The heretics following behind the burning woman lept over her body, careless of their fallen comrade as they closed in on Estra.
"Stay behind the bar," Estra quickly threw over her shoulder to Lency. A surprisingly swift axe blow came down at her, making her slip the side and returning the strike with a slash of her own that took off the man's hand at the wrist.
While he was bent over staring at his new stump, Estra went at the others with full force. Her blade danced through the air, slashing and stabbing with practiced precision as she fought off her attacker's strikes. Even with all her years of hard training, all Estra could do with a sword alone against this many was defend herself. Sadly, for them, she was far more than just a swordswoman.
Estra parried another furious blow, releasing a blast of shattering force into a man who'd overreached his stab. The arcane force crushed through his ribs and sent him flying back into another one of his companions in a disheveled heap. Estra didn't allow the rest a moment to regain their composure. She swept her hand once more, sending a table flipping end over end towards them.
The solid oak clipped one of them in the side and took her slower friend in the head before it came to a rest against the far wall. Estra pressed her attack quickly, finishing off the injured woman before ducking into a spin that carried her under the axe cut of another and using the momentum to carry her own blade through.
By the time she jumped to her feet the man who'd fallen under his companion had freed himself and approached her from behind. Estra barely dodged the man's strike, taking a deep cut as she sprang out of the way. Flames engulfed her entire arm as blinding pain went roaring up from her shoulder.
Estra's wheeled around facing the last man with an outstretched palm that carried enough power to burn down the tavern and everything in it. Just before she made the unwise decision of scorching the man to ash, a loud crash sounded and her attacker crumpled to the ground with a piece of green glass jutting from his neck.
Estra looked down at the man in confusion as he desperately tried to stop leak in his neck. She knew from a glance that his efforts were hopeless. His artery had been opened and that would be the end of him.
Estra looked up at Lency with an appreciative nod, but the girl didn't even notice her anymore. She stood blanked faced over the man with the broken wine bottle in her hands. In an instant, the girl's face went from shocked, to hateful.
Lency raised the bottle high above her head and brought it down on the man's teeth with enough force to cause an explosion of emerald and ivory. Still, she wasn't satisfied. She mounted the man, striking down at him repeatedly until there was nothing left of the bottle to hit him with. When she no longer had an object to use, she struck him with her fists, careless of the glass shards that dug into her knuckles.
Estra watched on for a moment while the girl beat at the man with everything that she had. She reached out towards Lency as if to stop her, but couldn't find it within herself to claim that the girl was at fault. If she'd had the chance to do the same to those who'd tortured her, Estra knew she would be no different.
She gritted her teeth against the pain of her shoulder, muttering the God's words of healing as she strode over to the window to peer into a dim alleyway that held no visitors. Estra stopped her mending for a moment to call forth a quick warding spell for the arrival of more heretics before she sat and waited for Lency to tire out. It was only when her hands trembled from elbow to fingertip that the girl rose from the floor.
Estra looked down at the man, wondering what he'd done to the girl to deserve such ire from her. She walked over to Lency and grabbed her by the hands. "Best if we get these healed up quickly," Estra said, completely overlooking the scene that had just transpired. Her palms warmed around the girl's shaking fingers, soothing her hands with a soft aura. The specks of glass fell to the floor like minuscule raindrops as the wounds they left behind began to thin out.
When she was done, Estra held the girl by the shoulders, looking for a smart-arsed jest to lighten the mood before she saw the expression on the girl's face. It was a cold one; the kind of dead visage she'd seen others make many times after they kill their first man. This girl was not only experiencing the reality of her deed, but a mixture of virulent emotions that Estra could only guess at.
Estra pulled the girl's face into her chest just as her uncontrolled sobbing erupted. The tears soaked through faster than Estra would have thought possible. Lency's hands gripped her cloak, muddling her once pristine whites with angry scars of crimson.
She stood there in a tavern with bodies strewn about the floor and a woman still dying at their feet, holding a girl that she'd only just met. Sunlight found its way into the dark ally, slanting a path through the open windows to highlight the strange scene within the tavern. The cooing of city pigeons on the rooftops above drowned out Lency's muffled cries.
Estra ran a hand through the girl's dark hair, ignoring the burning in her arm as she tried to comfort her. She didn't know the right words to say. Providing assistance to others was commonplace for her, but giving true comfort was a practice well out of her capabilities.
She recalled the many times her mother had soothed her before she was torn from the world that she had once known. All she could think to say was the same thing she herself had always been told in moments like these.
"Don't fret child," Estra whispered softly. "All will be well in time."
Oops! This image does not follow our content guidelines. To continue publishing, please remove it or upload a different image.
