The vermillion light of the setting sun glinted off of iron and steel as Arvel and Lunette circled their enemy, making strikes at any opening they found, but their attacks never found purchase. As darkness crept over the mountainside, Melodia’s raven feathers faded into shadows, and she moved like a ghost out of the way of their attacks, never retreating but seldom countering.

“Fiend!” Lunette shouted as she lunged toward Melodia, swinging her longsword down in a powerful strike.

Melodia lifted one of her wings, softly giggling behind the pitch-black curtain of feathers as they hardened, and Lunette’s slice struck them as if hitting a solid metal shield. Lunette’s momentum came to a sudden stop, before she was thrown back by the flex of the wing, landing on the gravel near Rain.

“L-Lunette!” Rain stammered as she crawled toward her fallen knight, her voice still hoarse from nearly being choked to death.

Melodia smiled at them, and turned to approach Rain and Lunette, before she heard the sound of footsteps racing across the pebbles. She leaned aside, out of the way of Arvel’s heavy hatchet swing.

“For years after we parted ways, I thought you might come hunting for me,” Melodia said as she narrowly slipped out of the way of Arvel’s pressing attacks, “I thought you’d have begged your father to teach you how to be an Immortal Knight like him, a slayer of demons and hero to the humans. Imagine my disappointment to see you throwing away your potential, retreating to your little farm and shutting out the world.”

“You wanted that?” Arvel hissed, pursuing his attacks, “You wanted me to come and kill you?”

Another swing met Melodia’s claw and sent Arvel’s hatchet flying, whipping through the air before clattering against a nearby pile of rocks. His eyes instinctively tracked the hatchet as it flew, and he only narrowly dodged a swipe of Melodia’s claw aimed to rake across his face.

“I wanted to see you!” shouted Melodia, laying in a flurry of swipes with her claws, scratching deeply at Arvel’s forearms as he lifted them to shield himself; “You were amazing! You were vibrant and excitable and in love with life itself. You were all of the beautiful things mortals are supposed to be and never really live up to.”

Another swipe raked low across Arvel’s abs, slicing them open with a spray of blood. The wound was shallow, but painful, and he let out a howl as he felt his skin torn. Arvel stumbled back away from her, and squinted through his pain, watching Melodia lift her claw to see his blood dripping slowly off of it.

“So much wasted potential,” she whispered, “I thought seeing that village ripped to shreds would’ve tempered you, not broken you.”

“Are you gonna pretend you ever thought about me?” Arvel asked, clutching a hand over his abdomen, “Acting like you did what you did to try to make me strong. You did it to make yourself strong. You’ve just been trying to work out the consequences to make it seem like you ever cared about anybody but yourself. If you’d ever spared me a second thought, you’d have turned your back on your father—”

Melodia’s eyes widened, her gaze sharpening.

“Do you think it’s that easy?!” Melodia shrieked, “That any of the Pale Emperor’s daughters can just ‘walk away’?!”

“I never said it was easy,” Arvel said as he grimaced, “But sometimes we do hard things for people we care about.”

In a flicker, Melodia was in front of him. Her long, clawed hand wrapped around Arvel’s neck, lifting him up off of the ground.

“And suddenly, you’re an expert on how to show your affection?” Melodia questioned, holding him up effortlessly, “Surrounding yourself with women who willfully ignore your flaws and your apathy has made you think you know what love is?”

Suddenly, a glint of metal passed through Melodia’s wing, and she let out a blood-curdling scream as purple blood and black feathers lifted into the air with the force of Lunette’s slice. Melodia let Arvel go, dropping him in a heap on the ground as she fell to her feet, her knees weakened as a chunk of her elegant wing landed on the ground nearby.

“Lay not a finger upon him!” Lunette shouted as she drew her sword back for a second swing.

Melodia turned, and reached out, stepping inside the radius of Lunette’s swing and reaching up to grab hold of Lunette’s head, wrapping her claws around the knight’s gold-maned scalp.

“LUNETTE!” Rain screamed out, voice straining as tears rolled down her face.

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When Arvel looked up, his blurred vision clearing, he was struck with a horrific sight.

Lunette dangled from the end of Melodia’s grasp like a ragdoll, limp, her eyes wide in terror. Her sword had fallen from her quivering fingers. She could only tremble as her strength was sapped from her, the vivid aura of her life drifting up along her skin and into Melodia’s hand. Lunette’s skin became wrinkled and thin, and old scars began to split open, as droplets of blood rolled upward along her skin toward the pull of Melodia’s cursed grasp.

“N-No...” Arvel muttered.

‘You can’t let her grab hold of you,’ he had told her, ‘If she gets ahold of you, it’s all over.’

“How brave,” Melodia hissed, “To cry, ‘lay not a finger on him’ as though you could ever hope to stop me. I am a daughter of the Pale Emperor. I am a princess among demons. I sup on mortal souls. What are you, to try to stand up to me? To try to defend him? How does it feel to know you will torment him in life and in death?”

Lunette opened her mouth to spit back a retort, but could only groan in pain as her body withered. Melodia smiled, gazing down at Lunette’s breast. In her eyes, she could see the thrum of Lunette’s beating heart, the core of her vital aura, as it began to slow and weaken.

But, from the center of Lunette’s chest came a glint of metal. A blade pierced through Lunette’s body, and into Melodia’s. Gazing down at the sword jutting through the center of her own chest, Melodia gasped, before coughing up a gout of royal blood.

Arvel grimaced as he held tightly to the hilt of Lunette’s discarded sword, watching red blood drip down the hilt. The flow of vibrant aura that was rising up into Melodia’s hand paused, and began to sink down, pouring down the sword blade and into Arvel’s hands.

Melodia let go of Lunette and stumbled back, pulling herself off of the sword and gazing down at the hole in the center of her chest. She clutched her hand over the throbbing void, and said, “You surprised me again...”

Arvel withdrew the sword and dropped it to catch Lunette’s limp body as she slumped against him. He wrapped his arms around her protectively, looking up at Melodia as she began to drift away.

“This isn’t over,” muttered Melodia, as black feathers began to sprout around the edges of her face, and over the rest of her body, “You and I will never be over.”

She curled inward, her shadowed body warped before taking on the shape of an enormous, monstrous crow. A single flap of her wings was nearly enough to topple the humans around her, as she took off to head up over the mountain peaks.

As soon as the gust of wind had dimmed, Rain scrambled toward Arvel and Lunette.

“Lunette,” she whispered hoarsely, “Lunette, is she...”

“I think I got to her in time,” Arvel said, wincing, “I’m sorry... I’m so sorry I had to do that.”

Rain looked down at Lunette’s body, once sturdy and strong looking, now frail and broken. There was no breath in her lungs, no movement, and even the color was draining from her face, turning her richly tanned skin a sickly ashen shade. Rain couldn’t help but burst into sobs, taking one of Lunette’s fragile hands in between hers, clinging to it desperately.

“We can’t stay here,” Arvel whispered.

“Wh-What?” Rain asked, lifting her head.

Arvel slowly stood, groaning as he held Lunette’s arms and tugged her behind him.

“You’re hurt,” Rain whispered.

“I’m alive,” he replied, flinching as his abs flexed beneath the cut skin. Though the scant vitality he absorbed from Lunette had stitched the wounds somewhat, they were not entirely healed. He pulled Lunette’s arms around his shoulders, and tucked his arms under her legs, lifting them up at his sides to carry her on his back.

Rain watched him lift Lunette, and asked quietly, “How long until we know that she’s alright?”

“I don’t know,” he answered, “I’m not as experienced with this as you might think.”

It was a long walk back down the mountainside, in the quiet of night. From the winding path between jagged rocks, they could see the distant campfires and lanterns of the settlement, and the smoke rising from Arvel’s chimney. By the time they reached the foothills, they didn’t return to the settlement, instead heading for Arvel’s house.

As soon as the front door opened, a pair of feet heavily stomped across the door, running from the back bedroom.

“Arvel!” Fidget shouted, “Welcome home!”

She stopped in her tracks when she saw him in the doorway, his body bloodied, with Lunette slumped over his back, covered in blood. Beside him, Rain stood, her dress dirty and her eyes bloodshot, bruises forming around her neck and around her eyes.

“Wh-What?” Fidget stammered as she stared at them.

“We’re okay,” Arvel said quietly, “But we need to lay Lunette down.”

Fidget raced around the house in a near panic, collecting scrap cloth for bandages and filling a pail with water to put by the fireplace to warm. They laid Lunette on Arvel’s bed, and gathered around as they began to wash her. Though Lunette’s body was growing cold, Arvel kept telling Fidget not to worry, and tried to keep her focused on other helpful tasks like bandaging his abdomen or fixing tea for Lunette.

They had been home for nearly half an hour when Lunette suddenly gasped.

“She’s alive!” Arvel shouted, reaching over to touch her shoulder, watching her chest slowly rise and fall beneath her torn and bloodied tunic.

“Ser Lunette!” Rain sobbed, as she reached out and grabbed the lady knight’s hand between both of hers.

“She’s not dead!” Fidget exclaimed, her eyes beginning to well up with tears, “She’s not dead anymore!”

Lunette didn’t open her eyes, but her chest slowly rose and fell with her shallow breath, and her hand twitched in Rain’s gentle grasp. The household gathered around her as tears flowed freely, and for the first time in nearly a week, rain poured over the wasteland.