“Rumi!”

Rumi looked up, strands of her wavy hair stuck to her sweat-covered face as she struggled to trundle along with Qingxi on her back.

“You came!”

Soleiman brought Strapi to a stop, letting Pallas hop off to tend to them.

“What happened to Qingxi?”

“We were caught,” Rumi said, heaving as she passed Qingxi over to Pallas. “Qingxi got burnt, bad, but we managed to kill the Hashashin chasing us-”

“Your hand!”

“Ah, yeah, I… cut my fingers off,” Rumi whispered.

“What?” Soleiman said, slipping off of Strapi’s back the next moment. “How?”

“Uhm, well,” Rumi started, eyes avoidant as Soleiman rushed forward to hold the bloody mess of her hand in his as Pallas took off her gloves. “Qingxi told me to use her sword, and it made this powerful blade of wind,” she said, following along as Soleiman led her to Strapi so that he could fetch a few rolls of bandages from the mare’s saddle’s satchels. “Which… well, killed the Hashashin, but also cut my fingers off…”

“Shit,” Soleiman mouthed, wrapping the first of the bandages around the base of Rumi’s hand. “Pallas, are you done with Qingxi yet?”

“Just about,” she replied, spraying the last of her blood onto Qingxi’s face and buckling her faceguard onto Qingxi.

“Could you coat Rumi’s fingers for me?”

With Qingxi still on her back, Pallas went ahead and began spraying Rumi’s hand with blood- working in tandem with Soleiman to quickly coat the entire wound with a protective layer of both blood and bandage. One that would keep it from festering or opening any further, at least before it dried up.

“Alright, you should be okay for now. Just remember to keep it over your head at all times,” Soleiman said, tying down the end of the bandage and affixing the entire cast solidly onto Rumi’s hand before lifting it up for her. “Does it hurt?”

“A little bit,” she said, the adrenaline still masking the agony that roared forth from where her fingers once were.

“Okay, good. Because it’s going to be a while before we get any help,” he replied.

“Why?”

“We’re splitting up,” Pallas said, lifting Qingxi up and balancing her atop of Strapi before herself climbing on.

Rumi’s jaw dropped.

“We decided that since we only have one horse, two of us, Pallas excluded, should take the longer trek through the forest to avoid getting caught by the Hashashiyyin,” she said. “Meanwhile, Pallas and the most injured out of you two will ride on ahead to try and get some help.”

Rumi stared big eyed into Soleiman’s black voids, seeing the stun and shock on her face in his eyes’ reflections.

“Okay, Rumi? Else, Qingxi may not get the help she needs in time.”

Pallas nodded along.

“Mesimeos, tomorrow morning, right?”

“Yep.”

“A-are you sure?” Rumi asked, her voice meek as she pulled away from Soleiman, her right hand held tightly to her chest.

“We can’t all outrun them,” Soleiman said, checking his own bags and making sure everything was in place. “I know it’s a little daunting but it’s safer for us to be in the forest than out here.”

“But, I- I really don’t think splitting up again’s a very good idea. I mean,” she said, gesturing with her right hand towards the unconscious Chitite slumped against Pallas’ back. “It’d be over if they found us!”

“Yeah, but if we all try making it to Mesimeos we’ll just end up caught by the Hashashiyyin on the way there. And if we all meander our way through the forest, Qingxi’s not going to get the help she needs in time.”

“I, uh, hng…” Rumi groaned.

“Rumi,” Pallas said, moving Strapi back slightly to face the Solean. “It won’t be long. Just a day out in the forest, not any longer.”

Soleiman nodded.

“If he does take any longer, I promise you I won’t make him ever forget it.”

Soleiman nodded again.

“Uuh,” she groaned, not sounding very convinced.

“It’s the best way,” Soleiman said, placing a hand on her shoulder, the stone cold determination in his eyes meeting Rumi’s as she looked up to face him. “Trust us.”

“Alright, see you there!” Pallas said, spinning Strapi around. “And remember, Soleiman, not any longer than a day!”

And as Pallas took off in the direction of Mesimeos, Soleiman raised his hand to wave her off. Joining Rumi’s arm already held high.

The two fellows soon emerged out into the grass clearing, sticking by the forest’s edge to keep on the path as they raced atop their golden steed.

They were accompanied only by the rhythmic thuds of hoof against dirt and by the whipping of the wet winds. For now, they were alone. And with the trees to their right whizzing by, each individual blurring into the mass of the forest, Pallas had some time to think.

Mesimeos.

She realised just how much their survival hinged on the receptiveness of this one village to their arrival. How she’d need nothing short of complete compliance and cooperation to get out scot-free and to even have so much as a slimmer of hope at juking the Hashashiyyin and reuniting with Soleiman and Rumi.

Surely, though, they would listen to her.

She hadn’t met these people before, and any memories she had of Ahdi Minerva had long since faded into the recesses of time or been obfuscated by the smoke of Minlos’ flames. She did not know them, and they did not know her. Complete strangers, bonded to her only through the faint possibility of shared family lineages and a common outwardly appearance.

Nevertheless, she understood well enough her fate-bound duty to win them their liberation. A duty she understood she had to fulfil, for how could there be any other reason to her being chosen as the vessel of the 3rd Minervan Blessing?

For on that day, one decade ago, when Minlos was set ablaze, the skies above Minerva’s northeastern reaches were blotted out by the smoke of thousands of burning towns and villages, the Hashashiyyin descended upon Minerva for one reason, and one reason only.

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Pallas didn’t know it then, but she knew now. And that reason was that she had come into existence.

Her mere presence alerted the Hashashiyyin to the possibility that a 3rd Soteira may arise to drive their occupation back again for the third time in a century. Her mere presence had frightened one of the continent’s leading superpowers to such an extent that they led architected a genocide of unprecedented proportions against the Minervan peoples.

And so she knew she would have to prove herself. To make their sacrifices worthwhile. To justify her being born.

Pallas sighed, the feeling of her heartbeats amping up in intensity as they approached a pointless crescendo welling up within her again. She wondered what life would be like if she hadn’t been given the Minervan Blessing. What life would be like if she simply lived peacefully under the rule of the Ahd, or the Gravitas.

Maybe that would’ve been a good life. Maybe not. She didn’t know, and the less she thought about it, the less her heart would feel like it was on the verge of exploding.

But what she did know was that her life and the lives of her fellows were in dire straits. And they had to get to Mesimeos before the jaws of defeat ensnared them in its serpentine maw.

Pallas urged Strapi on, egging the mare on to gallop just a tad bit faster. The rhythmic beating of her hooves against the dirt slowly creeping up in speed.

But, somehow or rather, that rhythmic beating seemed to go off-beat. Like her speeding Strapi up had caused the sounds her ears heard and parsed to desync.

As if… she was hearing two horses’ hoofsteps instead of one.

Throwing a glance over her shoulder, she shot forth a stream of blood towards the Hashashin tailing them, sending it straight for his steed’s eyes and snout.

The man yanked his horse out of the way with incredible timing, skipping it over to the right just in time to send the blood splattering onto the soil.

Preparing for the retaliatory strike, Pallas urged Strapi onwards, leaning far forward to bring both her and Qingxi’s bodies closer to the ground.

But nothing came.

The rhythmic dissonance faded away, leaving the beats of Strapi’s gallop as the only one in earshot.

Perplexed, Pallas turned herself around again, pulling back on the reins to slow Strapi down.

The Hashashin had turned tail and ran. Him and his horse quickly headed back into the grass-covered clearing. Headed back to the Thosmodene Estate.

He was running?

Pallas brought Strapi to halt, her head spinning with confusion and her eyes affixed on the slowly shrinking man and his horse.

No.

She couldn’t let him run. There wasn’t a doubt in her mind that the Mistress wouldn’t get executed if news got back to Kardia that she and Qingxi had escaped with a horse. A horse that couldn’t have come from anywhere other than her.

Pallas kicked Strapi’s sides, sending the golden mare lurching forward in a panicked hurry.

It would also mean they’d know that she had a horse- that she could feasibly outrun them in a mad dash out of Minerva. And if there was one thing Soleiman would not let out of her head, it was that knowledge was power.

In a war, ambiguity reigns supreme.

“Come on Strapi, giddy up!” Pallas said, urged the disgruntled mare onwards even as it shook its head in annoyance.

To leave no traces and to leave the enemy guessing was what would keep them, hopelessly outmanned and overpowered, alive.

But there was no chance they’d be able to catch up to the Hashashin.

Slowly, he and his steed began to disappear into the distance, the fresh stallion much more capable at booking it than the encumbered mare.

The pounding in her heart rising once again, Pallas looked about her person in a panic.

Hastily unbuckling the straps about the satchel Soleiman had earlier told her contained ‘everything else she might need’, Pallas firmly stuck her hand into the mess within. Her fingers wriggled about, fishing through the myriad of equipment until they finally met the fibrous texture of a hempen cord.

She grabbed the rope, gently tugging it from the satchel, careful not to cause anything else to spill out.

She held the rope firmly with her two hands, forcing blood into it as she gripped them tightly, watching as its shades of brown turned a bright red.

Looking up briefly to see the man was still within thirty or so metres from where they were, she let drop one of the rope’s ends, feeling as it hit the soil and yanked back against her as it slid against the grass.

“Come on girl!” Pallas yelled, thumping both of her feet against Strapi’s sides as she yanked the blood-soaked rope forward.

With the forest’s edge beginning to back away as they neared the Kardic walls, Pallas swung the rope out ahead of her, locking her legs about Strapi to keep her balance as she did so.

It whipped about once, then twice. Then again and again.

Each time Pallas threw her entire upper body into the action, sending the rope swinging about faster and faster each time it passed in front of her. But it could not reach the man, its length only enough to cover half the distance.

Then, the rope began to extend. At first only slightly, with the sound of fibres tearing appearing occasionally across the rope’s length. But soon, it began to drastically swoop outwards, gaining one, two, and then five metres of length as the crackling and popping of fibres began to cry out from all over the cord’s bloody length.

But to no avail.

She leant back suddenly, yanking the rope back as it swung out in front of them, reeling it back in.

It swung about them, Pallas raising her arm up behind her and letting her shoulder drop back in anticipation.

Then, a shower of blood shot forth from all throughout her arms, imbuing her armour with her very essence as she felt as every muscle in her body fired in perfect symphony with every other, sending forth a surge of harmonious energy that rolled out from her legs to her abdomen to her arms and out into the rope.

Then, as the rope raced forwards, a loop formed across its length, storing the energy that she’d thrown into it with her blood armoured arms. It rolled outwards faster and faster, its circumference collapsing inwards as its speed rose to a blinding pace, defying even her eyes. It grew more and more rapid, pulling along the blood she’d soaked it with as it shot down the length of the rope, until finally…

It cracked.

The entire fifteen metre long rope had been turned into one gargantuan whip of monstrous proportions, and the very end of that whip split the very air with a thunderous crack that seemed to challenge even the loudest of roars the sky could muster- sending forth a deluge of blood that rocketed towards the Hashashin.

The bullets struck the stallion’s hind legs, sending the animal sprawling onto the ground as both man and steed bit the dirt.

Pallas rode Strapi up towards the two of them, blood-soaked rope still tightly in hand as she untied the rope that bound Qingxi to her. Though by now, the whip’s end had been frayed well beyond repair- shaving a good few metres off of its total length.

She hastily dismounted, hopping off of Strapi just as the Hashashin struggled to his feet.

With a few metres still in between them, she stepped out onto her right foot, quickly planting her left just behind it as she leapt up and twisted herself into a spiralling pirouette.

The rope once again went flying out from her, picking up speed rapidly as she spun again and again, dancing atop her toes. And as she terminated her dance with a final leap into the air, she brought the rope down onto the Hashashin, sending it burying deep within the man’s cloaks- meeting resistance only when it came across flesh and bone.

And with that, the man was thrown back onto the soil, what limbs of his were visible from under the shadowy veil spread out and in no position to grant him an escape.

Steadily, Pallas approached him, rope once again by her side as she looked down upon their pursuer.

“N-No,” the man coughed.

He looked up, the shadows of his cloak parting to reveal the large round spectacles that sat broken upon his nose.

He seemed to try to get another word out, though to no avail. Coughing and gasping and almost gagging at some points, he clutched his back in pain as his face scrunched up, each breath wavering more than the last.

“Please,” he said. “I-”

He coughed, blood spluttering out as he did so.

“I won’t tell anyone.”

Pallas gave no reaction, instead throwing the end of the rope back behind her.

The man began to mouth meaningless words, his face scrounging up as tears began to build up in the very edges of his eyes.

“Mistress-”

Pallas cracked the whip a final time, sending his head rolling out across the grass and scaring the stallion back to the Estate. Leaving her alone in the clearing once more.

Leaving her with no witnesses.