The blood on Mym's hands and in her clothes was her own. It ran through her trousers and onto the pavers to pool and drip into the open flume. Her leg felt numb and there was a fullness in her shoulder but she felt no pain. The tall orc had her da's [alepnstock] and a hand up before him. He stepped across her outstretched legs toward Daraway and the dead man. Daraway's eyes flicked to hers, to the red mess she was making. She reached to charge her [longarm] but her fingers didn't work properly. The tall orc had his hands on the anvil and was saying something to them. She leaned her [longarm] against the anvil and pushed the spike of her [alpenstock] into the pavers and she stood upon her leg and pain seared all up her side and made her catch her breath. The tall orc heard and turned his head.

"No fight," he said again. As if that night had never ended.

She choked up on her [alpenstock] and lunged on her good leg and swung the pick at his head. He caught the swing with the side of his hand and she yanked on the shaft and the pick's serrations grabbed his forearm and they tumbled over together, scrambling hands against limbs and twisting and two quick blows against the side of his head and the scrape of the [alpenstock] against the pavers. She felt his weight come across her and press down into her. She grappled and they writhed together and her coat tore open across her midsection and his knee came across her cheek and he forced the side of her head into the stonework. Her good arm flopped into the flume and the warm water ran over her hand. She breathed hard and she felt him breathing hard and the damp heat of his breath against the skin of her stomach. She and he breathed in rhythm as if in her [hunt] of him she had become a part of him or he a part of her, as if their entwinement receded to times before either was birthed and now extended to the coming end of their lives and into the ways of being for which she had no name except death.

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"I never wanted this," she heard him say.

"Then release us," said Daraway.

"Show me," he said, and she knew he wasn't speaking to her or to Daraway.

Mym heard the dead man shift his footing and she heard his rags brush over Daraway's cloak and in that moment the woman acted. Mym felt the sharp heat of it and heard the dead man's shapeless wail and the clatter of his [knife] on the anvil and she smelled his burning. The tall orc suddenly lightened atop her. She kicked and bucked against him and he staggered with a hand across his smoking eyes and da's [alpenstock] swinging free from the leash around his wrist. She grabbed it. He reached for the dead man's [knife]. She swung it with everything she had. He got the [knife] up and her shard of the sky severed its point. She crashed into him and they both went over and now her knee rested on his neck. He pushed both his hands against it. The black centers of his eyes grew as he sputtered under the weight on his throat. His blade was broken. He couldn't breathe.

“Ye killed me da,” she spat.

With his last breath he looked at her dead in the eyes and said, "I'm sorry."