Jeva nudged Andal, "I haven't heard anything for a minute, I think they're done fighting."
Andal got up to look around a bend, "I don't hear anything either. Hopefully they killed each other- hey! That giant is collapsed, and I can see one further on!"
"So Kollus and Gol lost. We should check what kind of state Trots is in."
Andal lowered his head, "We could use this as a chance to get away. If Trots can beat Kollus and Gol, that doesn't bode well for us."
Jeva shook her head, "You're being protective of me, I get it. Do you really think we should do that? You're someone who has always jumped to what needed to be done, so I'll follow your lead. Do what you think is right, and I'll follow."
He looked up at her, holding back his answer. After a few seconds he slapped the wall and leaned his head against it, "We need to go out there. Trots could be injured, and this might be our only chance to kill him."
Jeva got up and put her hand on his back, "Don't worry about me, I think this is the right choice."
"We'll find out pretty quickly when we get out there. Let's be cautious, he could be looking for us right now."
They only had a few corners to go around before the outside was exposed by the destruction, and their view was mostly obscured by the corpses of dead giants. When they stepped into the sun and looked around a giant's corpse they saw a large grassy area, with no bodies or snow, and Trots in the midst of it.
He was standing, but just barely. His legs wobbled as he stepped, and his torso flopped to and fro like a drunkard. His glorious aura was gone, but random spurts like electricity would sometimes spray out of him, showing his terrible light in an even brighter way. He wasn't looking at them, or at anything for that matter. His eyes were barely open, and his head hung low while it flopped about on his body.
Jeva peeked over Andal's shoulder, "Is that him?"
"Yea, it's gotta be; he just looks like a complete wreck."
Jeva egged him forward, "Then let's get him, now's our chance!"
Andal didn't move yet, "It is, but let's be careful. We don't actually know what's happening with him or what he's capable of." He raised shells of light over them, "It probably would be wise to shoot him before he knows we're here."
"Couldn't agree more, using my biggest spell."
She started charging a bolt of lightning. Andal told her, "Don't tire yourself out right away, we don't know how long this will go."
She winked, mouthing silently, "I'll be okay."
She unleashed the lightning, which stuck Trots on the left side of his chest. He was sent careening back from the impact, spinning because of where he was struck. Andal raised two swords of light that they grabbed onto to carry them in quickly, trying to push the element of surprise farther.
Trots stopped spinning and planted his feet. He was turned south, seeing the green trees that Lars had made when he was creating spring. He still wasn't showing an awareness of his surroundings, not even acknowledging that he'd been struck, but there was a moment of recognition where he mouthed, "Tree…"
A forest sprang up suddenly. Andal and Jeva let go of the swords that were carrying them and made bursts of wind to slow their momentum before they hit the trees that had appeared in their midst. Jeva landed softly, "Is he attacking us?"
"I don't think so," Andal answered, "I think this was random; he's not thinking clearly. This could be dangerous all the same."
The shade of the trees was unnaturally dark, so Andal created the strongest light he could as they worked their way to Trots. The trees weren't too dense, so they weaved between them quickly. They got a clear view of Trots, then a Haverdash formed suddenly in between them. Andal caught himself and blocked its attack with his shield, stabbing a sword of light in its side and following that up with a stroke from above. "He can make other Haverdash!"
A fireball burst behind him, "I guess so!"
Andal knocked the dead Haverdash aside, sending a sword of light to hit Trots, but another Haverdash appeared between them and got hit instead. Andal cleaved its head off before it could react, but then felt a sword hit him in the back. It didn't penetrate the shell of light, but he had to respond to the fact of a Haverdash behind him.
He turned around, but a fireball consumed the Haverdash, "Get Trots! I'll surprise anyone else as soon as they pop up!"
There was nobody between Andal and Trots, so he closed the distance before that changed. Since Trots wasn't going to dodge, he reared back to make the hardest strike he could. He swung into and through Trots's neck, trying to decapitate him. It had no effect though, as the cut healed instantly behind the sword while it was still moving through the neck.
Andal cut him repeatedly, but the wound always healed before it was done being made. "I can't hurt him! He's healing too fast!"
"There's no way that he keeps that up, keep trying!"
Andal rammed the sword through Trots's face, shoving it all the way out the other side of his head. Trots opened his eyes and looked at Andal, both of them pausing. Rushing wind burst out of the ground, flaying the soil and leaving only a floor of roots to stand on multiple feet below where the ground had been before. Andal and Jeva, along with the broken earth, were flung into the air at high speeds. They shot up into a cloud, which was cold enough already, and then above the cloud where Lars's aura of spring hadn't reached. Ice coalesced on their faces and clothes, and the air was too thin to recover what had been sucked out of them on the way up.
Andal made masks to let them breathe, as he had done to counter poison gas before, and Jeva hit them both with light bursts of fire that prevented ice buildup without breaking the shells of light. Andal made swords of light pointing downward when their ascension slowed, and they grabbed on to speed back to the fight as fast as possible. They passed through the cloud again and closed in on Trots's forest down below, then the swords of light disappeared as they reached the end of their range.
Andal made a shield several feet below himself, made a burst of wind that slowed him down, then made the shield disappear in quick succession. Seeing this, Jeva raised her hands to show she was ready to make wind. Andal made a shield below her, she slowed herself down, then he removed the shield. They did this a few times each, being able to land on a shield just above the forest canopy.
Jeva pointed out Trots, "There he is! We're in almost the same spot we went up from!"
"He's fully healed already," Andal lamented, "What do I do?"
"What if you stuck your sword somewhere necessary and left it in so that he couldn't heal? Say, his heart or his brain? He noticed you last time when your sword was in his brain, right?"
"That's genius! Let's try it!"
"Let me go in first, I'll clear some of those Haverdash!"
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Jeva jumped through the trees and paused her fall with a cushion of air, then she made a ring of fire that expanded from her and fried the nearest Haverdash. Andal jumped in after her, cushioning his fall as well. Trots was turned mostly away, so Andal first hit his shoulder with a mean chop that spun him to face the right way, then stabbed him right between the ribs to skewer his heart. It seemed to be working, because it got Trots's attention. Andal held the sword there firmly, placing shields above and behind him so that he couldn't be knocked away.
Trots didn't move his head, but turned his eyes to meet Andal's. A flash of light came out of Trots like electricity, hitting Andal and his shields with brightness far greater than his previous aura's, and the shields were destroyed. Then Andal and Jeva felt a piercing pain shoot up their legs from the roots they were standing on, and they crumpled. Dark water had entered them, a thick line of it went from their heels to their knees.
Despite falling to his knees, Andal hadn't failed to hold the sword in place. Trots hit Andal's hand with the back of his, meaning to break the grip so that he could pull the sword out, but he and Andal both froze immediately when their skin touched. Every particle that had transferred from Lars to Andal over the years responded to Lars's command to enter and destroy Trots from within, pouring out of Andal like fire.
Blots of necrosis sprang up over Trots's skin, and his muscles dried up beneath it. He looked at Andal with pain in his eyes, "Lars, how could you have done this?"
Andal lost his grip on the sword, too exhausted from such a well of energy leaving him, but Trots didn't remove the sword. He kept talking, "Even now I thought I could reach a greater state of glory, spurred on by the greatest intensity of feelings I had ever known, but this is too much, and anything else may kill me! How could you deny such good things, Lars? You were so close to glory; one of the most beautiful branches was grafted on!"
The Haverdash around them had decayed as soon as Andal and Trots had touched, and inspiration struck Jeva as he spoke. She ran forward and grabbed his hand, making them both freeze. The particles that had originally come from Lars, which had been transferring from Andal to Jeva over the years, rushed into Trots.
The trees disappeared. Jeva felt weak, but not as much as Andal. She was able to stay on her feet, but Trots collapsed on his face in front of her.
He lifted his head, and Jeva could plainly see him actively decaying away in front of her, albeit slowly. He rolled onto his back and cried out in anguish. He was silent for a moment, then started speaking as if to someone he knew, “I saw a tree that grew to the heavens. The trunk of the tree was wide, such that it could never be cut down, and the branches did not sway in the breeze. Many eyes watched the tree, hostile eyes, then roots pierced the earth and flayed it. They came forth like charging bulls, and wherever they broke the ground a geyser of the darkest waters would come forth and pursue everything under the heavens. The floods overtook me, as well as the eyes, but I was not consumed, and I was not afraid. Do you know how I felt, Moxey?”
The decay showed no sign of slowing, so Jeva didn’t intervene.
“I felt at home, like it was where I was meant to be. Under the darkest waters I saw clearly, that the earth had a coat of diamonds, and that the tree shaded the whole earth. The sun could not shine past the branches of the tree, but the shade of the tree was brighter than the light of the sun, and the diamonds could not reflect the fullness of the light.”
Andal came up beside Jeva, “What’s he doing?”
“He thinks he’s talking to Moxey, he’s definitely dying though.”
“But I look now,” Trots choked, “And the waters are shallow. Many hostile eyes remain, and the tree doesn’t reach the highest heaven! The sun can be clearly seen above it, and it cannot be said which light is brighter! What once was diamond has been reduced to silver, and the light is not bright enough to reflect off of it through the waters.” Trots fell silent for several seconds. His lips were gone, and his heaving lungs could be seen through his translucent ribcage. He only continued to speak by the remnant of his great power. He screamed in frustration, which echoed off of the Dalmation and other nearby mountains. “Am I to find joy in what I see, the great tree, and the silver floor of a dark sea? I cannot! I saw what should have been!” He fell silent again, and for the last time.
*
The dark water hadn’t faded from their legs, if anything it had crept up farther. They plodded towards civilization as best they could, hampered by a deep ache caused by the waters. They were less than half of the way back, but they’d stopped three times already.
Jeva sat on a large rock, tugging on Andal’s arm to tell him to stop walking. He sat too, and they dangled their legs to rest them. Jeva looked at her calves, “Andal, I know you can’t cleanse it, but what if we were to amputate? Then you could heal the stubs.”
He shook his head.
“I’m serious, Andal. It feels like poison, and it’s definitely creeping higher. I feel like if we don’t stop it now then we’re both going to die.”
“I know, I had the same thought. It’s not that I wouldn’t try amputating our legs, though I don’t know how we’d get back to civilization, it’s that I can’t heal anymore.”
“Oh.” Jeva put her hand on her knees, then pulled her hands back because they hurt to the touch. “Since touching Trots?”
“Yea. I can’t do much at all since then.” He made a shield of light in front of them, which was partially translucent. “I don’t know what happened there. He called me Lars.”
“Yea, I don’t understand it either.” She looked at the horizon, where the sun was threatening to set while they were still in the middle of nowhere. “I’m just glad it worked.”
“Moxey told me Lars was alive, obviously I can’t trust him, but I’m just so confused.”
“Andal!” Jeva interrupted, “Look over here, what is that?”
He looked where she was pointing, a shiver going down his spine. A mausoleum was appearing a few dozen feet from them, completely silently. There was no fog, only a light snowfall, but the mausoleum appeared as if being uncovered by a mist.
He told Jeva, “I think we should run.”
She looked back, “I don’t think I can.”
He sighed, “I don’t think I can either.” He drew his sword and slid off the rock, facing the mausoleum.
A stone man dove from the sky above them and stopped on the snow suddenly, not crushing a single flake. Andal yelped in surprise and cut at his belly, which glanced off without nicking him. He was easily seven feet tall, made completely of stone, and had empty pits where his eyes should have been. He had no curves on his body, only sharp edges, and fangs like a wolf. He bowed, and stone bat-wings over ten feet in span splayed out on the snow on either side of him. “The Queen of Graves will see you now.”
The color left their faces. Andal kept his sword pointed at the man’s face as he stood back up, “No, we’re not dead yet!”
The man pinched the sword and pulled it away from his face, “The Queen does not seek to bury you at this time. If you would,” the mausoleum door swung open to a total blackness within, “take audience with her.”
Andal and Jeva shared a glance, and he lowered his sword. “What does she want?”
“That is for her to tell you, inside the mausoleum.”
Jeva slid off the rock, and they both went inside. They were in complete darkness, so they didn’t separate. Jeva gasped, and Andal exclaimed, “We’re going to die!”
A confident, feminine voice replied, “As all things should.”
“But we’re dying now, and we’re going to last two days. How do I know this?”
“You would know more, standing in my house, if you weren’t so concerned with your own fate. But, if you want to keep living so badly, why haven’t you bowed?”
Jeva bowed to the darkness, “Your majesty, we are honored to meet you. Why did you want to speak to us?” Andal followed suit.
“Vicid, my chosen one, was killed by Trots the Haverdash. You killed Trots, avenging Vicid, who you knew.”
Andal muttered, “So he did kill the nominees.”
“In addition, you killed Moxey the Haverdash. He sought to end mortality for the Haverdash, being a threat to the order of the world. You two have acted according to my will, unbeknownst to you. I give you the option now, seeing that you were stripped of your power, to do so wittingly. I choose you, Andal, and I choose you, Jeva, to be my champions until you die.”
Andal looked towards Jeva, forgetting that he couldn’t see at all. “You choose us…? Does that mean you’d remove Trots’s poison from us? It wouldn’t make sense for your champions to die, right?”
“I have no qualms with my chosen dying. Do not ask me to do something outside of my nature, like saving a life.”
“So all you offer us is power? I suppose… I’ll be able to heal again?”
“No, healing will not be returned to you. Far be it from me to enable you to save lives.”
“But then what is the point? We’re just going to die!”
“That was true from the moment of your birth, and it is because of death that you strove forward, trying as hard as you could. Death itself is not a force of evil, but the perception of death as a force of evil is itself a force of good. You became the best you could be in trying to prevent death, and that will remain true in your final two days. At this very moment your Council of Nations is evacuating the humans from this side of the continent, moving as many as they can across the mountains through the Marble Pass. The Haverdash know of this, and the Haverdash Salva calls an army to her that will attack the pass and cut off the escape for humanity. You have a chance to save lives in the only way I accept, by killing others.”
Jeva asked, “Even in our last two days to live we have to fight? We killed Trots, but I’ll be honest, I feel drained now.”
“It is in someone’s last moments that they show their true selves. I, who work in death, know people better than they know themselves. Do not waste my time with hesitancy when I know you will keep fighting until your final breath.”
“I’m sorry, we can’t accept,” said Andal. “The fact is, as servants of Nishir, I do not see how we could be your champions. It just doesn’t work.”
The stone man at the entrance guffawed, then held up a hand apologetically. The Queen of Graves told them, “Nishir has hid himself from this world since his city was taken, the moment his cathedral was destroyed.”
Andal retorted, “That’s not true!”
“Do not accuse me of lying, even if I were you would have no right not to believe me. The power you have now is everything that came from Nishir, which is small indeed.”
“If that’s true, then where did the power come from?”
“I will not satisfy your ignorance at the verge of death. Far be it from me to diminish the consequences of mortality.”
Andal grit his teeth, then told her, “Answer me this question and I’ll assume everything you say is true, and as long as Jeva agrees then I will become your champion. Is my friend Lars still alive?”
“I know of Lars. He was killed by a Haverdash.”
Andal hung his head, then turned to Jeva. “I’m willing. You?”
She nodded, “As the Queen said, we were going to accept eventually.”
Andal announced to the Queen, “We will become your champions, and we will fight the Haverdash at the Marble Pass.”