Well… what to do.

I stood about a mile from the burning village. The place looked… weird, and not just because it was on fire and being ransacked.

Were the houses on stilts? It looked like it from this distance, but it made no sense. This place didn’t flood to that level, did it?

I glanced around, to the flatland surrounded by rolling hills, and the huge mountain behind us.

That mountain had been relatively easy to pass. I had rounded along its birth, and found a waterfall which fed a large river. I had followed it here, to this road… and then this road to this burning village.

Maybe I should have gone the other way. Barren’s cousin, the baker who hadn’t been anywhere near as portly as he had hinted, had told me going the western road would add many weeks of travel… but at least then I’d not have encountered this.

Or maybe I would have. Was this an army doing the deed? Or something more?

Far off screams echoed in the air, and I had to forcefully stop my foot from stepping forward and taking me into battle.

“Calm yourself,” I ordered myself to not rush into war. Not willingly. Not without first thinking about it.

Last time I did that, I had to run and hide for over a hundred years. Let’s not… repeat history so quickly, shall we?

Still, all the same, I stepped forward. I stayed on the path a little longer, and then stepped off it and into the knee high grass, as to round the burning village.

I could see people between the flames and burning buildings. Some were still alive. I saw men with swords and axes. I saw men on horses, carrying torches and spears. I couldn’t see the source of the screams, especially of the feminine type, but I knew the reason as to why.

The battle was done. The village already destroyed. The men who had done the deed were now just enjoying their spoils.

Picking up the pace, I realized I was focusing a little too intently on one of the men. He had emerged from a half destroyed building, that was only smoldering and not in a full blown blaze, and was carrying something. A box of some kind. Likely spoils.

“Stop,” I warned myself as I forcefully turned, and began walking another direction. This time along the village, and not towards it.

Really Vim. What are you going to do? You have no idea what was going on. And…

I slowed as my feet left grass and found packed dirt again. I was back on a road, this time one leading fully around the village and past it. It basically led in the direction I wanted to go, to the far off mountain peaks in the distance that were barely visible.

Hesitating a moment, I took a glance to the village. One of the houses imploded, crumbling into itself as dark black smoke began to bellow upward, adding to the huge plume of ash and smoke.

I couldn’t hear any screams anymore.

Shifting on a heel, I turned away. To return to the path.

Walking around the village, I let my eyes dig into the familiar scene.

The homes on fire. The lawns and surrounding grass burning quickly. The men coming and going, some carrying spoils others limping from wounds and injuries.

They honestly didn’t look like an army, but they must be one. Some had armor. One of the horses had armor too. The man riding it had no weapon, and seemed to be shouting orders. I wonder if he was ordering the men to hurry up, or stop, the pillaging.

I scanned the area, and searched out the buildings that were on the outer perimeter of the village area. Either homes, or storage buildings. There were only a few, and they weren’t on fire yet. Nor did it seem any were being ransacked either.

Strange. Maybe they weren’t after the food at all, just the valuables.

But…

Although most of the village was aflame, and destroyed, I could tell that this place had been… similar to the many other villages I had passed through so far. Like the little village on the other side of the mountain, where that baker had been.

Little villages. A few hundred strong. Farming or fishing villages. Places that were quiet, and without much.

What kind of wealth was there even to pillage? Honestly?

“Celine, run!”

My feet and mind came to an abrupt stop.

Turning my head, I felt my neck creak and complain. As if I hadn’t moved it in years. Quickly my eyes scanned the road behind me, for the source of what I had heard.

What I had thought I heard. There was no way, was there? It was impossible…

With a dry mouth I stepped forward, towards where I had heard the shout. It was from near the village, near the section I had been heading towards earlier. Past the field with knee high grass and…

And it was impossible. Surely. I had misheard. I had to have.

Celine wasn’t here. There was no way she could be.

Her following after me was believable. But if that had happened, why not as I left? Why not just leave with me? She could have begged it of me, and I would have buckled and allowed it on the spot. Yet she hadn’t. She had sobbed, she had cried, yet she had let me go. She had…

A figure then darted out past a burning building. Running quickly, towards me.

A huge wave of relief rushed down my back, as my muscles relaxed.

That wasn’t Celine.

Releasing a mighty sigh of relief, I blinked a few times as I tossed aside the weird thoughts and emotions that had just took me over, and instead focused on the person running towards me.

She wasn’t alone. She was being chased by three people. Three men. Only two of them looked to be carrying weapon or in armor, and…

Yes. She was carrying something. A bundle of something. Some of the stuff she was carrying flapped outward, flopping around her face. Why didn’t she drop it? It was making her struggle and…

Then I realized she really was running towards me.

Firming my footing, I glanced around me. To make sure nothing odd was happening. There wasn’t. Other than the person running towards me, and the men chasing after her… and the burning village not far away, there was nothing weird.

As they drew closer I began to hear the sounds of her exhausted breathing. She sounded pained. She was struggling, and exerting all the strength she had as she ran. The men behind her were oddly not much better. One of them was breathing through clenched teeth, and had a slight limp. The other two also seemed to not be running at their best either, but that might be because of the heavy armor and weapons in their…

Then I noticed it. Thanks to them drawing closer. Rather, I should have noticed earlier yet hadn’t. I blamed my weird thoughts earlier, and attempts of ignoring them.

They weren’t human.

Now far more interested, I stepped forward. Towards them.

Stolen story; please report.

Two of the men, the ones with armor, were definitely not human. Their faces were covered in fur. Stringy stuff, that looked tied and knotted. I could even see little things gleaming in the patches of fur. Either beads or jewels.

The other man didn’t have the same patch of fur all over his face, but it became clear he wasn’t a part of them. Not a fellow soldier. He tripped, tumbling and disappearing into the knee high grass. One of the soldiers wasted no time, he rushed over to the spot where he had fallen and began to stab him with his spear. He roared in fury as he did, and I heard the cries of a man dying as he was stabbed over and over again.

The other soldier didn’t join him. He instead kept on chasing after the woman… who was now near me.

She darted out of the grass and onto the road. She almost skidded and tripped, but regained her balance… and then with a wheeze of exhaustion she ran to me.

Standing perfectly still, I watched her intently as she ran to me... then past me. Half expecting her to keep on running, I was shocked when she skidded to a stop.

Turning a little, I frowned as she fell to her knees, huffing and gasping for air.

Before I could question her, my eyes fell to the thing she carried.

That hadn’t been a bundle of clothes or something. It had been wings.

She was carrying a young girl. One with wings. Beautiful red things, with huge feathers.

The girl was out cold… and had a pale face. I didn’t see any blood, but…

“Out of the way!”

Turning, I faced the soldier who finally caught up to the woman. He stepped out of the grass with a rush, and readied his sword. He kept on hurrying towards us, but had slowed a little. Likely thanks to me.

At first… I had thought of killing the man. But after seeing what that woman had been carrying…

I turned again, to face her. To question her. To doubt her.

“I didn’t kidnap her. They want to eat her,” the woman wheezed out her words quickly, and I could tell she had struggled to say them. She was out of breath, and hurt. Was that blood starting to seep into the back of her shirt? Yes. It was.

My eyes narrowed onto hers… and I nearly recoiled at the sight of white.

White eyes. Not white pupils, but orbs of pure white. They even glowed, in the sun.

“Save us, Vim. Or you’ll regret it,” she said with a raspy voice.

I shivered at her, and wondered what the odds were I’d meet another Saint so quickly.

“Out of the way!” the man shouted again, and then rushed forward.

Although a Saint… I was not in the position to doubt her just yet. She may be the child’s kidnapper, and these men simply trying to save her… but…

But they weren’t birds. Their facial fur told me they were some kind of monkeys. Something with ape blood.

“Why do you want them?” I asked him as he approached.

“I’ll lay you low if you don’t move out of the way!” he shouted at me.

Why even threaten me? Did he maybe instinctively know I was a threat?

“Who is she to you?” I asked him again.

“They’ll not be reasoned with,” the woman behind me said.

“She’s our spoils! Move!” he stepped forward, placing me within striking range of his long sword. A sword too long for a human to use comfortably.

Yet his words had sealed his fate.

Looking past the man before me, I noticed the spearman. He was hurrying towards us. About to cross the threshold of grass and step onto the dirt road.

Not too far, but a distance. If I killed the man before me too harshly and quickly, he’d just turn around and run. And that might bring the entire group down onto us. Them being non-humans, and in such numbers… that wasn’t something I could risk.

Especially if they had bows and throwing spears.

I’d be fine, but the two behind me…

“Fine…!” the man took a deep breath and stepped forward. To engage me. To kill me.

He hefted his huge sword, which was as long as he, and took another step towards me. It had been a quick motion. One that would have worked on a human. Maybe even other non-humans.

But for me, it was the worst thing he could do.

With his whole body exposed it was easy for me to step forward, even quicker, and jab at his throat.

The side of my palm crushed his throat, and I even heard his spine snap and crack. His head jolted, and his eyes went wide… as I reached up and grabbed the sword from him. I didn’t even need to pull it free from his grip as he collapsed, falling to the ground with a tiny whine as he died.

The spearman slowed in his approach, his eyes going wide… but I didn’t wait.

With a deep breath, I took another step forward… and then flung the sword at him.

It being so big and long made it easy. The thing flew through the air, making an odd noise as it spun around a few times, and then rammed the spearman right in the chest.

The huge sword impaled him, and sent him flying back a few feet from the force of the impact. He landed harshly, his spear flying off into the grass nearby, and he remained on the ground… unmoving.

A quick glance around showed no one else. I could hear shouts beyond the smoke and fires, but nothing nearby.

Still, just in case, I checked on the men. The man I had hit first was slumped a few feet away. He had fallen onto himself, curling up. He wasn’t even twitching, or wheezing. He was dead.

The other man, the one I had thrown the sword into, was moving. He was lying on his side, thanks to the long shaft of the sword sticking out of his back. It didn’t let him lay down flat. His left arm was stuck under him, but his right was trying to grab at the sword. He kept trying to grab onto the sword’s blade, to grip it and pull it out, but his hand couldn’t gather the strength. It was limp and lifeless. Each time he tried to grab it, the hand only fell off the blade and to the ground.

He was dying too. Not only had that sword gone straight through his chest, I knew I had thrown it hard enough to do more damage than just from that. I had likely broken most of the bones in his chest too.

The third man, the one he had speared earlier, was also likely dead. I couldn’t see or hear him, but I could see all the blood on the spear even from here.

Though that might be blood from other victims…

A heavy breath of relief drew my attention away from the fires and bodies, and I turned to the woman. The Saint.

She was still there. Sitting on the ground. She was holding the young bird, and was staring at me with an odd smile.

Those white eyes dug into me in ways I couldn’t explain.

“Who are you?” I asked her.

“My name is Celine. Thank you for saving us Vim,” she said warmly. Her voice had a certain deepness to it. One not usual for a woman. It likely sounded deeper thanks to her exhaustion and pain, but I could hear her normal pitch in it. Somehow I found it sexy.

“Celine…” I couldn’t believe it.

She gulped and nodded. “Would… would you check on Alf? I know he’s dead, but I’d like you to make sure all the same,” she asked me.

“Alf…” I turned, and guessed it was the man in the grass. The one who had been speared.

“Please. He had been a good man. If somehow, impossibly, he had survived, I’d like you to ensure fate doesn’t win,” Celine begged me.

I shifted, and debated ignoring her request. Especially since she spoke in a way that told me it was likely fruitless.

If a Saint spoke of fate in such a way… then… well…

Grumbling I stepped away anyway, to check.

It didn’t take long to find the man’s body. He was curled up in the grass, in a pool of his own blood. The man had been stabbed multiple times, mostly in the chest and neck. A few gashes ran along his face too, but I could tell those hadn’t happened during the death throes. Those were older. By a few hours.

Stepping away from the body, I returned to the road and stepped back to the woman. She was still sitting there, but had re-positioned the girl a little. Her wings were now furled, and she rested easier in her arms.

“Thank you. You don’t know how special this girl is. You’ve saved someone very important,” she said to me.

Oh…? So she wasn’t just a Saint in appearance.

She lifted the girl a little to show me. The young girl didn’t seem hurt, which was good… but she did look pale. “Is she hurt?” I asked.

“Yes. She… just went through something terrible, is all. Her soul is broken. And she is sick…” the Saint coughed, and then held the girl out farther to me.

Oh… she hadn’t been showing me, but asking me to take her.

I didn’t hesitate to take the responsibility. I accepted the young bird, and made extra care to not hurt her. I knew from experience that birds were usually frail things.

She felt light. Too light. Even though her wings were bigger than her.

“Her name is Lilly. She’s been sick for awhile, but her parents wouldn’t let me help her. We’ll need to find some plants nearby… I think there’s a pond over there, we should be able to find them there,” the Saint spoke evenly as she slowly stood up and got to her feet.

As she did, I noticed she was short. Her head came to a stop at my chin. And…

She smiled warmly at me, and I noticed a tiny cut on her lip. The kind that came from a heavy fist.

“Are you okay?” I asked her. I could smell her blood, even through the ash and smoke.

She looked rather dirty too. She was wearing some nice clothes, and they were dark colored so I hadn’t noticed it before. It looked as if she had been rolling around on the ground… which she might have indeed been doing. Yet even through the dirt I could see injuries. Like her cut lip, and the blood staining her lower back, I could see them. Small cuts and nicks. Bruises. An inflamed pinky.

“Yes. I was nicked, but I’ll be fine. Come on, let’s hurry, or this poor girl will become infirm and lose her legs,” she said as she stepped away.

Blinking at her, I felt the sense of urgency that came with such knowledge. I hurried to follow the Saint down the road, towards this supposed pond and its plants that would save the girl from such a fate.

Without a glance behind us, to the burning fires and crumbling village… we both ventured back towards the mountain I had just crossed over.