The two elementals moved like lightning, leaving Zaana standing there and blinking in confusion. Davrial’s serpentine sliver of metal emerged from beneath his cloak and wrapped around his body, forming armour that deflected the first strike from the scythe that came down at him. Saith was already wearing his skeletal insect-like armour so he charged forward and caught his scythe as it bounced off, bringing it down for another swing. He wasn’t holding it though, just pushing on it from afar, somehow.

Davrial charged forward as well, his armour growing blades that flew at Saith’s face, unprotected without the helmet he’d had before. The two blades of his scythe clicked together into a shield and he changed his attack smoothly into a block that caught the blades easily.

Zaana ran away, trying to escape the whirling blades and clashing warriors in the middle of the courtyard. There were shouts and screams as sisters rushed out to see what was happening. One of the screams could have been hers, she couldn’t tell. She just wanted to get away.

She dashed past Priestess Nisi and went back into the confession booth. She went behind the curtain and realised there was no way out, she was trapped. Before she knew it she was under the priestess’s chair trembling and hugging herself. It had all gone wrong. Everything had fallen apart and it was all her fault. She’d had one secret to keep, one! But she’d messed up everything. The panic and fear built within her and she felt tears welling up. Now either Davrial would die or Saith, and who knew who else would get hurt. Anything could happen. And it was all her fault.

She heard a scream, a child’s scream coming toward the curtain. No, she couldn’t deal with that now. Then the curtain was pushed aside and she froze. All the panic and fear in her body was locked out as she looked up into the eyes of Neron Saith’s son.

He looked down at her in fear and backed away to the corner of the room. She stood up, reaching out to try and comfort him but then she had another idea. This was all her fault but maybe she could fix this. Maybe she could save Davrial after all.

She grabbed the boy’s arm and he cringed away but he was too scared to resist. “Come with me,” she said and dragged him away.

Davrial sent a sliver of metal in an arc between them and exploded it. White flashes lit the courtyard and Saith staggered backwards, blinded. Maybe that’d teach him to wear a helmet.

Davrial leapt forward, throwing another sliver at his opponent’s face but Saith put up his shield and then rammed two blades he’d gotten from somewhere under it. Davrial tried to block them but he wasn’t fast enough and they rammed painfully into his armour sending him flailing backward to the ground with incredible force.

Saith turned his shield back into its scythe form and blinked the light from his eyes. As he did he spoke to Davrial who was picking himself up from the ground. “You’re very tricky Day Star. Very skilled at elementalism.” He whirled his scythe around and circled the courtyard. “Flashes of light, your metal’s almost liquid it’s so smooth.”

Davrial paced as well, slowly circling, waiting for some sort of opening but Saith didn’t seem the type to get distracted.

“But for all that you’re not actually great at fighting.”

Something bit into Davrial’s leg. Something excruciating, like it was tearing him apart from the ankle. Metal fangs locked on, and prying his leg in two.

He reacted instantly, sending all of his armour and metal as a blanket of molten knives toward Saith. Saith blocked with his shield and then it was a scythe again, slicing his way out of the enclosing torrent.

Davrial ignored that though, instead he held back a sliver to deal with his leg. Looking down he saw that some sort of drill-like blade had wormed its way into his ankle. Blood spouted out and shivers of pain wracked his body. He couldn’t pull something like that out. There was only one way to stop it spreading through his body and actually ripping him apart from within.

The sliver became an impossibly sharp blade and severed his ankle and foot from his leg. He fell to his knees and looked up at Saith who was coming at him with the scythe. He rolled to the side and brought his molten armour back to slam into his opponent. The scythe narrowly missed him and Saith cowered beneath his armour.

But he was too fast. Saith was right, Davrial had much finer control over his metal than Saith did, but it came at the price of speed. And so even with the molten cloud of blades pouring over him Saith was able to get out of the way unscathed. Bringing his whirling scythe back to carve a path.

Davrial was on the ground, blood pouring from his leg. His heart rapidly beating in panic and constantly pumping more and more blood onto the dusty ground. Things were already starting to go blurry and the pain was intense. But he ignored it all anyway. In the thrill of the fight he was able to push past the pain, push past the black spots on the edges of his vision. Push past to Saith.

He pushed his element to the breaking point. Ripping it into pieces and ripping those pieces into smaller ones. Then igniting them all, something he had learned to do only through intense practise in the Wastes. The courtyard went white from the explosion and Davrial held up a hand to shield himself from the blast. Saith couldn’t shield himself much, he was right in the middle of it.

Davrial looked up and blinked a few times, the blast lingering on his eyes even when he hadn’t looked. He saw Saith fly through the courtyard and bounce off a door before disappearing into a corridor, his scythe clattering to the ground.

Davrial clambered to his feet and limped quickly across the courtyard to where his foe had vanished. His vision hadn’t cleared very well, he didn’t know which of it was the blast and which was the bloodloss but with each step it seemed to constrict even more until he reached the doorway and could barely see more than a single point.

He looked down and made out the vague shape of Saith’s face, scarred from the explosion and looking up at him with unseeing eyes. He reached out to his metal to bring it slicing into Saith’s heart when he realised he didn’t have any. He’d blown it all up.

Zaana dragged the crying boy through the pyramid. By now all the sisters had run off or found hiding spots. Just like she should have. But instead here she was, trying to make things right. She ran along a corridor next to the courtyard and caught glimpses of the battle through the windows. She had no idea what was going on. There were clashes and crashes of metal on metal. Occasional shouts or screams of pain. At one point Saith said something but she had no idea what it was.

They didn’t notice her though, which was just the way she wanted it. She reached the kitchen and sure enough there were the carving knives sticking up out of their block. She’d never been allowed to use them without supervision before but she had never been good at sticking to what was allowed.

She picked up a knife and the boy’s eyes went wide with panic. He struggled and twisted and she thought she might accidentally stab him as she wrapped her arms around him and brought him under control. He made a good effort at struggling but he was a small weak child who had probably never worked a day in his life and she was a huntress. Or so she liked to think. It was beginning to dawn on her how truly unrealistic those dreams had actually been.

“Stop moving and I won’t hurt you,” she whispered in his ear in what hopefully sounded threatening.

“My daddy will kill you,” he replied with a whine, but he thankfully stopped struggling. “He’s the greatest elemental on the planet. The greatest elemental in the galaxy.”

Zaana didn’t like the sound of that but she was finding it difficult to be intimidated by a five year old as she held the knife to his neck. That seemed to shut him up.

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“We’ll see about that,” she said and marched him back toward the fight in the courtyard. Every part of her body wanted to run. To get as far away from the maelstrom of hiltless blades that was the battle but she walked forward anyway. She wasn’t going to look scared in front of this pathetic child now was she? So she fought down all of her panic and all of her fear and walked, pushing the boy before her.

Saith’s blinded eyes narrowed as his vision slowly reappeared and he seemed to focus on Davrial standing over him. Davrial heard a whoosh and dropped to the ground as the scythe flung from the ground into the doorframe where he’d been standing. He saw Saith was still looking up at where he’d been in confusion and he grabbed the half blinded elemental by the neck with one strong arm.

Saith began to flail and the scythe spun down but Davrial twisted Saith’s body in front of his own and wrapped his arm around him in a chokehold. The scythe didn’t come at them and instead Saith just struggled blindly.

He was strong, very strong. But Davrial was stronger, and he squeezed and squeezed at Saith’s neck. The two of them frailed about in a bloody heap on the ground, the hovering scythe not sure where to strike yet and instead moving about uncertainly. One of Saith’s flailing feet hit Davrial right in the amputated wound and he roared in pain, but he didn’t let go.

Saith seemed to start choking. He was coughing and wheezing as he desperately tried to pry Davrial’s arms away. He coughed out something, a gasp, a wheeze, no, a word.

“I...” he said and Davrial couldn’t stop him from coughing out the next ones. “See... You...”

The drill that had taken his leg stabbed into his arm. He had held so strong and for so long but he couldn’t hold anymore as his muscles were literally shredded away. He fell back in excruciating agony, clutching at his arm with his good hand. Digging desperately at the drill with his fingers. But he couldn’t do anything, it was too strong, and too slippery with so much blood. His blood.

Saith scrambled to his feet and stood over him, the scythe whirling to his side. He raised it for the final blow but then a voice rang out behind him. A familiar voice.

“Stop!” the girl said and Saith glanced back. Davrial looked too and there she was, standing in the corridor, trembling in evident fear, with a knife at the neck of a young boy.

“Ah... aha...” Saith said slowly, various emotions flickering across his face. “What are you doing Zaana?”

“Let him go,” she said angrily but with fear still evident in her voice. The drill popped out of Davrial’s arm and he cradled it, desperately trying to stop the bloodflow. There was already blood everywhere from his foot and he was starting to feel so so tired. Like he should just collapse and close his eyes, he couldn’t see much anyway, maybe he should just give up to all those black spots filling his vision.

“We don’t have to do this,” Saith said, fear also in his voice for some reason.

“Kill her daddy,” another voice said, childish and whiny. The boy, Davrial realised. So that was what all this was about.

“You are going to walk out of here and leave him be,” Zaana said. “Otherwise I am going to kill your son right here in front of you.”

“You aren’t going to do that,” Saith said, but there was pleading in his eyes, Zaana could tell.

She just glared at him. He had fooled her enough times already but he wasn’t going to fool her now. He just looked down at his son hopelessly.

“I...” he said, then seemed to think better of it and looked up at her. “Fine, lead the way.”

Zaana realised that she hadn’t thought this far ahead. What was she going to do once she got them out of the temple. Lock them there? But then Davrial would be stuck inside and he looked in no shape for a rematch.

She looked down at him and he looked back up at her. He was covered in so much blood and it seemed like he could barely see her. But he was still looking at her somehow. And he shook his head sadly.

She didn’t know what that meant but it didn’t exactly help so she just turned and led Saith out of the temple. She made him walk first. There was no way she was letting the deadly elemental warrior with the whirling death scythe walk behind her. So they walked through the temple to the entrance hall, past the statue of Providence with his many arms and his dripping ink. Zaana rarely prayed, she’d never really thought about it a whole lot despite the sister’s constant lessons on the subject. But she prayed now. This, she thought, was something worth praying about.

Saith left the temple and waited outside with his scythe. Zaana stood inside, still holding the child and the knife. She looked at the temple door, she could close and lock it pretty fast but that scythe thing was faster still.

“Go to the end of the street,” she said. “All the way over there and take your weapon with you.”

Neron nodded and started walking.

“Faster!” she said and gripped the boy tighter, Davrial was bleeding out in there.

Neron started running and soon him and his weapon had gone as far as he could where she could still see him. He was covered in blood and drew a lot of looks from passers by who wisely chose to steer clear of him.

When she was happy with how far away he was Zaana withdrew the knife from the boy’s neck. He started to say something whiny again but she kicked him in the back, sending him sprawling through the door and slammed it shut behind him. Locking it as fast as she could. The last thing she saw was Neron Saith sprinting back down the street toward his son.

She didn’t know how long that door would hold against an elemental but she didn’t care. She just ran back through the pyramid to where she’d left Davrial. He was still lying in a pool of his own blood but now a few sisters had reached him and were tending to his wounds. Zaana wove her way through them to see his face which was staring off at the ceiling blankly.

She slapped him gently and his eyes came slowly back into focus. He looked up at her and she told him what happened. “I got them both out of the temple. You need to get away now, before-”

He laughed a little bit which looked horrifically painful for him and he stopped quickly. “Thank you... for that,” he said. “Did you kill... the boy...”

Zaana shook her head. “No but you have to get out, you can’t die. I messed everything up, it’s my fault and-”

Davrial shook his head, which also looked painful for him. “But you didn’t... end up... like me...” he said happily.

“But I screwed up. I screwed everything up. I need to save you so I can-”

“No, this is my fault... I...” he trailed off and lifted his good hand to his neck, feeling for something. His eyes went wide for a second in panic. Zaana looked at his hand but she couldn’t see much beneath it. Just some sort of small metal thing maybe, kind of like a drill.

There was a crash at the door to the temple and the drill lunged. Biting deep into Davrial’s neck, splashing blood all across Zaana’s face. She staggered back in shock as Davrial collapsed in front of her. His eyes, his face, all completely dead.

There was another crash and then footsteps as Neron Saith came back into the temple. He’d been friendly at first, then sad and small when she’d been threatening his son. Now, marked by a new scar he’d gotten when Davrial’s metal had exploded, he was angry.

The sisters scattered, including Zaana but the scythe whirled in front of her blocking her way. She turned around to see Saith grab Davrial’s head by the hair and tear it from his body as the little drill burrowed through his neck.

The elemental grinned at her, covered in blood and holding a decapitated head in one hand. He took a step forward then a voice stopped him.

Unlike when she’d done it this was a powerful voice. A voice full of authority and command. The voice of Priestess Nisi. “Stop!” she shouted and Saith did. “This is a holy place. A place of religion and peace. A place of Providence!”

He turned to look at her and his anger began to fade.

She continued. “You have just spilled the blood of this man all through this pyramid and now you seek to spill the blood of another!”

“She helped him. She-”

“She is a child! She tried to stop you and she clearly failed! Perhaps she made some decisions she very well shouldn’t have but you are not to hurt her while under this roof!”

Saith glared down at the priestess. Nisi had commanded Zaana all her life but now, standing up to a murderous warrior covered in blood, she looked a lot less intimidating than she’d always been to Zaana. Saith seemed to glare down at her for a long time but eventually he nodded.

“Very well, you are right of course. I shall be taking this back to the capital immediately,” he held up Davrial’s severed head. “I thank you for your hospitality.”

He walked out of the room and out of the temple and she heard him conversing with his son. Nisi walked up to Zaana and took her into her arms.

It was then that the weight of all that had happened finally sank onto her and she trembled in the priestess’s arms. She tried to look at the dead corpse, to see the price for what she’d done, but Nisi turned her away.

“I... I...”

“This was not your fault, child,” Nisi said. “You merely became entangled in things you had no hope of understanding. You should not have had to witness that, any of that.”

Zaana just nodded and her arguments died on her trembling lips. Eventually the body was moved and the pyramid cleaned of blood. She went back to her room and sat on her bed, staring at the wall for a while. She shifted, her bed was uncomfortable for some reason. Almost like there was-

She took the letters out of where she’d shoved them hastily into her clothes. In all the excitement she’d completely forgotten about them. Letters between the survivors of Gahenna’s Armies. Top secret letters that she’d somehow gotten hold of.

She opened up the first letter and began to read.