Heir of Iron

"I feel... guilt. Remorse. Shame." he said honestly, eyes distant. "A year... a whole year where I willfully put them from my mind to focus on..." he twisted his mouth bitterly. "... myself."

"Yes, you did. I recall it perhaps a bit less pleasantly than you do," she agreed, eyes hardening. "Would you like to know the exact number of times I brought you back from the brink of death?" she asked with perhaps a bit more tartness than he expected, to which Bart shuddered and shook his head, getting a small 'hmph' in response from her with a toss of her mane. "It was not a pleasant ordeal, each time I felt the mantle... flicker. Almost snapping back from your broken body, again and again," she said, baring her teeth at the memory, fangs gleaming before she looked back to Bart.

"No, I won't accept that. Not from you, Bart," she said sternly, "You did not have some puerile summer dalliance in my grove, I won't see you undersell the efforts you put in because you didn't bleed somewhere your friends could see it." she said, her brow creasing in concern. "You were tasked with great labors, do you really deny yourself so very much, that even the simple pleasures of food and lovemaking being given to you — freely and without compromise — invalidate your struggle in your mind?" she asked, incredulity warring with genuine concern in her tone. Bart was stunned, she seemed genuinely agitated. He blew out a breath

"It is... not something I am good with. Excess was always my weakness," he said, laying a hand over his barrel-like torso, "Saying no to things that... feel good, is difficult. Self-denial is a virtue." he said quietly, uneasily. "It's easier to live without temptation entirely than it is to balance it."

"Beloved you do not have to deny yourself joy..." she breathed, and her expression was exasperated as he set his jaw.

"I have ill-practice with it... as my year-long 'puerile dalliance' attests to," he said, looking back at her with a single eye, momentarily haunted and hollow.

"You are... so very bad for me." he said in a haggard voice; "Yet... also, so very good."

"You fear loss of control?" she asked him, having drawn closer, the moonlight bathed them both in a stark bar of light splashing across the otherwise dimly-lit room, Bart furrowed his brow.

"I fear how easily I just... give in," he said, eyes tracing over her again. "To my desires, my wants. I feel shame because I know... there were days in the Glade where I did not work my hardest, or put aside my blade, armor, or studies to indulge in you and your pleasures, the wonders of your world so far from my own."

"Bart, that's ridiculous. God himself does not expect such single-minded.... destructive dedication such as that!" she responded, and he set his teeth against her outburst.

"My friends... my family, they have suffered, struggled in this conflict when I was absent. My efforts spared them nothing, not pain nor trauma," he said, closing his eyes, and resting his brow on the meat of his forearm. "I feel such a weight of guilt on me when I see those men who were being eaten alive by these monsters while I was tumbling in the grass with their Patron Godhead like some lonely shepherd boy."

Cithara's head jerked back from that, offense creasing her features for a moment, before she narrowed her eyes sadly, and shuffled closer to Bart, eyes searching his, her gaze suddenly far more worried, far more clinical.

"Beloved... what would you have in its stead?" she asked softly, "Would you be as Daedolon, a simple machine driven by duty and little else? A human siege engine?"

"It would have made this conflict cleaner, I would have saved more men... I would have saved..." his voice caught as he remembered Nazir's words, felt the man's heart pounding against his chest with panic, fear still fresh in his memory. A dark chasm welled in his heart, and in it filled in all of the haunted looks and agony he'd heard from his companions — his family. Cithara read the words on his silent lips as clearly as if he'd spoken him, the way his powerful form crumbled in on itself speaking stanzas and bars all its own. She moved closer, her voice soft.

"Bart...you cannot protect the whole world, beloved," Cithara whispered to him, "Even I tried to do so, and failed, failed so spectacularly that I tore the earth asunder... and destroyed so many lives in the process," she said; old, familiar pain in her voice. "Do not torture yourself, my dearest Bart. You are mighty, mightier perhaps than even the First Paladin was in potential... but you are but one man," she said, and came to his side, pressing herself to his bare trunk.

"Forgive yourself, please. You were strong enough." she breathed to him, and he felt his chest catch as she touched her horn against his heart, against the single, white blaze of a scar where she had planted her mantle on his soul. "You were enough." she almost pleaded.

The words... struck something, an ugly black venom rose up in him, and her eyes met his full of intensity. He felt bitter recrimination, the eyes of the dead and maimed staring back at him from behind her eyes as she hissed.

"No, beloved. That is the Wendigo, it has its mark on you — do not forget." her eyes bore into his as she leaned up close to him; "It will strike at your mind, just like this — fill you with doubts, make you angry, reckless and foolhardy," she pressed her chest to his, nestling her face in his neck, her lips by his ear.

"Pay those black whispers no mind, only my voice. You are enough. You are the best man you can be because you struggle, let no man or fell beast question it while I draw breath." she breathed, and he found his arms crushing around the unicorn.

"I left them, they were in danger..."

"They agreed to that danger, they fought and when they needed you most — you arrived."

"But... I... I dallied, I wasted time they so desperately needed..."

"You loved me and that time was not wasted beloved, it was not wasted by half. You have no idea what your love fixed." she breathed, practically weeping, that black void seemed to narrow as she pressed her horn to his flesh again, and he felt his soul ring like cathedral bells.

"You were not dallying my love, you were quite busy mending a broken heart," she said, eyes glimmering as she pressed into him, and that black venom seemed to ease out of his mind, the unnatural despair easing away. Bart shuddered as he felt a familiar, creeping presence, a flickering of slithering shadows at the edge of the room drew both their attention.

'If there is a seam, I will force it wide...' echoed in his mind as real as sound, and he shuddered as Cithara's warmth and immediate, undeniable presence washed away the greasy cold smear he felt on his soul from the touch of the Wendigo.

"Even here, it can reach me still," he snorted. "God, what a monster."

"The Wendigo is my equal in strength, if not ability. Its orbit is wide, even now I can feel it stretching it thin to touch the brand it left on your heart," she said, her face wrinkling up in animalistic fury. "It touched your heart." she hissed. "How dare it. How dare."

"You are being uncomfortably possessive over that," Bart noted and she drew back to look him dead in the eyes with her gold-on-gold gaze.

"It is mine, I have built a lovely home for myself there and I will not brook some ravenous throwback to darken its doorstep," she said with an almost deadly calm, her words warm but her eyes nearly predatory. "You are not the only one who long denies themselves, and when I was offered a chance to be greedy for myself free of consequence or compromise — greedy I was." she purred, pressing into him.

"You are an indulgence, a handsome, wonderful, refreshingly blunt indulgence I will fight God and Heaven for," she said, pressing close, "If there is no room to live, to love, my dear Bart... what sense is there in fighting at all?" she asked him — and bluntly it struck him across the face. He smiled at her and sighed heavily, weight leaving his shoulders.

"It always sounds so simple when you say it," he complained halfheartedly, and she gently kissed him.

"You just need someone to help you gather it all up in your mind, that's all," she said, nuzzling him reassuringly. "The Wendigo will task you, gnaw at you... I will guard you against it, my love, you need not fear its presence in your dreams... none of my boys shall tonight, nay for once in many nights you will all sleep soundly at peace in my presence," she said, and she smiled looking out the window, a tragic edge forming on the expression.

"We must leave at first muster, beloved. We cannot stay. I cannot drown these beautiful, doughty boys in my love," she breathed, eyes closing. "One night, already I have seen it. The familiar pep of those bathed in my orbit, already I push them out of the cycle by fingers, I will not see it grow further than must needs be," she said resolutely. She slid back closer to him then, much of that steel leaving her in a quiver.

"Come now, my husband. Make love to me one more time before we march to war." she breathed, and then with a smile simply added:

"Let me care for you."

Bart allowed her to draw him in for another kiss. He let her care for him, his hurts, his wants. His needs. The lantern dimmed long before they settled, emotionally and physically satiated. Safe. Whole.

CHAPTER 21

The night passed uneventfully and quietly solemn. Guards on watch would muse for years at the eerie, welcoming calm that suffused them until they found their beds. The terrors of the darkness were far away, and only the solace of dreamy slumber remained — so was the power of the Lady in White.

They emerged from sleep to a further spectacle, the cresting light of dawn cast across the great fields of battle... and they were clear and clean. The call came down from the walls, sentries confirming and relaying information with outrider scouts: not a single corpse remained of the invaders, let alone a spot of blood upon the grass. Were the earth not churned by feet and engines of war, it would be as if no blood had been spilled there at all.

"Blood of God," Bart murmured, surveying the barren landscape. He had risen with the dawn muster as had many of the other men, being back in a regimented environment was deeply comforting to the Paladin. He had not realized how much he would miss the sounds of clattering armor and the talk of rough men of good quality.

"Language," Cithara said quietly next to him, her own gaze sweeping across the field with cold approval.

"Oh look at ye, so cavalier wit' th' blasphemy now." Lidia said to him with playful mockery; "How's it feel, Tinman?" Cithara and Bart had been joined by Gram and his riders, which had necessitated of course that Lidia tag along. Gram touched her shoulder in a silent gesture of reproach as the Lady in white surveyed the destruction, as if she were looking for something.

"Naima says the three paladins were burned and their ashes separated and interred," Nazir said, eyes keen and flicking about, his hand on his newly-acquired sword. The young Southerner had gained a sense of paranoia in addition to his newly-honed combat savvy, he clearly felt more useful here than in the keep where Naima and Rashid prepared their supplies for their immediate journey. "Holy One, there can't be anything left to claim."

"A bold assumption, Little Lion," Cithara said as they walked, the riders had ranged out to canvass the area and form a more secure perimeter — the Lady had simply walked boldly forward, unafraid and focused.

"Forgive me, Holy One but... it seems to be borne out," he said, reaching his hand down into the churned soil and digging up a fist-sized clump. The dark-skinned man breathed deep of it, sniffing at it gamely and gesturing beneath him — a sizable divot had been dug, by a great impact; "This is where one of the great giants fell, you can see the outline. They cut it to ribbons and yet — no smell of rot, or ichor of any kind." he said and held the clump of loamy soil out to Bart, who gamely took the clump and breathed in — he had also seen the creature fall, much, much closer than Nazir had, his eyebrows raised.

"Not even a trace, like it was strained through cheesecloth," he said, dusting his hands clean as the Unicorn seemingly ignored them, walking forward a stretch before responding.

"The Erlking and his riders are consummate hunters," she said and turned to them with golden eyes full of knowledge great and terrible, and she added with a simple, matter-of-fact tone that chilled Bart's blood.

"Nothing goes to waste."

Lidia visibly shivered at that, pressing closer to Gram by reflex as Bart and Nazir exchanged haunted looks, the unicorn simply resuming her search.

"Darling, do we need to be so cryptic? They may not show it, but you're frightening them." Bart asked her in a quiet tone, the Unicorn turned to him, her eyes hard and fearful.

"They should be afraid, beloved. There is something out here still, and it is more dangerous than you can imagine," she hissed, her voice only for him. Bart's guard went up at that, and he casually loosened his sword in its scabbard with his thumb, Gram's eyes caught the motion, meeting Bart's gaze momentarily in concern, mirroring the Paladin with a subtle shift of his grip on his polearm.

They continued in silence after that, cutting through the center of the battlefield, eerily quiet. Bart had never fought a massed battle before, but even he found the lack of carrion birds nor the buzzing of flies as was common even during their smaller exchanges with the Plagued Men unsettling, as if the entire offending army had been swallowed by the very earth, down to the last drop of blood.

"I remember this place," Nazir said after a moment, the foursome having pressed past the churned-up frontline where Bart and Cithara had met the crush of the enemy in divine fury. Bart cast his gaze around, in the ruin and wreckage his mind also drew together images from a year and then some ago by his own reckoning, there had been tents, men here, now flattened and hammered away.

"This was Parias' camp," Bart said, and Nazir nodded curtly.

"You have been here before then?" Cithara asked them, and the trio nodded, Bart, extending his hand to gesture at the hauntingly empty grounds.

"When we arrived, Parias had lain siege to the fortress, and this was the back most of his lines. We stole armor and cloaks from his patrols, and blended in to push through their lines," he explained, the Unicorn's nose wrinkling in disgust as they moved through.

"You speak the truth: this place reeks of the Wendigo's cursed presence. It was here not long ago." she drew herself up a bit; "Is still here, in a fashion."

That statement lit up the eyes of the trio around her, Bart's hand grasping the hilt of his sword, Nazir going so far as to slowly slide his odd hybrid blade free of its scabbard, the sinewy young southerner bouncing it a few times in his palm. Cithara's gaze looked over him with curious eyes, her gaze hard to read but the smile that touched her lips briefly was reassuring before casting her sight back to the ruined camp.

The devastation was not total here, where on the field of battle every mote of the enemy's presence had been scrubbed, here and there stood the wreck and ruin of a place once inhabited by at least creatures in the shape of men. Tents and carts collapsed and crushed beneath the trod of the wild hunt, it was a curiously... half-done job. Bart's gaze still found no speck of blood or bodies in the turned earth or collapsed structures, but the foxfire-mantled hunters seemed to have been rushed, hesitant to linger in this place.

"Darling, when you were here before... was there anything that stood out to you as wrong?" she asked, gazing around the destruction, her orbit flaring as she pressed out with senses he could not even begin to understand. The big Paladin furrowed his brow, casting his mind back to that hazy moment, it had been so full of outrage, fear, and pain... he grimaced a bit. To his side, Lidia snapped to attention.

"That wee little monster Parias had with 'em," she said suddenly, stepping out from Gram's shadow. Bart had never considered Lidia fearful... but she seemed much like the others to be deeply unsettled by the empty battlefield and its haunting quiet. "She was... guttin' one o' the defenders." Bart's eyes also lit up in memory, the hellish thoughts unlocking in that day of traumas like a black flood of viscera and gore.

"The Altar," he said in a hollow tone. Nazir merely spat to one side, a visible paleness falling over his bronzed skin at similar gruesome and mostly forgotten memories, both men's eyes meeting for a moment in a shared recall of the battle atop the Ziggurat. Cithara, however, became erect with interest, her eyes blazing with golden fury.

"Show me. This deep in the stink of that monster, I can feel only the darkness and suffering it left behind," she said, visibly gritting her teeth. "Being here for I is like as you wading through a sewer."

"Been there," Lidia remarked dryly, stepping out ahead of the group. Bart barked out a bit of laughter at that, breaking the pall a bit. Cithara raised an eyebrow at him.

"It's a story for later, beloved." He told her as he stepped up his own pace to keep up with his adopted sibling.

"It seems there are many stories I have yet to hear." the Unicorn said, a terse smile pushing past the gloom that still rested over her features. Bart gave her a tight smile in return.

"A few, perhaps," he said with a wink, getting her smile to widen, only just.

They wended their way with renewed purpose through the shattered encampment, and before long Nazir called out to them, picking his own pace up to jog through a burned-out series of tents. The remaining trio caught up to him at a canter, and found him, hands on his hips, looking resignedly at a dilapidated, broken-down... and very familiar wagon. It was burned out, and each wheel twisted from the axles or shattered on it, the bed itself cracked in twain as if something large had trod upon it, the smell of it suggested other... fouler things had been done with the insides.

"Learned One's Pinions, the bastards ravaged it," he said with a mournful tone, Bart and Lidia frowning as they came up, Gram lifted a palm by way of confusion. Nazir turned;

"Our... no, My caravan, from before. I paid good gold and better services for this some time ago. Spent many a coin and favor, built up a lifestyle that suited me, placed it on four wheels, and hitched it to my dear sister's ambitions." he offered as a way of explanation. "We were forced to abandon it to flee the plagued men's ranks and Parias' rage. Seems in the passing months they helped themselves." he groused, Lidia peeked around one side and made a face.

"Aye, looted from top tae bottom," she said, drawing out a torn and stained sheaf of cloth, doubtlessly one of Nazir's own bits of finery from the color, the southern man sighed, Bart clasping his shoulder with one armored hand.

"Twas the culmination of my personal fortunes, looted and pillaged by mindless beasts wearing the shapes of men," he said, giving another discarded, crushed coffer a rueful kick. "It is just gold, possessions, it can be replaced yet..." Nazir seemed truly heartbroken as he touched one of the doors, now hanging lopsided from twisted hinges. For only the second time, Bart saw true grief pass his sworn brother's face.

"It's all different now, isn't it?" he asked Bart, the big Paladin sighed and closed his eyes. His hand tightened on his shoulder, and Nazir wordlessly reached up and clasped his ring-bedecked fingers over the black-enameled plate of Bart's gauntlets, the tarnished silver and dented gold clashed with the battle-worn plates, and fresh, pale scars on the young man's once-soft hands.