Ander - Part 6: Subchapter 88
88
The ground trembled beneath his feet, but Dorin didn't care. They swarmed across the snow, weaving between jutting pieces of rock and dead branches like water breaking upon a riverbank, but Dorin didn't care. Their roar was like the voice of death itself, come to swallow him whole, but Dorin didn't care. All that fear, all that dread, couldn't hold a candle to the warmth of Aisa's hand, or the gentle pressure of her fingers intertwined with his own. Even though there were a thousand bloodthirsty Wolves baring down on them, wild animals set to rip their prey apart, she was standing tall and proud, and he admired her for that.
"Aisa."
As she turned to look at him, he saw that there were tears silently streaming down her cheeks, and his admiration for her only grew. "Was it worth it, Dorin?" she asked. "Everything we did, everything we've gone through. All the blood and sin and death. Did we come even close to wiping it clean? Did we touch even a single speck of it?"
"Aisa." He leaned in close and, after only a moment's hesitation, their lips locked together. The pass was so cold, but the point where they came together was so warm. He could feel her, all of her: the beating of her heart, the rhythm of her breath, the tears on her face. It was a moment he wished could last forever, but, as with life itself, it was over far too soon. With a thousand Wolves charging in to end their lives, he pulled back, looked into her eyes, and said: "We did the best we could."
*
The Wolves crashed into the wall like a natural disaster. Kiana felt the shudder all the way into her bones, nearly powerful enough to knock her off her feet. A fair few Foxes (more than a few, actually) screamed out loud. She looked over the edge and had to clap a hand over her mouth to keep from doing the same.
It was like staring down into the gaping mouth of hell itself. Hundreds and hundreds of bodies, writhing and undulating, reaching for her with hands like spiders, clawing at the wall, leaving long, jagged scratches in the wood. The poor souls who had tried to stand up to them were valiantly trying to push back the tide, but it was no use. They were slowly being crushed between the wall and the advancing flood. One of them had a spear going through his chest, and was coughing up blood. Another had been forced down to the ground and was trying his very best to defend himself as they stomped all over his bloodied face. Even the attacking army wasn't exempt from the chaos. Those that had stumbled during the charge were slowly being trampled to death. They screamed in agony, dragging their battered and broken bodies through the snow, but no one stopped to help them back up, or even bothered to step around them. Those at the front not tangled up with the small chain of defenders were slowly being pushed forward by those behind, even though there was nowhere left for them to go. It was like watching a dam slowly filling up with the blackest of waters; pure poison filled with drowning bodies.
"They're climbing up!" someone shouted, absolutely hysterical.
Some of the smaller Wolves were forcing their fingers and toes into the valleys between the posts, digging in with their claws and pulling themselves up in awkward lurches. They had knives clamped between their teeth. The less agile Wolves simply stayed at the bottom, hacking at the wall with axes. Some even resorted to biting at it with nothing but their naked teeth, gnawing and snarling like animals and then spitting the bloody wooden chunks into the snow.
"Ander, please!" Kiana screamed, slamming her fists against his chest again and again. He barely shifted against the weight of her blows, and his face remained set. It was like he was stuck in some kind of trance. "Ander! You have to snap out of it!" Kiana shook him, trying to get some kind of reaction, but there was nothing, only that blank-eyed stare, as if the horror had become so great he simply could not acknowledge it any longer without going completely insane. "Ander! You have to do it! You have to -"
A single tear leaked from his eyes and fell onto her cheek, where it quickly froze into an orb of ice.
You have to break your heart for me. You have to break your heart for our baby. You have to break your heart for your family.
You have to kill a part of yourself, so that we may live.
"I love you, Kiana," he whispered, slowly raising the horn to his lips.
I want to live long enough so I can see you start to show. I want you to live long enough so you can get all grumpy and yell at me for smiling at the way you struggle out of chairs. I want us to live long enough to see our baby, to name them, to raise them. I want us to live so we can be a family, Kiana, and for my family, I will do it. For you, I will do it. For my baby... for our baby... I will do it...
A tear fell onto the horn and slowly ran down the side, following the curve.
Why him? Why does it always have to be him? Always...
Ander took a deep breath and pressed his lips against the mouth piece. It was like watching the one she loved taking a dagger to his heart.
This time... Just this one time...
Kiana grabbed the horn and wrenched it from his grasp with such force it snapped the string around his neck. He looked at her with total shock, blinking at the suddenness of it all. "Kiana, what -!?"
I'll be the one to carry your burden.
"Kiana, nooo!!"
Before Ander could reach out to stop her, she raised it to her mouth, took a deep breath, and blew as hard as she could.
The low, mournful sound it cut through the pass was the most terrible thing she had ever heard, made all the worse for the screaming.
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