Ander - Part 6: Subchapter 92
92
Kiana finally made it all the way up to those horrible wooden spikes. Save for the splash of snow that had exploded over the top of the wall, they had been spared the brunt of the avalanche, but she still felt cold and drained. Just making it over here had her huffing and puffing like a -
Like a pregnant vixen.
"Ander!" she called into the storm, but the wind was so strong and the night was so black, it felt like she might as well be screaming into an empty cave. She had seen him jump over the remains of the wall, but where did he go? "Ander!?" She needed him. Oh, by the gods, she needed him now more than ever. She felt... wrong. There was this terrible feeling deep inside of her, boring through her body like a giant worm. She kept cradling her stomach, praying that it wouldn't somehow touch her baby, but what was it? Why did she feel this way? What was wrong with her?
Sarah was up ahead, staring out over the rugged spikes of the wall. One hand was up by her throat, wringing at the neckline of her dress, which waved and billowed in the wind, but other than that she was a solid block of ice, completely motionless.
What was going on up there?
Kiana trudged through the snow, grabbed one of the posts and used it to pull herself the rest of the way up the wall's new incline.
"Oh... Oh dear gods..."
The pass had been devastated. The winding path, the tough little winter shrubs and bushes, the stout boulders with their lines of black and grey, they were all gone, buried, along with a thousand Wolves.
Ander's people. Ander's family.
She had killed them all.
The force of that realization hit her all at once, doubling her over. She clutched at her heart and an awful retching sound burst out of her mouth. If only she could vomit, if only she could get it out, maybe she'd feel a little better, but no matter how hard her stomach clenched, all she could do was dry heave thin ropes of spit and bile. They melted discoloured divots into the snow, absolutely disgusting. Snow wasn't supposed to be like this! It was supposed to be pure and clean, not saturated in blood and death!
I did this... But I had to... I did it for him, so he wouldn't have to...
No. That wasn't entirely true. Now that she could actually feel it writhing inside her body and mind, she knew that it wouldn't be enough. She had blown the horn, but he was still the one who had built this trap, and he would still blame himself for every death. All she did was make a copy of his pain and plaster it over her own heart, and now that she knew how it felt, now that she knew what it meant to have it tearing through her, she finally understood why he had been so reluctant to pull the trigger, and exactly what he had given up in order to protect her, their unborn child, and the entire valley.
It was torture. Pure and simple. What she had done... it made her look at herself in a completely different way. Her hands... shivering and covered in snow... they didn't feel like her hands anymore. It felt like they belonged to a complete stranger. She reached up and touched her face, dampened by tears she didn't even know were still flowing down her cheeks. What did she look like? What did she become when she blew on that horn?
I only hope you can still love me afterwards...
Kiana didn't so much wipe the tears off her face as she swiped them off, furiously rubbing her forearm across her eyes.
The answer was yes! Yes, she could still love him! Yes, she did still love him! Nothing could ever change that! And if the pain and the guilt they felt was the same, then she knew he could still love her, too!
That was why she did what she did. Not to take his burden, but to share it. They were in this together, for better or worse, and that meant sharing the pain as well as the joy.
There was a lone set of footprints leading away from the wall, fading into the grey of the storm. She followed the tracks with her eyes, squinting into the night and shielding her face against the wind, until she spotted a figure in the dark, crouched in the snow.
It was Ander, digging furiously, scooping out great big handfuls of snow without even the paltry protection of gloves. It struck her in much the same way as that gut-wrenching feeling that had doubled her over mere minutes ago.
"Is he...?"
Without turning her head, Sarah answered the question she had been unable to finish. "He's being Ander."
They had cursed him. They had spat on him. They had struck him. They had thrown rocks at him. They had beaten him down. They had broken his bones. They had pierced him with knives and spears. They had tried again and again to kill him, to murder him, to destroy him and everything he believed in, and yet...
"Ander... you still..." Fresh tears spilled form Kiana's eyes, but these she did not wipe away.
He still believed in them. He still fought for them, even now, at the end of it all. He still held out hope for them.
She loved him, and that meant sharing everything, the pain as well as the joy. If he could still hope, if he could still find the last shred of light inside this place where everything had gone cold and dark...
Kiana ran a hand across the gentle slope of her belly, drawing strength from the tiny life growing inside of her.
...Then she could find hope, too!
Kiana climbed over the jagged teeth of what was once a wall, made both to protect and kill, and dropped down to the other side.
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