But suddenly, the lustful god’s shadow caught up and a black hand emerged from it and grabbed Terry’s ankle.

Caerwyn sliced the arm and it dissolved into black dust. Terry was free again after a moment, and he ran a few more yards with me and Caerwyn in tow behind him before he was so tired that he collapsed and fainted.

The black shadow ploughed ahead of me and Caerwyn as we tried to catch up to where Terry had fainted.

The shadow formed into a shadowy man in the shape of King Torr and swung Terry over his shoulder.

Caerwyn was ready with his blade and his hands tensed as he charged the shadowy creature.

Light unexpectedly sprang forth from Caerwyn’s blade as he thrusted it into the lustful god who screeched in pain. He dropped Terry to the ground and his own shadowy blade sprang forth from his hand.

I was stunned. Where had this light come from? I had no time to think of it as I had to check on Terry while Caerwyn dueled the lustful god.

I felt Terry’s pulse. He was still breathing, but he was clearly exhausted. He just needed rest. I whispered to him, “I’ll save you Terry, I promise.”

I unsheathed my blade—or rather, Terry’s blade--ready to help Caerwyn in battling the lustful god.

Caerwyn was as skillful as ever as he parried, dodged, and deftly poked at the lustful god’s body. When he made contact with his golden sword, a little bit of shadow would fall away and the lustful god would shriek in pain.

Caerwyn was angry. He was full of passion and enraged at the lustful god, which made him rasher and less able to concentrate. “I hate you! I hate you for what you’ve done to them!”

I snuck up behind the lustful god and stabbed him in the back as Caerwyn relentlessly and powerfully slammed his sword--glowing with light--against the lustful god’s shadowy one repeatedly.

The god shrieked and its screams pierced the air. The shadow formed into a black dove with a gigantic beak.

I stabbed its back repeatedly with such angry fury that I could think of nothing else but wanting this horrendous creature dead.

I heard a deep and dark chuckle emanate from the lustful god as me and Caerwyn chopped tirelessly as him.

“I can feel it! I can feel your lust not only for each other but also to see me dead! How sick and perverse you are! Do you not realize you are only feeding me with such feelings?”

Fast as a snake, the dove’s beak snapped at Caerwyn’s arm and it came clean off.

I yelled in dismay as Caerwyn’s blade fell to the ground with his arm.

Caerwyn was stunned and any words he had were caught in his throat. Just as the lustful god lunged at Caerwyn’s head, I reached out with all four of my arms and hugged the bird around its torso.

I had to find it again, I knew. I had to find whatever love was left in my heart and bestow it upon this loathsome creature.

This creature knew nothing but hatred and anger. What a sad thing that was. He had been loved by no one. I could feel it… I could feel that he needed a mother.

“I love you. I love you where your mother did not.” I soothed the black dove.

It shrieked and squawked as it struggled in my embrace and lost dozens of black, smoky feathers. As long as I could hold those loving thoughts in my head, the dove couldn’t escape. But…

But as I looked upon Caerwyn’s arm—as I thought of how I had been defiled because of this petty and disgusting creature—I simply couldn’t find it in me to love him.

He shrank in my arms just as I lost that good and beautiful thought, and then he formed back into King Torr with no shadows on his being. The man was panting with a hideous look upon his face. In a moment shadows leaked from his body and grabbed both me and Caerwyn with the smoky black tendrils spreading from his body. I struggled as he began enclosing the tendrils around us to tightly that I was choking.

Terry woke up, then—looking exhausted--and saw Caerwyn bleeding quickly to death from his arm and was alarmed to see the lustful god choking us to death.

Terry picked up Caerwyn’s dropped blade and I managed a scream despite being choked as the boy pointed it at himself. “Let them go and let me heal Caerwyn or I will kill myself.”

“Don’t!” The lustful god yelled. “I will put them down!”

The lustful god released me and Caerwyn from his tendrils and Terry dashed past the wicked god and to Caerwyn’s side.

He calmly put his hands upon Caerwyn’s missing arm and took a deep breath. He said to him as gold poured from his hands and stitched up Caerwyn’s arm, “you know… I loved being your squire. You were the only one who befriended me at the temple. You paid so much attention to me and tried to be my father when I had none to speak of; nobody else wanted me as a squire or a friend. And you, Mimi… You were just so lovely. You were so kind that you made me want to be that kind… I can’t thank either of you enough.”

Caerwyn and I were in too much pain from the lustful god squeezing us to speak. We were still gasping for breath.

Terry still had his sword pointed at himself as he threatened the lustful god, “I’ll still kill myself unless you let them go.”

The lustful god was in a panic. He held up his hands. “I’ll let them go; put the sword down.”

“You have to promise me… You have to prove to me that no matter what you’ll let them live.” Terry demanded.

The lustful god grimaced and bowed to Terry and said, “if you take a piece of each of their hairs and bless it, then I will be burned horribly burned for the first three times I try to attack them.

Terry looked very thoughtful for a moment as he wondered how to accomplish such a thing, but then he smiled.

He didn’t need to know how to do it; he loved us so much that, with his face scrunched up in a smile and tears falling from his eyes, he just did it. Lightly and carefully, Terry chopped pieces of mine and Caerwyn’s hair off with his sword, blew lightly on them, and they glowed yellow with protective power.

“Hand the hair back to them, and they will be protected from me.” The lustful god commanded.

Terry did so. He placed the strands of hair in mine and Caerwyn’s hands and enclosed our fingers around them. He said calmly, “you’ll be okay now.”

I placed mine in an empty flask of water, and Caerwyn put his in a palm-sized sack that was tied around his belt.

Terry then turned to the lustful god with his sword still pointed at his stomach and said, “you’re going to wait here with me until the two of them are so far off that you can’t catch them.”

The lustful god nodded without protest. He knew if he lost Terry, his goals and dreams would likely never come to fruition, or would only come to fruition with much more difficulty.

But I shook my head. “I won’t leave! Not without Terry! Terry, put that sword down. Come with us!”

“You two go, I’ll be fine.” He replied lightly.

I yelled with angry tears. “Put it down right now! I swear to God, Terry, if you don’t come with us--!”

Caerwyn was gazing at Terry intently the entire time. He looked down with tears in his eyes.

Caerwyn wrapped his unsevered arm around my shoulder. “Come, Mimi. We can do no more good here.”

“What?” I cried and wrestled free from his arm. “What’s wrong with you? We came with the army for Terry!”

I freed myself from Caerwyn’s arm and ran to Terry’s side—trying to take the sword from him but he easily pushed me away. “Mimi, trust me. Go with Caerwyn.”

“And leave you with the lustful god? Never! I… I at least want to be close to you… Even if I can’t rescue you.” I sniffled again.

“Mimi, you can do more outside the army than within. You can rally moths and humans alike—I’ve seen it. If anyone can stop Torr, it’s you. Please go.” Terry pleaded.

“But now that you’ve blessed us, he can’t hurt us anymore!” I reminded him. “We can stay and we’ll be safe!”

Terry couldn’t stop smiling at me as I wept uncontrollably. He put a hand on my cheek. He suddenly doubled over in pain—from exhaustion and using too much magic, I assumed--and leaned on his sword. “I want to be selfless; I want to be like you. That’s my fondest desire. Let me do so.”

There was a long moment of silence but for my weeping when I realized he would not be moved and I also realized he was right. There was nothing I could do to help him.

I looked him in his blue eyes and I said to him, “promise you’ll be okay?”

He nodded. “I promise.”

Caerwyn and I stepped away from both Terry and the lustful god.

We walked silently away from them with tears streaming endlessly down my cheeks.

After many steps, I heard a sound that I would never in my life be able to forget. I heard an audible thud.

I turned around and saw that Terry had fallen down and was not moving.

I shrieked in horror and dashed back to his side with Caerwyn following after. Nervously and with haggard breaths, I checked his pulse.

I went cold and for a moment.

I refused to acknowledge what my fingers were telling me as the world spun.

And all at once, I screamed in dismay as I was overwhelmed with emotions that I could not handle.

He had no pulse. He was dead.

Sadness and shock overtook my whole body and made it shudder. It felt as if life left my own body in that moment.

The lustful god’s shriek of rage filled my ears as I fainted.