His entire world devolved into fire, blood, and pain, so much pain. It consumed him, ate at him. A hundred cuts along his body, burns down his legs, aches everywhere. It was worse than anything he had ever known.

“Roger!” It sounded distant but familiar, penetrating ever so slightly through the fog. Who was Roger? He felt a cool hand on his torso. He knew that name. He recognized the voice.

He opened his eyes. Arlette stood above him, terrified and confused. He focused on her face, so lovely and pale. It gave him something else in the world to hang onto, besides the pain. “Hello, Arlette.” It was meant to sound lighthearted and sarcastic. It came out as a wheeze. He coughed and struggled to breathe.

“Roger, hold still.” She kept calling him Roger. He supposed it was all she knew him by. She placed a hand on his chest and silver energy coursed through his body. The cuts began to close. The burns started fading. The aches softened. It gave him enough respite that he could look around. He saw a world of fire and death. Flames ate away at the gardens. Beautiful flowers went up in smoke. A mere five feet away from him, Highlord Albert laid dead, burned to the point Dere could hardly recognize him. He heard screams elsewhere, panic. The guests were fleeing.

Further away, he spotted another figure, large and burned but alive. It was Sylvian. “Tough bastard.” Dere thought. Even closer than Sylvian, Dere saw another man, breathing through the pain. He didn’t look as handsome as usual, but Dere could tell it was Frederic. He almost chuckled, something about the entire situation just felt funny somehow, but he could only manage a strained cough.

Arlette glanced down at him, worry etching her stoic face into a permanent frown. “Roger, you need to relax.” She said. “I’m not good at healing. It isn’t my specialty. Please, keep still.” He tried to look apologetic. He doubted it showed.

His head fell to the side, in the direction of Sylvian and Frederic. In the distance, he spotted another figure, a woman. Unlike many of the other people that dotted the burning courtyard, she was standing and moving towards him, towards the fire and death. In her hand, she carried something. Dere struggled to make it out through the smoke. Focusing, he saw a curved sword, speckled with red blood. “Arlette, please hurry.”

“I’m trying, Roger.” Dere kept his gaze on the woman. She kept moving in his direction, but he wasn’t her target. No, she headed towards Sylvian.

“Arlette?” He wheezed it out again. She looked down at him, about to repeat the same phrase. He nodded in the direction of the woman before she could. Arlette seemed confused, but she turned around, just in time to see the woman plunge her sword straight through Sylvian’s heart.

Arlette gasped. Dere watched Sylvian’s body tense up then relax. His life, so powerful and vibrant, faded out of him. The woman pulled the blade out of Sylvian and kept walking. This time towards Frederic. “Arlette!”

“I’m hurrying!” Arlette kept healing him, and Dere took a second to look up at the sky. It had turned to night. The moon shone on him from above, brilliant and beautiful. He muttered a noiseless prayer to his sister, wondering, as so many mortals probably had, whether she even listened. It might have been his imagination, but Arlette’s channeling coursed through him with more power than before. His body kept healing. The woman kept walking. Eventually, she stood over Frederic. His handsome face, filled with spite, met hers. He had accepted his death. She lifted her sword.

Then, Dere shouted. He didn’t know why. What concern was Frederic to him? The man actively hated him. But, nonetheless, he had done it. No taking it back now.

The woman stopped and looked in his and Arlette’s direction, taken just a little off-guard. Dere nudged Arlette to the side, grabbed his sword, and lifted himself from the floor. It hurt to stand. It hurt so much, but he could do it. He steadied himself on two feet and faced the woman.

Tilting her head she looked him up and down. They each got their first good look at each other, through the smoke and the fire. She stood taller than any other mortal woman he knew. Dark golden skin corded with lithe, powerful muscles reflected the firelight. She wore a light blue, loose fitting shirt and pants that blew ominously in the wind. Everything about the way she moved screamed danger.

Dere knew he must have looked unimpressive across from her. His injuries and exhaustion had him almost wobbling on his feet, hardly a match, but Dere had never been as easy as he might seem. He grabbed his sword and drew on the trickle of power streaming from it. It was so little, but it would have to do. Behind him, his shadow shifted and distorted.

For a while, she kept observing him as he stood twenty or so feet away from her. Perhaps she wondered what it was that possesed him to make him do something so stupid. Dere was, after all, wondering the same thing. Then, she simply shrugged. In just a few seconds the answer probably wouldn't matter anyway.

With a blast of air she covered the ground between them. Dere dodged to the side and deflected her blade, his body complaining the whole time. The woman careened past him at blinding speed before twisting in the air and regaining her footing. He turned to face her. She met his eyes and nodded, perhaps a little impressed. Dere glanced around for Arlette but couldn’t find her. She had disappeared without so much as a whisper.

He dropped into a stance, feigning an attack. The woman smirked and prepared to meet him. Suddenly, her eyes darted around and she dodged to the side as a dark figure lunged forward and attacked her. It was made of evershifting grey shadows and held an incorporeal blade. It was Dere’s shadow.

Dere followed up his shadow’s attack, feinting low and going high. The woman parried his blow with ease and whipped out her curved sword towards Dere’s thigh. It took all of Dere’s speed and experience to deflect the blow. She aimed another towards his neck, which he managed to dodge in time. Behind her his shadow attacked again. She whirled around and parried its thrust. Quick as the wind, she slashed her sword at the shadow, but it blocked it with its odd blade.

The fight roared on. Dere and his shadow exchanging blows with the woman, nobody gaining an upper hand. Eventually, she lashed out another strike at Dere, forcing him back. Using the opportunity, she whipped her other hand around in a circular motion. A gust of wind knocked Dere and his shadow back ten feet. Dere flipped around and landed on his feet, nearby one of the courtyard’s columns. His shadow mirrored his action.

Dere and the woman glared at each other, each preparing for the other’s next move. Dere knew her fighting style well. She was a Blessed of Afre the Goddess of Storms. She, on the other hand, had never fought anything like him.

With a snarl, she lunged at him again. He didn’t attempt to block it this time. Instead, he jumped towards the ground, into the shadow of the column. Her slash sliced through the stone column with ease, cleaving it in two, but Dere no longer stood there. He had disappeared. She looked around in fury, just in time to see Dere’s shadow lunging towards her once again. Blade a blur, she blocked the shadow’s attack and countered. The shadow managed to deflect but left itself open. She prepared to finish it. Except, before she could, Dere emerged from the shadow of another column and sent his blade flashing towards her leg. She dodged backward but not quick enough. The sword bit into her unarmored thigh and drew blood. Unleashing a primal scream, she whirled her hand around again and sent a much more powerful blast of wind outward, knocking Dere and his shadow thirty feet across the courtyard.

Dere landed and skidded back several more feet, almost bumping into something as he did. Once again, his shadow mirrored his landing. Momentarily distracted, Dere glanced downward and saw Highlord Evrard, dead and burnt, like all the rest. His sword laid a few feet away from him. Its shadow looked thin and small in the firelight. Dere looked up from Evrard to see the woman staring at him, eyes full of rage. He took a long breath, pain all but forgotten, and prepared to meet her next assault.

This time, though, she didn’t charge. Instead, she summoned a flashing bolt of lightning in her hand. Dere’s eyes went wide and he held up his blade in time to block the bolt. It sent him flying back several yards and almost knocked the sword out of his hands. The force of the blow laid him prone. As he sat there, she approached him slowly, another lightning bolt appearing in her hand. Dere gestured and, before it hit him, his shadow jumped in front of him, absorbing the brilliant light and fading away.

The Blessed woman sneered and used the wind to propel her forward once again, eager to finish the still prone Dere. Using all his speed and grace, he whirled his body around and jumped towards her, under her flashing blade. She went over him, just barely, and he landed next to the body of Highlord Evrard once more. He reached out his hand and touched the shadow of Evrard’s sword. It traveled into him and disappeared. Turning around he saw the woman dash forward one more time. He held up his hand and from it a shadow of Evrard’s blade soared out. She saw it too late. Her dodge was too slow. It cut her across her stomach and she tumbled to the ground, a few yards away from Dere.

Dere tried to rise, but everything that had happened today caught up to him: the pain, the loss of blood, the use of his powers. He felt too weak. He struggled to his feet, too slow, he knew. Even injured, she rose faster than him, grasping her sword as she rose, eyes filled with an indescribable rage. Dere held his own weapon, hoping he had the energy to stave her off.

However, before she could attack, she suddenly stopped. Her mouth opened wide and she turned to look behind her. There, Arlette stood, materializing out of nowhere, a small dagger plunged through the woman’s back.