Honor
Honor
Aslan and Gobil closed the distance. Gobil advanced slowly but inexorably; Aslan sprinted to meet him.
Gobil had recovered the longsword he had dropped at the start and swung it. Aslan leveled two daggers at him.
Clang!
The crossed daggers caught the descending longsword's edge. The blades shivered under a force that seemed impossible for a man already bleeding out on his feet.
Claaang!
Aslan shoved outward with both daggers and deflected the blow. Gobil staggered, barely caught his balance, and came again. The ground beneath him was slick with his own blood.
"Graaagh!"
A foot skidded on the muck, then stuck fast. Gobil's ankle twisted and he lurched, but he did not stop. He gripped his sword and charged. He lunged, stabbing.
Sparks flew as the longsword glanced off. Aslan swept it aside with one dagger and brought the other down in a chopping arc. The feather-patterned blade severed a wrist. The severed hand tumbled across the dirt, and the life visibly drained from Gobil's face as a cold sweat broke out.
Clang!
Steel rang again. Gobil swung his bleeding stump to blind Aslan and followed with a horizontal slash. Aslan caught the attack and drove his shoulder into Gobil's chest, shoving him backward.
Fay watched it all in silence.
She watched, and she could not understand.
An opponent like this was not even a match for Aslan.
With his level of skill, Aslan could have killed a man like this with his bare hands.
To put it bluntly, he did not need to fight seriously at all.
Gobil had lost his mobility. He had lost his weapons, and it was too late to staunch the bleeding. Left alone, he would die.
Aslan knew that. Fay knew that. Even Gobil had to know it.
Yet here Aslan stood, holding two daggers and meeting him in earnest.
He was honoring Gobil, who poured every last shred of himself into the fight.
Fay could not understand. This was neither Aslan's usual way of ending things in an instant, nor toying with his prey.
She shook the shortsword in her hand up and down with a clatter, and congealed blood pattered onto the ground — the blood of the warriors who had guarded the door.
As Fay watched with idle curiosity and confusion, the fight hurtled toward its end.
Aslan's fist struck the flat of the longsword. The blade was knocked aside. Gobil tried to recover his guard, but Aslan's leg was already moving.
A wet crack.
A light kick swept the back of Gobil's knee. Gobil's stance collapsed entirely. His legs slid through the blood-soaked dirt and he crumpled. He reached out with his hand.
Aslan gripped the dagger in both hands and leveled it at Gobil's heart.
Gobil stretched a hand toward Aslan's face to stop him. Aslan knocked the palm away with his elbow and drove the blade forward.
A soft thud, then a dry snap.
The stab punched through the heart, shattered several ribs, and buried itself deep in Gobil's chest.
Gobil, who had been barely upright in a half-crouch, collapsed to his knees the moment Aslan stepped back.
Clatter.
The longsword fell from his grip.
"Keuhk... gwu...."
Life poured from his mouth like a waterfall. What little remained.
Gobil's chest plate grew crimson as he groped at the dagger embedded in his heart.
Blood streamed unceasingly from his lips. He spat it out as his eyes flew wide open.
He was dying. Gobil felt it closing in.
Heaving shallow, ragged breaths, he barely forced the air out.
He would die having left nothing behind. The moment he sensed that fate, Gobil fought it with every fiber of his being. He clawed at his failing consciousness and tried to resist.
He stretched a fumbling hand toward the longsword he had dropped.
Until a girl's bare foot came down on the blade.
A girl stood before him, her foot planted on the sword to bar his way, her face alight with killing intent.
Her blue-violet eyes bore no emotion whatsoever. They held a vegetal stillness, more plant than creature. Gobil met those eyes and gasped for breath.
The shortsword came free with a soft hiss. It was a blade the girl had swung again and again to reap lives, now stained dark.
Unlike the killing edge of the sword, there was not a flicker of murder in her eyes.
Gobil and Fay locked gazes. The instant Fay moved to thrust her blade home, Aslan caught her wrist.
Fay turned her blue-violet eyes calmly to Aslan. He shook his head once and grasped the dagger buried in Gobil's chest himself.
Dropping to one knee, Aslan gripped the feather-shaped dagger tightly and spoke.
"Your choices were wrong... but I know. I know you are no evil man. I know you acted according to your honor."
Gobil could not answer. The last scraps of his life permitted nothing more than a twitch of his fingers. Aslan watched his pupils contract and dilate and delivered his judgment.
"Maybe... we could have fought back to back."
"You unlucky... bastard...."
A hoarse laugh trickled out. The words Gobil wrung from the last breath of his life were neither curse nor resentment. They were the quiet reproach of a warrior who had accepted his death. Aslan looked into that warrior's eyes and drove the dagger deeper.
"Huh...."
Gobil's final breath escaped. His pupils bloomed wide, then veiled over. His head drooped. So Gobil died. The ground beneath him was blackish-red with the blood that had poured out.
Aslan gazed at the body for a moment, then pulled the dagger free. He wiped the blade against the back of his knee and channeled mana into his cloak.
The cloak, infused with a massive two hundred points of mana, gave a faint tremor and then recalled every dagger Aslan had thrown or dropped. Blades came skittering and slithering through the seams of the cloak.
Even the dagger in his hand returned into its folds. Fay, who had been staring quietly at his back — it seemed faintly bitter — opened her mouth.
"Why did you do that?"
When Aslan turned his head, Fay's face was expressionless. Even the cheerful mask she habitually wore was gone.
With a face like a doll's, Fay spoke.
"I don't understand."
I.
Aslan knew that to appear properly elf-like, to play the part of an elf, Fay substituted her own name for I.
Which meant the words coming out now were her unvarnished truth. No act.
"He could have tried to take you with him. Some hidden trick at the last moment. If he'd had a fireball scroll, it could have been dangerous."
The voice that came from Fay's lips was not her usual bright tone.
It was cold. It reminded Aslan, somehow, of himself.
Hearing that tone, Aslan could only nod in agreement.
If Gobil had possessed a fireball scroll, he might well have used his last breath to mutter the incantation and detonate them both.
"It was unnecessary. If you were going to kill him anyway, there's no difference if I did it."
Fay was scolding him in that cool, distant voice.
Aslan understood exactly where that scolding came from.
"You never taught me to do it this way. Why did you?"
It was worry.
Worry that Aslan might get hurt.
Knowing that full well, Aslan simply looked down at Gobil in silence.
Gobil had died on his knees, eyes closed.
There was not a single trace of priesthood on his body.
Not even partial priestification.
"But a man deserves a proper end."
Fay closed her mouth and stared at Aslan. Aslan met her eyes and continued.
"He said he would do whatever it took... but I saw him hesitate. Some of his warriors showed signs of partial priestification, but Gobil himself? Not even the slightest mark. He was still human."
Aslan spoke and turned his head; Fay rolled her eyes to look at Gobil too. The pooled blood was merely a dark red.
"If he had undergone priestification, he could have fought more effectively. Maybe the whole battle would have gone differently. But he didn't."
As he spoke, something suddenly crossed his mind and he gave a bitter smile.
That bitterness was too deeply internal for Angie or Ereta to read, but not for Fay.
To Fay, Aslan was the entire world.
"You feel kinship with him?"
Aslan started to answer, then closed his mouth.
He could not deny it. Fay knew him too well.
"Yes."
"Why?"
A question. A question rose on the expressionless elf's face.
Aslan looked at his old companion and the corner of his mouth lifted.
"Because... I might have ended up just like him."
Aslan felt kinship with Gobil.
The willingness to use any means necessary. The drive to do what no one else could. The vein of goodwill that ran beneath it all.
In Gobil, Aslan saw the failure that might have been his own.
Much was different, but Aslan saw himself in Gobil.
The recognition left a bitter aftertaste. It stirred a compassion born of that kinship.
And so he had met him with care and given him a conscientious end.
He had done it even knowing that becoming sentimental in moments like this could ruin everything.
That was the human part Aslan had never quite been able to let go.
He bent and picked up Gobil's shield from the ground.
A shield the priests had likely given him. The green-scaled shield gave off a sullen, murky light.
Aslan strapped it to his hip and turned his gaze back to Fay.
Beneath that expressionless face, he could faintly feel the worry. The fear of losing him.
Aslan reached out and stroked Fay's hair. Red strands slipped softly through his fingers.
"Thank you. For worrying about me. You were afraid I'd get hurt, weren't you?"
Fay blinked. Her large blue-violet irises vanished behind her eyelids once, twice, then reappeared.
Fay was nothing like a typical elf.
As far as Aslan understood, Fay was what people would call a psychopath.
"Yes."
But she cherished Aslan.
She had been so worried about him that she had resolved to finish the fight herself, thinking it better that she be the one hurt.
So he had to tell her.
"I could fight without hesitation because you were guarding my back. Thank you, Fay."
He whispered the words and kept stroking her hair. The high body heat unique to elves radiated against his palm.
Slowly, emotion crept across Fay's cold, blank face. The mask crumbled.
The smile that formed was not her usual mischievous grin.
It was an oddly softened expression, the corners of her mouth and eyes folding gently. As she lowered her gaze, Aslan smiled back and withdrew his hand.
"Let's go back."
Fay nodded.
*
The first thing Aslan received when he led the dwarves toward the city was stares of bewilderment.
The second was a rising murmur, and the third was the wary regard of the warriors.
Amid the reactions he had expected, Aslan focused on the voices around him.
"That's... Gobil? Gobil is dead?"
"Did the dwarves kill him?"
"No, if the dwarves killed him... they're awfully docile. Why are they so docile?"
"And who is that man?"
As the crowd buzzed, the warriors took in the sight of Gobil's corpse and directed wary glances at Aslan and the dwarves.
Their eyes held not only wariness but confusion.
If the dwarves had done the killing, the dwarves were now meekly bearing the body. They carried no weapons.
If Aslan had done it, he had walked in far too openly and now stood quietly, as if waiting for something.
No one knew what to do, so they simply kept their guard up.
After weathering the suspicion and the questions for a long moment, Aslan signaled the dwarves as the crowd began to thicken. They brought forward one corpse in particular.
The warrior whose body showed the most extensive partial priestification.
A familiar suit of heavy plate encased a body that seemed disturbingly less than human. The gathered people stared at it in consternation. The murmuring swelled.
"Behold this warrior! It was he who slew Gobil, acting chieftain of the Honor Tribe!"
Aslan flung the cry into the crowd before anyone could react to it.
And before the reaction could come, he pressed on.
"These dwarves fought desperately to hold back as many of the warriors as they could, but Gobil's personal guard — this man among them — were too numerous. In the end, they killed Gobil and tried to slaughter the dwarves as well."
A murmur rippled through the crowd. Voices of disbelief.
Aslan ignored them and kept speaking.
"By the time I arrived, it was already over. I protected the dwarves and Gobil's body, and I drew my sword to thwart their plot."
Their.
Eyes fell upon the corpse. Its armor was rent or shattered, and the marks of priesthood stood out starkly amidst what remained of its humanity.
Those who did not recognize those marks as signs of priesthood were simply bewildered.
"They were the pawns of a priest, and their plan was to hand this city over to the priesthood. To make it a city of the Poison-spitting Dragon!"
The dwarves had been trying to stop it, he added. As the crowd's noise rose, Aslan searched the throng for Dorel.
Dorel was approaching with Tiyamal's support.
Angie and Ereta flanked him.
The plan Aslan had given his party was simple.
Fay would remain in the city. Once Gobil departed for the mine, she would neutralize the guards at the gate and open it.
Then the party would enter and deal with Gobil's remaining faction while Aslan subdued Gobil himself.
A simple plan with no points of failure, so long as everyone carried out their role.
Given the sheer combat power of this party, failure had never been a serious possibility. Seeing his companions unharmed told Aslan that the remnants had been completely suppressed.
He continued without a trace of hesitation.
"But before he died, Gobil negotiated with the dwarves. Gobil and the dwarves reached an accord!"
At Aslan's nod, a dwarf whose arms were ravaged by burns stepped forward and dropped the sack he had cradled in his arms.
Iron ore spilled out in a clattering rush.
Smiths in the crowd recognized the high-quality ore and let out exclamations of awe. Aslan spoke into the noise.
"The dwarves, moved by Gobil's resolve, have ceded the land they inhabited. On that land stands an ancient imperial city — and beneath it, an iron deposit so vast it encompasses the whole of that city!"
An ancient imperial city. An immense vein of iron stretching beneath the entire city. The crowd's muttering tilted away from unease and toward something else. Aslan allowed himself a slight smile.
"They demand only one thing in return! Accept them as friends and let them dwell in this city! Will you accept these dwarves as your allies?"
People exchanged opinions. Even the warriors traded glances or voiced their thoughts — but only voiced them. No consensus formed.
The problem was simple enough. There was no chieftain.
With no chieftain to render a decision, everyone simply passed the responsibility along.
That was when Dorel pushed through the crowd and stepped forward.
"I, Dorel — son of Remul, brother of Gobil, and newly appointed acting chieftain — will accept that proposal."
Dorel spoke with a fractured voice and a face swollen from beatings. Though his voice was cracked and hoarse, no one mocked him. The limping, propped-up acting chieftain continued.
"Those foul priestly pawns crept into our city, sought to murder the sons of Remul, and aimed to seize the land of the most honorable people of the mountains! They meant to swallow the city whole when the sons of Remul were dead and the city lay empty!"
The crowd's eyes settled on Dorel. He shrugged off the arm supporting him and stood on his own legs.
"I too nearly died at their hands, but by fortune, the comrades of this righteous lord, Lord Aslan, saved me and I survived. As acting chieftain, I will not stand idle before such a threat!"
As he proclaimed this proudly, Dorel extended a hand. The dwarf with the burns on both arms made a puzzled, guttural sound.
"In the face of the great threat of the priesthood, I accept these dwarves — who protected my brother — as our allies!"
Dorel's swollen face was heavy with grief as he spoke. Only someone with Aslan's sharp eye would have noticed it.
He mourned the knowledge that his own brother had crossed a line that should never have been crossed.
Aslan watched Dorel in silence. Dorel glanced back at him and forced the sorrow from his expression.
"Let any who object, or any who possess the honor and deeds befitting a chieftain, step forward and challenge me!"
That bold, ringing declaration carried a weight of authority that belied a man who limped and bled. His outstretched hand held resolve, and the self-possession in his nearly swollen-shut blue eyes was unmistakable.
Perhaps because of that, no one stepped forward and no one spoke. In the sudden, heavy silence, Dorel scanned the crowd, then made his way to the dwarves. He limped to them, and the lead dwarf tilted his head, then opened his arms.
"Friend...."
Dorel embraced the dwarf. The murmured word rang out with startling clarity in the dense quiet.
As the people looked at one another and traded unspoken emotions, Aslan simply watched the scene.
Goodwill did not always produce good outcomes, but this time, he hoped it would.
As he gazed at the dwarf and Dorel, a large message appeared before his eyes.
[Completed Sub-Quest]
[ ! Support the Honor Tribe's Chieftain Succession]
[Ongoing Main Quest]
[ ! Forge an Alliance with Baramunz]
Aslan read the two quest notifications and let out a long breath.
It was time to go back.