Legacies of Blood

Elaina pulled herself from her slumber with the feeling of something heavy in her hands. When her eyes opened, she was sitting in darkness, but the travel pack she’d left behind in Zelmesca was sitting uncomfortably on her chest. Fleeting images of Kaethe speaking to her flashed through her mind, though she couldn’t recall her exact words. She remembered her sister handing her the pack just before she woke up, but it being physically present with her seemed almost impossible.

Sliding the pack off her and onto the floor, Elaina took a moment to take in her surroundings. The room was small, and the bed was simple with wool blankets. Though she remembered it being relatively warm when she came through the fardoor, there was a chill in the air. A narrow slit of a window nearby showed that it was night, but what hour remained a mystery to her. Hanging from the wall opposite her was a horizontal crescent moon and stars cast in bronze---the holy symbol of the Sophitian faith.

Where the rest of the room was constructed of sturdy stone brick, the door at the front of the room was made of heavy oak bound with iron fittings. Elaina’s heart skipped a beat as she anxiously stared at the iron. The blanket slipped from her body as she took in her surroundings, calling her attention to her nude state. Her mouth went dry at the thought of strangers seeing her naked in her unusual state. Hearing distant shouting from outside her room, Elaina decided it was past time she got dressed.

Elaina grabbed the first clothes she could from her pack, which seemed to be better organized than last she’d left it. Even the gifts she had been given before departing Willowridge were included, meaning she would have something to study and read when she had some downtime next. She pulled the tunic and trousers of her traveling clothes on, but before she could slip into her boots, the door flew open, illuminating the room with candlelight.

A woman dressed in modest priestess robes stared at her in confused surprise before stepping into the room with the candle she held in one hand. She softly pushed the door closed behind her but left it ajar. “We need to get you out of here.”

“What’s going on?” Elaina asked as the shouting from outside the room grew louder.

“There’s no time to explain,” the priestess argued, her eyes passing over the pack and Elaina’s clothes, her brows knitting together in confusion. “Where did you get those?”

“Don’t worry about it,” Elaina said as she got to her feet. A slight wave of vertigo washed over her before she got her bearings. She heard a door slam at the end of a corridor as the shouting drew closer. The swordmage could make out some of the angry words being spouted as another female pleaded for everyone to turn around and leave the church in peace.

“They’re coming for you,” the priestess said in a distressed voice. “We tried. I swear we tried.”

Elaina glanced around the room again and spotted her sword in its sheath tucked neatly under her bed, along with the damaged armor from the night of her battle with Royce. Leaning down, she grabbed the sword and stepped out of the room.

“Stay here,” Elaina muttered to the priestess before emerging into the corridor. Some candles burned from sconces along the walls, casting everything in a dark orange light. At the far end, a mob of black-hooded individuals pushed their way past another priestess toward her, stopping short when the redhead came into view.

“That’s her,” one of the people in the mob muttered to the apparent leader. Every one of them was wearing masks, each of which was kept as plain as possible to make them indistinguishable from one another to the casual observer. “That’s the mutant.”

“She’s broken no laws!” The priestess in the corridor protested, only to be shoved roughly up against the wall. “Please, you can’t do this.”

“You’ve sullied and perverted a sacred place with that thing here,” one of the hooded individuals snapped. “Speak again, and you will be punished for such heresy.”

“Oh, boy,” Elaina muttered, taking a step forward as she drew her weapon, tossing the scabbard onto the floor. “You guys don’t know what you’re getting into, so I’ll give you a chance to turn around and walk away. But if you lay one more hand on that woman or try anything with me, I won’t be so nice.”

“You’re in no position to be making threats, mutant,” the leader said, drawing a gleaming dagger from somewhere within his billowing cloak. The other mob members also drew their weapons, some of which were daggers, while others were short swords or rapiers. Elaina’s unseen sense for magic buzzed slightly, indicating to her that the blades were magical to some degree.

“That’s cute,” Elaina said, motioning to their weapons with her free hand. “I’m sure you’re popular with the traveling circus.”

“Silence!” the leader snapped, beginning to stalk toward her. “You’ve dishonored this place of faith for long enough.”

Elaina’s expression darkened as she placed her free hand on the flat of her blade, focusing her will on her innate magic. “*Radanta Lan.”*

The light of the Radiant Blade spell blazed to life, filling the corridor and overwhelming the modest glow of the candles. The mob hesitated in their advance at the display of magic, which Elaina used to her advantage to strike first. She dropped into the Guardian Stance just before reaching the leader, allowing her to move effectively in the corridor’s confined space.

The redhead opened with a thrust, driving the blade toward the leader’s midsection only to find that he was quick enough to brush it away with his dagger. The weapons sparked as the opposing magics clashed, possibly startling a lesser combatant who didn’t understand what had happened. However, it didn’t have the surprising effect the leader wanted, as Elaina pivoted and slammed her elbow into the masked man’s face. He stumbled away from her, opening a pocket for her to advance on the others as they brought their weapons to bear.

Their movements were crude and ineffectual. Their footwork showed that their training was rudimentary and focused on dueling rather than working together as a unit. Using the Guardian Stance taught to her by Kitch, she was able to deceive them into thinking their numbers were an asset rather than a liability until the last moment. She knocked several attacks aside, each sparking and hissing with every contact the weapons made.

Elaina moved briskly from one attacker to the next, striking at any opening she created or they presented to her in their awkward movements. As the swordmage shoved one of the men into the wall, another came down on her with a chopping motion with his short sword. Parrying it to one side, using the man’s momentum to her advantage, Elaina followed with a slash up the man’s back, causing him to twist and contort in pain before falling to the ground.

The man with the rapier was slightly more adept than the others, thrusting forward and rolling her blade to the side as she intercepted. His movements were wide and prone to flourishes better suited to open areas, giving Elaina the advantage every time their blades met. He was on the back foot almost as quickly as he’d advanced. The swordmage blocked low, forcing the rapier’s tip to the floor before she brought the glowing blade diagonally upward across his chest. Elaina felt the weapon pass through his clothing and skin with equal ease, forming a bloody line from his navel to shoulder.

Another of the attackers threw himself at her in a tackle, binding her up with his arms so that another of his gang could strike a fatal blow. The swordmage leaned into the hold, swinging her legs around until her bare feet were pressed firmly against the wall. Pushing with all of her strength, she and the man holding her shot across the narrow corridor into the opposite wall, where the masked man’s skull bounced heavily off the stone bricks. Stunned from the impact, he released her, allowing her to parry the incoming strike of the leader’s dagger to the right while hammering his ribs with a fierce knee from the left.

The cloaked men were only seconds into the fight and had already suffered significant losses. Recognizing this, they began to shrink back, assuming a defensive posture as they edged backward toward the door from whence they came. At least, that was how Elaina read the situation before one of them vanished into a realmshift to attack her from the opposite side. Trusting her kenning, Elaina blocked the blow over her shoulder, causing the man to gasp with surprise as she turned to face him. The others at the door hesitated to press what was supposed to be an advantage.

Elaina’s blade collided with the masked man’s with enough force to knock it back into his own face. He averted his gaze just in time to avoid taking the edge of his sword across his eye, opening up a vertical slice along the side of his skull instead.

“Go, go!” The leader said, motioning for his men to retreat from the corridor. The group nearly tripped over one another to abandon the corridor before the swordmage could turn her attention to them.

Elaina kicked the leg out from under the man in front of her, cutting a horizontal line open across his chest with a backhanded swing before leaving him to bleed on the floor.

“G-goddess!” the priestess gasped with her hands over her mouth, watching Elaina wide-eyed as the swordmage walked past her in her stocking feet to pursue the retreating mob.

Emerging into what looked like a prayer chamber of some kind to the swordmage, Elaina noted the positions of the mob members as they attempted to fan out among the wooden benches to get better attack angles on her. One of them muttered something in their own language as he caused a blast of wind to hurl one of the benches toward her at speed.

Elaina stepped toward it, vanishing into a Faestep that brought her within a foot of the spell caster. The redhead grabbed the man by the face, lifting him briefly off the ground before putting him head first through another of the benches even as the first broke upon the church altar.

“She can realmshift!” One of them exclaimed with surprise as Elaina turned away from the injured man rolling around on the floor, holding his head in pain.

“But she’s not vishanti!” Another argued as he brought his dagger back over his head, channeling a hex into it. He swung several times, causing arcs of cutting wind to leap from the blade in rapid succession in her direction. Following her instincts, Elaina leaned to one side, narrowly avoiding the first strike, before ducking under the second. With nowhere left to go on the third, she lashed out with her blade, knocking the hex to one side, where it cut deeply into the wood of the nearest bench.

A strong sensation set the back of Elaina’s skull ablaze, prompting her to leap to her right as a glowing dagger shot through the space she’d occupied a second before. She only caught a glimpse of it as it sailed by, only fully realizing what she’d avoided when it sank several inches into the stone wall behind her. The leader, the source of the hexed dagger, stared at her in utter disbelief, his arm still outstretched from the throw. “....How?”

Elaina closed the distance between them with another Faestep even as he magically summoned the dagger back to him. She met him with a swift kick to the chest, forcing him to stumble away from her and miss the turning dagger. The swordmage pivoted, knocking the blade out of the air as it approached, and sent it sailing into the shoulder of the nearest masked man.

“YEAARGH!” The man screamed, the wound hissing and bubbling around the blade embedded in his shoulder as he struggled to pry it out. Elaina recalled Royce telling her about the nature of mystic weapons and how their attunement to their owner caused any other to burn at its touch.

“Vile mutant freak!” Another man near the church entrance howled, his hands rolling in a quick circular motion before he hurled a blazing fire hex in her direction. Elaina didn’t think about her response; she simply reacted, interposing the blade between her and the glowing ball of heat careening toward her face. The hex bounced off the magic that infused her weapon, rebounding back on the caster in the blink of an eye.

The man didn’t see it coming, catching the hex in the face before it erupted into a localized conflagration so intense it knocked him back through the doors to tumble limply down the stairs. Breathing heavily, Elaina’s eyes darted around the room at the other men, afraid that she wouldn’t be able to keep up if they all decided to start hurling such spells at her simultaneously. Fortunately, their coordination was just as bad as it had been at the start, made worse by the damage she’d done to them since the fight started.

The high-pitched sound of a metallic whistle outside caught everyone's attention in the room, heralding the imminent arrival of whatever guards patrolled the area. Those who could still focus enough to realmshift took their companions by the hand and vanished into thin air. The only one left behind was the burning victim of his own spell on the steps outside.

The pair of priestesses emerged from the corridor, gasping and gaping at the damage to the prayer chamber. “Lady above...”

Elaina jogged out the front doors with her sword in hand, looking down at the oily black smoke that rose from the twisted, broken body of the masked man at the bottom of the stairs. A sickening wave of nausea washed over her at the smell, intensifying as she realized a small group of bystanders had gathered around to see what had transpired. The redhead hadn’t wanted to kill him. Blocking had been a reflex, but she realized how much worse the situation could have been had it struck the church’s interior instead.

“Damn it,” Elaina muttered as a pair of guards pushed their way through the small crowd. One of them recoiled at the sight of the burning body while the other pointed her weapon in Elaina’s direction.

“Drop your weapon!” The guard shouted authoritatively. “Drop it or---!”

“No, no, no!” One of the priestesses shouted as she appeared beside Elaina, waving her hands over her head. “She’s the one that defended the church! Don’t hurt her!”

The guard’s brows knit together as she looked back at the other. Elaina recognized the other one; she’d been one of the guards who found her and brought her back to recover. By the look on her face, it seemed she recognized her at the same time.

“It’s alright,” the familiar guard said, holding a hand up toward the other. “Stand down. Let’s get these people out of here.”

“Are you injured?” the priestess asked Elaina more calmly, holding a hand up between her eyes and the glowing weapon in Elaina’s hand. The swordmage glanced at her sword sheepishly before extinguishing the spell she’d placed on it.

“Sorry,” Elaina apologized. “No, I’m alright. Just a bump on the head, I think.”

“I’ve never seen anyone fight like that,” the priestess chuckled briefly. “Especially considering the serious condition you were in.”

“Thank you for looking after me, priestess...?” Elaina’s voice trailed off to give the woman room to offer her name.

“Oh!” The woman laughed, offering her hand to Elaina in a friendly gesture. “I’m Flori---Flori Goga, and I’m just an acolyte. I haven’t taken my final vows yet.”

“Right,” Elaina nodded as she took Flori’s hand and shook it. “I’m Elaina Woodlock. Nice to meet you.”

The familiar guard climbed the stairs to approach Elaina, her expression cautious. “You want to explain this, Miss Woodlock?”

“I wish I knew,” Elaina answered, shrugging dramatically. “I woke up, and they were already in the church. I didn’t even have time to get all my clothes on. Then they started to push the other priestess around, so I warned them to leave. They... did not heed my warning, you could say.”

“They forced their way in, Irina,” the other priestess said, emerging into the night air alongside the other priestess. “All of them in masks---perhaps a dozen. They demanded we turn the woman over to them for judgment.”

“Judgment?” the guard---Irina---repeated, her face twisting up with a mixture of dread and confusion. “Because...?”

“Because she’s a mutant,” the other priestess answered coldly. “I told them it didn’t matter. She was injured and needed treatment. It’s my decision to make in my church. They didn’t like my answer.”

“That was reckless, Silvia,” Irina murmured. “You should have sought us out immediately. We could have handled it.”

“It all happened too fast,” Flori objected angrily. “How were we supposed to---?”

Irina held a gentle hand up toward the acolyte, who instantly fell silent. “They woke us in the middle of the night. I admit, I wasn’t acting rationally. I was disoriented.”

“Understandable,” the guard said, glancing over her shoulder as a few pales of water were thrown onto the smoldering corpse sprawled out in front of the church. “They’re getting bolder, aren’t they?”

“Who?” Elaina interrupted. “I have no idea what is going on.”

“They call themselves the Hand of Sophitia,” Sylvia answered, her eyes filled with disgust. “They claim to be acting in her name when they take actions like these---seeking punishment or judgment against those they view as heretics. They even claim that the priestesses, those most loyal to her, have been corrupted by outsiders and become too tolerant of their corrupting influence.”

“I was unconscious,” Elaina scoffed incredulously. “What corrupting could I possibly have been doing.”

“They don’t see you as a corrupting influence,” Irina interjected, lowering her voice. “They see you as corruption personified with your... anatomical difference.”

Elaina’s face grew a little hotter with embarrassment as she glanced around to see who else might have been listening. Two more guards had arrived and were working to disperse the rest of the crowd that wasn’t assisting in putting the fire out, so almost no one’s attention was on her. “How... did they know?”

“That’s a good question,” Irina acknowledged, glancing between the priestess and her acolyte. Both appeared to be at a loss. “I’ll have to look into it, but it shouldn’t matter. We’re not the kind of people who go around lynching people over such things. At least, we didn’t used to be.”

“Things are changing,” Sylvia remarked ominously. “The things they said when they forced their way inside were utterly contemptible. And these people out here simply looked on in silence. No one stepped in to do anything.”

Irina jerked her thumb back toward the thinning crowd. “They were here when these men arrived?”

“They came shortly after, drawn by the commotion,” Sylvia clarified, her bright blue eyes showing contempt for the onlookers. “Even so, they did nothing.”

Irina nodded her understanding, pulling her simple helmet off her head to run through her dark, curly hair. “Alright, we’ll question everyone in the area in the morning.”

“You’re the one that brought me here, aren’t you?” Elaina asked before Irina could excuse herself. “I owe you my life.”

Elaina’s gratitude appeared to catch the woman by surprise. She stared at her blankly for a moment before smiling gently, her eyes gleaming like a pair of peridots in the candlelight. “You’re welcome, Miss Woodlock.”

“Just Elaina is fine,” the redhead corrected gently. “No need to be so formal with me.”

“Nice to meet you, Elaina,” Irina responded, offering her hand to the swordmage. “Sergeant Irina Enache.”

Elaina shook her hand politely before letting her return to her duties, which sounded like they might have her working through the night and into the morning. She chewed her lip a little as she turned her attention to the priestess. “I suppose I should get my things and go, hm?”

“Nonsense,” Sylvia objected, adjusting the fit of her headdress before smoothing out her robe. It looked like she’d thrown it on over a chemise when the mob had come knocking. “You’re welcome to stay the night if you wish. I’ve no intention of putting you out onto the street at a time like this.”

“Thank you. I appreciate that,” Elaina sighed with relief. “I’ll get out of your hair as soon as I get my bearings. I don’t want to overstay my welcome.”

Flori led the way back into the church, with Sylvia following close behind. Elaina looked over her shoulder toward the guards roping off the scene to document the scene properly. She frowned, feeling a pang of regret in her gut again for having to take another man’s life. If she hadn’t reacted as quickly as she did, there was a good chance she would been the one in a smoldering pile instead, but it didn’t make her feel much better about the situation. Had this been what Kaethe had warned her about? What would they have done with her if she had not awakened when she did?

Elaina shuddered at the thought as she padded back into the church in her bare feet.