Chapter II: Remainder
Eirena glanced over her belongings.
There were few things in her small satchel; two sets of clothes other than her armor, two fine daggers, and a book: The History of the Mage Clan Wars. Of all these things it was the book that she considered the most precious. It was ancient as she was, and similarly, in remarkable condition. Its pages were littered with notes, some of the writing in it belonged to her sisters, and in two places were pieces of advice from The Prophet himself. The Enchantress brushed her fingertips over these inky lines, reaching out with her senses to feel the fading mark left behind by their presence. She could feel the faintest warmth emanating from these scripts, but so much time had gone on that it could have been the fabrication of her mind...
She missed them terribly.
For much of her life she'd been training to fight against the Darkness, The Prime Evils, The Vizjerei Clan... but she had never been asked, or had the courage to ask herself, what came after?
She had nothing. This time was not her own. These people were foreign to her. Their humor, their manner of speaking, their dress and etiquette... at best she was antiquated, a relic of a time that had faded into the crack of a history book.
"Eirena, are you busy?"
No... she did still have something left.
"What do you wish of me?" she asked, turning to face the Demon Hunter. Valla appeared much better than she had the other day. There were still dark bags under her eyes, souvenirs from countless nights staying vigilant for demonic attacks. Portions of her fair skin remained bruised, but otherwise she was whole. She stood there like a statue in the doorway, her face impassive, as it often was, while she searched for the words she wanted to speak.
"We set off for Kingsport today. It was an impulsive decision on my part." She shifted her weight to another foot. "I only just realized that I didn't take you into consideration. Your job is finished; if there's something else you'd like to d-"
"-no!"
The sudden outburst took them both by surprise. The Enchantress rubbed her arm uncomfortably, blushing to the floor.
"What I mean is...my mission has always been to follow you and be of use. Where you go there are many opportunities to better this world," she clarified. Eirena tried to keep her voice from cracking as it grew softer. "If...if you would have me, of course."
Valla regarded her with a strange, understanding look. Her charcoal black eyes poured over her, sucking her existence into their bottomless depths. It was unnerving, though not unpleasant. In fact, it was only when Eirena was being regarded this way that she knew that someone was attempting to see her for what she truly was. It made her feel...present.
"I usually prefer to work alone," Valla admitted after a time. Eirena tensed. "But I've had to grow accustomed to company in the last few months. You can stay with me as long as you like, Eirena."
The Enchantress released a breath of relief, and nodded, smiling bashfully. "I... you truly are a hero, Valla. Your abilities suggest nothing less." She fidgeted with her hands behind her back. "And I've also come to think of you as a friend. Does this displease you?"
The Demon Hunter watched her for a time, and then shut the door behind herself, leaving the two women in relative seclusion. For the first time, Eirena saw something resembling uncertainty unfold across her face. The woman's features softened, exposing a weaker side of her the Enchantress would never have suspected to exist.
"It doesn't, in fact," said Valla. She motioned to a nearby stool; her dark eyes flicked up in askance. "May I?"
"O-of course!" Eirena rushed to pull it out, but Valla raised a hand for pause, seating herself without trouble. Eirena quickly took a spot opposite from her companion, pushing her belongings off to the side, and bringing a candle forward for better light. The entire time, Valla's lips had the faintest impression of what could almost pass for a smile. Somehow, this only made Eirena want to please her more.
"You might notice that I've been somewhat...distant from you since you started traveling with us," she remarked slowly. She gazed into the firelight at the end of the tallow. It made her eyes gleam like wet pitch. "It wasn't that I didn't like you or approve of you, Eirena. I want you to know that."
The Enchantress tucked a blonde strand of hair behind her ear tentatively. The Demon Hunter observed this motion, and this time she was sure that Valla had smirked.
"You just remind me of someone..." She lowered her gaze; her lashes veiled her eyes from view. "Someone I lost a long time ago; someone that was the reason I am what I am today."
"Who?" Eirena didn't know what else to ask. She recognized that it was a painful subject. As good as Valla was at shrouding her emotions, alone she could spot the space between her brow knot up beneath her skin.
"Halissa," she answered honestly. Valla swallowed, looking first at the ceiling, and then at the table. "She was my little sister, and she was the most beautiful thing you've ever seen. She had blonde hair and blue eyes...just like yours." She looked directly at Eirena. "She was like sunshine, pure and...uncorrupted. And when the demons came..." Eirena saw the hatred seep into Valla's face. It became hard again. Her knuckles grew white in their fists. Fire burned the oil blackness in her irises. The Enchantress didn't want to admit that merely looking at her, though she knew she'd never hurt her, was frightening.
"Did she die in the attack?"
"That might have been a mercy," she breathed, calming herself. "But if she had died, then I would have lost my will to live then and there. I wouldn't have found the strength to run, and would probably have perished myself." Valla rubbed the back of her neck, wincing at a crick that wouldn't go away. "I took her away with me. The town had nothing and no one left. We only had each other. The next few days were hard, and I don't even know how I acquired what little food and shelter we had. I don't remember that part, and I don't care to." She huffed sardonically at her memories. "I do remember the fear, though, using branches to sweep our tracks, wading through a stream and marshland to get rid of our scent. Halissa grew more and more unstable. She was stone quiet, initially, too terrified to say or do much anything..." Valla lifted her hands, moving her fingers along with her coming explanation, "Demons are sentient beings. They claw their way into your mind, even when you've physically escaped them. They break down your defenses and use every fear and weakness you have against you. My teacher, Josen, told me that you are the demon's greatest weapon, and I never questioned it, having watched my own sister succumb to one."
Eirena poured a glass of water, nudging it forward. Valla took it gratefully.
"So what happened to her?"
"She went mad," The Demon Hunter sighed heavily. "One night she ran screaming and flailing, first at me, and then into the wild, and then towards the river. She fell in the water, grasping the ledge. I did everything, everything I could to help her, but she seemed more terrified of me than she did the currents. She let go, and I found her body on the banks further down. I buried her body in a makeshift grave of cairn stones."
"What did you do then?"
Valla shrugged. "I stayed there. I had lost everything I had left in this world, except my life. For hours or maybe even days, I kept near her grave trying to find reason in it all: the attack, the running; her death...but there was none. We were victims with no one left to avenge us. That's when Josen found me with a group of Hunters." She folded her hands together on the table. "He verified everything I'd already figured out. There was no reason. And we were victims of terrible crime that would go unpunished unless I became a survivor and my own avenger. He taught me that after a point, reasoning was useless, action was everything, and that hatred would fuel me where morality would not. Years later, here I am," she nodded to herself simply.
The two women stared at each other for a time. It was not an uncomfortable silence that passed between them, but one of mutual empathy and respect. They had both lost, or thought they had lost, everything that mattered on this earth. They ran on their memories and their convictions. They were sisters of loss and retribution. Eirena no longer felt so alone.
"You just..." The Enchantress shot up. Valla paused; her mouth remained open with the glass of water in her hand, slouched in the chair. She looked up at her. "Every time I look at you I can't help but think you and Halissa would look so much alike, if she had a chance to..."
The sentence hung in the stagnant air of the room.
Live.
Eirena nodded, giving a meek smile in return. "Thank you for telling me, my friend. I, too, feel...hollow. Yet I know that it is not I that should be feeling hollow, but the world. I am a person displaced by time. My era has passed. Therefore, I cannot help but feel there is a great consequence for my being here." She pressed a hand to her forehead, sliding her bangs away from her face. "Part of that consequence is that I no longer have the right to choose my own life. It is as you have said; I came here for one purpose, and that purpose is fulfilled. But you have found a way in which to live. So far, I have not."
"You think I can help you get an idea?" asked Valla. "You think I can guide you in the right direction."
"I think," she admitted shyly, "It's a start."
Before she even had the chance to look up, the Demon Hunter was already on her feet. She reached out with one hand, smoothing down the top of her hair.
"You have a gentle and honest heart, Eirena," she said. Her voice had always been smooth, low. It was a sound men would call seductive. In a fight it could become terrifying. Here, Eirena heard a note of something more; of experience and unconditional care. In Valla at that moment, she heard the voices of her sisters. Her throat clenched at this revelation. "Of course you may come with me," she continued. "What you're going through is difficult, but I want you to know you can speak to me whenever you need to. You're too kind to suffer this way." Valla hesitated here. "I-I'm sorry. I'm not very good with this."
"No," Eirena objected. Tears brimmed her cerulean eyes. She struggled to breathe without sobbing. "No, you're wonderful, my friend."
The Enchantress couldn't see well, but again, she could sense that the Demon Hunter had nearly smiled. Valla started walking towards her satchel. She carefully piled Eirena's belongings neatly within its folds, tying it securely.
"Meet us at the foot of the Keep out the southern gate," she instructed. "We head off at the end of the hour."
"What do you think of all this?"
Lyndon swore silently under his breath, securing the last of their provisions in the caravan. Kormac sat at the end of the wagon, his legs swinging freely across the edge.
"Think of all what?" he asked.
The Templar stretched his hand before him in an arc, motioning to Bastion's Keep and its battlefield around him. "Everything that's transpired here. With all due respect to Valla, it's difficult to believe that one woman can lay such waste to an army, let alone vanquish The Prime Evil."
Lyndon still wasn't quite sure what to make of his question. He sat across from him on the wooden boards, grabbed a bottle from a nearby crate, and after some consideration, grudgingly took another.
"Rum?" he offered the extra bottle.
The Templar shook his head.
"Oh come on now! It's sacramental rum."
"I have never once heard of sacramental rum," Kormac said stoically.
"Well you have now!" Lyndon set it down in front of him, tired of holding it in the air. "Blessed by yours truly and whatever Gods you please. Now then, to answer your vague question...you've traveled with our resident Demon Hunter the longest, have you not?"
"I have." Kormac eyed the bottle before him mistrustfully. "What of it?"
Lyndon took a swig of his drink. "Well, in that case you've always seen how she fights; like a starving wet cat with its last life on the line."
"In a manner of speaking, yes," he conceded grudgingly. Kormac continued staring at the bottle.
"That being said," Lyndon went on, "'You can't question she's a vicious fighter, so why do you question what she did out here?" He pointed to the corpses littered around them with his eyes. Kormac was still staring at the bottle. Lyndon rolled his eyes. "Oh take a swig already. I won't tell anyone."
Kormac snorted, "Do you swear on your honor?" he asked sarcastically.
"No, but I'll swear on yours. It seems to mean oh-so-much to you," he replied sweetly, batting his eyelashes. "Hells if I know why. You can't drink honor, you can't sell it or eat it or bed it. Yet it's so damnably heavy, weighing you down, making it almost impossible to relax without having the Rod of Guilt shafted up your ass in the process."
Kormac's face grew red. Lyndon nudged his bottle closer to him. The Templar grabbed it, bit off the stopper, and drank.
Lyndon didn't dare chuckle since he knew a lecture would be well under way for that little slip up. He leaned back against the caravan.
"But, thinking a bit more, it does seem rather incredible. The Prime was defeated single-handedly. I mean, we were there too, clearing the way, but it's almost impossible to believe she took Diablo down on her own. The Hells, the Heavens, the Eternal Conflict...it all sounds like the stuff of legend and myth."
"We're now part of legend and myth as well," Kormac reminded him. "And I guess you did bring up a good point; we were there right up until the very end."
"Exactly," he smirked. "We've riddled holes in a few dozen demons ourselves. And now our next adventure is-!"
"In Kingsport for you," Kormac pointed. "Next it's my Order. Though it doesn't seem very grand, compared to this."
"Have neither one of you stopped to consider that this isn't over?"
The two men choked on their drinks, turning towards the voice. Valla and Eirena approached the caravan, dropping their few belongings in with the others.
"What do you mean, it's not over yet?" asked Kormac.
The Demon Hunter strapped the bags into place. "There's someone that got away that needs to be punished. Leah must be avenged."
The three of them looked at each other.
Adria.
"Then why are we wasting time running errands?" Lyndon demanded. "This is a dozen times more important."
"Because we don't know where she's gone, and there's a high chance that she hasn't forgotten us." Valla's dark hair swung before her face like a curtain. "Getting things done on our own agendas, clearing out any demons we see along the way, and waiting for her to make the first move will give us a means to start hunting her down. I'm not going to forget her treachery anytime soon, be assured of that."
"Anywhere you go, I go, my friend," Eirena chirped. Valla patted the Enchantress on her arm at the remark.
"Go on to the front. I'll be there shortly."
Neither one of the men missed the kind tone of her voice. They exchanged quizzical looks.
"Kormac, you won't need to wear such heavy armor on the caravan. Use leathers and keep your spear on you instead. Lyndon, sit further back and have your crossbow at your side at all times. You're on lookout for any ambush and you're also calling out directions as you remember the way," she ordered.
"As you command."
"If that's what the lady wants."
Valla nodded, started heading towards the front, and stopped suddenly. She pivoted around to face them.
"Thank you for your hard work earlier...I couldn't have done it without you."
