"Did you really think I was just going to let you and the bard ride off on your merry way with my daughter in tow?" Ares asked as he materialized.
"No, but I hoped you had gained a little sense in the last few hundred years. You're not getting her."
"Xena, I've been more than fair. I gave you some time. Let you stop a war that would have been interesting. I haven't even brought up the fact that we have a marriage agreement in this lifetime. It's time we sat down and talked."
How dare he bring that up. And why was he so insistent about having Camilla? Was it just a ploy to force the marriage or did he have something much darker in mind. He moved toward Valentina and Camilla. "Take another step, and it will be the twilight of the gods, part two."
He put his hands up as if he hid no weapons. The weapon he hid besides his godly powers were ones of mental warfare. She wasn't reassured. "I just want to see her," he said.
"Right, and the Trojans just wanted to throw a surprise party." She ran and flipped in front of him, blocking his path. "If you want to get to her, you'll have to get through me."
"Don't think I won't, my dear," he said.
He raised a hand. Xena didn't know whether it was a strike or to try and lull into her a false sense of security. She didn't wait to find out. She blocked it with her gauntlet.
Whatever they started out as they were strikes now and he threw fist after fist as she threw block after block. Until she threw a good snap kick that threw him back, creating space between them.
"So it's okay for mortals to change but not gods?" he asked as he raised back up.
She wrapped her whip around his ankle and jerked him to the ground, face down. "We've been down that road before. You become mortal and start acting like a halfway decent human being and then as soon as you get your godhood back, it's business as usual. So don't give me that I've changed bit."
He'd gotten closer in the course of her talking. "You didn't makes mistakes along the way on your road to redemption?"
"That's not the same thing, and you know it." She grabbed his shoulders as if to embrace him and instead kneed him in the middle.
He oomphed and doubled over somewhat but sent her falling to the ground with a sweep.
She tucked her body to roll to keep from absorbing the impact, but she didn't complete it before he pinned her to the ground by her wrists. "Would you just listen to me for once in your life-lives?" he amended.
"Why?" she asked as she snaked her legs around him to hold him in place. "You haven't deceived me enough already?"
"I'm trying here, okay? For you and Camilla. Is that so wrong?"
She twisted her body so that she rolled him over and used the weight of her body to pin him down. "It was you who taught me it's not in your nature to change."
"For love, I just might."
She couldn't believe he was trying to pass off darkening her deeds again as in the name of love.
She moved her arm to elbow him across the face, but she was met with dirt. The coward had disappeared.
"Wow, that was one of the coolest fights I've ever seen," Valentina gushed, coming up to her with the baby still in her arms. "Of course, up to now the only fights I've seen have been barroom brawls and playground squabbles, but still that was amazing."
"I'm glad you enjoyed it. You'll probably see a lot more of it. He doesn't give up easily," she said, standing up and brushing the dirt off.
"You can't really blame him. Camilla is his daughter after all."
"Trust me, she is as much a weapon to him as his sword. You just don't know him like I do."
"Maybe not, but I know he came and found me."
"What?" Getting knocked to the ground must have harmed her hearing. Her ears were still ringing.
"Yeah, I was just working in the field one day, and he appeared telling me that I could change you for the better, help you be a good person with nothing more than my words. I was a skeptic too at first. I thought, why me. Why would the god of war want to keep someone from warring? It doesn't make sense."
Why indeed.
