Disclaimer: Xena and Ares' thing was not harmed in the writing of this chapter.

And here we've arrived at the end! Wow, once I cut out all the crappy characterization and purple prose, I've lost nearly ten thousand words from the original. That's... rather disconcerting.

Anyway, thanks for sticking it out, whoever's left! *u*

Part 3/3. In Which There is an Endin—Xena Disagrees

"I hope you didn't damage your arm again in your... enthusiasm this morning."

Xena jumped, just a bit guiltily.

Gabrielle let her squirm for another moment before rolling her eyes. "No, you weren't that loud," she said, dropping down into the chair next to Xena's. "I just came to check on you at an inopportune time."

Xena laughed. Was it a bit hysterical? She checked. No, she was good.

"Don't think you're off the hook, yet," Gabrielle reminded her. "I'm still angry at you for your suicide run yesterday. Half of a very large army is still a very large army."

"It wasn't ever supposed to be a suicide run."

Gabrielle hummed noncommittally. She finished checking the gash on Xena's side. It'd be a little sore, but it was healing nicely, and began pulling off the bandage wrapped over her shoulder and down to her elbow with quick movements. She paused, and then tugged quickly.

"Ow."

"Xena!" Gabrielle said in dismay.

Xena looked down. The wound had closed over, but it was glistening sickly and flecked with black. Angry red and purple veins branched off from it.

"Why didn't you say something? You can't have not felt this!"

Xena shrugged, and she winced, shifting her shoulder into a more comfortable position. "I didn't have time then."

"Well, you'd better have time now. I'm going to have to drain it."

Xena agreed reluctantly and started shedding armour while Gabrielle went to fetch water, a hollow needle, and more bandages.

When Gabrielle returned and had Xena's arm pinned to the table, she leaned forward, staring into the candle's flame. She cleared her throat.

"So... Are you okay with..."

"Hmm?"

Xena glanced at her. "You know."

Gabrielle laughed. "Never thought you'd get embarrassed."

Xena winced at the jab of the needle. "There's a first time for everything."

Gabrielle hummed again. "Well... Depends."

"On what?"

"Are you gonna get married and settle down on me?"

Xena swung around to stare at Gabrielle blankly. After a moment, she started sniggering.

Gabrielle smiled, her eyes still focussed on the task at hand. "See? We'll be fine. Stop moving."

Xena tried to still her shaking shoulders. "At least—"

"At least what?"

"At least I'd leave you my chakram as a souvenir." Her voice broke and she continued laughing.

Gabrielle rolled her eyes and reached for the water bowl.

"Who says I want your cast-offs?"

Ares found her going over a map with a quill pen in hand.

"Hey," he said, wrapping his arms around Xena's waist and nuzzling her hair. It smelled nice.

"Hi." She gave him a sidelong glance. "Going to lecture me some more?"

"Nah." He said against her scalp. "Unless..."

"Unless what?"

"Unless you're gonna let me punish you as well." He bit down at her neck and grinned when her pulse sped up under his lips.

She laughed, a bit breathily. "What if I'm not into that kind of thing?"

"Oh, I'm sure I could make it worth your while," he said, letting the words rumble in his chest.

"You do realize we're in the middle of a war?"

"That can wait."

She snorted, but she turned in his grasp, tilting her head up.

The kiss was just getting interesting—he loved her hands, soft and rough in just the right places—when the door slammed open.

Ares groaned and disentangled his fingers from Xena's hair reluctantly.

Belasius was looking fairly shell-shocked. His mouth worked soundlessly, and his eyes shifted Xena to Ares and back again.

Mortals, Ares thought. He crossed his arms over his chest and levelled a glare at the man. So he was just a bit frustrated at being interrupted, that's all. Once upon a time, he might have shot off a fireball first and looked later. Damn, he really was going soft.

"Well?" said Xena's razor-sharp voice.

Belasius snapped to attention. "Arctureos is moving, sir. Frontal charge."

"Moving? How? That explosion took out half of his camp yesterday!" Xena said incredulously.

Belasius's throat bobbed, and there was a glint of sweat at his hairline. "He's probably trying to catch us by surprise. His losses yesterday must be infuriating him."

Xena growled. She stared down at the map, tapping her finger against the table's surface. When she looked up again, there was a gleam in her eyes, as if fire was reflecting from her irises. "Get me every able-bodied soldier," she said. "We're going to meet him and crush him." She paused suddenly in thought. "No, actually, light the bonfires we've set up in the plains. Bring all the smoke chips we've collected." She smiled, or at least bared her teeth. "I'm going to give him some chaos to be surprised about first."

Ares looked at her sharply. "You're not going out there alone with those wounds."

"I can't sit this one out after what the men saw yesterday. That would kill morale." She frowned, and her voice hardened. "I know what I'm capable of, Ares. You were the one who gave him this army."

Ares' eyes narrowed. "Then I will go. I'll take away the soldiers and kill him myself. I don't want you to—"

"Stay out of my way, Ares." The gleam had turned malevolent.

Ares' jaw clenched. He tried to think of something to say, but hot rage and cold dread was clouding his mind.

She nodded to Belasius. "Do it."

The general hesitated for a bare moment before he saluted and marched out.

Xena looked back at Ares as if she dared him to challenge her.

Ares shook his head and transported himself away. He recognized that look.

He wasn't sure if he liked it.

Thedalus was twenty two. He'd joined his lord Ares' army six months ago because he heard that the pay was good, and with his face beginning to clear up, the uniform was really attracting the attentions of some of the girls back home in his village. When he was deployed with the rest of the army to follow some guy called Arctureos, he didn't think too much of it, even if Arctureos was clearly insane and high-strung enough to hop up and down and smash things when Lord Ares lost them their shot at Corinth a few months ago. A job was a job, right?

So consider this from his point of view. He had two weeks of leave coming up in a month—hopefully, if this thing against Amphipolis finished up in time—and he hadn't actually managed to fight anyone. After seeing what had happened to some of the other soldiers once Xena had left, he wasn't sure if that wasn't a good thing. He also wasn't sure if he wanted to come back after his leave was up. In any case, he'd make that decision when the time came. For now, he was marching with his unit under the scorching sunlight because Arctureos had practically had an apoplexy when one of the L.T.s had tried to suggest that they retreat for now and regroup. Arctureos had screamed at them a bit and pointed them at Amphipolis right then and there, never mind that it was the middle of the day.

It was a surprise attack, Thedalus reasoned.

So imagine Thedalus's surprise when a cloud drifted across the sun and he looked up to see that it was an awfully dark, low-lying cloud, and was, in fact, not a cloud at all, but smoke that clogged the air and made his throat itch.

His unit slowed uncertainly in their march. The smoke was getting thicker, and it was getting hard to see anything except blurred shadows, even of the people right beside him.

Then, he couldn't see anyone at all.

"Krakus?" he said, squinting around. "Sir?" It was as if he was isolated in a grey, shifting world.

Thedalus took a few steps forward, reasoning that any direction could only be an improvement.

"Sir?"

He was relieved to see a tall shape in the fog in front of him. He ran forward, and it wasn't until steel flashed and he was falling forward with blood rushing over his hands that he recognized the hard blue eyes.

Xena flitted through the smoke like a ghost.

The last soldier had had a chance to shout before her sword slicked through his throat. The noise had caught the attention of two other soldiers, who had come running. They'd bumped into each other in the smoke and wasted a precious few seconds ascertaining that they were on the same side, seconds that Xena used to slip behind them and swing.

She flicked her sword and some more blood splattered to the ground.

There were some shouts and pained gurgles in the smoke.

She smiled. The soldiers were beginning to realize that something was picking them off and getting jumpy. Friendly stabs were sure to follow. She couldn't see very well, either, but her advantage was that everyone was an enemy.

There was a presence to her left.

To the soldier, it must have looked like the smoke flickered. Then, there was a sword through his neck.

Xena wiped her sword off on the man's pants as he sprawled on the ground.

Every good fighter develops something like a sense for life energy. That's why she had always known when Ares was around (he radiated) and it was so difficult to sneak up on Gabrielle anymore. It could be described as the feeling of someone stepping into her personal bubble. What Xena had learned from a swordsmaster in the East, however, was how to extend her bubble and differentiate between the energies of different people. A seasoned warrior did not have the same presence as a farmhand. From what she was sensing in the smoke, a good number of Arctureos's soldiers had little experience as warriors. Well, it was too late to worry about that.

She looked around. The smoke was beginning to drift away under the breeze.

She hadn't actually killed that many soldiers. The confusion and paranoia she'd sown amongst the men, though, that couldn't have gone better.

Satisfied, Xena closed her eyes and extended her senses.

There. She felt Gabrielle.

Xena began to walk.

The smoke had finally dissipated. Arctureos's army was in disarray, all semblance of formation lost. As they located each other, they began to clump together until groups of various sizes dotted the plains. Nearly a fifth lay on the ground, a few cut down with clinical precision, the rest the unlucky victims of blind slashes. Many were clutching injuries and moaning.

The sun seared away the last of the smoke, and when they looked towards Amphipolis, a wall of metal glinted in the light.

And in front of the Corinthian ranks was Xena, tall upon her great cream horse.

She drew her sword slowly, a fierce smile on her face.

"Kill'em all!"

After the initial confusion, Arctureos's army met the Corinthians' charge. Here and there, a Corinthian went down under a thrust of sword or spear, but Arctureos's army could no more break their line than raindrops could collapse a tsunami.

And through it all rode Xena, sword flashing, eyes glowing, like a god of death.

Her sword bit down though another soldier's shoulder, and she kicked a spearman hard enough to crush his nose.

She looked over her shoulder. One of the village boys had gotten separated from the rest of the ranks, and he stumbled and fell, a spear stuck above his collarbone.

Xena kicked off of Argo's saddle, flipping tightly in the air and landing heavily on the soldier who was trying to land a finishing blow on the boy. Reaching over his shoulder, she dragged her blade over his exposed throat.

The boy was gasping in pain, clutching at the heavy spear. It might have nicked an artery, Xena thought. She checked the wound. The tip of the spear had gone in only two fingerwidths, but the weight of the weapon was forcing it down further into the boy's shoulder. She ripped off a piece of the boy's tunic, wadded it into a ball, and yanked the spear up and out.

He cried out, and she pressed the cloth tightly against his shoulder.

"Keep up the pressure!" she told him, guiding his fingers to hold the makeshift bandage in place.

No sooner than she had let go of the boy's hand, she raised her sword up above her head to block a downward stroke directed at her crown.

Her shoulder screamed.

She spun around, using the force of her movement to cleave the soldier's head from his shoulders. A spray of blood spotted her neck and chest, but she knew the hot trickle down her arm hadn't been this man's blood.

Xena swore. She'd torn the stitches.

Another spearman tried to run her through. A quick grab, tuck the spear under one arm, and a stab, all in one movement. What kind of idiot uses a spear in melee combat, anyway?

She glanced down at the boy. His lips were waxy blue, and the cloth was quickly soaking through.

"Kid!" she said.

She couldn't stop to help him. Two swordsmen rushed her, and she jumped up, legs thrown out wide, and kicked them both in the face.

"Kid!"

The boy's fingers slackened further, and the cloth tumbled to the ground. Blood welled from his neck in pulses.

Screaming in rage now, she held her sword flat, supporting it with both hands, and leapt up toward another soldier. The blade crunched into his nose and cheeks. Landing in a crouch, she threw a leg out and around, sweeping another off his feet and to the ground in front of her. She stabbed down.

The boy had stopped bleeding.

Xena didn't waste time yelling anymore. She threw herself into another attack.

It wasn't long before bodies littered the ground around her. Her arm was painfully hot, sending sparks dancing across her vision.

A sword bit down into the ground where she had been a moment ago. She rolled around and slashed hard, diagonally down the soldier's back.

Staggering to her feet, she ignored the limpness in her muscles and the heavy fog on her mind. She had to keep moving.

She sheared through a swordsman's neck and took down another with a tackle and a stab with her breast dagger in her left hand, when there was a wordless roar.

She looked up and around.

Arctureos's soldiers were running.

A couple streamed past her, one giving the boy from her village a kick in the head accidentally as he stumbled past. She took his head off reflexively.

"They're running!" someone shouted, coming toward her.

It was Belasius.

She knelt down and wiped half-heartedly at the blood on the boy's neck, and then she closed his filmed eyes.

"Xena?"

"Status?"

"I don't know all the numbers yet. I think we may have lost a company."

She nodded. Her neck was stiff. Fatigue, she thought.

"Take him back to the village," she said, nodding at the boy at her feet.

"Yessir." Belasius waved in two footmen to pick up the body. He put the boy's sword on his chest and folded his arms over it.

Xena watched them shuffle away, and she turned to Argo, who had sidled up and was nipping her hair.

"Sorry for leaving you, girl." Xena pulled herself up into the saddle. Something hot and wet trickled over her arm at the movement. She didn't look at it.

Nudging Argo with her knees, she let Argo pick her way over the battlefield, giving the occasional nod to a cheering soldier.

She made it back to the tavern like this, and into her room, before her vision stopped being blurry and went, instead, simply black.

"Xena?"

Gabrielle squeezed the excess water from the cloth in her hand, folded it in two, and replaced it on top of Xena's forehead.

She sighed. Xena's fever didn't seem to show any signs of abating. She'd patched up Xena's arm again. At least that went smoothly, what with Xena being unconscious for the process. Aliyah had found some of the medicine Xena had used on her face back when they were being chased by the Olympians. Despite its age, it worked remarkably well. The swelling on Xena's arm seemed to be checking itself. It wasn't receding, though.

"How is she?"

Gabrielle gave Ares a tired look. "As well as she can be," she said. "She wasn't resting her arm properly and giving it a chance to heal. She wasn't eating properly or sleeping either."

Ares frowned at her. "But yesterday—"

"Being unconscious does not count as sleep," Gabrielle interjected. "It doesn't help you heal."

Ares nodded, a bit helplessly. "You know a lot."

"She's taught me a lot."

Ares laughed quietly and ran his fingertips over Xena's cheek. The skin felt stretched, and it burned. "She seemed like she was fine just a few hours ago."

"Yes, well, she's good at seeming. She's going to be in so much trouble when she wakes up..." Gabrielle grumbled.

"Maybe we're the ones in trouble."

Gabrielle snorted. "We're the ones crazy enough to love her anyway, you mean."

There was a commotion outside.

Belasius's second in command, a tall wiry man, stomped into the room. "Xena!" he said. "There's trouble! We've just gotten reports that Arctureos has reinforcements coming from Sparta—" He cut off abruptly under the combined weight of Gabrielle and Ares' glares.

Xena stirred, but didn't wake.

Gabrielle stood and walked to the door. She jerked her head at the man. "We'll talk outside," she hissed.

The door shut almost all the way behind them.

Ares sat in the chair Gabrielle had pulled up the bed. He became aware of eyes boring into the back of his neck. Turning his head, he caught a glimpse of widened blue eyes and a blond blur that vanished from the crack in the door. The door closed.

Ares looked back to Xena. He threaded his fingers through the dry, hot hair, and he chuckled. "I think your new adoptive brother doesn't like me much," he said.

There wasn't a response.

He looked up when Gabrielle came back into the room.

"I'm going to go," she announced, her face grim.

Ares hesitated. "Are you sure you should be hiding this from her?"

Her glare swivelled to him, and he found himself leaning back.

"Don't you understand?" she said softly. "Xena needs to rest. If she pushes herself anymore, at best she will lose that arm."

Ares felt a pit opening in the bottom of his stomach. At best?

"I am going to go stop these reinforcements," Gabrielle continued. "I want you to take care of her."

At Ares' nod, she subsided. She leaned over Xena, checking to see if the wet cloth needed to be changed. She took in a deep breath and pressed her lips against Xena's cheek.

"Please be alright," she whispered.

If Ares heard her voice creak, he didn't say anything.

Gabrielle stared down at the army snaking through the forest road at her feet. Their armour clanked in unison as they marched, echoing in the air.

Someone swore softly behind her.

"And just when we'd finally gotten on even footing. We might even have had the advantage if we considered the terrain," Gabrielle said.

Belasius agreed quietly.

Gabrielle ran her hands roughly through her hair. It was dusty. Gods, she hadn't had a good bath in weeks.

"Okay," she said, taking a deep breath. "Okay. There's only one road into the valley, right? They have to go through the pass."

Belasius gave her a doubtful look. "Begging your pardon, sir, but if even Xena couldn't hold that pass last time we tried to trap Arctureos there..."

Gabrielle shook her head. "No, we don't need to hold it. We just need to block it somehow."

"Even so, they're on the only road right now. How are we going to get there before them?"

Gabrielle scanned the troop with her.

Ah, she was right.

There was Lykus and one of his friends. They were uncharacteristically quiet today.

Gabrielle winced, remembering the dead boy.

She shook the image from her head.

"Know a shortcut?" she asked.

Lykus nodded, and there was a hard edge to his eyes that hadn't been there before. Gabrielle thought he looked older.

"Leave it to us," he said.

Voices were buzzing outside the door again.

Ares unlaced his fingers from Xena's and stalked to the door.

Dragging it open, he scowled fiercely at the suddenly pale and frozen soldiers. It looked like a scuffle had been about to break out.

"What is it?" he snapped.

One of the soldiers jumped and saluted. "Sir," he stammered, "Arctureos rallied the remainder of his troops. He's, uh, demanding a duel."

"With whom?"

"Xena, sir."

"Well, send a messenger. Xena doesn't need to humour him in his little ego trip. Just let him come and see how far he gets with a crippled army in foreign lands."

"I said we shouldn't have told him!" hissed the other soldier angrily. "We could have handled this!"

The first soldier dragged his elbow out of his colleague's grasp harshly. "He's threatening to burn the fields and forests, and whatever he can reach of the village!"

Ares frowned. "Look, soldier—what's your name? Aeneas?—look, Aeneas, Xena doesn—"

There was a hand on his arm.

"Stall him," Xena said. "I will be there as soon as I can."

Aeneas saluted gratefully and fled.

Ares trailed Xena back into her bedroom.

"You can't go out there," he said.

She didn't answer, instead checking the dressing on her arm with a frown.

"You're sick, Xena!"

She had one end of a bandage in her teeth and was winding the rest tightly around her arm and up her shoulder. She glanced at him.

Her face was red and pale in patches and her eyes too bright.

"Xena—"

She finished tightening the bandage and tested her arm. It didn't shake anymore. Satisfied, Xena slung her armour over a shoulder and picked up her sword. She slid it from its sheath and inspected the edge. A few more scratches. She would need to have it reworked soon.

"I have something to protect, Ares," she said, her voice steady.

Ares' jaw tightened until his teeth felt as if they were grinding to dust. Arguing with her never worked.

Arctureos crossed his arms over his chest and ignored the muttering behind his back.

Contrary to what the soldiers might think—and no, he didn't care what they thought—this wasn't a half-hatched revenge plot for the humiliating loss in Corinth. Arctureos had goals. Ambitions.

Arctureos was planning ahead.

With Ares at his back and the Spartans as his allies, he was poised to sweep across Greece and further west. The Romans were making another bid for the western lands, where the Celts were quickly crumbling, and he was going to have a piece of that. What stood in his way was Xena.

Xena of Amphipolis, warrior princess out of the sticks, and her godsforsaken ability to use the pitiful imitation of a Corinthian army to grind his progress to a halt. Arctureos ground his teeth. Six thousand men injured or dead. He had lost six thousand men in the span of a week or two. The black powder was a terrible idea in retrospect. The crone who sold him the secret in exchange for a cellar full of liquor hadn't told him how dangerous it was to have lying around while the army camped nearby. No matter. He wouldn't be trying that again, and once the Spartans arrived, Xena would be crushed like a bug in a gale.

If Arctureos was going to have the world, he needed to get rid of Xena first.

He gave a quick command and grinned as Ares' army took up a roar behind him, shields rattling and banging against swords and spears. They would keep it up until they flushed Xena out.

He didn't have any delusions about beating her in an honest duel. The point of this was to get her exactly where he wanted her. Then, once the Spartans arrived, they would sweep Amphipolis off of the maps, with the Corinthians and Xena right there along with it.

The Corinthians had formed a line before them in the Amphipolis plains. They were quiet and shifted uncertainly at the noise from Ares' army. A lone rider stepped out and trotted over to Arctureos's lieutenant. Another useless message, Arctureos thought. If Xena didn't hurry, the forests around her nice, peaceful village just might go up in flames.

Arctureos looked up sharply at another fuss.

There was a ripple in the Corinthians' line.

The soldiers at the front parted, and Xena stepped out into the open, her sword unsheathed in her hand and her eyes fixed steadily on his.

Ah. Arctureos smiled. This was more like it.

"Xena!" he called out, walking forward with an exaggerated swagger in his step.

She stopped several arms-lengths from him, but she didn't say anything.

"Oh come now, Xena," he said. "Where's the noble chitchat? Aren't we supposed to psych each other out before a good duel?"

She narrowed her eyes at him, and he took the opportunity to look her over. There was the white of a bandage peeking out from under her shoulder guard on her sword arm, and her face was heavily flushed. If he concentrated, he thought... He thought he just might have seen her sway.

His grin turned nasty. This was turning out quite well in his favour.

"Aren't you supposed to try to convince me that there's no sense in this war? Don't you want to find out my motivations, see how I tick, and save my immortal soul?"

Finally, she spoke. "I'm no preacher."

Ahh, one of those serious heroes.

"I see, I see. You expect me to learn the errors in my ways through this fight, where we, as fellow swordsmen, communicate best with our blades."

Xena raised an eyebrow at him.

"No," she said, in tones that hinted that she thought he might have heard too many stories. "I expect you to die."

"Chilling," Arctureos said mockingly. Then he had to throw himself back to avoid the sword pointed at his gut. Xena...

Xena was gritting her teeth as her eyesight tried to double on her.

The haze of pain and stiffness had maintained itself at a constant level for so long that she thought she could push through it and ignore it. She hadn't realized her body would refuse to move at the speeds she demanded of it. It was like wading through water.

She watched Arctureos topple back with a squawk and followed the initial jab with a quick downward slice. She smiled grimly. It would be enough against Arctureos.

Arctureos dodged again, hissing when the tip of Xena's blade caught his cheek and sliced a shallow, stinging cut.

He had to stall until the Spartans arrived!

"You're off your game today, huh?" he said, affecting a casual laugh. "Slaughtering my army taking its toll?"

He mentally crowed when he saw Xena falter. Just a bit, but it was enough to drop her next slash too shallow. He parried her blade and pushed her back, off balance.

She still reacted to his next attack more quickly than he could see. He was left with a smarting wrist and a bewildered taste in his mouth.

"I thought you were a hero, Xena!" he said, backing up under her advance. "How do you sleep at night, knowing that thousands of men won't go back to their families after this," he paused to sneer dramatically, "because of you!"

He managed to catch her sword on the downswing. The stories all said that she was as strong as ten men. He'd always thought it was an exaggeration, but given the way his elbow was rapidly straining under the force of her swing, he wouldn't be able to block many more of her attacks.

She'd winced. She'd winced and dragged in a harsh breath and shaken her head as if she couldn't see him very clearly and this was his chance.

Arctureos heaved off the blade locked on his and threw his other fist forward into the opening he'd created. He followed with a knee to her stomach and drew his sword back to strike.

Xena grabbed his sword arm and flipped up and back, slamming her boot into his windpipe.

As he fell back and retched, he watched her stagger and spit out a mouthful of blood.

There were agitated stirs coming from the Corinthians.

"Xena!" Ares yelled.

She dropped to one knee, leaning heavily against her sword stabbed into the earth.

Arctureos stared. Ares?

"Xena, stop!"

It was Ares.

"You don't have to do this! I'm withdrawing my support from Arctureos!"

The murmuring from behind him turned into a roar.

"What?" Arctureos said, gasping for breath. "You're what?"

He turned and looked at his army. His lieutenant frowned back at him uncertainly.

"You're betraying me?" He pointed an accusing finger at the God of War.

Ares looked at him as if he were the remains of a cockroach squished against his boot. Arctureos refused to be cowed.

"I am the God of War. I choose those who are worthy of my support. Arctureos, you are a manipulative, conniving coward who has just proven himself unworthy."

"Bullshit!" He heaved himself up. "I've heard the rumours. It's because of her, isn't it?" He pointed at Xena's bowed form. "Everything I did was for the greater glory of Ares! It's because you have a thing for her!"

Ares stared at him coldly and didn't answer.

"No!" Arctureos yelled. He spun around to see his lieutenant forming up his ranks to retreat. "No! You can't leave me! I order you to stay!"

Armour clanked as they marched away. A few soldiers sneaked looks at him, but they turned away when they caught his eyes.

He spun again with a wordless scream of rage. No matter. None of this would matter when the Spartans arrived. When the Spartans arrived, they would obliterate—

They should have been here by now.

The commander said he would send a message when he was several marks away from the meeting point, and he'd gotten that message long ago, and they were supposed to be here already.

Horror started creeping over his limbs like ice.

Xena pushed herself to her feet using her sword as a crutch. She seemed to ignore Ares' urgent protests.

Her eyes settled on his, blank and unreadable.

"Wa-wait!" Arctureos said.

She vanished when he blinked, and then he was pushed back by three hard strikes of her blade that left his sword vibrating in his hand and his arm throbbing and feeling like sausage.

"Stop! I surrender!" he said.

To his horror, she lifted her sword again and slashed, nicking his torso.

"I surrender!" he cried, dropping his sword from weak fingers.

The back of Xena's fist caught his chin and sent him sprawling to the ground. Through the black spots, he watched her walk over to him.

Her boot landed heavily on his right arm. He tugged, but there was absolutely no give.

Ares was shouting something else now. It sounded like "Stop!" and "that's enough" to his ears, which were garbling noises en route to his brain. Ares didn't want her to kill him, he realized in relief. Ares was—

Xena lifted her sword in the air, and Arctureos noticed her glazed over eyes. She wasn't hearing anything.

Arctureos's eyes widened until white showed all around as Xena drew her sword back in both hands, ready to stab through him.

It began its descent.

"Stop!"

Arctureos cracked an eye open when he didn't feel any cold steel parting his skin and skull. The tip of Xena's sword hovered right above the bridge of his nose.

"Xena, it's okay. You can stop now."

Arctureos watched Xena's face flicker as she stared at the woman who had grabbed her wrist.

"Gabrielle?" Xena said, her voice a hoarse rasp.

"We stopped the war," said Gabrielle. "It's time to stop fighting."

Gabrielle hovered over Xena's unconscious form for the second time in two days.

Lykus and Ares stood behind her, the former opening wringing his hands and the latter looking as if a lever the length of the universe could not move him.

"Well?" Ares demanded.

Gabrielle sank her head into her hands. "Her fever isn't breaking," she said woodenly. "It's been two days. At this rate..."

Xena shifted and started retching.

Gabrielle pulled her onto her side quickly, tilting her head to let her airway flow freely. There was nothing in her stomach to vomit, and a thin string of saliva ran down her mouth.

"Breathe, Xena," Gabrielle whispered, stroking black bangs off of her face. "Concentrate on breathing."

The infected arm was swollen its entire length and blazing hot.

Xena's eyes cracked open a sliver. They focussed on Gabrielle's face after a while.

"Gabrielle," she said.

"I'm here."

Xena licked cracked lips. "What... what happened?"

"Arctureos was taken with the Corinthians. They've got a prison cell with his name on it." Gabrielle smiled, rubbing Xena's back soothingly. "And the Spartans withdrew."

"Spartans?"

"Arctureos had called them in for reinforcement."

Xena made a distressed noise in her throat.

"Don't worry, Lykus and I stopped them without shedding a single drop of blood. Right, Lykus?"

The boy nodded urgently. "Gabrielle and I started a rockslide in the pass and blocked it completely!" He paused and blushed. "I mean, Gabrielle and the other soldiers did most of the work. I just helped a bit."

"Don't be silly, Lykus. We never would have got there in time if it wasn't for you." Gabrielle turned and smiled at Xena. "He's a real hero, now."

Xena looked at the flushing boy.

"... Lyceus?"

Lykus blinked, confused.

Gabrielle grimaced and ran her hand over Xena's forehead. She was delirious.

Xena tried to sit up, but Gabrielle pressed her firmly down. "You have to rest, Xena. Don't worry, Lykus will still be here later."

There was a fluttering noise and a shimmer of white light behind her.

Gabrielle looked around.

Chang'e stood next to Ares, the rabbit in her arms and a frown on her face.

"What are you doing here?" Gabrielle managed to find her voice.

Chang'e turned her sad eyes to Gabrielle.

"She's dying," the goddess said softly.

Ares reacted first.

"Shut up!" he snarled. "Don't talk about things you don't know!"

Chang'e shook her head. "No, I'm not here because of that. Not exactly."

"Then what?"

Gabrielle recognized the white jade bottle immediately.

"The elixir the White Rabbit makes will heal her."

The room was quiet.

"Then what are you waiting for? Give it to her!"

"It will also grant her immortality."

Gabrielle looked at the bottle, and then at Xena. She shouldn't have been so surprised, she reasoned. It was called the elixir of immortality. But...

Gabrielle shook her head. This wasn't the time for that. Xena's life came first.

She reached out for the bottle, uncorked it, and held it to Xena's lips.

Xena grimaced at the smell.

"I know it smells bad," Gabrielle said softly, "but please drink it. It'll make you feel better."

Xena's eyes opened again.

Gabrielle tilted the bottle encouragingly.

Xena's hand covered the top.

"Immortality?" she said faintly.

Gabrielle hesitated, and nodded.

Xena smiled crookedly, and she pushed the bottle away.

"What are you doing?"

"I'm not drinking that."

"Xena!" Gabrielle nearly cracked the bottle in her fist in her frustration. "You're going to die without it!"

Xena chuckled, coughed, and laughed some more. "Don't write me off so soon."

"What?"

"You know me. I'm too stubborn to die." She leaned back onto the bed and turned her eyes to Chang'e. "Thank you," she said, "but no. That is not my Dao."

Chang'e must have seen something in her eyes because she closed her mouth without saying anything and smiled. She bowed, and then she wasn't there anymore.

"Xena..."

"Do you trust me, Gabrielle?"

That night, her fever broke.

Gabrielle cried.

Xena picked at the sling restraining her arm irritably. It itched.

Aliyah put a tankard of some kind of sweet tea in front of her and scolded her. Xena just smiled.

The tavern seemed a lot quieter now that the soldiers had gone. There was an elderly couple sharing a meal at one of the corner tables, but other than that, it was deserted.

Gabrielle was out teaching Lykus how to swing a staff without hitting himself in the face.

Xena looked up at the sound of approaching footsteps, and she smiled again.

"Hey," she said.

"Hey yourself," said Ares. He sat down across from her.

"You disappeared on me these past days."

Ares looked at the table, at his hands, at Aliyah, but not at her.

Something hollow was growing inside her. "What's wrong?" Xena said.

He fiddled with his gauntlet for a moment, and then he sighed.

"I've been thinking."

There wasn't a snarky response to that like he'd expected. He looked at her fully. "I nearly lost you."

Xena tried to laugh. "Look, I'm perfectly fine. On the way to full recovery."

"That's not what I mean."

Xena frowned.

"It's like..." he said hesitantly. "It's like you become a different person." His eyes flicked up. "Around me. Because of me. Because of War."

Xena's face slowly became blank.

"And... I guess I realized that the you that I love is the you that... isn't around me."

"You think you're changing me."

"You nearly stabbed that man through the head!" Ares said, his words a rush. "And the way you looked when you were doing it... I never want to see that again."

"You've seen me kill before."

"It's not the killing. I don't care about the killing. It's... I feel this horrible black lump in my throat when I realize that I did this to you. That I'm," he paused and huffed a laugh, realizing what he was about to say, "I'm bad for you."

Xena was staring at him. "I thought you said you would never give up," she said finally, her voice soft, ringing in the silence in the tavern.

"And now I've realized the consequences." Ares laughed bitterly. "There were never consequences before I met you."

He picked up her left hand and pressed a wisp of a kiss to her knuckles.

"I love you, Xena," he said. "And I can't do this anymore."

And then there was light, and he was gone. Xena sat still, looking at the empty space where he had been.

"Five dinars says he's just sitting there, waiting for you to call him back."

Xena's fingers twitched at Gabrielle's voice.

Gabrielle stepped forward until she was leaning slightly over her shoulder. "Aren't you going to go after him?"

She clenched them into a fist.

"No," she said tightly. "I can't. He's right."

"Are you sure?"

There was a smile on Xena's face when she turned. Gabrielle hated it immediately.

"Of course," Xena said, taking Gabrielle's hand in hers. "After all, I've got you, right? What else do I need?" She hesitated for a moment. "How about you? Are you..."

Gabrielle squeezed the fingers enlaced in hers. "Yeah," she said. "I'm getting better." She smiled softly. "I love you, Xena."

Xena closed her eyes. Hearing those words from Gabrielle was so much easier than—

"I love you, too."

Xena flexed her fingers, testing her grip on the hilt of her sword. It felt good to hold it again. The leather wrappings were comfortable and yielding under her palm, where years of wear had rubbed it smooth and soft.

Lifting the blade, she gave a few experimental swings.

Her shoulder might have creaked a bit, but the movements were as smooth as she remembered, albeit a bit slower.

She ran through her sword forms. Slice— high parry— riposte— spin and lunge.

And then she did them again, faster.

This dance was familiar. This was when she felt the most at peace. No blood. No opponent, even. Simply the soul of swordsmanship.

A good opponent, though, one who can match her and challenge her, that was...

Well, that was neither here nor there.

She was cooling down when Gabrielle returned from the river with two fish strung on a piece of twine and a stick.

"See?" she said drily. "I can catch fish without resorting to excessive violence against animals."

Xena chuckled, nudging a chunk of wood further into their campfire. "But I bet it's not nearly as fun."

Gabrielle had buried the fish, wrapped in broad leaves, under the fire when the sound of loud footsteps crunching through the leaves on the ground reached her ears.

"Well, what do we have here? Some little girls playing camp," said a voice. It even sounded unwashed.

"We'll make this real simple fer ya." The spokesman drew what looked like a butcher's cleaver from his belt. "All your worldly possessions, or your life." He paused and grinned with a mouth like a checkerboard. "Although... we could be persuaded to take some other form of payment."

There was the grunting laughter that unoriginal thugs generally associated with this kind of situation. This kind of laugh had been recycled for ages without end.

Gabrielle gave Xena a look, hoping she didn't look as amused as she thought Xena did.

"Well?" the man said, unnerved by the silence.

"How about this," said Xena, standing. She smiled widely as he realized she was taller than he was and better equipped in the weaponry department. "You give us all your weapons and promise never to play at banditry again, and I'll let you off with a slap on the wrist. Yeah?"

The bandits looked at her, looked at each other, and yelled and charged.

Xena caught Gabrielle's eyes and rolled hers. "They never listen."

Gabrielle dodged an uncoordinated lunge, slipped under the outstretched arms, and jabbed the hilt of her sai into the back of his head. He crumpled, giving her access to a second man behind him, who received a couple of quick blows to his chest and stomach and dropped, gasping for his lost breath. Hah. She looked over at Xena. Xena was—

Xena was standing over a doubled-over man, sword raised above her head and ready to strike.

"Xena!" Gabrielle shouted.

She was about to rush over, even though she knew she wouldn't make it in time, when Xena conked the bandit on the head hilt-first. He tumbled to the ground in a heap, out cold.

Xena gave her a mildly defensive look. "What?"

Gabrielle scratched the back of her neck, embarrassed. "Er, behind you?"

Xena knocked the last bandit off his feet with a backhanded punch over her shoulder.

"I saw him."

Yeah, Gabrielle thought. It was going to be alright.

They'd stopped in a traveller's inn on the road outside Kakopolis. Xena hadn't wanted to get anywhere near Kakopolis, but Gabrielle had firmly told her that just because Kakopolis was on the road to Potidaea, she wasn't about to take a detour through miles and miles more of bloody forest, and Xena should just grow up already. More or less in those terms. Maybe leaning a bit on the less side.

There were two soldiers in the traveller's inn, wearing the colours of Ares' army. Xena had to stop her hand from twitching to her sword. No longer Arctureos's army, she reminded herself.

They were talking quite loudly about a 'smoking hot babe' in Kakopolis.

Xena had just resigned herself to a meal overhung with discussions of said woman's assets, when the soldiers abruptly changed topic.

"Yeah, there's just no getting near him anymore."

"I thought Lord Ares was scary before, but at least back then, he'd bust our balls for clear reasons."

"You know he cancelled the raid on Mesopotamia? Told the king who hired us that he should try and talk terms."

"Really?"

"I'm not shitting you. He's changed."

The soldiers paused as if digesting this monumental statement.

"Think he got dumped?"

Gabrielle looked at Xena carefully.

Xena fiddled with a piece of bread for another moment before tossing it down into her bowl in disgust. "The food here sucks," she said, and stood, heading for the stairs leading to the upper floor of the inn.

"Where are you going?"

"Bed," was the curt reply. "We'll get an early start tomorrow. I don't want to stay here for longer than necessary."

Gabrielle sighed.

That night, Gabrielle had barely drifted to sleep when she awoke to a thump and a muffled curse. Sitting up in bed, she watched Xena struggle to strap her sword onto her back.

"I'll be back," said Xena, noticing her. "Sorry for waking you."

Gabrielle tried to smother a smile. She reached out and flipped a twisted strap.

Xena paused, pulled the strap free, and buckled it in the right way around. "Thanks."

She headed briskly for the door.

"I'll be back," she said again.

Gabrielle snickered and dropped back onto her pillow. "Take your time."

Ares was trying to read. The fact that his eyes had run over the same line of text five times didn't occur to him and was entirely beside the point. He cleared his throat, shook the scroll to free it of wrinkles, and peered down at the text intently. There had been whispers after the story of Amphipolis got out. Warlords had regarded him with as open of suspicion as they dared, and his campaigns to the east had nearly ground to a halt. He was glad he could still talk circles around any of them, no matter what Xena thought of his intelligen—

The parchment crinkled a bit under his fingers.

It was alright. He was making progress. It kept him busy. The alternative... Never mind the alternative. He was the God of War, and he was perfectly fine.

He didn't look around when his door clicked open.

"I told you I'm busy!" he growled, injecting as much menace into his voice as he could.

The person at the door paused, and then stepped forward again.

"You don't have any time for me, either?"

The scrolled smacked against his table on the way to the floor.

He turned and looked at Xena.

She was watching him steadily, an expression he couldn't place on her face.

"What—" he croaked, stopped, and tried again. "What are you doing here?"

She stepped toward him, and he fought the irrational desire to back away.

"I've been thinking," she said.

He snorted. "What else is new?"

Her lips quirked. "I've been thinking that it's a bit too late."

"For what?"

"To go back to the way things were."

It hurt to look at her.

"Xena, we already—"

"Do you know why?"

He swallowed his half-hearted protests and shook his head.

"Two reasons. The first is that... we've already changed. Both of us. We're not the same people as we were before."

He laughed bitterly. "I know that. It's been staring me in the face for the past month."

She hummed in agreement.

"And the second reason?" he asked, against his better judgement.

"The second?"

There were high windows cut into the walls of the temple. The light of the half moon shone through as a beam of silvery white. Full moons get a lot of credit in folklore, but it's the half moons, balanced midway between waxing and waning and ready to tip with the slightest provocation, that bring about change.

She stepped forward into the beam, and her eyes glowed blue.

"The second is that I love you."

Xena lounged in her leathers on Ares' bed, her armour in a pile on the floor.

She drew up a bare leg and balanced a scroll on her knee. It tried to roll up on her.

"What are you reading?" said Ares from the door.

She looked up. She smiled. He'd tossed his vest and belt onto a table with a grimace.

"Long day?"

"Idiotic warlords."

She chuckled. "It's a message from Hercules. Seems Corinth is doing alright and the king doesn't know what to do with his much more experienced army."

"Huh." He sat at the edge of the bed.

Xena looked up. He was staring at her legs.

"I'll be with you in a minute," she said, a smirk growing.

"No no, far be it for me to take you away from your message from Jerkules."

She rolled her eyes and he sniggered.

When she looked up again, he was still staring.

"What?" she said.

"Have I ever told you that..." he frowned in concentration, "your eyes are like priceless sapphires, set in the milky smooth planes of your face?"

"... What?"

"Or, or, that your hair is like... raven silk, sweetly fragrant and softer than a cloud?"

"Did you hit your head?"

"Shut up, I'm trying to seduce you."

She started to laugh.

He leaned in over her, face twisted in rapturous poetic frenzy. "Your laugh is like peals of the most beautiful bell. Let me lose myself in your sweet embrace, in the honeyed walls of your mouth and the warm caverns of—"

Xena kicked him in the gut.

"Okay," said Ares' voice presently, from somewhere under the bed's horizon. His head popped up like the rise of a black and somewhat scruffy sun. "How about 'let's fuck'?"

Xena sighed, scroll long forgotten. She beckoned at him.

Ares hopped onto the bed and crawled over her, bracing his arms over her head and leering down at her. He wondered briefly if his face might fossilize with too much sleaze.

She dragged one hand slowly down his chest and let the other play with his nape. She tugged his head down until her lips were brushing the shell of his ear.

"You know what?" she said, feather soft.

Ares grunted distractedly.

She lifted one leg against his knee like so, grabbed his arm and neck and bucked up like so.

Ares blinked up at her.

Xena leaned down and kissed him, their lips and tongues settling into an easy rhythm.

When she drew back for breath, Xena grinned down at him. "Sometimes, actions speak louder than words," she said.

Ares grinned back and pulled her down for another kiss. "Don't let Gabrielle hear you say that," he said.

And they lived happily—

They were togeth—

They were.

End