Tale

Chapter 5 : Side by Side

/!\ I do not own Rise of the Guardians, only my OC.

Lía Tale

They wouldn't be able to hold much longer. The despairs were everywhere. Lía was giving everything she had to get rid of them, shape-shifting every few seconds, slashing the air with her dagger, eliminating a despair every second, but the more despairs she destroyed, the more appeared, fresh and ready to fight her. Her and her partner were both exhausted and wounded by the sharp disks of darkness.

"What are we going to do?" Jack Frost asked, breathless.

He was fighting bravely alongside Lía. His staff was powerful and he was too, but the Guardian of Fun was also getting tired.

"Aren't your friends supposed to come?" replied Lía after transforming briefly into a wolf to bite a despair.

"Yes, they are!" answered Jack, jumping high to avoid a sharp despair.

"Then we hold until they arrive." decided Lía with a firm voice.

She could see that Jack Frost was losing hope. Since they were immortals, they technically couldn't die, but Pandore probably knew secret, dark ways to destroy them anyway. And Jack Frost was afraid to die. The tale-teller could feel that.
She was afraid to die too, but she couldn't show her fear. She had to be strong for the both of them. Hold Jack together until reinforcements arrived. She could do this. She had to do this. Otherwise, it would be the end of them.

Lía could see Pandore, not far from the battlefield. The spirit of despair was using two of her dark creatures to float above the ground, stepping on the flattened despairs. She was looking at the two immortals fighting against her despairs, watching them battling for their lives. She had a smile on her face and seemed proud of her creatures.
She kept convoking more and more of them, making the fight more and more difficult for Jack Frost and Lía. Her goal was clear : destroy them both. And, from the look of the situation, she was about to succeed.

Lía roared, letting her anger and frustration out, making Jack jump of surprise. She refused to give up. She would never surrender. She was stubborn and would not let go. She fought with even more rage and fury, decimating the despairs around her.
She also fought with less prudence, exposing herself to multiple cuts and bruises. Blood was running down her legs, her arms and her left cheek from multiple cuts. Those weren't deep, but she could feel pain slowly gaining on her. She didn't pay any attention to it. She had to fight.

The shape-shifter threw her dagger in the air, turned into a crow, transpierced a despair with her beak and turned back into her human form while airborne. As she was about to land, a despair appeared underneath her, its sharp edges waiting to slice through her skin. Lía noticed it and bent her back backward, barely avoiding the despair and landing on her hands.
She caught her dagger as it was falling, used it to destroy another despair and took one second to breathe. Her body was filled with adrenaline and pain was beginning to draw back. A second later, she couldn't feel her wounds and the pain they caused her. She turned to Jack Frost and noticed that he too didn't seem to be bothered by the multiple cuts in his flesh.
He was fighting quite well, she had to admit that. He was agile and skilful, fast and strong, and was not afraid anymore. He was a good warrior, and she admired him for that. But even the best warrior wouldn't hold much longer in their place.

Jack Frost

Jack sighed after destroying one more despair. He was tired and bloody, filled with pain. But he couldn't stop fighting. He had to defend himself, to help Lía and defeat Pandore. He heard Lía roar and jumped, startled. She seemed even fiercer now, realising tricks with her body, her dagger and her magic that he didn't think were possible. She would jump high, turn into a crow or a wolf while throwing her dagger in the air, destroy a despair or two, turn back into her human form and catch her dagger. She fought with ease, strong and graceful.
Jack admired Lía. She was brave and didn't give up, even if the situation looked desperate. He himself had some doubts. He was sure that the fate Pandore had planned for the two of them was worse than death, but he didn't know if he could keep fighting much longer. But then, he would look at Lía Tale slicing a despair with her dagger or turning into a cat, and he would fight with more fury and determination.

After a while, he couldn't feel pain or exhaustion, only determination and a bit of fear. But he had to be brave. That he knew. So he kept destroying despairs with his staff, freezing them or making them explode with one blast of his staff.

A few minutes later, which felt like hours for Jack, he saw Pandore invoking even more despairs and he felt his determination weaken. How could they ever defeat her? A despair used his small hesitation to cut him on the arm, adding a new wound to the dozen others he already had.

"Come on, guys, where are you?" he muttered to himself.

Every few minutes, he would look up to see if the Guardians were there yet, but the sky remained empty.

Lía had told him what to do : hold until the others arrived. But how could he? He had fought enough in the last two days. Lía Tale and him had been fighting for about half an hour, and each breath was harder to draw.

Finally, what had to happen happened. As he was avoiding a despair, he tripped on a rock and fell on the ground. The hard, frozen ground. His head hit a rock, no bigger than a pebble but still too hard for his skull because of the speed and height.
His sight became blurry, he heard a buzzing sound and fought hard to avoid losing consciousness. But a curtain of darkness was beginning to cover his eyes. He was about to lose this fight.

"It's over", he thought. "If I lose consciousness now, I'm dead."

But a voice, a strong, confident and deep female voice, kept him from falling into unconsciousness.

Lía Tale

"Don't you dare die on me now!" Lía exclaimed.

She had seen Jack trip and fall, his head hitting a frozen stone. The fall and the hit would've knocked anyone out, but she could see the Guardian of Fun struggling to stay conscious. "He really is strong", she had thought to herself. But Jack Frost was still about to lose consciousness. So she had done the first thing she had thought about : speak, scream, to keep him alive.

"Oh, you keep your eyes open, mister! You're not allowed any rest right now!" she said, trying to hide the concern in her voice.

She managed to get closer to him and stood next to him, her feet firmly planted in the ground. She was fiercely defending her grounds from the despairs, killing any of those who would approach Jack too close. As she defended him, she kept talking to him to try and keep him conscious.

"There is only one person here who is allowed to kill you, Frosthead, and it's me!" Lía said. "Understood? You owe me a death! I order you to stay alive, okay? You have to obey me!"

"Doing my best, ma'am, but it's difficult..." said Jack Frost, half conscious, while repressing a cry of pain.

"Get up now, alright? C'mon! Don't give up now!" threatened Lía, getting more and more worried for the Guardian.

"Yes, yes, I'll do it..." replied Jack. Finally, his grip on his staff got stronger and he got up slowly. Fortunately, his head wasn't badly hurt. He wasn't bleeding, he would just have a really big bump. His legs were trembling and he could barely destroy one despair because of his weakness, but he was up and that was what mattered. Lía was keeping him alive while defending herself. And, if this task wasn't difficult enough on its own, she also kept talking to Jack, to make sure he wouldn't lose consciousness.

"Your skull is thicker than I thought it was, Frosthead!" she teased while cutting a despair in half. "You're lucky your head didn't split in two when it hit that stone!"

"Ha, ha, lucky me." replied Jack sarcastically. "But yes, I am hard to get rid of!"

"Noticed that earlier!" said Lía with a smile.

He was now standing with more assurance and began destroying despairs again. Jack was apparently resilient and strong, to recover so quickly from his fall. She herself could not feel pain anymore, and her wounds didn't bother her. She was just getting a bit cold.

"It's probably nothing." she thought to herself. "The air is cold tonight. Plus, I have more important things to worry about."

And she kept fighting, often saving Jack Frost from a painful cut by defending him against a despair. And, right when she thought that they wouldn't hold much longer...

Jack Frost

Jack tried to walk, but his head hurt too much. It felt like his brain was made out of cotton candy, and he could barely think. His moves were slow and clumsy. He would've died at least ten times in two minutes if it hadn't been for Lía Tale, who would intervene at the right moment. How could she be everywhere like that?
He sighed and looked at the sky for one second, just to clear his mind. And then he saw it.

The sleigh. He had never been so happy to see it.

"The Guardians!" he screamed as loudly as he could, relieved. He saw Lía, who had seemed desperate right before, smile with joy and relief. His head was now hurting because he had cried too loudly, but he didn't care anymore. They were saved!

The sleigh landed near to the pond and the other Guardians got out. They all readied their weapons. They had seen what was happening from above and were already ready to defend Jack and Lía from the despairs. Two immortals alone couldn't get rid of dozens of despairs, but five Guardians and a shape-shifter? They had their chances.
Tooth, Bunny, Sandy and North immediately joined the fight.
Jack smiled and fought with more determination than ever. He would survive this. With Lía and the other Guardians, they could win. Together.

o

Pandore realised that. She saw the other Guardians join the fight and she screamed with anger. She couldn't let them get away. Not after sacrificing so many despairs to get rid of Lía Tale and Jack Frost. She had to do something. And she noticed the pond.

It was covered in ice, but the frozen layer seemed thin. It was illuminated by the moonlight. Pandore remembered that it was there that Jack Frost got his powers and became a winter spirit. He was now able to survive a long dive in the frozen water. But others might not... and the really old spirit of despair knew something that all the other immortals ignored : they could die. All of them.
Die because no one believed in them, but also die of wounds or extreme conditions. Time may not have had any effect on them, but lethal wounds, drowning, burning alive... all the most painful deaths could still affect them, even though they were way more resistant than mortals. And the use of special blades, for example, made their deaths even easier. Pandore thought about it a while. Drowning a Guardian in the pond was an uncertain way to get rid of them. So, instead of drowning one, since she had enchanted knives, why bother?

Pandore smiled. She could still win. She called one of her biggest despairs and whispered something to it. It disappeared and reappeared a few seconds later, holding something inside of its body - if you could, in fact, call this dark, sharp disk of dense shadows around a bright sparkle a body-. It was a knife with a bright white blade and a short handle wrapped in grey leather. Pandore took it out and dismissed the despair.
She then cocked her arm, aimed carefully and...

Lía Tale

She saw the knife. She saw Pandore take it out of a despair and admire it for a second before getting ready to throw it. The thousands of stories the tale-teller knew and remembered flashed before her eyes, and she realised that she knew something about this specific blade. It had been enchanted by multiple spirits, thousands of years ago, to destroy immortals.
Lía gasped as she understood what the presence of the knife meant. Pandore was about to kill one of them!

She breathed deeply all of a sudden, focusing entirely on the knife. She didn't hold the Guardians close to her heart, but it didn't mean that she wanted them to die. She couldn't let anything bad happen to them.
Time seemed to stop as Lía tried to determine the knife's course. Pandore had picked the less agitated Guardian of all, not really caring about who it was, and aimed at them. And it was Jack Frost. She was aiming at Jack Frost.

Lía cried out, trying to warn Jack, but it seemed that all the air had deserted her lungs. She couldn't warn him in time. Pandore threw the knife, and it was too late. There was only one thing the shape-shifter could do : get him out of the way.

She ran, took one, two, three steps and jumped, putting all of her strength in her legs. She reached him just in time to push him violently out of the knife's course. Lía herself curled up in a ball in the air to avoid getting hit by the knife. She succeeded, but as she uncurled to land, as her left foot touched the ground, she slipped on the frozen floor.

Lía felt her weight and her speed throwing her violently to the side. Her left side. Where the pond was.

The impact was painful, the thin layer of ice broke under her and then... she felt the cold water all around her, cooling and calming her down as she slowly sank to the bottom of the pond, next to a white knife stained with the blood of countless immortals. She felt oddly at peace. And she closed her eyes.

Jack Frost

He shouted, surprised. Lía had pushed him violently, making him crash on the frozen ground next to the pond. He managed to slow his fall down and got up extremely quickly, quickly enough at least to see Lía Tale breaking the icy surface of the pond with her body and starting to sink. He also noticed a strange knife sinking next to her. Then everything seemed to... hold. Like time had stopped. No one was moving. The despairs all vanished. Pandore cackled and said mockingly:

"Well, drowning it is after all! Zeus, I am going to miss this knife. Oh, well..." before disappearing too.

The Guardians couldn't move. Jack couldn't realise what had just happened. Lía had pushed him and now... He started looking around for no reason, and his eyes laid on the tale-teller's dagger, planted in the ground, the black steel and purple crystals shining in the moonlight. And suddenly, he reacted.

"LIA!" he screamed.

He let go of his staff and ran before diving into the pond. He swam as fast as he could, trying to reach the tale-teller. It had been barely thirty seconds. She couldn't be that deep, right? Plus, she was an immortal, so she couldn't drown! And she didn't seem bothered by the cold, earlier. She would survive this.

Finally, after thirty seconds of anguish, he saw her. Her back was about to touch the bottom of the pond. A white knife, the one that Pandore had thrown at him, was already lying there, but Jack didn't pay attention to it. He just grabbed Lía's arm and pulled her to him. He held her close, looking anxiously at her closed eyes while swimming to the surface.

He emerged rapidly and Bunny and Tooth helped him out. The Guardian of Hope tried to take Lía Tale from his arms, but Jack wouldn't let go.

"Is she okay, mate?" Bunny asked, worried for the tale-teller.

"I... don't know, Bunny... I... I think her heart is beating..." Jack stammered.

He laid her on the ground. He put his hand close to her slightly opened mouth and felt air against his skin.

"She's breathing!" he exclaimed, relieved.

All the other Guardians, gathered around him, sighed with relief.

"Tale?" he said, trying to wake her up. "Tale, come on, wake up!"

"Jack", Tooth intervened with a calm and soothing voice, "she just sank to the bottom of a frozen pond. She's not you, she may be in hypothermia. She needs sleep, food, and, most importantly, heat."

The others all nodded. It made sense. Lía was strong, a single fall on a thin layer of ice wouldn't have knocked her out like that. They didn't know her well, but it was obvious that she was resistant enough to overcome this fall quickly. But hypothermia...
But Jack didn't agree with them.

"No, it's not that. She's really resistant to cold, I noticed it earlier. I don't think it's because of the temperature or the water. It's something else."

"Still, we should take her to the North Pole and put her in a warm, comfortable bed where she can rest safely." insisted Tooth. She was convinced that she was right.

"Guys, listen to me!" said Jack Frost. "It's not that!"

He kneeled and took her in his arms, trying to warm her up (even though his body temperature was really low). With one arm, he held her head, and with the other hand, he gently stroked her impassive, pale face, pushing a lock of white hair back. And leaving a scarlet trace of blood on her cheek.

He gasped. His hands were covered in blood. But where did the blood come from? He suddenly had an intuition. While still holding her head, he gently turned her on her side and looked at her back. He gasped again.
A long, really deep, bloody cut ran from her left shoulder to her right hip. The bones weren't visible, but only a few millimetres of flesh were still covering them. Blood flowed continuously from the wound, staining her white tunic.
The other Guardians saw the cut too, and let out surprised and worried gasps.

"Wow, we knew that the despairs were sharp, but this..." murmured Bunny anxiously.

"I... I think you were right, Jack..." Tooth told the Guardian of Fun. "It is not hypothermia... it's the blood loss that's causing her paleness and unconsciousness."

"We can't lose a Guardian." North assured with his firm, strong voice, trying to reassure the other Guardians. "Sandy, you have healing sand, yes? Can you repaire her?"

Sandy shook his head. With multiple sand shapes above his head, he explained that he could heal a few minor cuts, like the ones that covered Jack's arms and legs, but that such a deep wound couldn't be healed with sand magic.

"Then we bring her to the North Pole", Santa decided. "Bunny, carry her. Sandy, heal Jack. Tooth, try to slow the blood. I drive the sleigh."

"No!" Jack said with a firm, slightly panicked voice. "I carry Lía."

"But..." North replied. But Tooth shook her head.

"There is no time to argue. We have to move now. I know we're immortals, but I also know a lot about health and wounds, and this one would've already been lethal. I don't want to wait and see how immortal we exactly are."

"Then we go now." decided North.

They all watched Jack carry Lía in his arms, holding her close. He used her cloak to slow the flow of the blood, but the purple and soft fabric was already soaked in blood. Jack climbed aboard the sleigh, followed by Tooth and Sandy. They all sat on the back seat of the sleigh.

"Her dagger!" Jack said to Bunny before the Guardian of Hope embarked too.

Bunny picked the dagger up and gave it to Jack. He also gave him his crooked staff, which he had forgotten. Then, Bunny sat on the front bench next to North, who made the sleigh take off.

North used a snow globe to teleport them directly to the North Pole. He let the yetis take care of the sleigh and led the others into his workshop. They all walked quickly and silently. Jack was slightly limping because of multiple cuts on his right leg, and his head was extremely painful, but he didn't slow down. Lía was losing her blood, he couldn't stop.
Finally, they arrived in the corridor of the guest rooms. There was only one unoccupied guest room left, next to Jack's. North opened the door and they all entered.

The guest room was the same size as Jack's. The walls were ultramarine blue, the carpet on the floor was grey, the curtains were purple and the bedspread was white. There also was one table next to the window, one wooden chair, a black armchair and a cupboard pushed against one wall.

Jack put Lía one the bed, using pillows to elevate her head. There was a risk that she would swallow her tongue and he wanted to avoid it.

"And now?" he asked with a worried voice.

"I'll take care of her." answered Tooth. "I'll need bandages, gauze, disinfectant, thread and a needle. Basically everything that you can find in a first aid kit."

North clapped in his hands to call a yeti and asked him to bring them what Tooth had asked for.

"I need to see her back", Tooth told Jack. "Turn her over."

With the help of the Guardian of Memories, Jack Frost laid Lía on her stomach and removed her cloak. Tooth used the tale-teller's dagger to cleanly cut Lía's tunic and clear the area around the wound. The yeti came back with everything that Tooth needed.

"I need some quiet now. Everyone, get out please." Tooth said.

"But..." Jack whispered.

He could barely stand on his own feet, but he felt like he couldn't leave Lía. He owned her his life, and he needed to be sure that she would survive.

"The best way to help her is by leaving the room." Tooth told him with a nice, reassuring smile.

Jack nodded and left, followed by North, Bunny and Sandy. He managed to get into his room without falling, and Sandy followed him. The Guardian of Dreams made him lay on the bed and used his magic sand to heal his cuts. The smallest ones immediately disappeared, but the bigger ones, like the ones on his right leg, just got smaller. With sand symbols, Sandy told Jack that he would come back later to finish healing his wounds and left the room.

Jack was worried. He needed to know if Lía Tale was okay. But his exhaustion was too powerful, and he fell asleep quickly.

Lía Tale

It felt like she was floating. Everything around her was dark and cold, but she felt so at peace... she never wanted to wake up. Her back was painful, like someone was strongly pinching it, but soon the pain vanished and she went back to aimlessly floating in pure darkness.

After a while, though, she started hearing some noises. Voices of children, adults, laughter, cries... but also the howling of a wolf, the croak of a one-eyed crow, the song of an orca... she knew those noises. Those songs that she kept hearing. Suddenly the noises stopped and the darkness felt too cold and too dark for her.
She was alone, once again. She couldn't stand it.
Now she heard the low whistle of despairs floating toward her, the slashing of a white knife close to her ear, the cries of a winter spirit... and the tears of all those children, adults, animals... that knew despair and couldn't handle it. Couldn't stand it. She had to do something. Anything, to make it stop.

"Enough!" she cried.

Lía Tale couldn't stay here any longer. She had to stop despair from spreading, stop those tears from falling. She had to go.

I have to wake up!

And the tale-teller opened her eyes.