Leina began to nod off, before jerking awake and shaking her head. Rowin looked up from the fire plow he'd been whittling.

"Something wrong?" he asked.

Leina crunched her eyes shut and opened them again. "You've been such a tremendous help. I should keep watch. I need to…" Leina yawned loudly. "...Auhhh, pay you back."

Rowin dismissively waved his hand. "Don't worry about it. Besides, you've been walking all day while I was lounging on down the river. You need the rest more than I do."

"No, it's…" Leina yawned again. "It's fine."

"It is not fine," Rowin said, his countryside voice taking a feudal lord's tone. "You lay down, get some rest, and we'll wrestle with your guilt tomorrow. You can't wrestle anything if you're half-asleep."

Leina yawned one final time before pitching back and wrapping herself in Rowin's coat, curling up and quickly falling asleep with her well-toned shoulder as a pillow.

Rowin, meanwhile, sat himself against the nearby tree and continued his fire plow. He'd already made two bases, and this stick he was sharpening would be the plow itself. Better now than if he was worn out and exhausted, especially with what it would take to actually use the plow to start a fire.

He'd just about finished and was ready to start sharpening the second plow, when he thought he heard a sign of life. His eyes darted to where it came from, but the shadows of the forest revealed nothing. His gaze drifted back to his work, then darted back. Then again back to his work, before they darted back. After a third try at this little trick, his luck finally won out.

He couldn't make out all of her, or even most of her, but he saw enough of her pursed lips, her exposed cleavage, and her pointy ears to know her for an elf. He cocked his head, trying to both get a better look and maybe startle her into moving a little, but this elf was a veteran. She stayed perfectly still, unblinking.

So, Rowin simply bowed a little in her direction. "Miss." He then patted the spot next to him and went back to whittling. "It's warmer over here, just so you know."

Nothing happened after that, at least that he could see.

The elf, meanwhile, was more than simply intrigued. Her underwear had given her away, as it had slithered off to nab a field mouse behind her, leaving her bare. Her fingers drifted down, her eyes gobbling up the now two delectable things before her. Leina was already too adorable, as the elf had found when she'd stretched and twisted Leina into all sorts of sensual positions back in the fight pit. Now, though, Leina had an equally delicious-looking man with her. Their blonde hair, their lithe bodies, combined with how well-mannered and honest they both were… Oh, they were practically irresistible.

The elf stopped herself before she touched herself. If she wasn't careful, this job would prove too much for her to take. It was already hard to not lick her lips and join that amazing body, Rowin, over by the fire, where things would get really hot if Leina's sexy little self got involved as well…

XXXXXXXXXXXX

Leina awoke to the rain-like sound of chain mail. Rubbing her eyes, she cast open Rowin's borrowed coat, uncurled herself, and sat up, noticing the sun's rays poking down through the treetops.

Rowin was sleeving his other arm into a dull golden tunic with plain blue lining on the inside, peeking out from the collar and cuffs. Blinking a few times, the sleep cleared from Leina's eyes and she saw that no, it wasn't a tunic. Rowin was donning a longcoat of golden chain mail with blue padding beneath, with plate metal on his shoulders and chest sculpted into rigid wing patterns. Thinner plates overlapped at the bottom, surrounding his knees and thighs.

"Ah, welcome back," Rowin remarked, yawning as he stretched. His legs bent as he squatted down and scooped up his sword belt, cinching it around his waist.

It was only now that Leina got a good look at his weapons. In addition to a small dagger, his right hip supported a longsword sheathed with a large red gemstone at the center of the brass-colored crossguard. On his left hip, he had the ornate silver handle of what seemed to be a long cutlass, given the slight curve along the upper end of the blade. It had a powder blue gem of some kind attached between the blade and the guard, ringed with silver.

"Good morning," Leina said as she picked up his coat and shook the dirt from the outside. "Have you made any plans for the day ahead?"

"Besides more walking? No." Rowin took his coat back and slipped it on over his armor, buckling it closed to hide the eye-catching gold and blades at his hips. "Well, after breakfast."

"What is for breakfast?" Leina asked as he hefted his small pack of belongings onto his back, his strange mandolin tucked inside.

"Whatever we find first." Rowin nodded towards the road. "So let's find something and get a move on."

They were in luck, as there was a patch of blueberry bushes not far from the road, allowing them to both eat and walk at the same time. Leina grabbed a few too many and had to fish them out from between her breasts, much to her embarrassment in spite of Rowin's polite aversion.

"I hope you don't mind," Leina said, trying to save face, "but I find it strange for a man like you to be wielding such weapons."

Rowin frowned, then raised an eyebrow. "Why's that? Do men not…" He trailed off as he remembered the bandits from yesterday were all male.

"I only find it strange because they seem like weapons a lord would have," Leina said. "Are you of noble birth like me?"

Rowin shook his head. "Can't say as I am, no."

"Then where did you get them?"

"I found them."

"What? You just 'found them'?"

Rowin chortled. "Well, not at the same time!" Rowin mashed the rest of his blueberries into his mouth and drew the long sword. Its blade shimmered gold, like an ambient sunrise, and the last third curved slightly into its point. "This one's been with me longer than the other. Found him in a ransacked curio shop, asking me to bring him along."

"You… stole that?" Leina asked.

"Nope."

"Then, you must've purchased it."

"Nope."

"Did you earn it?"

"I found him."

Leina recoiled in newfound revulsion. "You did steal it, didn't you?!"

Rowin was unshaken, even trying to hide a smile. "First of all, the proprietor had left in a sudden hurry after a gang ransacked the store. Second, I wouldn't have found him at all if he hadn't called me to him."

Leina narrowed her eyes suspiciously. "Called you to him with what?"

Rowin shrugged. "Why, words, of course. What else?"

"But-…" Leina groaned and wondered if this was why Rowin had been traveling alone. She could envision this wearing on the nerves rather quickly.

It only got worse when Rowin held the sword's hilt close to his face and whispered mischievously, "Don't spoil it."

"And your other sword?" Leina asked, wary now in case Rowin should prove more morally compromised than Risty had been.

"This one I found in a cave," said Rowin, stowing his longsword for the cutlass. "No sign of the previous owner, so I imagine they didn't value it much if they dropped it."

Leina couldn't imagine why. This one's blade was a fading gradient of blue with a web of white lines curling and gliding up from the bright blue base, the same color as the gemstone implanted in the silver hilt, all the way to the darker, duller blue of the tip. It was as if someone had dipped the metal into a pool of water and captured a still image of the way the light refracted, bent, and faded the deeper it went. Even if the coloring was nothing, the gemstone alone was valuable by its sheer size. It was almost as big as a lime.

Leina's eyes flitted between the sword and the man holding it. She stopped walking and emptied the remainder of her blueberries into her mouth. After a moment, not wanting to talk with her mouth full, she spoke.

"Could you spar with me?"

Rowin's head tilted. "Now?" He rattled his cutlass. "With this?"

"No, not with real swords." Leina looked around and spied a dead tree nearby, surrounded by taller, healthier ones. Jogging over, she hung from a branch until it snapped and came down into her hands, before tossing it towards Rowin. He sprinted forward and caught it one-handed, before stowing his cutlass.

"The first sword I wielded broke," Leina said, "and so my mother's sword felt unfamiliar at first. I want to become better with any weapon, not just the one I'm used to." She spied another branch, this one fallen on the ground, and hefted it in her hands.

Rowin shrugged and leveled his "blade" at Leina like a fencer. "Whenever you're ready."

"Here I come!" Leina declared, charging in. Leina swung her sword like an axe at a log, which Rowin sidestepped. He turned his weapon sideways and countered with an upward stroke at her head, which Leina hastily blocked. Pushing him off, she battered him with three more overhead chops before locking weapons with him, digging her feet into the ground and trying to drive him back. Rowin had two hands on his branch, holding her still.

Leina was already starting to breathe heavily as she shoved him back and brought her sword back and around her head for a sideways slash. Rowin hopped back and sucked in his gut, despite wearing armor.

"You missed your calling," he teased. "You should've been a lumberjack."

Leina wrinkled her lip but failed to disprove his point as he blocked a chop at his side, then two more.

Now, unbeknownst to the pair, their snake-wearing stalker's eyes weren't the only ones taking in their display. Certainly, she was watching Leina's curves bounce and flow behind her armor, and the sweat glisten down the young maiden's legs, but she was also wary of the winged woman flying overhead, holding a strange-looking cudgel in her hands. The stalker's eyes focused on this third newcomer once she realized Leina, however sexy she was, wouldn't come close to actually connecting.

The angel, for that's what the woman was, was sexy in her own right. She wore a form-fitting white breastplate that propped up her modest but admirable bust. Beneath that flowed a red skirt with white trim. Her long, thin legs ended in a pair of winged boots. As she descended, it became clear that one of her wings was artificial, looking more like a metal talon than a feathered natural limb. Her big eyes were framed by deep golden blonde curls, peeking out from beneath a wide, red, pillow-like hat with a winged insignia on the front.

"Already?!" gasped the angel excitedly. She swooped down and hovered above the two sparring partners, then cleared her throat. "Ye fighters who seek to enter the Queen's Blade, may all bear witness to-"

"Hey now! I'm no one's queen!" Rowin shouted.

The angel's lips curled inward, as if trying to suck her words back in. What she'd thought was two women turned out to be one woman, plus a man with very effeminate-looking blonde hair.

"...Moops…" Laila weakly murmured from between her sealed lips, turning nearly as red as her hat as she started losing altitude, pressing her fingers together. "I'm so, so sorry… I just… From up there…"

Leina gave her a courteous bow. "I'm Leina. It's nice to meet you, Miss…?"

"Oh, um… I'm Laila, angel-in-training." Laila hefted the cudgel she was carrying. It looked as though it had a pair of milk bottles stuck to one side of it. "As such, I've been entrusted with the Holy Milk Thrower."

A fart of laughter burst from Rowin's mouth and he devolved into heaving fits. "It-, It throws what?"

"Holy milk!" Laila said, annoyed. "It's not funny! Holy milk is a powerful and precious substance of the angels! You'd do well to heed its power, mortal!"

"My name's not 'mortal'. It's Rowin, thank you." Rowin threw his branch away and pointed at the Thrower. "I don't suppose holy milk makes you fly or sates your hunger, does it?"

"No, and that would be a terrible waste!" Laila said.

Rowin shrugged and turned to resume the journey. "Oh well. Come on, you two."

"Oh. Alright, if you think so," Leina said, hurrying to catch up.

"Y-You shouldn't order an angel, Rowin!" Laila said, floating alongside the two.

"Why's that?" Leina asked. "I thought angels and Heaven were all benevolent things."

As Laila regaled the two of them with the temperament of different angels, such as a foul-up named Nanael and a banished deviant named Delmore, Rowin pulled out his mandolin and began tuning it up.

"Thought the angels were all goody-goods," he murmured. "Seems the angels sing a different song. Still, better them than the alternative."

XXXXXXXXXXXX

All around, the hamlet burned as fiercely as the corpses of its former inhabitants. Five wooden huts, the products of years of hard work and community labor, reduced to funeral pyres for the families and celebratory bonfires for the perpetrators. There were half a dozen of them, four and two, the four in question kicking and clawing at the corpse of the last farmer who'd tried to stand against them. Their bloated grey bodies and fat limbs belied the quickness of their movements, as their victims had discovered too late.

Nearby, a woolly sheep brayed and yelled in terror as its wool burned on its body, running around in a panic and spreading the fire all along the grass of its pasture. The rest of its flock were either in a similarly cruel state or already dead and burning, the smell of burning flesh mixing with the noxious clouds of smoke surrounding their cackling murderers, a pair of goat-headed dwarf-like abominations, a burning sword clutched in each of their hands as they torched the pasture's small sheep house, hacking at the wooden supports until the burning structure folded in on itself and collapsed.

Laughing at this, too, one goat-demon nudged the other and gestured to the other end of the village. The other nodded, and the two sprint-waddled their 3-foot-tall bodies back to the rest of their gang, leaving burning hoof-prints in the ground where their cloven feet seared the earth. They set upon the four fat ones and smacked and pushed them away, hacking off the dead farmer's legs and tossing them like scraps into a pig pen at their obese minions. The two goat-demons then stuck their swords into the farmer's shredded body, watching as its smoked and sizzled before bursting into flames. They laughed all the way back to the twisted gouge in reality that they'd come through, uncaring of how or why it opened, happy to bully nearby dretches into coming with them and making the misery go that much more quickly. Conversing in their guttural tongue, the horned demons were the last into the sickly green-black light of the rift before it slipped shut like a parting of skin being reversed. No trace of it remained.

In its wake, the last braying of the terrified sheep gave way to weak moans of agony before their throats and lungs were too seared for even this. The final mercy of death quickly followed. Nothing was left alive in this hamlet, not even the smoldering grass nearby. The embers of the burning hamlet carried through the morning light and it wasn't long before the smoke became visible to nearby towns and villages.

When the people came to look, none of them noticed the last thing that had slipped through, its red skin paradoxically hidden in the greenery of a cluster of bushes, surrounded by unoccupied fields. This skeletal thing, its bulbous fingertips wrapped around a pike of bone and teeth, lingered away from its future victims, watching, waiting, more patient than even the stones on a beach, for it would succumb to no caress but the desire for its next, perfect murder...

Author's note:

Hope the tonal whiplash wasn't too bad. I admit I surprised even myself with how much I absolutely came to hate these dregs even as I wrote about them.

If you enjoy my works and would like to commission a chapter of your own, general information can be found on my profile page. Feel free to PM me for any additional questions you might have. And do leave a review; I'm sure the commissioners are as eager to hear your feedback as much as I am.