The demonic monsters had found them. They were swarming the forest, hunting them down.
"Elder, I'm begging you, please go!" Freyla pleaded, pushing at Aerin again with her uninjured left hand.
"It's too late, Freyla." Aerin looked down at her friend, the one who had stood by her through the absolute worst of it. The bond between them ran deep. "We're surrounded."
Aerin's shoulders slumped. "I'm so tired," she whispered. "I don't want to live like this anymore, always hiding, always on the run. I haven't had a single night of real sleep since the war began." She looked into Freyla's eyes, her own resolve hardening into something brittle and grim. "I'm staying with you. We fight to the death."
Her voice, once a leader's, was now just lost and helpless. Before this, before they were found, Aerin had been filled with a desperate hope. But seeing her people cut down, seeing Freyla wounded and bleeding at her feet... the last thread of hope inside her had finally snapped.
