Time seemed bend and meander within Nhea's little cove. So much that it seemed as though the time she spent in there was a few minutes and at the same time, many days. At certain points, Nhea could feel the seconds pass by, like large ripples across the forest. At other times, it felt like a rapid, breaking at the base of a mountain, violent and speedy, seconds rushing past. When she came out, it was like she had slept for many years.
The entirety of the forest felt different. The trees, the fallen leaves, the thickets and brush, all seemed to sound a different melody of silence. As though they were attendees to a funeral, sitting quietly as a dirge was sung. The forest was silent. There was silence within the darkness now. Nhea felt no fear peering straight into it. She looked toward the edge of the glade, and headed towards it. As she moved, dark, formless bits and pieces, blew past her, increasing in volume as she approached the glade. "Ash," she said. Her little steps echoed through the forest as she stepped over dead leaves. Little step by little step, she slowly approached the last tree that marked the boundary of the glade.
She heart fell as she breached the boundary.
The ash blew aimlessly through the air. The charred remains of men, once hard-set of gold and glory, broke off little by little and joined the mass which filled the skies. The glade had turned into messy patches of black, littered with countless bodies. Mutilated and desecrated.
Nhea's breath quickened as she saw the horrors that lay before her. As the scene hit her, so did the caws and warbles of crows in the air, perching on branches and dead bodies, feasting. Fluid rushed up her gullet, and she quickly covered her mouth, clenching her stomach. She collapsed to her knees suddenly, the bitter vomit surging past her fingers covering her mouth. Her back bowed low, she moaned in agony.
Her mind broke past the wretchedness before her, set on one thing.
Quantum.
Much time had passed since he hid her. Dreaded horses had run close to her hollow, their hooves banging on the tree roots, shaking the small cove. The sounds of warfare had filled the air. Until, mysteriously, there was silence. The silence had rung for a long time, before she emerged.
Nhea shook her head violently, resisting the hands of misery and fear on her back.
She needed to find Quantum. She wondered where he could possibly be.
She coughed hard as some of the vomit slipped into her trachea, alongside the dirty air.
Nhea rubbed her mouth with the back of her the hand, and cleaned the vomit of them with the grass on which she knelt. Clenching her teeth, she stood. She staggered, but maintained her balance, as she forged on.
Nhea hurried past desecrated remains, crows feasting to their delight. She strode past burnt guts and limbs, arrayed across the glade. Within her, fear built, its precursor being her fear.
Her strides became larger and larger as she slowly began to run. The bloodied grass, covered with shrapnel and flames on their last breath began to fade past her.
With as much speed as she could muster, she followed the corpses, disturbing crows as she ran. They flew away in a flurry of black feathers and ominous wings.
Nhea broke through the tree line on the southern edge of the glade, and continued to run, faster and faster. Her heart raced as fast as her little feet carried her, dark thoughts filling her trauma-stricken mind.
All she could see was Quantum, within the vast expanse of her mind, bathed in blood, fading away into dust. She couldn't lode him. She couldn't lose another one. She couldn't lose another piece of herself.
She assured herself that Quantum would be alive. She would find him, definitely. She had to.
Her thoughts soon joined the race with her heart and her little feet, as she leapt over tree roots bending out of the earth. Arrows stuck in trees, and human bodies littered her path.
It seemed there was no end to them.
An agonizing pain gnawed at her heart, as she feared the worst. The rustle of ash-covered leaves filled the air, as Nhea run as fast as she could following the path of desolation.
Lifting her feet.
Swinging her arms.
She tripped over a fallen horse, that lay at the end of a small thicket, and fell. Falling hard, she let out a sharp scream, and rolled over on the trampled grass, coming to a stop on her side.
Nhea, mustering her strength, clenching her teeth, pushed herself back up, and continued running, building up speed as she ran.
Her mind filled with the unspeakable, a dim light of hope continued to shine in the darkness of turmoil.
She drew closer and closer, and the corpses began reducing in number.
Nhea soon came across, a steep ditch with a thick brush beneath it. She forced herself to a halt, almost losing her balance.
Beyond the ditch she could see it; a small, shallow pond in the clearing.
Blood red.
Nhea calmed herself. Her chest heaved, as she struggled to catch her breath. She looked down and carefully descended, her little frame maneuvering past thick patches of bush.
It seemed to take forever, but she finally made it to the base.
Moving further past a tree that stood in her way, she was met with a nightmarish scene.
She stood still, her amber eyes staring in horror.
It was the crown of all the horrors she had seen in the time leading to that moment.
A beautiful thing that the universe had violently torn from her hands.
For the second time.
She stood still for a few moments, as still as the water of the pond itself, rendering a blood red reflection of her.
Quantum lay still in the water.
Fallen.
All sorts of words rushed to her mouth, but failed to escape her lips. They seemed to crash into one another on their way. Amalgamating into gibberish.
She slowly drew closer to Quantum, her feet sloshing in the pond, disturbing its stillness and breaking the perfect reflection of the crescent moon above that illuminated the forest.
As she approached. Memories flashed in her mind. They were indecipherable and vague, but their effect was clear. The pain in her heart increased with every step. Her steps became heavier and heavier, as each step was a deeper revelation of the truth.
She couldn't believe it.
How was it possible?
Quantum had fought and overcome, many times. Why did he have to fall now? When she had barely repaid him an iota of what he, had given to her.
Upon reaching his body, she dropped to her knees, a loud splash sounding in the forest.
A lone body was a little away from Quantum's body. The man's jaw had been torn off, just as Quantum's. It lay motionless.
The large frame of a once powerful, dark horse lay close, within the same pond, its entrails floating on the water's surface. It lay motionless.
The broken body of a hunted man; a supposed demon, with a heart of gold lay in the shallow waters. A man who had done much for Nhea. A man who had held her up, when every one else turned their face from her. She was a failure of a daughter. An incompetent. A silly daydreamer. Regardless of all these things, he had still turned his heart to her. He had stood for her, showing her true value. Something she never believed she carried. He lay motionless as well.
Nhea's heart sank, as she touched his cold, wet body. It was a nightmare come true. Fate had turned such a scornful eye towards her, that it would quickly take everything good away from her.
Tears began to well up in her eyes. Quantum's essence in her life was speaking even louder now. She didn't know how it had happened. But in the short time they had spent together, he had shown her a beauty of life her eyes were closed off to for so many years. A love that spoke volumes. Within a light that no darkness, no falsehood, no evil, could overcome.
Nhea's head sank as the tears fell from her face, dropping from her expression of deep anguish into the water. Little ripples formed and carried onwards, slightly disturbing leaves floating on the pond's surface.
She remembered Quantum's words as they were in the glade, the pursuers approaching.
"Should I let them take it?"
It echoed within her mind. She clenched her chest, the pain of loss stabbing into her heart. She rested her head on Quantum's body, and the cold seeped into her mind.
"No…No…no"
She wailed loudly, her cries cutting through the air like curved blades. She rubbed her forehead on his limp arm, rubbing her hands around him to at least feel some warmth from him.
There was nothing.
His countenance was dark. The light had left his eyes. His body was scarred and torn, and a large stab wound was drawn at his back. His left arm was broken at the joint, his left hand motionless in the shallow water.
The forest couldn't dare interrupt Nhea's mourning. There was nothing but silence. Even the crows had gone silent. The murders perched on the branches of trees surrounding the pool, watching, periodically twitching their necks and scratching their wings with their black beaks.
The memories overflowed alongside her tears. Nhea cried bitterly, a somber tune ringing in the forest, as murders of crows flew overhead.
As she cried, the anguish slowly transformed into anger. The tears soon began to disappear from her face. A deep, silent anger, directed at her weakness.
"Live", she said to herself.
"I…I will live…"
She took Quantum's cold hand and placed it upon the amber fluff on her head.
"…But I don't know…what to do without you. W-what should I do?". She sniffled, "Where should I go?"
"I need you…."
"I'm not ready to live without you…"
Her grip on his hand tightened, and then was slowly released. She placed in back into the water, and looked around into the forest around her, and into the skies above. Something continued to bother her. For some reason, she couldn't let go.
As she pondered in silence, there was the sudden clop of a horses hoof, and she turned, glaring at the source.
It seemed one pursuer had remained.