Legacy

& A Legacy

~~~~~ The After ~~~~~

I could smell the blood in the air. If I opened my mouth, I knew that I would be able to taste it. A coppery scent that fought with pungency and promised that crimson sight of blood trickling, streaming, ending. A body nearly fell into mine and I moved instinctively, not bothering to turn as I let it fall to the side.

One glance: a black-haired boy, maybe sixteen. A curved blade still sat in his twitching fingers, his intent obvious but the result the same as I'd always seen. I'd known he was going to fall past me: the death wound in his neck and the weapon in his hands, before he'd even woken up this morning.

A crazed roar interrupted my walk and I looked up in a flash, knocking the woman outside. Her roar became a high keening as she saw the boy and using her distraction, I knocked her outside. I didn't need to kill her. In two month's time as one of the only survivors of this massacre, she would do it herself, lost in the grief of her son's untimely death.

The boy dead on the ground just behind me.

"They're nearly all dead," a husky voice told me. A hand stole around my waist and pulled me backwards and I side-stepped away from him, drawing my blade with a crooked smile. The carnage was beginning to die down around us. The futures told me that we were safe after another job - well unless something changed.

"Of course they are," I replied, pushing the boy away. "We always get the job done."

Almost distractedly, he swiped at an attacker's stomach, the assailant trying to keep silent and kill him. Kydan never missed anything. His shimmering blade turned red with the assailant's blood.

"Do I have to kill anymore or can I clean my blades now?" he asked me, almost indifferently. "I'd rather I don't get an infection from my weapons. I prefer to use them to kill other people and not myself."

"You should be okay," I replied, shrugging lightly. As he retrieved a well-worn cloth from his jacket, a man raged up, blades flashing like a storm. Kydan stepped back, trying to flip his blade into the better position until I stepped forward and stuck my foot out. The man tripped and over his fallen body, Kydan whipped around the crossbow from around his neck.

A poison-tipped arrow flew. At long-range, Kydan was deadly with the weapon. At close quarters, it was like shooting fish in a barrel. He didn't even look down as the man stopped moving.

"Now you're okay," I assured him, wiping blood off my shirt. Turning, I ducked an arrow that hurled through the room. It wasn't necessary - it was aimed at precisely one person only. I heard the sound of collision and arrowhead nicking bone. The scream accompanied it and the sound struck me like familiar notes of a song.

"You find this Master?" I asked Kydan, knowing he was following. "They said he was hiding out in one of these out-lying villages and we've swept through everyone of them. This has been the only one of them that actually hints there might be some kind of allegiance."

"No, they haven't found any sign of him yet," Kydan sighed, catching up to me. "But they're still searching. Remember, we get double if we can take him back alive. And I need new weapons. These ones are getting worn out."

"I remember," I shot back. "I need the money as much as you do. Let's just get the bastard and bring him back for the money at the end of the day. You can get your weapons and I can maybe sleep somewhere that has an actual roof."

"How far did your future seeing go?" he asked me, frustrated. "If we spend too much time in this place, the Light will try and recapture us. I've seen enough of the inside of a prison. There's only so many cracks in a wall I can count."