I think humans fight because they must. There is no logic to fighting – everybody claims grand motives and pontificates on the greatness and horrors that follow. But mostly, people fight because they have no other choice. Somebody above them told them to fight, and so they do. They kill, maim, and destroy, in the name of the state or of another human being. I wonder if they ever put their own names on the bullets that they pumped into their victims. What if they don’t want to fight? What if they choose to throw away their weapons and choose to accept that this madness was not worth lives? They would be shot by their commanders; death in front of them, death behind them.

That is what I thought, standing there. I saw with the dispassionate eyes of the dead the surprise and fear of the soldiers facing it.

First, they saw the tendrils of snow, Finora’s little storm, blinding them. They vanished within it, struggling in a momentary lapse of sight.

Next, came Fangira. A shadow within the storm. She moved without stirring the wind – that secret technique – and, perhaps it was because of my vantage, I saw her almost dissolve in the wind twice. Once, quick, to the middle, and then straight in front of the right most shield of their formation and a punch.

He stood no chance.

His shield dented, then crushed in a blast of light, and he was hit straight into the gnarled trunks of the trees lined to the side, where a nasty sharp branch impaled him through the neck.

Even the trees had tasted blood.

The next blow took out two: the shield rippling under the punches of Fangira’s fists as it splintered and cut off the man’s arms and the momentum made him take out the crossbow behind him. The strange circling bands of light that hummed and buzzed around her arms seemed to have somehow tunnelled through the shield and the men’s bodies! But before she could land in the third blow, the Arch Magus managed to locate her.

And launch towards her a beam of bright white flame.

She dodged, her agile body ducking, her legs circling around, kicking and launching one of the bystanders, a startled spearman with a shield, straight into the path of the flame.

Before he had chance to utter surprise, his torso burst in fire as did the rest of him shortly thereafter; the white flame cleaved his upper body in two, continuing in its path till it set a pine tree on fire.

And then she moved again like a shadow, and dissolved back near to us, standing in front of us like our very own shield.

Four soldiers – dead. Within what – six seconds? Seven seconds? Ten minutes? Did it even matter? Time is an illusion. Each man who faced an unstoppable death felt like he had faced eternity.

There were still about twenty of them left though, including that very dangerous Arch Magus. If I was not facing eternity, I certainly faced a moment of time dilation.

“Nora! Ready?” Fangira motioned.

“Mmm”. A muffled murmur of acquiescence. I turned my eyes to the side and saw her kneeling down beside a soldier, holding his neck. Her mouth bit into the carotid artery, and she was drinking from it. When she slowly stood up even with her lips sticking to the throat, I saw the drips of blood trail down her chin, and the man’s legs almost dragged on the ground. She seemed a little taller, a little more muscular, as if her limbs had stretched out and developed muscles.

Those giant wings stretched a span wider than ten feet, glowing crimson.

Time began to flow, turning from sweet honey to water, tasteless.

I heard the shouts saying “The Lhiannan! The Lhiannan!” or “Devil’s bitch!” or some other nonsense from across the narrow passage. Some raised their swords, and some gripped their shields harder. I saw a gleam of white, like a layer of flame, appear on their armor. And I realized they were on the defensive.

And afraid. So very afraid.

“It seems,” I remarked, “that the Magus can’t attack while defending. Otherwise, we’d be fried even before we could have this conversation.”

“Yes,” Fangira said. “They’re waiting. They’ll be here very soon. I can feel the hooves approaching: a hundred or so. Nora, prepare the ground. I really did not want to do this, for it always brings that one out. Begin! Now!”

The man dropped down from Finora’s grasp, flailing, bleeding out, turning the little flakes of packed ice frosty red. That’s how the strange summons started. The snow turning red. And then the red crawled, slipped, and ached across till the edges of the path.

It started glowing, like the light of a dying moon.

“What are you all doing?” the Arch Magus screamed. “Stop gaping at her, for the flame’s sake. Loose! Loose, you idiots!”

Snaps of strings. The rush of arrows. And then I heard the howl of a wolf.

Finora thrust her right palm forwards, and the arrows split. A red mist hung in their stead. Then, she sliced her left arm up in a swift movement forward, as if conducting the most marvellously macabre orchestra. The red mist rushed as a jet in an arc towards the bewildered soldiers; it cut through the line of the shields and sliced off two of the crossbows, melting their skin off, searching ever for blood.

They got hacked by this red mist off the ground.

But the ones with the glowing shields sustained even after being hit twice, once while the mist went forward, and once while returning back: the Arch Magus’ protection worked well.

Yet, I should have known. Nothing in war goes this easy.

What caught my attention first were the many small glints of shining steel in the air, coming towards us like a swarm of mosquitoes.  Then it broke upon us, as the red mist danced in front splitting their path and swirling about trying to scatter them.

Oh of course, I forgot to tell you – I could feel the gallop of horses. The shouts of men, the neighing of horses – it was so unnatural in that quiet forest. But all my attention was taken up by the Magus and his men.

“Half a minute till they come!” I heard Fangira say from behind us. I had completely missed her movements. There were so many things to follow with your attention. It was overwhelming – all the things that were happening. And this is what I hate about fighting – so much movement everywhere! “Watch the bolts!”

She was kneeling, her hands on the snow, her eyes crimson, giving off their own light – like a candle wrapped in glitzy cellophane.

The Knights rounded up the curve of the path. Seven or eight horses in the front with many, many more behind that first line. They had their crossbows out. And from behind them I could see at least a few more ranks with their longbows ready to loose.

Then, Fangira howled.

Just as the arrows started to make up the distance, and their parabolic trajectories hit us, with that red mist dancing around to save us from that, Fangira howled like an angry wolf. If I were Mary’s little lamb, my blood would curdle and I would drop dead just from the sheer fear that the howl contained.

And to her howl perhaps a hundred different howls joined. From all around the thickset trees of the forest, from around the moonlight that shone so bright, howls. From the blessed darkness, howls. The red of the snow coalesced into something, and that something vanished into the air. And from the air came Spirit Wolves.

Just like that – like lightning out of blue sky, or clouds late in a hot afternoon – wolves.

They were filled with that same crimson that was littered on the snow. And they looked like normal grey wolves but larger, with some whose shoulders reached the height of an adult man. But it is only when I saw the terrified soldiers shoot arrows through them, that I realized that they were not, at least then, made of flesh.

I felt the air grow dense around me. Time flows differently at different times, and that was certainly a time when Time ticked with a tickling moan.

The horses neighed, the wolves howled, and soldiers whimpered. Fangira’s hands and legs started growing those dangerous bands of light. Finora batted away arrow after arrow in the role of that macabre conductor of the red mists.

The first rank of the Knights charging was terrified. The horses reared, kicking and neighing, wanting nothing to do with these monsters that stood in front of them. The rank behind it crashed against a few, who stumbled and their riders fell down into the melee. The wolves growled, and their howling ceased as they saw the Knights falter. Then they charged. The arrows from behind the ranks still continued to pour down, but they hit nothing but snow and muddy tracks of the forest.

The spirit wolves reigned supreme.

Their jaws opened around necks of both the horses and the men. The horde of wolves passed through the ranks which were bloodied, distraught, and no longer a recognizable formation. Many a limb was cut, and many a soldier died with frozen fear over their faces. But that is not to say that they did not get to fight back.

Only in contact of flesh could they become physical, become real – that was the power of the Spirit Wolves. Which meant that when the wolves go to bite, they would for a time become real. But I don’t think anybody figured it out back there – within half a minute the last ranks of the Knights had been attacked. Some swords and pikes may have prolonged their life, but only for a moment. The Knights floundered in the snow, crimson. Pushed under hooves of a charge, thrown out by their very beasts.

That was the end of the charge of the Fool’s Brigade. None of them needed to die – they only charged to authority, not to reason. And there were many clues as to this was a bad idea: a girl with wings, a girl who could literally punch the life out you, and a creepy man with a curtain. I bet that night many a spirit cried, “I should have taken his offer!”

 

However, there was one last problem. The Arch Magus still lived. Fangira charged behind the wolves, with her pace heightened by those humming bands on her ankles; as the shocked soldiers died to the wolves, she attacked him. He still had his men: some survived – some who had that white glow on their shields and armor – but that was just a few he had around him. She hit them, sending those rings of light through them, grunting as one managed to stick a spear into her thighs. She took out four at a go, before the Arch Magus finally managed to launch another blast of that white hot flame.

Towards us.

Even as the Knights died by scores, and the wolves ate the ranks: he launched it towards us.

That little bastard.

The red mist must have known. It moved swiftly, guarding Finora; I must have panicked because I jumped with a reflex that seemed odd at the time. My foot got tangled in the stupid curtain, and I stumbled forward, ultimately rolling on the snow. The mist vapourised: a red curtain blown apart, scattered in loose, tattered shreds. But the arrows and bolts still arched around about us. Finora waved her hands frantically at the last stray arrows, trying to gather whatever bit of mist that was left, even as the cavalry archers shot through the spirits lunging at their necks.

Explosion. The Earth thundered; lumps of snow fell upon me and I was momentarily pushed to the side till I hit brambles at the edge of the path. I heard a cry of anguish – of course one among many at the time – only that now I know it belonged to Finora.

It was when I stood up that I got to realize what sort of mess we were in.

The wolves had rendered the path into a carpet of human debris. And they were still on, far out of sight around the curve (had it changed by then?): a fearsome black and crimson shadow which streaked here and there with luminescent yellow eyes.

To my other side – Finora lay on the ground with arrows sticking out from her body.

I could not tell you, even now, what sort of injuries she had. I do not remember the number of arrows, nor can I recall where it hit. I just remember looking at her rooted to the ground: a poor imitation of a wooden puppet. She seemed to have shrunk back to her former self, perhaps even smaller.

Fangira was kneeling down beside her, cradling her head in her palm.

And in between us, far away from his comrades and without much scratches, was a knight.

I, the puppet, stood there looking from the Knight to Fangira. The wolves, by either random chance or sheer dumb luck, which are basically almost always the same thing, had missed this one armored Knight. Couldn’t see his horse, though.

Why did they not stop? They could have solved it all. Just by stopping and looking at themselves.

Fangira picked Nora up, and gave an exhausted sigh with a dirty look towards me.

“Find your own way home,” she said and left.

She dashed through a break in the trees and vanished within its darkness, with Finora, the arrows, and everything.

The Knight saw her go, then looked from me to the fighting wolves and remnants of their prey, listening to the groaning cries of the many that were not quite yet dead. I felt then that everything in that moment had grown ten times heavier. The air itself had become denser.

He growled and charged towards me, in an oath of fury and anger; his sword was raised with only one idea in mind. He swung at me with all his might.

I had just wanted him to stop.

The sword slowed down around me, as if it had hit water. It chilled, like it had been wet before being thrust into an arctic blizzard. I watched it, the moonlight glinting off its blade, tracing a curve ever so slowly. I simply dodged. The knight’s momentum made him slip on the snow, and he fell down, loosing his grip on the sword which fell to his side.

“Bastard!” he cried. “What are ye?”

I looked at his haggard face and his breath coming out in puffy mist.

“My friend,” I told him. “If only I knew!”

“How are ye mixed with the Lhiannan? Are ye too from the Devil?” He was paddling back with hands, trying to find a foothold in the snow that had turned slick.

“I have no idea what that means,” I answered him with honesty. “As far as those women are concerned, you could say that I am an acquaintance.”

He started wheezing and laughing. His was now speaking with clouds of mist coming out of his breath.

“’tis so cold!” he cried. “Ye bastards, ye killed ‘em all! So many, so many!”

“I told you to stop, didn’t I?” I asked. To which he didn’t answer. He just sat there on his knees, his armor now clinking because of the cold shivers on his body.

“So cold,” he kept saying. I let him be. I didn’t feel any cold.

I walked along the path, towards where the Knights had come riding. First, I saw a little spark of white flickering in the darkness – like the discharge of a plasma globe. The Arch Magus lay on the ground, his body broken and quite obviously dead. Next, I saw the bloodied battlefield, soaked red with mist still coming up from the warm blood

And all was quiet.

Except the clinking of the rather cold knight – but even he stopped after a wolf passed me by. All yellow eyes and crimson lined black fur. It gave me a piercing stare after which it suddenly disappeared.

Only I stood there.

Only I listened to the eerie sound of silence. Only I smelled the confused odours of death. Then the snow started falling – the moonlight dimmed. Was it midnight yet? I don’t think so.

That is when something peculiar happened. While I was standing there, the snow made me feel a strange kind of heat. It came from behind me – from the side of the path beyond the Old Oak.

It was strange – I had mostly felt the close comfort of room temperature ever since my strange awakening. I couldn’t feel either heat or cold – just bleh. That is what I would say how hotness or coldness to me feels like.

But that was heat. A lot of it. It came in slow measured steps towards me. A repercussion of the magic? Perhaps this is what Fangira was afraid of.

Who knows? I certainly don’t. And I was not going to stay behind to answer any ridiculous questions that you might have.

I took the first path that I could sort of make out in between the trees – a narrow trail, only a single person wide – and walked out of the madness that had happened. They had all finally stopped, and all remained silent.