Kobold Life

Chapter 13: Unity

"No!" I screamed as the body of the harpy fell from the air before me.

The bolt which had struck her neck had passed more than halfway through it leaving a blood-stained shaft emerging from the other side. She hit the ground almost immediately, nestling the egg to her soft plume before she hit the ground. Blood gushed out of the wound in rapid pulses, as I rushed to her side.

She wasn't an enemy anymore. She had accepted the deal, she was going to leave people alone. This wasn't supposed to end in blood. I looked in the direction the shot had come from, seeing Gabriel emerging from the grass some hundred feet away. Meanwhile, Jitra and Opal closed in. This didn't need to happen. Chell looked up with me, causing a fresh deluge of blood to pour from the hole through the side of her neck. It looked like she was trying to say something, but she couldn't speak through the blood. Instead, one taloned hand reached up to me as I knelt beside her. She was asking for help.

I tried to think, what could I do to help her. I had no magic, no healing or medicine, but there had to be a way. People healed quickly here, I had healed, and so had Gabriel, maybe she could too. I just had to find a way to keep her alive long enough. I had to find a way to fix this. Her hand grabbed my own, pulling me out of the state long enough to see her. Tears welled up in her eyes, as she pulled my hand down to the egg she had cradled. Its pristine white shell, now stained pink in its mother's blood. I looked back to her face just in time to see the life leaving her eyes, as her head lolled to the side and her grip loosened. I felt the weight of the egg trying to shift as her other arm fell off it. I moved it carefully from her, setting it into the grass softly. Her blood and her daughter's blood now coated me more liberally than my own.

I heard the sound of Jitra and Opal stopping a few feet back from me, having arrived moments too late to stop Gabriel. And Gabriel, I turned to face him with fury. He strolled casually through the grass as if nothing had happened, his crossbow reloaded and faced down at his side while he strode.

"Why!" I yelled, "She was leaving! Why did you shoot?"

He didn't stop walking, but let out an exasperated sigh instead of answering.

"Answer me!" I demanded, "She wasn't our enemy anymore! Why?"

"Cyrek," Jitra called from behind me, " they charm people, whatever she told you was just to lower your guard."

She tried to explain for him, but she hadn't made the shot, she just hadn't been there to stop it. Somewhere deep in my mind, I knew that it wasn't her responsibility or her fault, but the shock of it still resounded through me and sent wildfire through my veins. I turned to her, with a glare, and to my surprise, she backed away as if afraid. Perhaps she simply knew better.

That same glare moved to Gabriel, who had finally made it close enough that he deigned to speak.
From around fifty feet and still approaching he called back.

"She was a monster, she would have killed you in a heartbeat, the only reasons you are still alive, are that she wanted something from you and that I put a bolt through her throat before she could slice yours."

"Idiot!" I responded, "She had what she wanted, she was done, she was going to make something better of her life! And you ended it because you thought to shoot without knowing anything!"

"Shut up, Cyrek!" He called back, "Before you alert every other damn monster in the plains."

"So you can shoot them too," I challenged.

"I saved you, you just don't know it yet because you're still under her charms. You'd listen to anything she said, " He said, his cool finally beginning to break.