The Sword of Retribution

Danger in the Dark - Part 5

     They hadn’t gone more than a few yards when Shaun noticed Diana tying a piece of cloth around her arm and saw for the first time that her sleeve was soaked with blood around the elbow. “You’re hurt!” he exclaimed in surprise. “Why don’t you heal yourself?”

     “I mustn’t,” replied the cleric. “This is my penance.”

     “Your what? What are you talking about?”

     “I killed one of them just now,” she explained. “It’s the first time I’ve ever taken a life. Oh don’t get me wrong, I’m not the shrinking innocent I was a year ago. I now know that it’s sometimes necessary to hurt people in self defence, maybe even kill them, especially if you’re on a mission on which the lives of many people depend, but it’s not right that we immediately forget the life we’ve taken and just carry on as though nothing’s happened. A life is an awesome thing. Dozens of years long and carrying a vast load of unique memories and experiences. It is our duty to remember each and every life we take with awe and reverence, no matter how evil that life was.”

     “But if you let it heal naturally, it’ll leave a scar.”

     “Good, and every time I see that scar, it’ll remind me of the life I’ve taken. Better for the scar to be on my body than on my soul.”

     “But what if it becomes infected?” pointed out Matthew. “You can die from infected wounds, you know.”

     “If it becomes infected, I’ll pray to Caroli to heal the infection but not the wound. Always assuming that My lady agrees to do so, of course. It may be Her will that I die.”

     “Don’t talk rot!” exclaimed Shaun angrily. “Caroli allows you to defend yourself, up to and including killing if necessary, so that you can go on healing people and spreading the word. I know because Father Bryon told me, so heal that wound and stop talking such rubbish.”

     Diana was adamant in her refusal, though, and after a few minutes of heated argument her brothers gave up. Thomas saw them glance at each other and guessed that they recognised the mood she was in. Shaun looked relieved, though, to Thomas's surprise, and he walked beside him so they could talk quietly.

     "You think she'll be okay?" the wizard asked.

     "She's found a way to kill in self defence, or someone else's defence, that's consistent with both her faith and her pacifistic beliefs," the woodsman replied. "Naturally I don't like the idea of her body carrying permanent scars, but it's vastly preferable to the alternative. This is something that could have destroyed her. Not so long ago, she was so firmly opposed to violence of any kind that she’d have refused to kill the most evil creature in the world even to save her own life. Two wrongs don’t make a right, she’d have said."

     Thomas nodded. "I kind of miss the old Diana, though," he said.

     "The old Diana wouldn't have lasted long in the real world," Shaun replied. "Even if we'd never left home she would have been forced to harden off sooner or later. This life we're leading now is just speeding the process up."

     Thomas nodded sadly and they walked in silence for a while.

     They had no direct evidence that the humanoids were still with them in the hours that followed, but they all had the uncomfortable feeling of being watched and followed, and occasionally they would hear some small noise from the darkness surrounding them. The clatter of a pebble or the crunch of sand, similar to the noises they’d heard just before the humanoids’ first attack. Angus speculated that they were being tailed by a small number of scouts who were marking a trail for a larger force somewhere behind.