Warhorse

1

How could this have happened? She was a warrior, a proud knight. She had trained so hard, for so many hours. She was strong, she was better than this... But she was here... Bleeding to death in the grass. She wanted to call out for help, but only gargled chokes came out of her mouth. She could feel her body getting colder and colder as the blood pooled around her into the grass. The world was growing darker and darker, she was scared. She could only think of her family, how she had promised to come home, and her poor mother would never see her again. She would never get to spar with her brothers again, and never see her sister's smile. She'd never hear her father say he was proud of her strength.

Ever since she was little, all she ever wanted was to make her family proud. Her brothers were all accomplished knights, and she wanted to be just like them. She trained with her father every day to be the strongest she could be, but it always felt like they were so far past her. She never quit, and never would. After years and years of training, she finally felt like she could stand with her brothers. But her first mission ending like this... after all that time growing, becoming the strongest she could be, it still wasn't enough. How? Why? She did everything she was supposed to, why wasn't she strong? How could she lose so horrifically like this? This wasn't how it was supposed to happen! She was supposed to be great!

Great... Like Darek, he came home with a dragon hide... wearing its skin as armor, using its skull like a shield, carving its femur into a blade. He was great, he was strong. Why couldn't she be like him? He was so kind, he always believed she would be great... Guess he was wrong, wasn't he? She wasn't great, she was faced down in the middle of the woods dying.

Or Mark... On his first mission, he killed a titan with a bread knife. He came home covered in its blood. The titan's canine tooth was fashioned into a spearhead. Mark was always so brutal, a dog once attacked her when she was little. She could remember the sounds the dog's jaw made as Mark tore it off, trying to protect her. He said that he believed that if she wasn't ready to kill she would never be a good knight, so she volunteered at the butcher. Trying to get used to death and gore, she would spend many nights puking her guts out. But eventually, she got used to seeing the viscera.

Then Hound... He was the oldest. On his first mission, he raided a vampire's castle, single-handedly tearing through wave after wave of whatever the vampiric lord could throw at him. Werebeasts, undead, illusions, literal demons. And he cut through every single one of them. He came home with the dark lord's cloak, it made him invisible in the dark and was practically indestructible. How he killed the dark lord she couldn't imagine, but it was dead and he had the proof. Hound never really talked after he raided the castle, but the one time she could remember him speaking, he told her to abandon the idea of being a knight. She couldn't believe him when he said that, everyone around her always told her she could do it. That she could be strong, but not Hound. Hound looked at her like she was a worm that crawled onto his plate, she never understood that look. That look of utter hatred, like he would rather see her dead than be near him.

She wanted to be strong like them... Like every one of them, yes, even Hound. Even though it felt like he hated her, he was strong, and she admired that strength. Turns out he was right though... She should have abandoned this idea... Maybe then she would be alive. She was so cold, she wished she could be wrapped in her Mother's arms again, oh Mother... She was always so kind and loving... Mother really believed that she could be a great knight like her brothers.

And little Rose... She always admired her for wanting to be a knight, always offering encouragement. "You can do it! I believe in you!" She would say... It was something that helped push her to be better. She wanted to prove Rose right, that she could do it... That she was worth believing in. She remembered her Father, his stoic silence... But his eyes were loving, he really did care for every one of his children, and he always helped push her to be strong. He never gave up on her... Maybe if she tried pushing harder, she would show him that his efforts were worth it. How would they all react? Would they be sad she was gone? Would they mourn her? Or would they forget about her? She would... She would forget about herself. Someone like her... weak, fragile, worthless. She didn't deserve to be remembered, all she could wish was that they didn't hate her. She had wasted all their time by making them help her try to achieve a pointless dream, and now she was dying... All their time was wasted.

She felt herself begin to cry... She was so sorry to her family, forcing them to entertain this foolish idea of a dream. Instead, she went out and got herself killed, she didn't even get to tell them all goodbye when she left this morning... She was in such a rush to leave for her very first real mission... She forgot to tell them she loved them. Did they know? How much she cared for each of them? How horrible she would feel if any of them were to be hurt? She doubted that they did in this moment. She wanted to go home and tell them all the things she wished she told them sooner... How she appreciated all their time, effort, and encouragement. The world grew ever darker, so dark she didn't even notice the cloaked figure above her