Collaterals

And Struck.

Trigger warning: blood, gore, and profanity.

They moved slowly, out from behind the table. The hall was empty, now, just them stepping down the three steps, into the center of the hall, into—

Leila almost slipped. Bodies littered the floor. Some still choked on their blood, clinging to whatever rope of life was still hanging out to them. The smell of metal and death plastered itself to the roof of Leila's mouth, and she found that she could no longer recall the perfumed scent of her bath, no longer recall how it felt for her skin to be clean, smooth. Leila didn't look at the ground. Instead, her eyes scanned the room. Seven men remained, watching them as they drew nearer. 

And, closest to them, seated on a chair someone had dragged to the center of the mess, was the man Leila assumed to be their ring leader. He had ankle over knee, his back well rested on the back of his chair, chin angled almost to the sky as he raised a brow at them, "I dare say I remember telling you to disarm."

Leila looked to Ali. She'd obey his command, when it came to it. She knew this, even as she prayed he did not plan on giving them up to these men. Because in their eyes...Leila recalled Khaled's words. Dead. They want you dead.

Only Ali's grip tightened on his own sword as he looked to the men, scanning them. Footsteps sounded behind them, and Leila glanced behind her. Captain had risen, sword raised ahead of him, breath finally having steadied. 

The seated man laughed, clapping his hand, "Oh, good. An old man has come to your aid. Surely you are saved!"

Captain's eyes squinted as he moved to Leila's side, the words foreign to his ears. Still, one  needed little understanding of words when offense was being thrown. She looked to Ali and found his eyes were already on hers. One nod. That was all it took. 

The three of them dispersed, moving closer to the men, further apart from each other. They couldn't take seven men at once. But two or three? Here and there? They would force them to separate. 

"Oh, very well," The man stood, leaning forward so he can fish his sword from the ground by him. He brought the hilt to his shirt, using it to wipe the blood away. "But I'd not planned to draw it out like this."

And then they struck. 

Leila was lucky she had no train. Lucky her gown had tattered so that she could easily move, splits of fabric twirling as she went about from one counter to the other. Had she been of a sounder mind, she'd likely be horrified at her state of undress, at the fact that her drawers were visible or the fact that her corset had torn in areas so that her chemise had grown visible. Instead, focused only on the men ahead of her.

But they were barbaric, every step they took an homage to what little training they'd suffered. The first to approach her was the man she'd nicked. Well, nicked was an understatement, considering his face still gushed red blood, enough that it spilled onto his neck and wet his shirt. Three strategic steps got her close enough to spear her sword through his shoulder, and it'd pained him enough that he'd let go of his sword and fisted his hand in her hair, pulling her back so harshly she yelped. And so the Hand was caught between pulling her sword out his shoulder and pulling her head out his grasp, stumbling back as he struggled to stay upright. 

It didn't last long.

Another man, smaller but faster, trudged forward, sword raised high as he swung at Leila. The Princess's eyes went wide as he shouted, veins popping out in his face. He meant to decapitate her, and she needed her sword, her sword that she clung to so that— in a breath Leila had let go of her sword, falling to the ground just in time for the approaching man to bury his own blade in the guts of the one who now clutched her hair no longer. 

She was swift on her feet, kicking his legs from beneath him, watching as the men tumbled like dominos. In a moment she'd pulled her sword free and struck it through the back of his neck, impaling him as she panted, leaning onto her sword, pushing it further into the men now bleeding onto each other. 

Two down. 

Leila looked up, eyes scanning for: Captian, fighting two men at once, and Ali...Ali... where was...

"Leila!" Her brother shouted. 

The Princess turned, sword not yet fully seated in her hand so that she was frozen as a man now bared his teeth, sword swinging right at her neck—

But then he was no longer there. His head, at least. It flew off his neck, body thumping onto the ground before head landed mere inches away from it. Her brother looked to the body, then to her. Deliberately, Ali turned, and Leila mirrored so that, together, back to back, the siblings fought.

Where he missed, she struck, and where she fell, he stood. It was their own little dance, more intuitive that even the Dance of the Flame, so that, by the end of it, there was a small heap of bodies around them.

Leila could hardly believe it. Dead. All dead, except: steel still sounded on steel. She frowned, looking to where the Captain was moving, slowly being cornered to the wall. For a moment she stood, dumbfounded. Here was the man who killed Aasemah, here was the man who raised her, here he was, fighting in the same way he'd taught her how and... Leila ran to him, slipping onto the bloodied floor so that she was pummeling into one of men, swiping at his feet, drawing him away from the Captain. Move, counter move, move, countermove until the man fell and she was looking to the Captain, who's own opponent was doubled over, long since gone still. 

She must have gone mad. Absolutely mad because she was laughing, a crazed laugh as her new sword clattered to the ground and she ran two bloodied hands through her hair, turning to look to her brother. Alive. They were alive and well and Leila could not help but  take in her brother's mouth, ajar, gasping out a howl of relief as he let his own sword fall, opening his arms to her. She did not care for the blood on his face, drying and matting now with sweat and injured flesh. She did not care for the ache of her own muscles, or that her bare shoulders had grown warm under the feel of her new coat of crimson.

No, she stumbled across the ground, trying desperately not to trip over the bodies, slip on the blood as she  cried out, "Ali!"

His brows welled in emotion as he took a step forward, sniffling as he spoke, "It's Okay. It's Okay, it's over—!"

A great many things happened at once. One should understand, truly, the delirious haze now overcoming both of them. The doors, having been sealed shut right behind where Ali now stood, slammed open. Leila could not see who walked through them. She couldn't, because her view was blocked by the sight of the large man— the same one who'd sat on the chair, the same one who'd given that cruel laugh and sworn not to draw their deaths out— stood, directly behind Ali, fully animated,

and struck.