Resident warrior

CHAPTER 5-DAVID'S FINAL HOURS

The cold stones of the castle stood mute witness as dawn slowly bled through the sky, streaking pale gold across the battered battlements. Rain had stopped, leaving the world washed pure yet drowned in grief. The air smelled of the earth and loss.
David leaned against the rough wall of the blasted courtyard, blood oozing continuously through the cloth Faith kept pressed over his side. He breathed in a wheezy and thin way, each gasping breath coming out even worse than before. The pain faded, replaced now by some creeping numbness, almost like ice spreading through his limbs.
Faith knelt beside him, fingers trembling but steady in her desperate attempt to prevent the bleeding. Those fingers were cold as they brushed his skin, but her heart burned with a fierce determination: She wouldn't - not now, not after everything - lose him.
"Please hold on, Dad -" she implored, her voice breaking during the statement, "You are going to be alright. We are going to get help. We have to."
A weak smile crossed his lips, making them quiver at the edges. "Faith... you're stronger than you think. Stronger than me."
Her eyes widened, disbelief flashing through the tears. "Don't say that. You've always been the strongest. You kept us all alive."
David shook his head faintly, pain flickering across his face. "No... You and Ethan—you've got to carry this forward. I was just the shield, the wall... but you... You're the light."
Ethan stood nearby, fists clenched so tightly his knuckles were white as he watched the dispassionate exchange, jaw set, yet secretly at war with himself as he felt anger flash to helplessness behind his eyes. The fight was done. The threat had been crushed with the castle's fall, bitter though it is, carved deep into their souls.
"Don't talk like that," Ethan growled, stepping closer. "You're not going anywhere. Not without me."
David raised a shaking hand and rested it lightly on Ethan's arm. "You're the leader now. The one who has to decide the future. Not me."
Ethan twisted with pain, his voice cracking. "We don't leave anyone behind. That's not who we are."
Faith nestled closer, clasping almost all of David's hand in hers. "Please, Dad, don't leave us. You have to fight."
His eyes flickered up to hers-haunted yet tender. "Faith... your mother... she's in you and the way you fight for what you love even when the world tries to break you, that kind of love, it changes everything."

Faith caught her breath at a jarring moment and, in wave after wave of grief practically drowned. Her mother had long since disappeared, a wound in the heart she forged with her every moment. But from David's words, she felt a connection-an unspoken promise that her fight was not in vain.
"I won't forget," she whispered, voice choked with emotion. "You saved me... You saved us all."
David smiled softly, a fragile light in his fading eyes. "That's all I ever wanted."
Silence fell upon them, sacred and still, time breaking the castle around them into empty fragments, but in that quiet, they found something precious-a moment in which the world was silent.
David's chest swelled and fell the last time. Then his eyes closed with a slow exhale.
Faith gasped, her body trembling as tears spilled from her eyes. Ethan fell to the floor, planting his hand upon David's chest, where formerly heartbeats thundered but now only emptiness reigns.
"We'll carry you with us," Ethan said gently-a voice thick with grief-"Every step, every battle. You won't be forgotten."
Faith's head bowed as she muttered a prayer to the morning light. "Rest now, Dad. You earned it."
With the sun crawling higher above, some rays of gold pierced broken windows and broken arches, and the world felt blank-blank of their friend but touched with hope from his sacrifice.
Ethan and Faith stayed quiet for a moment longer to bear the weight of the losses. Then rising, Ethan wiped away his tears with the back of his hand.
"We have to move," he said, voice steady but heavy. "For David. For all those who ever believed in this fight."
Faith nodded, rising slowly. Her gaze lingered on the spot where David had fallen, a new fire igniting her spirit. "We'll finish this," she said. "Together."
Ethan gave her a small, weary smile. "Together."