Everheart

From the Wolves' Eyes: Chapter 8

Every feeling Cypress had about getting the door closed in her face vanished. He needs help, she thought. I need to help him. As she moved forward, Elija clamped his hand around her wrist. They had gotten through an encounter without giving up on their alibis. They had a chance to escape, and they needed to take it. When Cypress turned to him, he began tugging her away from the scene in front of them. “We need to act like normal citizens,” Elija told her in hushed tone.

“I’m not a normal citizen. What if someone had pulled me away from saving you the night you escaped?” Cypress pulled against Elija. “I’m helping him. He can’t defend himself, Elija. We need to do something about it.”

Elija tightened his grip around her wrist causing Cypress to wince. She hadn’t realized how strong he actually was. “Is that a joke? The Guard is over there. You could die,” he threatened.

“Then I’ll die for my cause.”

The statement caught Elija off guard and he loosened his grip on her wrist just enough for her to pull free and run to the man’s aid. As soon as he realized what happened, he reached out to grab her again, only to miss drastically while she ran to the man’s rescue. With a sigh, Elija took off behind her to help and make sure she didn’t get herself killed. As she ran, Cypress adjusted her cloak and grabbed her whip from her left hip and cracked it around the ankle of the Guard that was about to strike the man on the ground and pulled, bringing him to the ground as well. After the first Guard fell, Cypress pulled the attention away from the bleeding man on the ground as she became the center of the Guard’s attention. “You know, I always thought the Guard was a bunch of scaredy cats that enjoyed bullying people, but I never thought you would have enough guts to attack someone with a cart full of weapons,” Cypress taunted.

The Guards watched her carefully, trying to anticipate her next move. While they were paying attention to her, Elija snuck in and helped up the injured man on the ground. “C’mon sir,” he whispered as he helped the man to his feet and then walked away carefully. Unfortunately, he wasn’t as stealthy as he thought because he caught one of the Guard’s attention. Cypress saw him begin to draw his sword on the two trying to escape. She cracked her whip in an attempt to wrap it around his wrist, but he was too far to wrap it around, so all she was able to do was smack his armor clad wrist. “I’m your opponent,” Cypress said, trying to assert herself but finding her voice shaking slightly when her plan didn’t work the way she wanted it to.

The Guard turned back around to face her, replacing the sword in its sheath, and smiled from beneath his rust colored helmet. “Well then, come on and fight,” he said.

Another Guard chimed in, “Who’da thought that today would be the day we kill a dragonfly?”

Stop shaking. You’re stronger than they are, you know that, Cypress willed herself to smile. “Keep dreaming boys. And while you’re at it, I’d start praying that Airganon doesn’t kill you after you go back to him with your tails between your legs saying that I beat you.” She spit on the ground in their direction to be sure that they were enraged, hoping that would cause a lapse in judgement or cause them to not fight as well as they possibly could have. Continually stealing looks passed the Guards to see if Elija had brought the man far enough away, she was judging how long it would take her to distract the Guards before she could make a run for it. The more she thought about it, Elija was right. This encounter may just as well be her last. The last time she faced off with the Guard, it was night and she had the element of surprise, but that was long gone now that she had conversed with them and held their attention for so long. It wasn’t like a small thing could draw their attention away from her, and if it did, would everyone involved still be safe? Cypress soon found out the answer to that when the old man coughed, revealing where he and Elija were.