Women Of Steel | ✔

XLII

Happy new year folks, too bad this chapter's gonna break your hearts. I apologize, well not really :-)

***

They don't come for me first, no they'd be stupid to do so. Snout nosed Kelechi notices my frantic glances in Sade's way, I will continue to count those glances as the worst mistake of my life and I will carry that burden to my grave. Unceremoniously, and swiftly, Sade's throat is slit and my world tilts into oblivion.

I'm not sure who screams, but it's all I can hear, it rings in my head as I stagger to the ground as Sade falls in chains. My beautiful girl does not go down silently, her lips part in silent anguish.

I scramble to her side, half dazed as she gurgles on her blood, blood that has kept her life for twenty one years is the same one that chokes her. I don't hear the fight start, I don't care if the same fate happens to the prince, I remain selfish to my rotting core.

My hands shake as I cradle her head in my laps, rocking back and forth, tears dropping on her face.

"I failed you, don't forgive me, take it to your grave." I say with tears running down my cheeks, my chest hitching with every breath.

Her death is not swift, I watch painfully as the light leaves her eyes slowly and torturously, so much everywhere. On my hands, on her white cloth, seeping into the dark soil.

Under the stars, she whispers her last words, the last she will ever speak, the last I will ever hear her speak. Even in her death, I make it about me.

"Demi, I. . . I want to go home."

I lose my sanity, whatever tatters is left of it as the light leaves her eyes, as she chokes on her last breath and as her beautiful body goes limp and useless in my arms.

I scream my throat raw, grief pouring into my shout like an overfilled cup. My bloody hand grips my chest tight, pain settles in it and I cannot take it anymore, I cannot take the losses, and it hurts like hell, like a thousand hounds tear at it.

I am in hell. I am in hell.

Once again, fate looks me in the eyes and winks boastfully, did I ever think I would escape her one last bite. First my mother, then my siblings, my father, and Sade. All of them my faults.

I scratch at my body in disdain, clawing at my face and drawing blood. The need, the urge to be someone else, to be something but myself wells up suddenly.

"Get up and fight,"

My vision blurs as I focus my gaze on Sade's murderer standing before me.

"Will you also die like your coward slave girl?" He goads. "She was a dull thing to play with, all my men had turns with her."

White hot fury overtakes all my senses, shoving all reasoning to the cursed soil, I rise with a swiftness foreign to me. The bastard stumbles backwards in fear, it does not make me feel satisfaction, before I would enjoy his fear, basking in it to make me feel more powerful. Now, I don't feel anything, except hollow.

He is defenceless and foolish, I take his neck between my legs and snap it like brittle chicken bone. I take no satisfaction in his death either. He falls to the ground like a coward and I lift my bare foot and slam the heel on his exposed groin, he does not make any sound, dead men don't cry.

Unfeeling, I move like a phantom, taking out men from behind. A leering man holds Ejiro against a tree and whispers his filthy words in her ears. The hollow part of me falters, wanting to watch as he tears her to pieces, if I hadn't be with her, I might have been able to save Sade.

But when her pitiful eyes meet mine, I pick up a fallen spear and poke at his shoulders, in shock he turns around, allowing Ejiro to slip away from his grasp. He never spews the filthy words his mouth parts to speak, I run the spear through him, pining him to the tree.

I look emotionlessly around me, all the men have fallen and the prince has gotten free of his chains somehow. He knees in the sand over Sade's body, openly weeping.

The fury seeps from my body, leaving me empty. I lean against a tree, drawing from it's strength. My eyes focus on anywhere but Sade's dead body, the tears are long gone but the grief settles on my chest like a heavy stone in water and it will be there for as long as I live. The pain is forever, never reducing or increasing but constant.

Ejiro watches me, hawk-like, waiting for me to breakdown again. I almost slap my hands to my ears as the sound of the prince's broken sobs echo in the empty forest, I grit my teeth harshly at the sound.

"What will you do now?" Ejiro asks.

I ignore her, forcing myself to look in Tobiloba's direction, I walk to him and place my hand on his shoulder.

"Get up," I say sharply.

He looks me through his tear stained face with incredulity. "How can you stay so calm? Sade is dead, and she is not coming back."

"I've cried and it did not bring her back, I don't think your tears are more potent than mine." I tell him bitterly.

Hate flashes in his eyes, good, let him hate me.

"You are heartless."

I shake my head. "No, I'm doing the things nobody is ready to do. You can sit here and cry, awaiting another batch of bastards to come here and maybe kill you next, or you can get up and help end this war."

I don't wait for his reply, drained I turn to Ejiro.

"Can you help us with two horses?"

She nods, "Yes." She begins to walk away, then she halts in her steps. "I'm sorry for your loss."

My breathing hitches and I know if I say a word, the tears will return. So I say nothing at all, listening to the chirping of insects and the sad songs of the birds.

"Just go," I say feebly.

I watch her until she disappears from sight, then I sweep my gaze around the trees, Ejiro must have dragged me far away from the river when I drowned to another strange part of the forest.

"Did you love her?" I ask hesitantly, half afraid of his answer. Leaves rustle under the night's breeze and the prince rises to his feet, stained with blood. I am afraid he might have loved her, because if he did, I will not only have robbed Sade of life but I will have robbed this man of a chance to love.

"Sade is -- was a lonely girl," He stutters, rubbing a hand over his face. "I did not love her, we grew a friendship and she spoke a lot about her dreams."

"What were her dreams?" I ask absentmindedly, my eyes focused on nothing and a wide chasm in my chest.

"She wanted nothing more than to go home, sometimes she spoke of running away, and I offered to help her."

"Why didn't she go?"

I loathe myself even more, Sade lies a few feet from us eyes open and lips parted, yet gone forever and now we speak of her in the past.

"She didn't want to leave you, she said; 'Demilade has no one, her family is gone in death, I will not betray her when she needs me because she never needs anybody'."

I swallow my tears and force my face into stone because kings don't cry. I should be used to death and all the pain it brings but even if it comes a hundred times, it's bite is as deadly as the first time.

"Fetch the princess from wherever she hides, tell her we are going home."