Falcon's Flight

Two

Three more soldiers were waiting along the wall. They were trying to block the wall but they were doing poorly as the wall was wider than the three of them standing side by stand.

Hayabusa dived at the one in the centre as Shan Yu headed for the soldier on the right. Fen nervously swung at the one on the left who easily blocked. She wasn’t really getting anywhere with fighting him but out of the corner of her eye, she could see the middle soldier cowering away, covered in bloody scratches. Fen quickly looked away and dodged a swing of the soldier’s sword.

Fen tried to avoid another swing but her arm was nicked by the blade. She hissed and flinched as the soldier in front of her was struck down from behind and he fell limp to the ground.

Shan Yu stared at her arm, it was bleeding. Now both of them were injured.
“We need to keep moving,” he said. “More will come soon when they realise we’re alive. We can deal with that later unless it gets in your way too much.”
Fen just nodded, still trying to avoid looking at the dead soldiers. “That sounds like a good idea.”

They carried on towards the tower, leaving the dead bodies on the wall for the other soldiers to find. Hayabusa landed on Shan Yu’s shoulder for a while before quickly growing impatient and flying in circles above them again.

Shan Yu instructed her to watch for more soldiers as he searched the tower. He quickly found rope and rushed out of the tower again. Once the rope was secure, he checked the wall.
“There's no soldiers coming,” she said, not daring to look over the wall and see if the rope was long enough.
“Drop the sword down, you can climb down next,” he said. That would have been fine if not for the risk of the rope not being long enough. Noticing Fen’s hesitance, he sighed. “Then I'll go down first but you still need to drop the sword down, I don't think you'll be able to climb down while you're holding a sword.”

Fen cautiously held the sword over the edge and dropped it down hilt pointing downwards. Shaan Yu quickly jumped onto the wall and scaled down using the rope. She didn't understand how he never worried about it, she'd like to not worry about it. Hearing him shout, she assumed it was time for her to climb down.

Her arms ached as she climbed down, her feet on the wall. Fen never wanted to do this again.
“You're going to have to fall the last few feet,” she heard. Fen froze.
“What?” she stuttered. “But I'll fall!”
“That’s the point, I can catch you, you're small.”

She couldn't tell if that was supposed to be comforting or not but either way, it was the only way down.
“Fine,” she quietly said to herself. She then said louder so Shan Yu could hear. “3… 2… 1.”

Fen let go of the rope.