dead of winter, he knew he should be cold. He knew his frail body would shiver and break in the water. But the water was warm to his touch. The sense of magic swarming around him thickened. At Tessanna’s beckon, he embraced her.
“Tonight,” she whispered into his ear. “Tonight, under these stars, in this water, I can conceive. Will you give this to me? Will you give this of yourself?”
He had never believed such a thing possible. But as she wrapped her legs around him and guided him into her, he knew the answer. Aullienna’s face flashed before his mind. He had taken her from Tessanna, and tonight, he might somehow make amends.
“After what I have done,” he said as his breaths quickened. “Of course I will.”
Standing within the water they made love. Their movements were slow, careful. At last she wrapped her arms around him and pulled him below the surface, baptizing them in the name of Velixar and Karak. When he tore his head above the water and screamed out in ecstasy, he felt the eyes of gods upon him. His lover emerged with him, gasping in pleasure. A twinkle was in her eye. The act was done.
Tessanna was with child.
T hey elected to walk back to Velixar and the army. Qurrah felt he was exiting a dream. The cold of the wind came biting back, and he shivered underneath his layers of clothing. No matter how close to a fire he sat, or how much clothing he wore, he always felt cold in winter. Tessanna did not complain or show discomfort, but her lips were blue and her teeth chattered with each step. Despite all this, they wanted to walk. They needed to talk.
“Velixar offered this to me,” she said, answering the question she knew her lover kept unspoken. “He said Karak knew my prayers though I never sent them to him. He told me to travel to the pond and wait for you there. If I offered myself to you, and to the dark god, I would have a child. A daughter.” She looked to him, tears streaming down her face though her voice remained firm.
“I’ve always wanted a daughter,” she said.
“I’m not ready to be a father,” he said. “Our life, our actions…what will become of any child following our footsteps?”
She took his hand into hers and kissed his fingers.
“By the time I give birth, we will be gone from here. Our daughter can live a life free of this place. I can give her the childhood I was denied.” She looked to the stars and giggled. “Mommy isn’t happy with me right now, and she isn’t happy with Karak, either.”
“Will you still be able to aid me and Velixar in opening the doorway?” he asked her. To this she turned and glared.
“I am not weak now,” she said, a sudden venom filling her words. “Never think that of me.”
“I didn’t,” Qurrah said. “I just…wait a moment. Something approaches.”
He stopped her, then narrowed in his eyes in the darkness. He saw a shape running toward them. It was humanoid, though its body was hunkered down so he could not see much else. Tessanna lifted her hand so that fire swirled from her fingers.
“Unbelievable,” she said, licking her lips. “Karak has sent us a gift.”
The shape slowed once it reached the edge of light created by Tessanna’s fire. It was a being of pure shadow, its ethereal presence swirling like black smoke in the darkness. Glowing red slits for eyes leered at them. When the creature snarled rows of sharp teeth glistened.
“What is this thing,” Qurrah asked.
Tessanna’s hand closed, and the fire vanished. In only the starlight, the creature was free to approach. It stood directly before them and growled softly. Qurrah felt his skin crawl at the sound.
“I know this scent,” Tessanna said, her hand creeping toward the thing’s neck. “I know this body.” The shadow being retreated before her hand, shriveling back like a snake shedding its skin. Qurrah startled at the revealed face and neck of Delysia Eschaton. She looked catatonic. Tessanna rubbed her neck with her fingers, then pressed them against her lips.
“I love the taste,” she said, licking her fingers. With her other hand she drew her dagger. “The purity of her blood.”
“What are you doing?” Qurrah asked. The girl turned to him and beamed. The wildness in her eyes horrified him.
“Isn’t it clear? Karak gives me a child, so I take a child from Ashhur. She is a gift, a sacrifice, an omen. Choose whatever sounds best to you.”
Tessanna stunned him by leaning forward and kissing Delysia’s lips. Her dagger trailed upward, drawing a thin red line from the bottom of Delysia’s neck to the cleft of her chin. She licked the blood from her dagger and giggled.
“I could get used to this.”
“Enough,” Qurrah said. “Send her back.”
“Why?” she asked. “Do you care for her? She worships a false god, and even worse, lets such a perfect body go to waste.”
The half-orc grabbed her wrist and held it firm. He glared at her, every part of his being refusing to back down.
“You have killed enough of those close to my brother,” he said. “No more.”
He was not prepared for the rage that seethed inside his lover. When she spoke her voice was calm, but her entire body shook and quivered.
“I have killed?” she said. “Is that how you see it? I killed Brug. It was my desire, my idea, that killed Aullienna. Is it? Is that how you sleep at night? Is that how you banish your guilt, by casting it to me?”
She yanked her arm free from his grasp. The love they shared just an hour ago seemed ancient and lost to Qurrah. Even worse, her words tore at his guilt-wracked mind. Again he thought of an undead Harruq marching at his command and felt his heart split.
“You don’t understand,” he began, but Tessanna cut him off by thrusting the hilt of her dagger into his open palm.
“Take it,” she said. “Take it and listen. We are condemned by our actions, or we are free of them. We are murderers, or we are victims. You will kill again. Will you feel its guilt only for those you know? A life taken is a life taken, Qurrah. Will you succumb to guilt or not?”
He closed his hand around the dagger and looked to the imprisoned Delysia.
“I don’t know,” he said. “I don’t feel guilt, I just…I don’t want to hurt my brother. Not any more than I already have, even if he hurts me.”
She slipped behind him, her hands trailing around his neck and shoulders.
“But the choice is the same for him,” she whispered. “If he had never chosen his lover over you, then the hurt would never be. He chose his path. He chose his hurt. Will you be slave to it?”
He looked at Delysia’s beautiful frozen horrified face. She was alive inside, he knew. He could smell her fear. His fist clenched tight.
“Be gone,” he said, waving his hand. The essence of the Doru’al shrieked in anger but could not refuse the power of his words or the magic that spiked from his fingers. The girl collapsed as the rest of the darkness dissipated. Delysia gasped in air, her eyes locked open. The half-orc stood over her, dagger in hand. The hand shook.
“How many times,” he said. “How many times must I question myself? How many times must I doubt the path I walk? How many? How many!”
The priestess coughed once, then blinked. Her fingers clutched the grass, a reflex as the woman gulped in air.
“I will not,” he said. His heart was in his throat. He felt his soul quivering. “I will not do this anymore.”
He knelt down, pulled Delysia’s head up by her hair, and then sliced open her throat. Blood poured over his hands and onto the grass. She made no sound as she stared at him with eyes that were full of despair. He stared right back as deep inside him he felt something die. He dropped her head to the dirt and then looked to the dagger in his hand.
“There,” Tessanna said as she wrapped her arms around his neck. “Now the blood is on both our hands, as it always should have been.”
“A life for a life,” he said, mesmerized by the crimson droplets dripping from the edge. “Will it be
