“Most of the time they are completely harmless, too far gone to even move. It’s the ones who still believe they’re guarding a fortress from giants you need to worry about,” she explained, wiping the soot from her blade. “A lot of the hollows around here just want to protect the little they remember, I think.”
She rocked a stone back and forth with her foot before kicking it down into the depths below, the fiery pit she still couldn’t access. Of course the salamanders preferred to be left alone, but who knew just how much material was left untouched by those who feared the creatures guarding it. Brynne shook her head, grabbing the halberd from the fallen knight. Sturdy, but definitely wasn’t as good as her current weapon.
“I’m not surprised in the slightest. From my time here, it’s easy to get completely lost in the lands you travel to. You lose sense of time and distance, and then you forget mundane things. “Have I bathed today?” or “What did I have for breakfast this morning?” Then it becomes more common, you forget important information and then even your family’s names escape you. Eventually you forget your own.”
It was an incredibly cruel fate to endure. Sometimes she’d catch herself falling into that trap herself, forgetting basic details. But Brynne remembered the reason she came here, even if some allies she’d come across had long forgotten themselves. There was a lot to lose and time never seemed to be an issue.
“Giants? I wonder who won,” he asked dejectedly, already knowing the answer. Gazing around at the destruction, it was clear both sides had lost--though some might still stand.
Just not the particular fellow lying before them now. It was a loathsome joke, he thought, averting his eyes from both the body and her.
Their desire to protect what they loved, to save people--it was the very thing that made these creatures so dangerous after the final embers of their humanity cooled. It was this perversion of hope that made Rhys so sick to his stomach.
He remembered all the times he thought a blade’s stroke might be mercy to such a nightmare. But as he looked on at Brynne, the cursed child, he realized there was no such thing. The mercy of the blade was only for the living’s sake, not theirs.
Rhys stooped low to the ground, whispered a prayer for both their sake, then began the arduous work of removing the fallen’s vambraces and greaves and taking them for his own. If they lasted well enough this long to be a danger to them, then they would last a little while longer.
He rose to Brynne and wrapped his fingers around the red hilt of the halberd, his fingers lightly clasping over her own. They felt cold even through his gloves. He lingered there for a moment in silence, meeting her eyes as best he could.
Whether this was her end or her beginning, he would be there for it.
“...Let’s keep going,” he said. “I wanted to see the ocean from here.”
He plucked the staff from her hands and began walking deeper into the fortress to the beat of threes, two footsteps and the sound of the butt of the halberd tapping the cobblestone. Both echoed off the vaulting, crumbled ceilings, dust falling onto their hair every so often.
Rusted swords and broken pikes lay embedded in debris of stone and tree trunk all around the chambers they passed. He wondered how this became these tools’ final resting place, rather than the palms of their owners.
Before long their was daylight upon their faces as they stepped through an archway to the central courtyards, now drowned with the river’s overflow. Where once their may have been stairs, now there was only winding tree branches and vines that scaled the high walls with ease.
The hunter put a foot out onto the bark, testing the strength of both it and his resolve--before offering a hand out to Brynne for balance.
It must have been a beautiful place at one point--as beautiful as a fortress can be. He could sense the pride in the stonework of the walls and the high towers of the perimeter. Even now, the old timbers and rock held their shape for these final two visitors--nothing like the envoys of royalty that perhaps might have graced the halls before.
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