Victory's Price

Wolf (Part Eighty - One)

Chapter 81

A battle without reason, a battle without the burning of desire, was a battle already lost.

The harsh sun beat upon his shoulders and Wolf could feel the sweat as it trickled slowly between his shoulder blades. It was the only lethargy in this whole world, though, as Phoenix pushed him above and beyond the limits of his capability.

Wolf was bored of fighting the inevitable, bored of living and though his body, in the tireless hold of Victory, battled on, his heart was waiting to die.

No one was winning this day, bar the Stars, for they were both already dead, in their own private ways.

He need make no mistake for her to pierce him, no trip or fall, for with every meeting of their blades, he could feel the driving of her stake through his heart. He had not attacked yet, he could not bring himself to do it, and she forced only at the bounds of his defence.

She should have been frustrated, she should have been screaming but she pushed on, tireless, determined. The Phoenix lived at death's right hand, she was his closest companion. He would not be taking her today, no matter how fiercely she desired it to be so.

Victory leapt grimly into the dance. In Phoenix's hands the weapon had always seemed so nimble, so eager. But to him she was a steady force; deadly, unstoppable, but listless too, as though she were only willing by duty.

If it might have saved them, Wolf would have begged. He would have thrown himself to his knees and screamed the lowest, most desperate of pleas. But words were nothing to the Phoenix; she spoke with her eyes and the inescapable bite of her blade. And if they meant little enough to her, they meant less to the black pleasure of the Stars who gave all that they might take it away.

The rules could not be broken.

The Wolf had been nothing before her and he was even less without her. He had been a tiny scholar; insignificant, overlooked. His days had been filled with her stories, with her legacy, and nothing else. He was no player without her, he could be King of no Stars. What point was there in magic if there was none to share his side?

What point in immortality if it was a life ever alone?

Phoenix was silent, her jaw set. He wanted to talk to her, to give comfort in the hope that he might receive some in return. But he could not risk her derision in his final moments, it would all be too much.

She was everything. She was the Motherland. She was hope. She was power. To kill her would be to kill the single, united, spirit. She was as endless and as indestructible as the sea. It would be to kill his heritage, to kill the stories of a hundred generations. Her name meant both comfort and fear. She was the single guardian of a whole world and without her there would simply be nothing left.

No, the Wolf would die today.

Her hair shone in the sunlight, her every movement precise, elegant and truly beautiful. She was stunning, the very image of perfection. She needed no muscle to be fearsome, no steel but the metal of her gaze. There were few that could look upon her in the midst of battle and not feel the tight fist of terror. But not the Wolf. He wanted her side more than he had ever wanted anything. She had once told him that to defeat the Stars he must hold nothing in his heart but those twelve shining lights. And now he knew why.

He was never going to be able to kill her.

He was watching her, closer than he had ever watched anything. It was not that he battled for his life, it was not to deduce her attack, it was not to predict her movements. He studied her that he might remember her face, that he might forge something to carry into the beyond. And so he saw the decision dawn in her eyes before he even knew what it was.

She stopped, just feet from him. Her chest rising, falling, exaggerated and frenzied in her exhaustion. But she didn't care. She wasn't going to stop fighting until one of them was dead.

Or so he thought.

She paused, almost motionless, and turned to look down at the blade in her hand. She looked at it as though she had never seen its like before, as though she had discovered something truly horrific. And then she dropped it, so quickly that he half thought the sun had warmed it enough to burn her.

The Phoenix turned her gaze onto him, looking between his startled form and the weapon in the dust.

Could she do this? She was the Phoenix, when she drew her blade, blood would fall.

Wolf didn't know what was happening, couldn't believe that the fates would be so kind.

He could not kill her. He loved her. He needed her.

Just three feet from him, she hovered, agony in her gaze. And Wolf went to follow her, to make a sign of his defiance. He stretched out his arm, ignoring Victory's furious hiss, and slowly began to unwrap his fingers.

And she was on him in a second, her lithe form making nothing of the distance. Wolf's mouth fell, to scream his agony, to assert his final farewell. But no pain saturated his foggy panic, no sword to spill his blood. Her eyes held his own; clear, firm and desperate.

Wolf looked down. She  was so close, so very close, and yet he could not reach her. She held his blade, her Victory, in the tightest of grasps. The blade was already slick with the crimson of her palms but she had made no flinch as her own weapon sliced through the tender skin.

He could not believe this was happening.

Wolf looked away, turned his eyes from what he could not see, only to be caught once again by her beseeching look.

She could not do it either, she did not have it in her to lose. And though she held the point tight against her chest, unbreakably firm that he might not pull away, she could not pierce the flesh.

She was a woman of silence, a player of few words and so she said nothing, made no plea but with the desperation of her gaze.

The longer he stood there, impotent and disbelieving, the more broken she became; hollow, cracked. Legend no more, she had been waiting to die for two centuries more than he.

And Wolf knew then, as her panicked breath whispered, alone in the desert. He knew that he could slay her.

He could hear her pulse, its sudden frenzied beating as he tightened his grip. And it only made it harder.

But all he needed was the look in her eyes, a look she was too noble to deserve, and he knew he could do it.

They closed, her eyes, as he gently took the back of her neck in his hand. But the decision had been made, the events of the next few minutes and the next thousand years, set in stone. Gently clasping the delicate skin, his thumb against her spine, he readied himself.

And with a strength he did not know he had, he pulled her towards him, a strong, fluid motion. He pulled her inwards, along the full length of her Victory, until their chests touched, and he could take her in his arms that he might offer the comfort she had deserved from the start.

For a second she was still, as she lost the definition of the phoenix on her chest, masked by the identical crimson of her blood. It was a second that felt like an eternity before she tilted her head. Looking back into his eyes, she gave him a thank you more potent than words and only then parted her lips to speak.

She clasped his hands in hers, pulling his fingers towards the weeping hole in her chest. He could not resist her, not now, and as the sensitive skin of his fingertips mixed with the very substance of her life, he could feel the final, weak beatings of a heart that was four hundred years old and had been burdened with the responsibility of a whole world.

"This is my blood bond to you." She panted, struggling for breath. "I swore to make you great and it has been done."

"It was not worth it." He whispered, wrapping an arm around her waist as she gave her whole weight over.

"Victory takes her price." Phoenix smiled as though this was a good thing. "You have won your prize and I have paid the debt of my friendship."

x End x