The Lost Moon Child

Prologue

~Three Centuries Ago~
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​His ears rang loudly, the clamoring of swords striking flesh and thuds of arrows meeting their targets completely muffled out. The screams of his comrades and those of the enemy army were completely muted to his ears. His eyes burned uncontrollably as tears made their way forward to fall down his cheeks. It is said that silence is golden; its pleasantry deriving from its complete and utter nonexistence of sound. Silence is supposed to be charming, peaceful even. So why was it killing him with deafening defiance?

​His body shook with maddening disbelief; his nerves were completely shot to hell. He runs forward, nearly tripping on a fallen troop whose body lay battered and twisted, an arrow jutting out from his back horridly and traces of magic left on his corpse. Not that the man noticed any of this; he was too busy running. Running toward the one person in his life that he could not bear to lose. The one person who was falling to the ground, as if in slow motion, with an arrow of her own sticking out of her chest.

​"No!" he cries out desperately as he finally reaches her. She lays on the field, her ebony black hair a dark halo around her pain stricken face. He kneels next to her, grasping her head in his large hands and caressing her beautiful pale face lovingly. He could not lose her. He reaches one of his hands down to examine the arrow, regretfully taking his eyes off of her face for a moment. Blood bubbles up as his hand gently wraps around the protruding stick, then pulls it out forcefully as quickly as he can and with as much precision as possible from its intrusion in her body.

​She screams then, her terrible cries piercing and breaking through the unbearable silence that had enveloped his mind. Her breathing grows faster, tears running rampant from her hazel eyes as her voice cracks with agonizing torment. The now gaping wound had left a large gash across her chest and blood was flowing freely from it, its quick escape from her body reminding her sickeningly of a river current. She knew that she had to be strong, for him, but it was getting harder and harder to breathe.

​"Ithilwen," the man looks down at her, placing his hands on the gash across her chest in a futile attempt to stop the bleeding. Deep down he knew it was too late, but he refused to believe it. He refused to sit here and do nothing! His eyes could not hide his thoughts, though, as he looked down at her. She could always tell what her husband was thinking, even when her focus was as distorted and blurry as it was now. His eyes always betrayed him, and now they were revealing to her just how serious the wound was and how there was nothing to be done. What tiny amount of hope she had held in her heart vanished away in an instant. She knew her fate.

​Looking up at him, she reaches her hand up to push his hands away. His strength was far greater than hers, however, and he held his place firmly over the wound. She continues to fight him weakly, not moving his hands away at all. He looks down at her, confusion and persistence clear in his eyes, but the look on her face told him everything without her uttering a single word. She had accepted it. She was ready to die.

"No," he whispers, desperation breaking through his usual calm and collected demeanor, "No, Ithilwen, no! I won't give up on you! I won't!" He presses down on her chest with even more force, causing her to wince in pain and her eyes to shut tightly while her mouth twists up in misery. Seeing her suffering makes him go weak, and his hands fall gently off of her body in defeat. She begins coughing, the wheezing sound vibrating through her body, shaking her insides down to her very core. Blood makes its way past her mouth, its bright scarlet color a frightening contrast to the air around it as it flies out from her cough. His eyes go wide, fear and realization shattering him into a million pieces. She was going to die. And there was nothing he could do but watch her as she faded from this life without him.

When the coughing finally subsided and she could once again take in a shallow breath, she opens her eyes and looks up at him. He stares down at her, his hand covering his mouth and his body shaking in tormented nervousness and dread. She knew what this must be doing to him. But there was more at stake than just her life. "Durion," she breathes out, her voice coming out gravelly and coarse. He removes his hand from his face and takes her hand in his. Tears well up in his eyes as he observes the vast amount of blood around her mouth.

"Durion," she says again, this time as only a whisper. His eyes finally reach hers. She reaches up her other hand to caress his face. Her eyes travel over her husband longingly, knowing that these few moments would be her last. She drinks in every single detail of his face: his dark, wavy hair, the ever-present worry lines that were etched forever into his forehead, the scar reaching down from the corner of his left eye to the bottom of his high cheekbone that reminded her daily of the sacrifices he had made just to be with her, and then, of course, those eyes she loved so much. Eyes so green she could make herself believe that she was in the forest just by staring into them. She hoped he had passed them on to their son. She then takes his hands in hers, and guides them to lay against her stomach. She lays her own hands on top of his, treasuring something the two of them often had done since she had found out she was with child eight short months ago. He lets out a distressed whimper, feeling the upset kicking of the babe inside his wife's belly. The child was strong, like his mother.

"You ha-" the woman starts to say before being cut off with a distressed breath. She was fighting just to breathe now. She squeezes his hand in hers tightly. "You have to...save him." She looks up at her husband with a look as serious as she could muster up without passing out. "Save...him." He nods his head slowly, the sorrow that was building up in his body choking him and preventing him from being able to speak. She smiles up at him, knowing that he understood her and that he would do whatever it took to keep his promise. "I love you," she says, her voice barely even a whisper, before her eyes glaze over and death takes her.