FicWad

"So, you're still alive." The smirk on Orha's face made Calintz's heart drop. "I guess luck is on my side. Now I'll get to kill you with my own hands."

Calintz gripped the hilt of his sword and shifted lower in his stance. "Reith," he said quietly, not looking away from his opponents, "when we start fighting, just run. There's no way we can win. Just run, as fast as you can."

"But... what about you?" Reith asked, her voice honestly confused. Calintz stifled an urge to sigh.

"I'll catch up."

"Promise me, okay?" Calintz made a motion that could be interpreted as a nod, and felt some tension uncoil as Reith began to back away.

He tightened his grip and attempted to calm his frantically beating heart and focus. But he couldn't escape the thought that there was no way he was going to make it through this. He'd feel intimidated even if all of the Tears of Blood stood behind him. They were excellent mercenaries, all of them, but they were simply not on the right level to face the man who was essentially the leader of the Yason army.

Calintz took a deep breath and prepared to fight anyway. Keeping on eye on Reith, who was behind him trying frantically to find a route of escape, he calculated his options.

Obviously he should focus on the Blast Worms first. As long as the Warrior stood back and let them fight him, he'd have a chance of surviving a bit longer.

Stepping forward, he blocked an attack from one of the Blast Worms and quickly struck at the other. Strike one two, block a counterattack, strike one two three, and one of the Blast Worms was down. Orha's expression turned darker. Calintz ignored him and turned to the other, barely in time to avoid a swing of his heavy sword. A few swift motions with his own blade and the second Blast Worm was down as well.

"Calintz! This way!" he heard from behind him, and then the fall of Reith's footsteps. Good, she'd gotten away.

He had only begun to shift his weight to follow her when he felt someone else pull at the celestial chi in the air, and knew it was too late.

The sweeping motion the Warrior made with his weapons would have, Calintz was certain, cut down a substantial portion of any army which stood to face him. He was only surprised he was conscious afterwards. Knocked flat by the shockwave, ears ringing, Calintz tried to focus on the blade approaching him. Somehow he managed to raise his sword to block, but without any strength behind it, Orha's strike knocked it easily from his hand. Completely disoriented, Calintz looked up at his death.

It was slow in coming. "Really, human. Who do you think you are?"

Calintz hadn't quite figured out how to answer that question before he felt a blunt impact to his head, and the blackness encroaching on the edges of his vision took over.

*

When he woke, it was to the tingle of a healing talisman. His fuzzy mind sharpened instantly, and he took stock of his situation. He was in a cave. Not the same one he and Reith had come from, but one like it. He hadn't been taken far. His sword was gone, he had been stripped down to his pants, and all of his talismans had been taken. Most importantly, his hands were tied, but he was not otherwise restrained.

He didn't question the unexpected freedom, just rolled to his feet as quickly as he could.

There was motion from his side and suddenly Orha was in front of him with a blade at his neck, and Calintz realized that it was really no freedom at all.

Calintz froze for a moment, tense, ready to move. Orha just stared at him over the deadly blade strapped to his wrist.

After a moment, Calintz forced his muscles to relax. "Why did you heal me?"

Orha held his position a bit longer, then dropped the hand pointed at Calintz's neck to his side. Calintz noticed that he had removed the matching blade from his other wrist. He harbored no illusions that this meant he was any less in danger of immediate decapitation.

"Information, why else." The forced tone to Orha's voice suggested that this was not his first choice of situation.

"You and your men ambushed us immediately after the release of the Forbidden Magic," Calintz offered warily. "Apparently you have a better source of information than I do."

Orha snorted. "I hope you're not expecting me to tell you what that is. Allow that I have some intelligence, please." The Warrior's bladed hand rose again to point at Calintz's heart. "You, on the other hand. If you were smart, you'd tell me some things you know and insinuate that you know much more. After all, if you know nothing, there's no reason I shouldn't kill you right now. Believe me, I'd enjoy it."

Calintz's breath ran short as each swell of his chest brought his skin closer to the point of Orha's blade, but he didn't shift away.

"Maybe I'm just trying to learn what you already know, so I can figure out how much I need to reveal to be a worthy bargaining chip," he murmured.

Orha laughed sharply. "It would have to be quite a lot to be worth the lives of my men you've killed." The look in his eyes was simple hatred. "Why do you think you're so important, Captain?"

"I don't," said Calintz honestly. Because, after all, for the Tears of Blood their fight was deeply personal, but at the scale of the war itself, they were hardly anyone. Truth was probably not the most life-preserving plan at this point, but really he had no idea why he wasn't dead already.

Orha's face just twisted further in disgust. A sharp pain hit Calintz as the point of his blade lightly broke the skin of his chest. He shifted backwards instinctively. Orha, seemingly noticing for the first time that he had increased the pressure, continued it until Calintz was forced back against the rough stone of the cave wall. Orha stood in front of him at arm's length, the tip his weapon held steady an inch away. Calintz's heart thudded frantically as he tried to stare impassively at his captor.

They stood like that in silence for a minute. Then Orha /moved/.

Improbably, there was no pain. There was just Orha's hands curling feather-light around his neck, and the skidding sound of metal against stone as his wrist-blade scratched the wall over his shoulder. Calintz's breath caught despite the fact that Orha's hands exerted no pressure, and a rather embarrassing heat pooled in his groin.

"I should kill you right now," Orha said, low and dangerous. Calintz didn't respond. Because, of course, in his place, Calintz would likely have killed Orha long ago.

But the grip on his neck didn't tighten, and Calintz found himself trying to focus on the pain from his tiny puncture wound to distract himself from the way the motion of Orha's hands felt increasingly like a caress.

After a moment, the blood beading at the puncture point coalesced into a droplet, which began to run slowly down his chest. Orha's eyes followed it until it soaked into the edge of his pants. Calintz began to feel lightheaded. He wondered if it was from panic or if he was still concussed from earlier.

Then one of Orha's hands released from his neck. Calintz felt the breath of the blade passing by his jaw as the hand moved to trace the path of the drop. Orha's weapon hovered parallel to his chest as his hand lowered, which meant a simple flex of Orha's wrist would send the point into his flesh. Probably nonlethally, but-

-but instead Orha's fingers just curled under waistband of his pants. Calintz gasped and stopped pretending that he was feeling anything else than a particularly self-destructive form of lust. A weapon handed to Orha on a silver platter. As if he'd needed another.

The abortive sound that Orha made might have been a snort. For a moment Calintz thought he was dead for certain. Then both Orha's hands pulled away and he, to Calintz's mute shock, unstrapped the remaining blade from his wrist and leaned away to set it down.

For a moment Calintz could see past Orha to the cave exit. He considered running for it while the Warrior was weaponless, but his arms were still tied, and even if they hadn't been, he wasn't strong enough to go up against Orha. He was-

"Just a human," Orha was suddenly growling inches from his face. Calintz shuddered. Then suddenly his legs nearly gave out as he felt the warm touch of a tongue across the shell of his ear. The tips of Orha's braids brushed Calintz's shoulder as the touch turned to teeth. Orha's hand reached to palm at Calintz's groin, and Calintz gasped, bucked into the touch, and threw his head back. There was a sharp pain as Orha's teeth caught on his ear, but it was /good/, and Calintz found himself wondering what Orha's strange ears would feel like under his tongue, if they were sensitive-

And then Orha pulled completely away. He looked at Calintz, sprawled against the wall, panting and flushed. Calintz tried to pull himself together.

"You're just a human. You shouldn't be important to anyone." Orha's glare was heavy, and while there was lust in his eyes, there was also still hate.

Calintz forced himself to stand straight. He tugged once at his bound hands before Orha was forward again, shoving him, and the last thing he heard was the crack of his head against the stone.

*

He was still alive when he woke up again, which surprised him. He felt the warmth of healing magic, and managed to drag his eyes open to blink a few times before a throbbing pain hit him and he closed them again. But he was definitely no longer in the cave with Orha.

"What's going on?" he tried.

"Captain! Are you all right? We saved you!" The voice cracked with enthusiasm and was far too loud for his head at the moment. Azel.

"What he really means to say is that we found you. We didn't actually do much in the way of saving." Amused and considerate. Eonis.

"Um. You should really rest, Calintz. I healed you as much as I could, but..." And Reith.

Well, he could figure things out later. For now, somehow, he was safe. He attempted an affirmative noise for Reith before he slipped back into unconsciousness.