The horses are all agitated. She thought as calmly as she could have managed. The arrow caught in her shoulder asked that she be distracted with nonsensical and irrelevant thoughts so the severity of the situation would be dulled. It was not until another one pierced her hood and grazed her ear, she rapidly blinked, sucked air through her teeth, and drew the first arrow from the quiver strapped to her thigh. She steadied her bow, the stabbing pain in her shoulder amplified and the roaring pain of her nerves gave way to clumsiness as her hand shook before the string snapped forward, propelling the arrow towards the rider. The arrow tore through the rain and sank into the wrong flesh, but the result was all the same. The horse fell and so did the rider. Despite the result, she felt she wasn’t in control of her physical and mental faculty and had cursed the aim.

"Hail!" 

Martin shouted as loud as his voice could allow him. 

"Turn back and warn the villagers! Remember what I told you!" 

She was in too much pain and shock to shout back, so she whipped the horse with the reins and turned directions. Her shoulder was burning hotter, the movements of the horse and the rain was fueling the fire of her wound. It was as if death had passionately called out to her as the agony she felt when she crashed down shoulder first into the wet grass rang through her. 

Her joints and muscle smashed itself against the arrow’s shaft, breaking it into two, the twinge shot up rapidly from its once dull but pronounced throbbing sting, her suffering was only made worse by the fresh pang from the contact with the ground. All the while, the rain continued to weigh on her, washing over her. 

She writhed on the grass but held her tongue, she did not scream, even in her most agonizing moment, she tried to hide her weakness as if to testify to the world that she was not one to bend to its will. But her grey eyes snapped wide open, and she gritted her teeth so much that her head began to shake. As she tried to pull the arrow out, the raider walked over to his prize, and she had done her best to draw her short sword to retaliate, but he simply stomped her shoulder. The pain evolved into a pure white one and she could no longer hold her throat back. 

A light began by her ear, a small orange light, a simple and insignificant ray that reflected into his eyes, in a moment that he could not comprehend, the orange flash by her ear blinded his left eye. The rain repulsed back from where he stood and for a moment, he stood absolutely still. Trying his best to regain his composure as he was frightened by whatever it was that had struck his reality. She pulled the arrow instead of her sword, a move that enabled her more speed, leaped to her feet with unnatural determination, led the pointy end through his throat. She fell to her knees just as quickly, the pain twisted her face and hardened her grit. 

She thought to herself. If anything, she will not die here. Although she still heard in the thin recess of her soul, the echo of her demise, as the thunder shattered through the land and violently vibrated her skeleton, mind, and heart, she knew that she would live. Through her pain and shock, she saw another rider approaching. 

In her squint, she observed, and hoped, that it would be, help. The horse’s head next to her was suddenly of great emphasis to her, it seems not only did the pain erode her senses, it had turned her strange, for every blink, neck turn, neighing of the horse had made a dent in her mind. All its body movement assembled itself into a mocking laughter towards her for being naive enough to believe in hope. 

With what remained of her will to live, she took up her short sword, and with it as a support, stab into the grass and slowly stood up, ready to embrace whatever that came, and she let hope die. She would have been shot by an arrow again if it was a Raider, but she knew that they might have wanted her alive as well. Her vision continues to blur, internally and externally, rain colored her vision grey, pain colored it black. The bandit observed the dead man with arrow through his neck, he sped up his horse, an arrogant and confident smirk already appeared on his handsome face, she was willful, no doubt about that, but the determination to survive and the lack of fear had seem odd as she had not done the deed yet. 

He was about to stop the horse with his reins, the surprise of her sprinting towards his horse despite her previous immobility and apparent shivering and convulsion in the rain compel him to simply pause. She let her sword cut through the muscle of the clopping beast, going right against the force of a sprinting horse, dislocating the other shoulder that worked. 

He fell headfirst into the mud like a stone into water, splashing blood all over the ground and the story ended for him there. She stared at his corpse for a while; the rain hitting the ground has become an odd silence for her. It made her think more about how little she wanted to have to do with saving and sacrificing, fully comprehending the sheer pain of living and dying, dismissing all thoughts of higher purpose. She spat and groaned softly in pain, tears involuntarily rolled down her cheeks but she had lied and told herself that it was rain, it would have to take more than that to make her cry. 

Next Chapter: Falter