by J. P. Oliver
“Looking good!” I told them.
“Hey, thanks!” Nguyen replied, grinning hugely. “I’m super hyped for this, man! Thanks for letting us whack people with swords.”
“Just not in the face, remember,” I replied with a wink, continuing on my way. I watched over my shoulder as Nguyen leaned in close to say something to Miller, who frowned instantly and then thumped him on the back, hard. Perez sighed when she turned to look at the two of them, both engaged in a furiously animated conversation, but a wry grin was playing about her lips. She picked up a small paper plate, the kind Nicole used to eat on a few years back, that was in the shape of the face of a cartoon bear, using a small piece of tape to stick it to her forehead, Miller laughing uproariously at the sight. Not the druid indicator I would have chosen, personally, but I couldn’t argue against its effectiveness.
The individual merchant kiosks were busy. Eric and Olivia took their appointed roles keeping their lines moving and the main thoroughfare clear, so navigation across Lochmire was easier for everyone. I watched as Walter and Hannah helped round up the volunteer goblins, wolves, and skeletons get over to their positions on the other end of the field, where the Yaltinian forces of evil, the Dark Legion, were amassing for their final charge against Lochmire Castle. Tiberion walked with them, chatting and grinning, his dark, tattered robes and the curling horns of his dragon-skull helmet easy to spot even from here. The multitudes of the Legion were all laughing as they marched towards their staging area, trying out their best intimidating battle cries, ready to instigate the Last Battle for the control of Lochmire, all in all the jolliest bunch of overwhelming evil I had ever seen.
I kept walking, weaving through the crowd, and spotted Roux near the registration kiosk. He was already dressed in his gold and sapphire robes, a large bag of multicolored beanbags hanging at his hip. Nicole sat on a stool in front of him as he fixed her hair in a lovely braid, keeping it out of her face. I smiled as he came around to face her, glittering princess crown in hand, the two of them talking excitedly, their faces bright and beaming, such a welcome change from just an hour earlier.
And there was one guy to thank for that.
I finally reached the main office, stepping inside. I had to get my own armor on and my things together, but there was one thing I definitely wanted to see first.
I knocked on the door to the back room, giddy anticipation bubbling up inside of me.
“Come in,” Quinn called, and I couldn’t open the door fast enough.
I thought I had sufficiently mentally prepared myself. I was wrong.
Full plate normally looked bulky and awkward, unflattering on most, comical at worst. Quinn somehow made it look gorgeous, sturdy and secure on his tall, muscular frame, its sharp angles perfectly complementing his strong jawline. The cuirass was real, polished steel, glinting in the sunlight that shone in through the windows, the rich, deep red of the gamberson he wore underneath the armor visible on the underside of his arms and sides of his torso. One leg was up on a chair as he finished tying on a shin guard, looking up from his work to meet my eyes, the corners of his mouth easing into a warm smile that made my heart skip several beats.
I made a noise that sounded awfully close to someone stepping on a mouse.
“Just finishing up,” he said, apparently misinterpreting my reaction entirely. “This was a lot easier to put on than I thought it would be.”
“You look fantastic,” I blurted, stupidly, feeling my face start to burn. Quinn looked surprised.
“Oh, um, thanks.” He rubbed at the back of his neck, ducking his gaze, stepping down from the chair, the smile still on his face. “Well, it’s all thanks to you. There was no way I was going to pick all this out myself.”
I swallowed, trying to get my short-circuited brain back in working order, feeling my lips curl into an answering smile of my own. “Quinn, I’m the one who should be thanking you.”
He huffed a quiet laugh. “Let’s call it even then, I guess,” he said, walking close to me, my heart already racing, and pulled me into tender kiss, his lips plush and soft against my own. A pleased noise escaped my throat, and I wrapped my hands around his neck to draw him closer, angling my head and deepening the kiss, even daring to dart my tongue against his lips. I heard him groan, and then, teasingly, I pulled away, Quinn’s utterly floored expression completely and totally worth it.
“All right,” I said coyly. “Guess we’re even.”
He blinked at me, his surprise slowly giving way to amusement. “For now,” he said, with a low rumble at the end of that sentence that made me shiver. He nodded towards the door. “I’ll leave you to get ready.”
“Hold down the fort for me,” I told him, and Quinn laughed, giving me a quick and casual salute in reply.
I had plenty of practice putting on my chainmail, so it didn’t take me long to rejoin Quinn back outside. I watched his eyes rove over me, a smile spreading across his face, but before he could say anything, Roux came jogging over.
“Bad news,” he said, his mouth twisted in a worried frown, Nicole holding his hand at his side. “Robert, Tiberion’s second in command, definitely won’t be here in time.”
My eyes went wide in horror. “What happened?”
Roux winced. “Well, he called for directions, and at the time, the only one who was able to man the phone was Greg…”
I groaned, pressing the heels of my palms into my eyes. “Perfect. That’s just great.”
“I mean, he’s only two hours away,” Roux added, trying for optimism. I stared back at him incredulously, blinking.
“The airport isn’t even two hours away,” I said, honestly awed. Quinn snorted.
I chewed the inside of my mouth, craning my neck up to stare at the sky, racking my brain for some kind of solution. “All right, well, who’s going to lead the Yaltinian charge, then?”
“You should,” said Quinn, as though it was the most obvious thing in the world.
All three of us turned to stare at him.
“You want dad to be a bad guy?” Nicole asked skeptically, wrinkling her nose.
He shrugged, half-smiling. “Well, Raine’s the only one with the leadership experience to stand in for him,” he pointed out. “And Tiberion is going to be busy doing that ritual thing, right?”
“The mass raise dead, yeah.” Roux grinned at me. “I think he’s right, Raine. Nobody can do it but you.”
Nicole hopped up and down in excitement. “Dad’s gonna be evil!” she singsonged. “Dad’s gonna be evil!”
I laughed. “I guess so,” I said, my old friend anxiety curling around my spine, stealing the air from my lungs. Could I really do this? After all the mistakes I had made trying to get the Last Battle together, I was pretty sure a leadership role was the last thing I needed.
But Quinn clapped a gauntleted hand on my shoulder, his eyes so fond it made every last one of my fears scatter into the wind. “You’ll be great,” he told me, as sincere as ever, and I had to blink rapidly to fight off another wave of tears.
I reached out to put my hand on Quinn’s shoulder as well, and I swore I could feel the warmth of his body even through the armor. “Have fun losing,” I said with a grin. “And please keep an eye on Nicole for me.”
“You don’t trust our designated child wrangler?” Roux asked with a laugh. I glanced over at the sidelines, where a fumbling, smiling Greg was weighed down with the most thickly padded practice armor we had, a large gaggle of four to ten year olds gleefully whacking at him with small foam weapons from every possible angle.
“Trust isn’t the issue,” I said, looking down at Nicole. “Princess Elora must defend her ancestral home!”
She nodded solemnly. “For Lochmire!” she cried, raising her sword above her head.
A warhorn sounded, the final call for everyone to get to their places. I pulled my hand back, snapped down the visor on my helmet.
“See you on the battlefield,” I said. Quinn smiled.
“See you t
here.”
The battlefield was strewn with bodies: human and elven, goblin and dwarf. Chaos reigned, arrows flying wildly, swords and flails swinging, the air thick with the shrieks and screams of the injured and the dead. An armored fighter ran at me, axe raised high, yelling a battle cry; I dodged nimbly out of the way, his strike too high, leaving his unprotected side wide open. I struck, ducking under his arm and stabbing both of my blades into his vulnerable flesh, a killing blow. The warrior gargled and fell to the ground, silent and unmoving.
Another victory.
“Forward!” I roared, raising my arm, looking at the monstrous legions that seethed behind me, baying for blood and violence. “Shatter the bones of those who would dare to defy the will of Tiberion, the rightful king of Juhanis!”
They rushed forward, an enormous, unstoppable tide. They swarmed over the lines of the so-called Last Alliance, an avalanche of claws and teeth and twisted, rusted spears, snuffing out the lives of those who thought they could stand against the Dark Legion.
A warhorn sounded: the Last Alliance’s call to retreat. A cruel smile stretched across my face. Victory was assured now. We would simply harry their forces as they withdrew into Lochmire Castle, their ranks scattered and disorganized, and siege the castle with our overwhelming numbers. Soon, the Dragon Relics would finally be in Tiberion’s hands, and when he at last rose the legions of the dead to stand with us, there would be no power left on Juhanis to stop us from total conquest. We continued to march forward, taking slight losses from the occasional arrow, but I paid it no mind. The horde was nearly limitless, its ranks refilled from the myriad of corpses leftover from every battle. We could not lose.
An impossible roar sounded from the edge of the forest.
It shook the earth itself with its power; the legions of goblins froze in their tracks, warily looking for its source, and shrieking in sheer terror when their eyes settled upon it.
“No,” I whispered, unbelieving. “No!”
“Oh, yes,” came the smug voice of Alfrim, an elven wizard with dark brown skin, dressed in sapphire robes. “We figured out the riddle of the Dragon Relics.” His gaze dropped down to his side, where a small girl clutched at his hand, her eyes narrowed defiance. “Or, rather, the Princess Elora did.”
A second earth shattering roar. The mighty dragon Koreznakadra (I saw it was piloted by Miller, Nguyen and Perez after they had sadly perished earlier in the day, its hydraulics removed and the fabric of the costume repaired) stood in front of another line of troops that had apparently been hidden in the forest, a flanking charge that could easily rout even the might of the Dark Legion.
A Paladin stepped in front of the beast, the late afternoon sunlight shining glittering rivers of gold upon his armor.
“Surrender,” he said, his voice filled with righteous conviction, “and we may show mercy.”
I gaped at the sight in front of me, but my surprise and despair quickly warped into burning fury. “Never!” I cried. “You will never defeat Tiberion!” I gestured wildly to the confused hordes of the Dark Legion. “Attack!” I screamed. “Kill them all!”
Too late, I realized that the earlier retreat had been a feint; the Dark Legion was caught in a pincer movement, two full lines of armed and well-equipped warriors too much even for our massive numbers. Goblins and skeletons fell by the dozens, the survivors panicking and fleeing the battlefield in terror, leaving huge gaps in our lines.
“Stay in formation!” I shouted, but it was already too late. The dragon alone cut enormous swaths through the Dark Legion, amplified by the myriad of spells cast from the forest, the scattering goblin and undead survivors picked off one by one by the Last Alliance’s many knights.
Eventually, only I was left.
The Paladin walked until he stood before me, his mouth drawn in a determined line. I seethed with fury.
“How dare you challenge the might of Tiberion!” I bellowed. “Once he finishes the ritual, his forces will --”
The Paladin smiled. “He won’t finish the ritual,” he said, and to my blank expression, he elaborated, “Not while we have the Book of Shadows.”
I stared at the forces amassed on the treeline, a pair of rogues grinning, holding a thick tome aloft. Beside them lay the shriveled body of Tiberion, so small and pathetic without the dark power radiating from his form, nothing but an old man in tattered robes.
My face contorted in outrage. We had lost, that much was certain, but I wasn’t about to surrender to their arrogance. “Well then, it is such a sad thing,” I said mockingly, “That you won’t live to see your victory!”
I surged forward, my blades already drawn, but the Paladin wasn’t thrown off-guard by my unexpected charge. He parried my first blow, and I swung with the sword in my left hand -- the hit colliding with his shield. I barely dodged out of the way of his returning swing, trying to gouge at his knee. In a heartbeat, his sword was there to block me -- just what I had wanted. Gripping the sword in my right hand, I darted impossibly close until I was just a hair’s breadth away from him, impossible even for his shield to block me at this distance, ready to stab my sword into his heart -
Quinn caught my mouth with his own and kissed me.
I nearly tumbled backwards in shock, but he must have dropped his weapons, as his hands wrapped around me, solid and supporting. My eyelids fluttered closed as I kissed him, too, half-laughing, kissing him again and again until I pulled apart, the goofy smile on his face unbelievably pleased.
“That,” I told him, trying for annoyed and failing miserably, punching his armored chest for emphasis, “was totally not fair.”
A loud chorus of excitement sounded from the treeline, the victorious Last Alliance hugging one another in raucous celebration. Juhanis was free, tyranny and madness defeated, all thanks to the valiant efforts of its heroes. Even members of the Dark Legion were joining in at this point, dancing alongside them or acting out exaggerated death scenes, much to the amusement of everyone around them.
As I leaned against Quinn, watching everyone celebrate, I found even though I was on the losing side, I didn’t mind at all.
19
Quinn
There was still plenty of clean up work left to do as night fell and most of the crowd had dispersed, heading back to their homes, but everyone was as exhausted as they were proud, unable to do much more than change out of their costumes and into regular clothes, though I did notice that Perez kept her ears on. The Last Battle had been a resounding success, despite its rocky beginnings, for both Lochmire and Raine, something truly fantastic that would be talked about for years to come.
“I didn’t do it alone,” Raine told whoever came up to thank him, every time, with a smile that crinkled the corners of his eyes. “And I couldn’t have done it alone.”
I had been glancing at Raine all night as we put the bare essentials back into the main building, my heart skipping a beat every time he met my gaze, a mischievous smirk curling his lips and making me blush furiously. It wasn’t until after the impromptu bonfire Roux had set up for the volunteers, everyone talking and laughing as we roasted marshmallows, that I finally got Raine alone, and stole a series of heated, urgent kisses from him in the back room.
“I was wondering,” Raine murmured against my lips, shocks of pleasure sparking across my skin, “if you had work tomorrow morning.” His hand snaked under my shirt, palm pressed against the planes of my stomach, and I groaned louder than I should have.
“No,” I managed. “I have tomorrow morning off.”
“Interesting,” Raine purred. His hand dropped lower, fingers delicately skimming the skin around the waistband of my jeans, sending tingling sparks spiraling down my spine. “It just so happens Roux volunteered to watch Nicole for me tonight.”
I swallowed. “Y-yeah?” I stammered. My brain was hazy, a thick cloud of heat and affection stopping all of my thoughts dead in the water. I wasn’t sure if I could even string a sentence together anymore.
“Yeah,”
whispered Raine, and then, hands curled around my neck, he yanked me down and kissed me, plundering my mouth with the hot lash of his tongue, leaving me scrambling to keep up.
The sofa had already been pulled out into a bed, I realized belatedly, Raine guiding me to it. His back hit the mattress, that coy, irresistible smile on his face as he pulled me on top of him. I broke our deep, messy kisses to nip at the soft flesh of his neck, his fingers digging into my back, a soft, contented sigh tumbling from his lips.
“You’re wearing too many clothes,” Raine murmured, glaring at them as though they had somehow personally slighted him. He started pulling my shirt over my shoulders, both of us laughing when it temporarily got stuck behind my ears, and I watched him look up at me from his place on the pillows, his eyes hungrily roving over every inch of me, his lips parting, my blood singing in my veins from the heat and intensity of his stare.
“God, you’re so handsome.” Raine pulled himself into a sitting position, moved himself closer to the edge of the bed, barely an inch away from me.. He planted a series of soft kisses against my chest, moving slowly across my skin to where my shoulder met my neck, and I shuddered, closing my eyes, kindling warmth pooling low in my stomach. His hands roved over every inch of me, reverent and gentle on my shoulders, caressing my neck, sliding over the planes of my chest in a constant, graceful dance. He seemed determined to lavish his attention somewhere he hadn’t been yet, pressing slow, intense kisses into the sensitive skin of my neck with each soft brush of his hands, and a quiet moan hummed in my throat.
“Gorgeous, actually,” he murmured into my skin. I gasped when he found my nipple, laving at it with his tongue, moving his head again until his teeth were sinking into my collarbone, his hands already undoing my fly, a heady thrill spiraling down my spine as his fingertips brushed teasingly against my hardening cock. “And good to me,” Raine whispered, stroking me in one smooth, slow motion, my eyes flying open and a loud, throaty groan rolling out from my chest. “So good to me.”
