And Then All Was Lost

by Greg Dragon

  “It heals. It’s healing like we do, CeeCee,” Isobel whispered and Alysia could see that its severed wing was beginning to grow back in place.

  “Like hell it will,” she spat and gripped the handle of the blade. “Please stay here and wait for us,” she said to James and Tracy, then nodded at Isobel to get ready.

  The tiny girl hopped up on the railing of the bridge and began running. She skipped this way and that to climb the ruins, and then when she was near where the creature slept, she somersaulted and landed on the top of one of the arches. Alysia moved quickly and pulled the Twilight Sword free as she got closer to the beast. When she was close enough to touch it, she swung it into his shoulder, but he woke up with a violent start, knocking her and the blade into a nearby post.

  James brought the pulse rifle up and began firing, but a loud noise from across the bridge forced him to glance at a host of demons rushing in at them. Tracy pulled her own gun and they began to fire into the mob, but there were too many and they were closing in, so they backed into the circle where the wounded demon was.

  Alysia experienced pain she had never felt before, as the blow dealt to her small frame did more damage than she could imagine. She was seeing in doubles and she looked around for where she dropped the sword. She crawled to where she saw two of them. She shook her head to clear the cobwebs, then snatched it up with a rolling motion. Isobel saw that the beast was about to pounce on Alysia, so she leapt and drove her sword into its neck, only to have it spin acrobatically and grab her before slamming her into the ground.

  “IZZY!” Alysia screamed as she saw her tiny body bend unnaturally and go limp from the impact. She scrambled to her feet and spat on the dusty stones. The blood from her injured tongue poured freely as she gripped the hilt, and she hoped and prayed that Isobel still had life. She quickly glanced at her father to see why he wasn’t helping. When she saw him shooting, she couldn’t understand why it was that she hadn’t seen the trap the big demon had set.

  She held up her palm and stood with her legs apart, daring him to touch her Isobel again, but he merely circled the plaza, smiling at her. It reminded her of a jackal on the walls of the Egyptian pyramids, a tall, black, winged jackal that walked upright on its hind legs.

  “Izzy, Izzy can you hear me?” she spoke, keeping an eye on the demon as he got down on all fours and prepped to launch himself at her. The girl shuddered and opened her eyes. A faint smile crossed her lips and forced painful, hot tears to fall from Alysia’s eyes.

  The creature launched itself with the speed of a blitzing linebacker, and Alysia made to meet it with her sword but found that her injuries were more severe than she thought. She couldn’t move fast enough to bring the blade around, and was run over instantly. The world went black, and her head throbbed, but then her eyes were back open and she was spitting out blood.

  In the blotches of vision that came to her between the spasms of pain, she could see Tracy, fighting like a cornered tiger. She had a pistol in one hand and her other clutched her leg, and all around her were fallen bodies, including her beloved James. Dad? Alysia thought, and she couldn’t believe it. Her father did not have the blood, the gift of healing that Chaos had given her, and he was older, with too many wounds to put a thought to.

  They were overrun, and though she couldn’t see where the big demon was, she could see that the only thing saving her was the stubborn redhead, enraged by what had happened to James and unwilling to fall without a fight. She wanted to run over, clutch her father to her chest and will him back to life, but that wasn’t realistic. Her body hurt like hell, but nothing like her heart; it felt as if a sore had grown inside of her chest cavity.

  She glanced up and saw that the main demon was on top of an arch, watching Tracy fight for her life. A calm came over her, and with her father seemingly dead, she stopped caring. What would be the point of going on if you are lost to me? she thought, relaxing in her position, watching Tracy fire round after round.

  “GET UP ALYSIA! JAMES IS ALIVE!” Tracy said, when she glanced back and saw the look of surrender in Alysia’s eyes. “Don’t you dare give up on us, girl! Use your damn sword! Get up and fight!”

  Alive, Alysia thought. My father is alive. The pain that had taken to her washed warmly along her limbs. She stood up and sheathed her sword, swaying on her feet as if a slight wind would blow her away. She clenched her fists and stomped on the ground, opening her mouth into a scream that came out loud and unnatural. The scream reinvigorated her as she let the pain out, and then she was amidst the rushing demons, swinging the Twilight Sword this way and that.

  One by one she cut them down as she lunged forward, letting the blade follow her path as she moved. When she had killed enough of them to cause the rest to retreat, her entire appearance was horrific, their blood and guts smeared on her sword, clothes and skin. It was then that the watching demon decided to rush her again to finish it. But this was no weakened version of Alysia Knight. The Twilight Blade had drunk the life force of twenty demons or more and it vibrated within her palm as if it were a living thing, drunk on the life that it had taken.

  Alysia spun like a wheel in a vertical slash, catching the demon not once but thrice as every rotation cut deeper into him, until on the fourth rotation, she shifted past him. Shifted, as if her form had become ethereal for just a moment. The blade grew black when she came to a stop and the big monster froze, unwilling to move out of fear that its limbs would fall apart if it did.

  “Alysia Knight!” it roared, but it dared not turn to look at her.

  “So you do talk,” she said, squeezing her eyes shut to stop the burning while simultaneously wiping the thick black blood off her blade.

  “Why?” the beast asked. “Why do they help you?”

  Alysia didn’t understand the question. She knelt and checked on Isobel, who hadn’t moved from where she had fallen. The little girl was brave and smiled up at Alysia, a smile that reflected a reverence borne of respect and awe rolled into one. “You will heal for me, won’t you, my little Izzy? You’re my angel. I don’t want to do this alone, I just—I just can’t do it.” Isobel blinked so slowly that Alysia worried she would never open her eyes again, but when she did, she understood it as her way of nodding affirmatively.

  “Why does the Turevila help you?” the demon asked again, but Alysia was not in the mood for a question and answer.

  “Tell your leaders that they help us because your time grows short, V’kosha dog! The Twilight Sword will take your souls, and then you will be weakened, and forced to face us in the other realm!” she screamed.

  The demon’s silence was one that reflected the fear and surprise that came with hearing what Alysia had said to him. She stood up and stared at him, his furry back dripping blood from the deep wounds her sword had made during their fight. She held the hilt with both hands tight, and then rushed in and jumped, twisting violently and removing his head in a fatal cut.

  The original demons that had fled watched from across the bridge, but when they saw the head drop, they scattered back into the city. They were the ones who set the trap to get Alysia Knight, but she had persevered and now they began to fear her even more. Why do they help you? the demon had asked, as if realizing that the attack on earth had set them up for even bigger problems. Chaos had told Alysia that the demons shared a hive mind, so despite her decapitating the one member of theirs to figure out her new power, the rest would know and prepare for her.

  “You are something else,” Tracy said, as she sat with James, cradling his head. She smiled up at Alysia with a look of pride, and then looked back at her father as if she wanted to make sure he was still there.

  “Dad,” Alysia said in a meek tone as she knelt in front of him to make sure he could see her. A smile crossed his lips but nothing else and she got up quickly to wipe her tears. What could they possibly do to save him, now that he was so broken that he couldn’t even talk? Isobel would be back to form with time, and Alysia would
be too. They would struggle to make it back to the base, but after a few weeks of laying low, eating, and sleeping, they would be ready to go back outside to find the next elite demon.

  James Knight did not have this privilege; he would need a real doctor, a medical facility, and actual medicine; all the things they did not have. She closed her eyes and thought about it: what could she do to save her father?

  “Isobel,” she called to the tiny girl as she walked over to where she laid. She had pulled herself up into a tiny ball and was on her side with her back turned to Tracy. Alysia sat on the ground next to her, and then lay down on her side so that the two of them were face to face. “Izzy, I need your help, girl. Are you awake? Do you think you can help me?”

  “CeeCee?” the girl whispered with her eyes closed, wincing every minute or so from pain that Alysia could only imagine was unbearable.

  “Yes, little one, it’s your CeeCee,” she said.

  “You want to help your father, CeeCee. You want to know if I can help you know what heals your father.” she said between gasps as Alysia nodded repeatedly before realizing that she couldn’t see it.

  “Yes. Is there a way? Can I save him?” she asked, hoping with all her heart that Isobel would say yes.

  “Petition, Chaos Lord, CeeCee. He can heal – him, but … price …,” and she passed out after saying it.

  Alysia got to her knees and meditated in the way that the girls had taught her to do when it was time to summon Chaos. She stayed like that for a very long time, and though Tracy called out to her several times, it did not register as she sat there, pushing through all of her human doubts to reach the master of the Turevilas.

  When Alysia wouldn’t answer, Tracy assumed she was doing a demonic ritual to resurrect her fallen friend. She understood that James was out of luck since he was merely a human being. She looked around for a vehicle, or anything that could carry him back to their camp where she could look after him. He had not been broken on the stone like Alysia and Isobel had, but the demons had bashed his head in several times when they swarmed him on the bridge. Blood poured from his nose and his eyes looked distant, as if his mind had wandered off to somewhere else.

  She didn’t know how bad his injuries were but he was no longer moving. There had to be some internal bleeding, and he needed to be properly diagnosed. Tracy analyzed her own health as she sat with her man, trying to decide what to do next. She, too, had been beat up by the demons, but she had pushed them back, so there wasn’t anything major for her to be concerned with.

  There was nothing she could see that would help them. If there was a vehicle, it was not close to them. She hoped that whatever it was that Alysia was doing would come with a way to take them home, but with the way their luck had been, she didn’t dare hold her breath.

  ~ * ~ * ~

  “Alysia Knight.”

  The deep voice spoke to her, and behind its tone was expectancy, as if he knew that she would reach out to him.

  “Lord Chaos, I come with questions,” she began, but then the darkness dissipated from her mind and she found herself on the shores of the black lake, the sky a mustard color yellow, with black, demonic creatures flying around.

  There was a gazebo on the left side of the lake away from where she stood, and within it sat Chaos with a beautiful, blonde-haired woman in a fancy red dress. Alysia looked around, confused, but walked over to where they were and stopped. She looked down at herself and saw that she was still in the tattered clothes she’d worn when she fought the demon.

  “Alysia, this is Adrica, my wife. You interrupted me when we were having our time together,” he said.

  Alysia forced a smile and bowed her head to the woman, who stood up—she was tall— and walked over and hugged her lovingly.

  “I hate that you have to go through this, young Alysia, but you must not hate my husband. His heart is in the right place,” she said. Alysia returned the hug, though she didn’t know why. Adrica’s touch made her want to be nice to her, so Alysia’s hug was genuine, and the whole thing made her want to cry.

  The woman backed up and used her gloved fingers to remove dirt from Alysia’s face. She kissed her on the forehead and then returned to her seat next to Chaos.

  “Come, earth warrior, come and sit with us.” He beckoned to her. “I assure you that you have time. Let’s have a proper talk, and when we are finished, you will be very happy that we did.”

  Alysia walked over and sat with them. A few of the warriors from the Bloody Garot materialized from the trees and brought them food on silver trays. There were four of them in all, two boys and two girls. When they placed the food down, Alysia expected them to keep their heads bowed like broken slaves, but they waved at her, smiled, and one of the girls—a leggy, dark-haired, waif, who seemed to be in her late teens—walked over and hugged her tightly as if they were old friends. “Thank you for humbling Dibolosa,” she whispered in her ear and then skipped off into the woods with the others trailing her.

  “So your father is wanting to help, but is too weak to deal with the might of the lost?” Chaos asked, cutting a slice of bread and then smearing jam on one side before taking a large bite out of it.

  “He’s dying,” Alysia replied, amazed that she could say it without her voice quivering.

  “Why didn’t you stay with him, see him off with the loving face of a daughter?” he asked.

  “I would have if I hadn’t thought that you could help. That you can go there, treat his wounds, and allow me to continue my mission without the burden of a broken heart,” Alysia said. “If I lose my father, I will lose all reason to live. This will affect your plans, so I came to beg you to help him, since it has bearings on everything you have invested to make me strong.”

  Chaos looked angry and annoyed at Alysia when she said this, and he twisted and contorted his features in order to reason through what it was that he would say to her next.

  “Foolish girl, have you not learned by now that there is no asking? There is simply exchange! Do you want your father to live? Then give to the afterlife someone else in exchange for him.”

  Alysia thought about his words and whether or not it was true. Even if they were, she would never give up Tracy or Jaime to death in exchange for her father, and the girls were off-limits.

  “I’m not asking you to resurrect my dead father, Chaos. I am asking you to heal his wounds. If you can’t or won’t do it then say so, but I have nothing else to give you,” Alysia said.

  “What if I tell you that a part of healing him would be for him to get the same blood you got when you defeated the Dra’yr?” he asked, seeming to calm down as he did.

  “What would be the cost of that? If he can be given the blood, then why not Jaime and Tracy too? They travel with me, and they will be assisting me to defeat the demons. As I said before, this is to our advantage, giving them this extra power. You should have seen how the demons took advantage of their vulnerable humanity,” Alysia replied in stern tone.

  “My mention of the Dra’yr was simply that, Alysia Knight: a mention. The slaying of the beast and the melding of the blood is wrapped up in ritual. The ritual of the one that is chosen to save her world. We do not allow old men to start the ritual; it serves absolutely no purpose to the cause. I’ve already explained to you why you were chosen,” Chaos started.

  “We are very sorry, Alysia, but even if we wanted to, we cannot give your father the blood,” his wife chimed in.

  “So coming here was a waste of time then,” Alysia said, standing and taking a deep breath in frustration. “I left my dad to die while I came here on a gamble. My Isobel suffers and I’m not with her. We are miles away from help, so there is a chance that one of them will die.”

  “It is hard for you, I know,” Chaos said, “but you are not without resources. You will find that as you become more successful at thinning their horde, your power will grow with time. Take the fruit back to your people as a gift from me and Adrica. You
can contact me after your next victory.”

  Alysia gathered up an armload of food, nodded at Adrica, and walked towards the forest. As she did, she felt herself getting light-headed, so she looked back to see what Chaos and his wife was doing. The gazebo was missing, but the serene view of the lake and the trees that bordered it made her smile. The leaves were red and there were tiny white flowers growing around it.

  She really liked this world and its off-colored foliage, yellow sky, and strange people. It was a welcome change from the stark white rubble that was left of the earth and all the sadness that came along with it. If her father died, she would no longer have a place in that world. Who would fault her for returning to the demon world and helping their cause once her life was void of everything she loved?

  Isobel, Koko, and Jasmine had become like a family to her, and she did care about them. Would Chaos take them back and rescind their freedom if she allowed herself to die? It wouldn’t be fair to Isobel, the tiny girl who had spent a century working as a handmaiden to everybody. Tears poured from her eyes as she thought about her. The decision was no longer hers, was it? All was lost: the world she knew, her innocence, and the tiny bit of humanity that was left for her by the apocalypse.

  She steeled herself and shook her head, letting the self-pity pass as she walked through the dark foliage of the trees. My life was forfeit from the day the demons attacked us, anyway, she thought. I will do what I can, and then when it is allowed of me, I will die to rejoin my mother in heaven.

  Chapter Four

  The world grew dark and disorienting and then Alysia found herself no longer walking, but kneeling, with numbing pain running through her body. She opened her eyes and struggled to keep the food from falling, as she saw Isobel lying in front of her, clutching at her shirt as her eyes squeezed shut with dried tears running down her cheeks. She looked around and saw her father. He was seated up against one of the posts and there were makeshift bandages wrapped around his abdomen. Tracy sat on the base of a statue, staring at her. She ran over when she realized that she had opened her eyes.