‘The bird of Hermes is your name,
eating your wings to make you tame,
not king, nor prince, why can’t they see?
a crow, yes a crow is what you’d rather be!’
Gabrielle’s lips were pressed inconceivable tight together, her fingernails digging into the horse’s saddle. The rider certainly wasn’t silent anymore. As soon as the others had disappeared into the blanketing fog, he’d started singing that unsettling tune, his voice bouncing off the staring trees and disturbing the forest.
“Shall I sing it once again my lady?” he asked.
“No!”
He turned to smile at her, obviously amused by her sudden outburst.
“I mean, perhaps you should rest your voice?”
“Nonsense! I could sing for a month, no, a year! And I have my lady, in the year twenty-seventy and eleventy-eight, I did, I sang, I sung for a whole year straight!”
“Well then perhaps you have done enough!”
His laugh exploded off the trees.“Never my lady! Why? I never did believe my voice was that bad, no sir I did not!” Gabrielle felt as if she were in the presence of a cunning and dangerous creature, a feeling all too familiar. She frowned deeply.
“It’s not the voice. It’s the song, just, I just don’t like it.” The rider remained silent.
“Who would want to be a crow?” she said.
“Who wouldn’t? Crows are misunderstood, they are very intelligent, lonely, and friendly birds! Better to be a crow then a vicious beast I say.”
“Well I still don’t like them” she snapped.
The rider laughed again.“Well then, my fair and wise, tell us, what would you rather be?” she thought for a moment.
“I’m not certain but I certainly wouldn’t-“
“it’s not very becoming to contradict oneself in a sentence my dear.”
“Never mind! Where are the other riders. It seems like we’ve been going around in circles.This fog, it’s so thick -”
“What you just spoke, you might as well have said, I am certainly uncertain. You see, no sense does it make, it makes none at all! Um, thank you.”
Her frown set in even deeper. She remained silent and allowed him to continue, listening very closely.
“ And what’s more, why bother saying anything when you aren’t even certain what you’d rather be? “ he scoffed “ women and men, I’ll never comprehend . . but what does that make me? A dog , a friend . . .a monster?”
“YOU!” Gabrielle forgot her lady-like complacency for one moment, but a moment was all it took for her to divulge her insidious side, tackling the masked rider into the ground and shaking him by the shoulders. “WHY ARE YOU DOING THIS? WHY DO YOU WANT TO TORMENT ME?” The Stow Away laughed hysterically, his manical smile appearing once Gabrielle ripped off the white silken mask. “You diabolical . . . heathen. . . bogey!” his hysterics intensified the more violently she shook him.
“Did you really . . . just . . .say, bogey?!”
Gabrielle screamed and tightened her grip “Leave me alone!”
“Aw, I just wanna play! The Hermes bird I am, I came! Eating my wings to make me tame! Gabrielle-“ he spluttered, “I can hear-“
“Hear what? Your life slowly disappearing? You’re black soul smouldering as it descends into hell?”
“Are. . . You kidding?” he laughed, “you can’t kill someone by shaking. . . them! But I think you should stop all the same!”
“Oh! You are just saying that because the end is near for you! And you know it! Well ‘tis the entrance of your demise my nemesis, and I welcome it!” Gabrielle froze as the caress of cool steal touched her chin.
“That is quite enough swine.”
Gabrielle whimpered and slowly rose to her feet, suddenly at the mercy of a White Crusader’s blade.
The Stow Away laughed once more.
“Are you fair comrade?” asked Bartholemew, his look of loathing fixed now on Gabrielle, his sword drawing scarlet beads across her neck.
“Yes, yes! I am fine, it’s nothing but another attack o’ my valourous life.”
“You diabolical wretch!” Spat Gabrielle.
“Silence!” The hilt of Felline’s sword connected with her nose, sending her sprawled across the ground. “You have no place to speak here traitor!” he roared. Gabrielle groaned as tears began to scream down her cheeks, mingling with the dirt and blood on her face.
“Don’t you dare bleed on this ground . . .” Felline growled, his hand grabbing violently at her hair. “We haven’t allowed it yet. . .” He turned to The Stow Away who was wiping dirt from his shoulders casually, his jaw was clenched tight.
The Stow Away drew his sword and began to study his reflection in the blade.
“May I ask your name, so we may kill her in it?” asked Bartholemew, who sheathed his sword. Already they had begun to drag her, as if his answer was already known.
“Well firstly,” The Stow Away sighed, “I must tell you . . “ he moved too quick for the eye to see.
The whistle of metal, a flash of scarlette. Gabrielle screamed as Felline who had been dragging her by the arms, fell to the ground,a deep and fatal wound across his chest crying scarlet into the ground, his sky blue eyes going cloudy.
The Stow Away smiled. It chilled Gabrielle to the core.
“This, is a war. It seems you’ve forgotten.”
The nameless rider screamed, and fell to the ground beside his fallen brother.
“How can this happen? Have the Gods no mercy?”
"God serves mercy, but it is the devil who deals justice, oh White Crusader."
"Then I shall come at you with all the fires of hell!"
He rose and charged valiantly toward The Stow Away. It was over with one devastating swing from his sword. His eyes stared widely into the mist. A happy blade grinned at her, its moist nose breached through the surface of its prey, sniffing, searching. Another fallen Crusader.
The Stow Away grinned with all his teeth, his eyes wild. He was completely scarlet, just dripping . . .
Gabrielle gripped her hands over her mouth. She shook uncontrollably. She had to stop this, she tried to remember, but her mind had drawn a veil over her memories, rendering her powerless and pathetic.
“Who-who are you!” screamed Bartholemew, fallen to his knees, tears cascading down his battle worn face. “Who are you that can kill the Blood Brothers which two swift blows of steel?” The red man reefed Bartholemew’s head back, exposing his bare and naked throat, ripe and pulsating. He bent down and whispered softly to him, like a cruel lover . . .
“The Hermes bird is my name killing vermin is my game” he held his sword steady against his flesh.
“And now, my brother, my sir, I shall gladly take the pound of flesh, for which we are owed.” And with one fatal slice,the last Crusader had repaid his debt.
“Not king nor prince, why can’t they see? A bird of prey is what I’d rather be . . .”
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