Let Go

“Let go.”

“I can’t.” It was accompanied with a sniffle. Wet and full of phlegm. An almost silent whimper followed.

“Please,” he said, begged, softly. “I want to know you won’t have any lingering regrets.”

“I-I don’t want to let you go,” she said. Her voice high, filled with the salty tears trickling into the corners of her mouth.

Her voice filled his ears. It turned into deep breath-inhaling sobs. Her face hung over his, her tears falling and mingling with his own. This wasn’t how it was supposed to happen. They were both supposed to survive the battle.

He said it softer this time, less plead, more comfort and empathy. He understood. He knew he was dying, but he wanted to know she’d been able to let him go. To live on. To be happy, even if he wasn’t with her physically.

“Let go.”

His body felt cold, his feet and hands numbing. He was starting to lose feeling. He was glad he was already lying down, still where he’d been felled.

A wind blew, barely tossing his sticky with blood and sweat, matted hair; hair that if he were to touch would be painted red.

He heard the shredded flags ripple in the wind nearby. They had been horribly misinformed. The enemy hadn’t had two thousand. It had been one hundred thousand. The scout had counted wrong. Or couldn’t count.  And only a few were left to wander the field of corpses. Luckily, Illaya had been one. L’Barin hadn’t.

He reached up with a numb hand and let his finger fall down a cut on her cheek. He knew the sensation he should feel, the warm, sticky, iron-scented syrup. But he felt none of that on his hand. He felt nothing. He didn’t have long.

His gaze moved up to meet Illaya’s. His dark ochre eyes lingered on her lighter, amber orbs. The corners of his mouth tilted up as he smiled. He always liked the dusting of pale freckles across her nose and cheekbones. It made her appear human if one didn’t look at her pointed ears.  

He was the same. Elf. But he only had one half of an ear left, having lost it during the fight when an enemy cut the tip off.

They’d fought humans who didn’t care for their species. He didn’t care one way or the other for them. He only cared for Illaya, and her safety. She was now queen. He’d seen her mother fall when they’d all failed to protect her.

“Go to your mother before they violate her body.” He let his arm fall back to his side. The sound of his limb falling dully into the blood-sodden dirt; the feeling lost to him. “You don’t want them to separate her head from her body.”

“I’d have to leave you then,” she said. Her eyes were pink, her fair skin swollen and red, wet and glistening with grief.

“You have no choice on that,” he said. His gaze roamed over her. “I am leaving you. And no matter how much neither of us wants that.” He paused with a grimace. A stab of pain shot through his spine. Near the wound that had claimed him. Sweat dotted his clammy skin. His breath was ragged as he drew breaths in short bursts. Too much and he’d be rocked with burning pain. “I don’t want to leave you either. But my time is coming to its end.” He panted as the wave of pain ebbed away for only a moment before it would return again.

At a sudden trample of hooves Illaya’s look shot over L’Barin. Her eyes widening and loosening a flood of tears.

“You have to go. Now!” His voice thick with urgency. Masking the pain that robbed his body of movement.

She looked down at him in alarm. Her smile was long gone. He was afraid it would never return, a permanent frown upon her fair, pretty face. A strand of her long silver hair fell over her shoulder.

“Go!” he cried and grimaced again. He squeezed an eye shut at the level of pain racking his side. He could not rise. He could not move. The enemy was coming back. He had seen them on their high horses riding through the field after it had ended.

“Run!”

He could imagine what she had seen. By the sound of the jingling of reins, the quick steps of big horses pounding toward them, trampling those fallen in the way; the snapping of flag poles as the horses were forced to crash through them, breaking them even more than the pitiful grave markers they had become.

He could hear the rough huffs as the riders drove their steeds. Armor rustled from atop the creatures. And all around for the eye could see was a sea of bodies. Parts whole and separated. A littering of steel, chipped swords, broken axes. Poles of spears and flags stuck in the ground and fallen around their holders.

She looked down at him. He saw it in her eyes. She wasn’t ready –able– to let him go. He would haunt her. Her eyes once again wet with tears. She bit her lip and looked over him. Somewhere where he couldn’t see, but he could hear. The hoof beats were racing toward them. He didn’t know what they would do to her if they caught her.

“Go!” He roared.

Her hand lingered on his chest, hesitant to break his touch. She pulled her fingers back and then reached out to splay her hand over his heart. To feel him one last time. She set her gaze on him, a stare that would remain with him even after he no longer could see. No longer had a physical form.

“I’ll love you in every eon. Find me again in the next.” She let her lips touch his. A pressure he felt on his mouth. The one feeling he was glad he’d not lost yet. He returned the pressure, able to lift his head, just enough.

“Go,” he breathed against her lips.

She nodded, wishing not to break away. But she knew she must. The sound was almost upon them.

“I love you too.”

She vanished. He could still feel the ghost of her hand pressing down on his ridged chest plate.

She was safe. And he knew it.