Scars

         Another battle won. I had taken the day to recover entirely, I do not remember it ever taking a whole day before, but this night was a celebration in my honour so I had to be at my best. I had not enjoyed the battle even a little bit this time around. There were not any real wars anymore, just beings like Kervos deciding to take places and kingdoms that could not defend against him. The city we buried today, Uylronaede, had taken him by surprise, there was only a small army of soldiers but they were intelligent and wilful enough to provide a challenge, hence why I was summoned to this battle.
         The promises made to me for the aid provided were uninspired and unimportant. I was simply bored when Kervos approached me, he said it was a challenge and that was all I needed to hear. Oh, how disappointing it all turned out to be, it was like sending a lion into a cockfight. Kervos heard my complaints on the subject when, just a half a day after my enlistment, the battle was over. He promised the best celebration I’ve ever attended as retribution. Kervos was a strange character, I had known him for a long while now, some sort of demigod only the bloodlines had been so twisted and intermingled that he had more god blood than human blood so was often considered one of us. Zeus’ blood was in his line, or so he claimed, the only thing he had to back this theory where his icy blue eyes and long golden locks. Other then those superficial qualities I failed to see a resemblance. He had been so driven to take Uylronaede that I assumed he had some sort of master plan for it but as soon as the living surrendered he brunt the entire city to the ground. He later informed me that he had no desire for the place until he was told he could not have it. I suppose I could understand that.
         The table in front of us was laden with delicacies in the forms of food, drink and golden place settings but none of it appealed to me. For once I did not feel the need to complain. I watched the people of the party, mostly gods and demigods, save the odd human server or cleaner. Kervos leant close to me and spoke of all the lovely demigods, nymphs and muses that would be more then willing to serve me this night. Usually this idea would appeal to me but tonight it just seemed so typical that it was pointless. The light shinning in my own dark hair resting on my shoulders appealed to me more then these females. My eyes glazed dully around the room until something held their attention. In the back corner of the room a human girl was trying to clean a bowl of spilled berries around three of Kervos’ demigod warriors.
            It was not the girl that held my attention, at least not at first, but the three males. The girl seemed to be trying to make herself as small as possible, which was not hard, she could not have been more then five and a half feet. She picked up the berries with one hand and wiped the floor with a cloth she held in the other. The men behind her did not seem content to let this pathetic creature do her job. The first man pushed off on her back with the toe of his boot, sending her into the mess of berries. She did not even look back at him, simply straitened out and got back to work causing the three men to bellow with laughter. Then the next man knelt behind her sliding his hand down her back until it rested on her buttocks and gave her a pinch. Again all the men laughed. The girl simply stood quickly but calmly and rung out her cloth in a bowl of water on a table three feet to her left.
            I thought it was the men that had my attention. Here were three great warriors with nothing better to do with their time then harass some weepy pitiable human. It was when the girl returned to her job at hand that I realized it was she that had my attention. You see, she was not weepy, nor pitiable. With her cloth cleaned she gave the men a short and neutral look, just as if to say, yes, I do realize that you are still here, then knelt again to wash the berry stained marble floors. Her hands were steady and her eyes were focused. The three men, all bigger, stronger and seemingly crueller than she, appeared to be nothing more than an after thought or a mild nuisance to this girl. The man who had not yet lashed out at the girl pushed against the hilt of his sword causing the scabbard to straiten out at his side then turned quickly as if he were whispering something to the companion on his left. The heavy scabbard cracked across the girls head and sent her to the floor again causing the three men to laughed even harder than before.
         “Ares?” Kervos’ voice broke through my focus. “Ares, are you listening to me?”
         I did not even realize that he had been talking. “Apologies friend.” I said dully. “I was watching this exchange.” I gestured to where the girl lay on the floor. Her eyes were still open and calm, she had not been knocked unconscious, it appeared to me that she was doing a mental assessment of her injuries. After a pause she got back into her kneeling position and continued wiping the floor.
         Kervos shook his head. “Just give me one moment.” He walked across the room, the men removed their helmets when they saw him and the girl bowed her head from where she knelt, after a quick nod to the men Kervos’ hand shot out and seized the girl’s hair. “You are causing a distraction.” He said as he pulled her to her feet.
         From the way the tenants in her neck and muscles in her shoulders tensed I could tell she was in great pain but her voice was level. “My apologies, I was just—” her explanation was cut short when Kervos slapped her hard across the face, she closed her eyes to the blow but did not react otherwise.
         “Do not tell me what you were doing, you were causing a distraction.” He turned her to the her three harassers, “Now thank these men for allowing you to clean around them!”
         “Thank you.” She said with a voice as cool as steel.
         Kervos released her with a push. “Go make yourself useful elsewhere.” He started back to me with an apologetic smile and took his seat.  “Now, Metope,” he pointed to a stunning nymph in a blue toga, my eyes fallowed his finger for half of a second before finding the girl again, she was filling wine bottles at the back of the room. I watched her steady hands pour the rich liquid, her long red hair moving with her as she made her way around the table. Kervos continued to ramble on but I could not take my eyes off of her long enough to listen.
         “Tell me, who is that girl?” I asked when I tried of his voice in the background of my thoughts.
         “Which girl?” He seemed too pleased that I was conversing with him to care about the interruption.
         “The one you just struck.”
         “Tressa?” He pointed to her and I nodded. “Forgive me for her behaviour, Tressa is a toy of mine, something like an old pair of boots, you do not know why you still have them or even why you feel compelled to wear them every now and again and yet you can’t bring yourself to dispose of them either.”
         His description of this girl bothered me almost as much as when he hit her, neither of these feelings made sense to me though. “I am quite intrigued by her.”
         “Oh?” He said cheerfully, “So it’s a human girl you want? Well I could certainly do much better than Tressa, someone younger perhaps? A virgin even?”
         An aggravated grunt passed my lips. “I do not want a human girl, nymph, demigod or muse. I want that girl.”
         “But Tressa is my toy.” He said in a tone I could not make sense of.
         “Kervos, friend,” I begun, in my most dangerous voice, “are you trying to tell me that I can not have the girl?” My jet black eyes burned into his as I spoke.
         He shook his head feverishly. “Not at all, I am saying that you may not want the girl. She’s a toy that I’ve… played with quite a bit over the years, perhaps someone less damaged—”
         Scooping my empty cup from the table I got to my feet effectively cutting him off. “I’ll be having one more drink then retiring to my room, I expect that the girl will be waiting for me when I get there.” I cared not for his reasons or excuses, this girl, his toy Tressa, was the most interesting thing I’ve seen in decades, I wanted to explore that further and did not need to explain myself to Kervos. After, what turned into, three more drinks and a few tired conversations with Kervos’ men I made my way to my room.
         In the middle of my room stood the girl. Kervos’ people work fast. Tressa had been changed out of her berry stained smock into a white toga with gold trim, it was held together by just one knot at the shoulder, her hair had been twisted to the top of her head in a regal fashion and her lips and cheeks had been coloured. Her eyes, a delightful sea green color that I have never seen before, seemed to look right at me and strait through me at the same time. I walked beyond her to the back of the room, on a table there was a bowl and cloth for me to clean myself with. I wrung the cloth and touched Tressa’s shoulder, she turned to face me and I wiped all of the rouge off of her face as gently as I could manage. After setting the cloth back in the bowl I reached around her neck and found whatever device was containing all of her hair removed it. Then I stepped back again and looked at her. Better.
         For a long time I just stared and through all of this she just stared back. There was no fear or apprehension in her eyes, nor was there any sort of lust or desire. Once I was satisfied that I had memorized every detail of her intriguing face (the curve of her nose, the soft point of her chin, a small scar above her right eyebrow, the definition around her cheek bones, the points of her lips) I scooped her chin with my thumb and forefinger and tilted her head up, she neither resisted or moved willingly. Even with her head back I still had to hunch quite a bit to reach her lips with mine and when I did something happened, something extraordinary.
         It was as if lightening were going supernova. I had never felt a mouth so sweet and delicious against mine and I have been with the goddess of love herself. There were strange pains in my chest, as if small insects were crawling around it, but in a pleasant way. Her scent filled my nostrils, it was only the scent of humans, that smoky-earthy aroma that used to sicken me, but coming from her it delighted my senses. Tressa’s mouth responded to mine in a way that I could only refer to as polite. Now, this is where my reaction to this girl gets indefinable by my accounts. I did not like the tepid way in which she responded to me. I felt… I felt… pain, a new pain, not that of a sword or other weapon, no, this pain crawled with the insects in my chest. I pulled her to me trying to ignite something in her, anything more than her neutralized mindset to the completion of this task. My own desperation failed me, Tressa became slightly rigid, I looked at where my hand grasped her bare shoulder and could see the red blotches that would later be bruises.
         My hand fell away from her shoulder before I had even completely processed what I was doing to her. I do not know what compelled me to do it but my lips gently brushed the red marks I created. This only seemed to frighten the girl but she caught herself and went back to a state of mechanical willingness. I did not know what to do. I wanted her, I did not know why, but I had never wanted anyone as much. Wanting is not an state that I have ever had to stand for very long. I wasn’t even sure if I could stand it at all. But when I reached for the one knot that held the light fabric around her body Tressa stepped away from me and I surprised myself by letting her.
         “Kervos thought you might enjoy me better with this on.” She whispered with her eyes on the floor as she clung to her one item of clothing. 
         Kervos really did not want me playing with his ‘toy’ it seemed. I shook my head, “I want to see you Tressa, take it off and lay down.” This was the easiest way to kid myself that I was not forcing the girl, let her do things on her own and I would even attempt to pleasure her. It was too dark in here to see her as well as I wanted to, I found a lamp on the window ledge at the back of the room, lit it and placed it down on the bedside table. When I got a good look at Tressa I understood what Kervos had meant when he said he had ‘played’ with her a lot.
         There were scars. A lot of them. They were mostly contained to the skin of her torso, beginning under her breasts and stopping at her waistline. Some were from burns, some from cuts and I believe a few were even bite marks. I remained frozen for a second for fear of what I would do to Kervos if I moved. But after a few moments of staring at this mess I found myself mesmerized by it. Most of my lovers had been goddesses and they do not scar. If ever a human lover of mine had many scars I certainly did not notice. Tressa’s body was like nothing I have ever seen before, the general shape was as lovely as any woman’s, but I could not take my eyes off of these marks. I sat next to her on the bed and traced the marks with my fingertips. There was a long gash off to the left, made by a knife as far as I could tell, just below her belly button there was a ‘k’ and part of what looked like an ‘e’, Kervos had begun to seer his name into her skin but he must have gotten bored and started drawing what looked like trees instead. There were more: round ones, strait ones, narrow ones, wide ones. “Do they hurt?” I asked Tressa.
         “Not anymore.” She whispered back.
         “Why does he do this to you?”
         “He enjoys it.”
         Finally able to pull my eyes from her marred skin I looked at her face. The tears were so tiny I was surprised I could see them at all. She closed her eyes to hide that fact that she was crying but I could tell just as well and with great disappointed I realized that I could not have this girl. More than my own pleasure, I desired to not hurt Tressa, and that is exactly what I would do. There is no way to avoid it with a girl like this, even if I tried to pleasure her it would not work, she would not understand pleasure, how could she? All she knows is Kervos and the horrible things he does to her. Things that I wanted so badly to kill him for. I took the sheet she had moved aside and covered her sweet and broken body with the soft silk. Her eyes flew open, this was the first time I had ever seen fear behind them, I kissed her gently on her forehead and made my way to the door.
         “Wait!” She called scrambling from the bed clinging the sheet to herself. “Wait please!” The sound of her voice startled me, she sounded panicked. I turned back to face her and she was fumbling for her toga. “Wait please, I can put it back on!"
         I took the toga from her. “It has nothing to do with that darling, you stay here and rest, no one will bother you.” I attempted to turn again but her hand closed over my forearm, her grip was only about as forceful as I would have suspected but I could not turn away from her when she had such desperation in her eyes.
         “Ares please.” She fell to her knees in front of me. “I am begging you, if you have any capacity for pity or compassion please, please stay.” I had no capacity for either of those things and yet I felt them both for her. “Ares if you walk out that door, Kervos will know, and…and…” her voice became a whisper so light I could barely hear, “Ares if he knows I disappointed you…. he will do things to me that you can not even imagine…things that only I could imagine, please I am begging you.” I knelt on the floor to meet her, I had never done that for any female before, and I kissed her again. Her words put a great pain in my chest, this pain mixed with the delightful insects that towed the dread of disappointment. The effect this slave girl had on me was like nothing I have ever experienced. Her response to my kiss was laced with relief but other than that it was the same distant and dutiful embrace it had been before.
         Confusion and dread filled her face when I tucked her under the blankets and then laid myself next to her only on top of them. “Kervos can not see through closed doors Tressa. When I speak with him I will simply say that you did everything I asked of you.”
         “Thank you.” She whispered with tears that I did not understand. They filled her eyes just like the others but at the same time a slight smile appeared on the corners of her beautiful mouth.
I brushed them off one at a time with my thumb and slipped my arm around her resting her head on my chest. “How long have you belonged to Kervos?” I asked her. And that was how it begun.
                Tressa and I stayed awake until the sun was beginning to come up, a number of times I asked if she was tired but she always replied that she never slept very much and continued to answer my questions. I discovered that she had belonged to Kervos so long that she had no memories of her life before him. At first she was just any other servant but he took a special shine to her when she matured. At first it was simply a sexual interest but he bored of that and began hurting her, which she preferred over his sexual advances. In the recent years he had lost his keen interest in her but still called on her randomly. I asked her very specific questions about him and her life with him and she always answered with out thought or hesitation. I had never met anyone so honest. She would describe scenes that disturbed even me as if she was passing along the morning news. I asked her if she ever feared that he would kill her in a rage and she replied that she prays for that every time he calls on her so I asked why she has not taken her own life and it was the first time she hesitated, she lifted her head and looked into my eyes. “I do not believe in the same things as the others, I believe there is something else out there for me, another life, another god that is not your uncle Hades or any of your kin and if I bear this life I will be rewarded for it in the next.”
“I could kill you for speaking like that.” This was simply a warning, of course I would never dream of it, but she must be careful how she speaks and who she speaks to.
“Do it then.” She said plainly and the sound that filled the air was very inhuman, I had never heard anything like it before, it was the sound of my laughter. Not the cruel laugh I use to unnerve opponents but a real laugh. We did fall asleep eventually and when I left the room the next morning I kept my word to the sweet girl and told Kervos she was the perfect company.
The weeks that fallowed were miserable for me. I tried everything I usually enjoyed to distract myself from thoughts and memories of sweet Tressa but to no avail. Her image was burned on the back of my eyelids, every time I closed my eyes her sad and resolved face stared back at me. Her scent seemed to have gotten stuck inside of my nostrils, with every breath I was flooded with her. Each time I rested my hands I could still feel her scars under my fingertips. After close to a month I could not stand it anymore and made my way back to Kervos’ kingdom. I was not sure why or even what I intended to do when I arrived there, I was driven simply by a need, there was no reason and I had no choice.
In order to move through the kingdom without interuption I disguised myself as the most average man I could think of. My great black stead got more curious looks than I did, once I was closer to Kervos’ home I unsaddled and instructed the horse to hide in the forest that surrounded his estate. I walked the grounds for an hour before I spotted her. I stood in the main banquet room, something must have been scheduled to happen there because servants were scrambling around cleaning and arranging things. Tressa was at the back of the room cleaning the floor as she had been the first time I saw her.
For a few moments I just stared at her and let my eyes know the peace they have been longing for since we parted ways. She wore a light working dress, its dull grey color seemed to mock her beauty, it had no sleeves and just wrapped around her chest, probably a garment meant for hot days like this but yet she held tightly to a heavy shawl wrapped around her dainty shoulders. I had intended to find a safe place to transform back into my own likeliness before I greeted her but Tressa sat back to rinse her cloth and her eyes scanned the room until they fell on me.
It was not my imagination, she recognized me instantly, her lips moved to the tune of my name. I smiled and started toward her but was stopped dead by the look in her eyes. Terror, pure red and black blinding terror. I took one more step to be certain and she sprung to her feet and ran away from me. “Tressa?” I called and started after her before I even realized what I was doing. She was fast but no one was faster than me. I watched her slip through a door off of one of the hallways and fallowed her in. It was a long and narrow room that looked like another broad hallway but did not lead anywhere. Tressa ran as far as the back wall then pressed herself against it as if it could absorb her entirely. “Tressa?” I called again as I approached her and she turned to look at me. I allowed myself to transform back, like a ripple in the water it stared at my center and spread over my body until I was myself again.
“Oh no, no, no.” She gasped when she saw me and begun to cry. “Please Ares, please just leave.”
“Why are you running from me?” I had not intended for my voice to be so harsh. I lacked control in her persence, became somethng else, something almost human.
“Please Ares.” She tried to push me toward the door but I would not budge. “Please, before he finds out that you were here, turn back into that man and leave.”
I seized her shoulders, violent actions did not startle Tressa as much as kind ones, so she hardly flinched. “Was I not kind to you? Did I not do everything you asked of me slave girl?” I hissed, suddenly feeling very silly for ever being so concerned with this foolish human and very weak for allowing myself to be hurt by her.
“No one has ever been as kind to me as you.” She whispered finally meeting my eyes.
My expression softened, I released her shoulders. “Then I do not understand—”
“No, of course you do not understand!” She snapped, the sound of her raised voice startled me into jumping a step back, men twice my own size have never been able to get that reaction from me. “You gods never consider the consequences your actions have on us!” Then there was that pain again. That hurt not caused by a weapon, the pain that put heavy blocks in my chest. “Oh Ares,” she cried softly after watching me for a few moments, no one has ever seen me hurt in this way before. “I am so sorry.” Her hand caressed my face. “I should not blame you, this is my fault, I should have been the one to figure out what would happen, you had no way—”
“What has happened?” I asked quickly.
She stepped away from me. “It’s not important.”
“Tressa?” I pulled her back to me and turned her face up. “Tell me or I’ll find out some other way.”
Her face crumbled tragically and she shook her head until she calmed herself enough to speak. “Your attention to me has… reignited Kervos’ interest in me as well.”
I froze for a long moment and stared at her. Reignited his interest? How could I not have seen that it might? I had left this poor girl with him for almost a month now after creating a newfound infatuation with hurting her. No wonder she ran from me. I had to slowly speak to keep from roaring my words. “What. Has. He. Done?
She pulled tighter on the shawl around her shoulders. “Nothing.”
“Show me.” I demanded closing my hands over her arms again.
“What difference does it make? It does not matter.” She could never understand exactly how much it mattered, not after the life she has lived. But I did not need her to tell me anymore, I finally understood why someone would wear a heavy shawl in this heat. I spun her quickly, grabbed the ugly thing at the top off her neck and tore it off of her. I could tell well enough from the top of the design cut into her back but I still slid down her dress to get a full look at it. “I do not know why you care for me Ares,” her voice cut through my frozen state of rage like a lullaby in a storm, “but you seem to as far as I can tell, I did not want to show you this because I was afraid it would hurt you.”
A vulture. That swine had carved my own symbol into this girl’s back. The slight scarring around the edges of the scabbed design told me it had been done to her a number of weeks ago, probably the very day I had left. That night I sat in a golden throne and drank fine wine with my father while she laid still and tried not to cry out as he tore and cut my symbol into her beautiful skin. Once I was able to speak again I asked the only question that mattered. “Where is he?”
She spun, pulling up her dress as she moved. “Ares no. Leave it be, you can not help me.”
“I will kill him.” I was moving back up toward the door.
“Ares!” She cried throwing herself in front of it. “If it is even possible to kill him then I will belong to his son, he is just as bad as Kervos and he will know his father died because of me, things will only be worse!”
“Fine.” I huffed, “then I’ll just cut off his hands.”
She shook her head and pushed me back into the room, I let her only out of fear that I would hurt her if I resisted. “Kervos has many hands in his men, he will always find ways to do these things. Ares please understand that there is nothing you can do.”
“Tressa I can not do nothing!” I calmed myself and gently placed my hands on her face. “Please just tell me, there must be something that I can do?”
There was hope in her eyes, or at least the only thing close to hope that I have ever seen. “There is one thing.” She said and I nodded, I would do anything she wanted. “Kill me.” Except that.
“No.” I shook my head fiercely and tried to step away from her. “No Tressa, I could never—”
“Please.” She began to sob, throwing her arms around me and pulling herself as close as she could get. “Please Ares. What am I? You have killed thousands. Please, please, just do it, I am nothing.”
“Tressa darling,” I found her chin buried in my chest, raised her face and waited for some of the tears to wash away so I could be sure that she was looking at me, she may not understand this but at least she will know it is the truth. “You are not nothing, you, my dear, are everything.” And I kissed her. How sweet it was when she kissed me back, not because she had to, I could feel her desire for me finally. There was no fear, no mechanical compliance, just passion. Her mouth welcomed mine as much as I needed hers. I laid her on the floor, keeping my arm under her shoulders so that catastrophe on her back would not rub into it. I was going to have her right here and she wanted me just as badly. I could feel it in the way her opened legs urged me, the way her hands fumbled with the knot on my cape, the small sounds she made that seemed to surprise her.
“Well isn’t this just sweet.” Kervos and three of his men, the same three that had torment her the night of my banquet, stood in the doorway watching us.
It took me less than a second to get us both to our feet, with one arm I swept Tressa behind me and with the other I drew my sword. “Kervos.” I growled, the animal in me ready to tear him into bloody slabs of meat.
“Ares, friend, I was told some strange man chased my toy down this way. I had no idea it was you.” He smiled politely as he and his three men entered and closed the door. “If you wanted another night with the girl you could have just asked. No need to disguise yourself in my kingdom.”
I could feel Tressa’s body against the arm I shielded her with, it was as if a current of energy were running through it. I had decided what I was going to do, it is frowned upon to take things from other immortals but most of the gods who would take issue with this owed me in one way or another, I would pass up many lifetimes of debts owed for this but it did not matter as much as she did. “I am leaving here Kervos and the girl is coming with me.”
Kervos’ laughter filled this long room. “Is that so?” His smile snapped off of his face. “Tressa belongs to me Ares, she is my thing, my toy, and I will not let you take her.”
I laughed back at him, the kind of laugh I was most used to, Tressa shuttered at the sound but so did two of Kervos’ men. “And do you expect to stop me? Even with three of your men you know you can not beat me.”
“I will cut you into pieces!” he screamed, “I will put each one of those pieces into wooden crates and use each crate and a foot stool!”
The sound of his screaming made Tressa tremble even more until her voice released the pressure. “Stop!” She yelled so loud that all three of his men jumped back. I grabbed for her with the arm I used to hold her behind me but she stepped around the other way in front of me. “Kervos I have no intention of leaving here with Ares, there was a misunderstanding, it is my fault entirely, punish me as you see fit.” I never realized that words had such fire until she burned me with hers. I had risked so much in my decision to take the girl and she did not want to come with me.
“Punish you!” Kervos howled with such force that the walls shook. “Punish you! Girl you have no mind for the things I am going to do to you. You think you know me Tressa, you ungrateful whore! You have never seen me before, but you will toy, mark my words, you will beg—”
“You will not touch her!” 
“Are you going to stop all of us Ares?” His voice dropped and words of the old language came out, I had seen him do this before, by the look on Tressa’s face she had too. It was a good thing she never did manage to undo my cape, this old leather thing has seen me through a great many battles and was our only hope now. I spread it and spun, I grabbed Tressa as I turned and folded her into me covering us both. Intense heat surrounded us, Kervos was not a full god, he could only hold the flames that filled the narrow room for a few seconds, my ankles we singed but I am no Achilles and would recover just fine. I did not need his trickery, mind you if I had time I would turn him and his men into roosters and serve them for dinner, but I had my sword and I would make him taste it. I was not exactly sure how to kill Kervos but I was going to enjoy finding out.
Before I could move to fight Tressa blocked the way. “Ares stop this, please, just leave while you still can.” She whispered.
Kervos grabbed her arm viciously, pulling her away from me, I wanted to reach for her but our opposing forces were likely to tear her in half. “No need to rush out friend.” He garbled ironically. “Tressa is very beautiful when she is in pain, should be a lovely showing.”
I took just one step toward them, waving my sword to remind him I held it. “Take your hand off of her or I will remove it from your arm. The girl comes with me whether she wants to or not.”
”Try and leave with her, you may make it past me and my men, immortal, but I guarantee you, by the time you cross this threshold the girl will be dead and—”
I had warned him. Neither Kervos nor his warriors saw my sword before his hand fell from Tressa’s arm and slapped off of the floor behind me to the right. Kervos cried out and ran past me to retrieve it, I only had a second to grab Tressa and toss her behind me to my left before Kervos’ men closed in. The first weapon that came at me was a dagger, a long stiletto I believe, I did not even see which man held it. I hooked under the curved handle and sent a finger or two flying away with it. Next there were swords, at least two, maybe three, they flew at me from all angles. In the same second I jumped to avoid one swiping at my feet only to hit the floor and duck away from one coming for my head. The third, by now I was certain there were three, lunged at my chest, I was able to knock it down with my own before it speared me but not before it could cut a long gash in my torso. A flesh wound, I barely noticed it. There were too many weapons to defend myself against to make any substantial hits, I only hoped the Kervos’ severed hand was enough to keep him away from Tressa. With every block I tried to push them away from me but as soon as one moved back another filled his place, by the time I got through the third the first was back.
Kervos’ voice pulled me away from my own battle. “I would have liked to have taken my time with you toy, after all these years, I was really looking forward to your death.”
I looked behind me to see Tressa pinned under Kervos, he had his handless forearm crushed into her neck, my sword was hot from his fire it had never really bled at all, and with his good arm he was fumbling with his belt. Pig. I could not help her with his men coming at me like hungry flies to a rotten corpse. I fought them in my peripherals, my attention was divided, sword, fist, Tressa, check my back, Tressa, kick, punch, block, Tressa, I felt useless. But the dagger, the one that I tossed with my sword, lay beside them and Tressa’s arms were free, flailing above her head as she struggled for air. “Kervos!” I yelled, knowing the kind of sadistic animal that he was, once he knew he had my attention he would want me to see Tressa as he did this to her. It worked, he looked at me, let little pressure off of her neck so she would not pass out just yet and turned himself and the girl, giving up on his belt for the moment he tugged at her hair so that her head rolled back and she looked at me.
“See Ares, what did I say, just beautiful.” He taunted. But he underestimated Tressa just as I suspected he would. Tressa did not see me, she saw the dagger. She waited for him to get back to work on removing his belt then closed both of her hands around it and brought it down.  She pierced it into his right shoulder near his neck and I thought I saw the tip poking out midway through his left rib bones. He screeched like a child as he pushed himself away from her, he clawed at the dagger with his one hand but could not seem to grip it. I was so enjoying watching the agony that she caused him that I lost focus for just a moment. That was all it took.
My sword. My saving grace against these three demigod warriors was knocked from my hand. It did not take them long to close in. Two of them grabbed either side of me and rushed me to the wall. Kervos tried to gargle a cheer from where he wept at the back of the room. The warrior in front of me, the one that had shoved Tressa into a mess she was trying to clean the first time I saw her, spun and wielded his sword dramatically as he approached. “God of War, I’ll be sure to place a piece of you nearby your slave girl when Kervos takes his revenge on her.” The warrior drew back for the plunge just as my blade seemed to spring out of his chest. As I was trying to figure out how in the world I had managed to stab this warrior without the use of my arms or sword he fell to the ground and Tressa stood behind him.
My blade was almost as tall as she, it shook in her hands as she brought it down on the fallen warrior again and again. One man released me to attack her, I took the opportunity to grab the man who still held on by his neck. I pulled him to my hip and twisted, his head did not come of completely but close enough. I got the man charging Tressa by the hair and threw him to the ground und using my foot I removed his head. Through this Tressa just kept slashing at the warrior she brought down, he was a mess of red pulp by the time I grabbed her. “Tressa!” she continued to swing the blade, I grabbed her wrist to stop her. “Tressa, stop!” she released it with a cry and I held her for the moment I could spare. “We have to get out of here.” I said and she swallowed her sobs and nodded. “Is it alright with you if I disguise the both of us?” She nodded again. I transformed myself first, not into the man I entered as because he has been spotted, just another unremarkable form. I turned for Tressa, she stood looking down at Kervos, he wept pathetically. “Would you like me to kill him, love?” I offered, she looked at him for a moment longer, let him wail at the thought and then shook her head.
“He’s not worth the energy it takes to raise a sword.” And on that note she brought her foot back and kicked the dagger he had not managed to remove. He squealed like the pig he was before passing out.
Transforming Tressa was heartbreaking. Not only did it sadden me to turn her into a less beautiful form but also it was easy. When transforming people, even willing people I am always met with some sort of resistance, people have identity and freewill and these things grasp at their natural form. But with Tressa it was as easy as pouring water over her head and in a wash of my motion she was someone else. She smiled brightly at the sensation and I thought I might cry.
No one bothered us on the way out of the estate, I summoned my horse from his hiding place in the woods. Tressa smiled at the animal and pet his main, he usually did not like to be touched by anyone but me but he nudged her with his head and licked her cheek. I saddled on then scooped her up with me, she rested with her legs over one side and I secured her at my shoulder with one arm, grabbed the reins with the other and rode out of that hateful place.
We rode for two days, once we were far enough away I transformed us both back and hunted some supper. Tressa slept most of the second day, she awoke in a panic until she realized it was me that held her, she smiled and kissed my cheek. Finally we reached the spot I had been dreading since we started out.
The road split in two directions. A mile up the northeast side was a small village, my home was many miles up the northwest side. I got down off of my horse and helped Tressa down as well. She looked confused, I kissed her softly to calm her. “I do not wish to own you Tressa.” Her eyes searched my face to comprehend what I was saying. I removed a purse of coins from my side and handed them to her, she did not seem to know what they were. “Walk along that road, you will come to a small village, there is a hotel inside, you can not miss it, it is in the very center of town. Go into the hotel, tell the owner that I sent you and you need a place to stay and a some work, he will not deny you.”
“You do not want me?” Her voice was soft and hurt.
“Darling I would love nothing more than to keep you but not as my possession.” I took her face in both of my hands. “I am giving you a choice. Go to that village and be free if that is what you want.” A part of me wanted her to reject this completely, say that she loves me and is certain that she wants me and nothing more. But her eyes continued to search for the answer, she could not understand what I was asking her so I had to make the choice for her. It was not as if she would be my slave if she came with me but how do you love someone without feeling as if you own them at least partially? Tressa would never be able to draw the line between me owning her heart and owning her completely. Strange thing it is to force freewill on someone, but I would not be another person to hurt her and she did not have the tools to make this choice on her own. I kissed her one last time, savouring the flavours of her lips, then got back on my horse.
I could not look back as I rode away, I was not sure if Tressa ran for the village or still stood perplexed trying to grasp the concept of thinking for herself. But then I heard her voice louder then it had ever been before. “Ares!” I snagged the reins and turned my horse, assuming that she was in trouble, but when I saw her she still stood in the middle of the path clutching my coin purse to her chest. She ran to meet me. “I do not understand what I feel for you.” She said as she caught her breath.
“It alright darling, I do not expect you to. I’ll come back someday when—”
“Ares stop.” She cut me off and approached the side of my horse, reaching her delicate hand into mine. “I understand all there is about cruelty, greed, pain, and everything else negative in this world. If the feelings I had for you had anything in common with those things I would know what they are but I do not.” She took a breath and fixed her eyes on mine. “When you tried to leave just now, something happened, a new kind of pain and I thought I have felt them all.” She laughed at this, I did not find it as funny, my hand automatically rested on her face. “You say it is my choice, let me choose Ares.” I dropped from horse and stood in front of her. She did not need anymore words, she got on the tips of her toes, I bent to meet her and with out breaking from the perfect kiss we have created I lift her to my horse and begun our trek home.
END

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