Published via Ecency

Serje was once again an idiot. Or had he always been an idiot? It was hard to tell nowadays. He didn't know what was worse... the pain he had caused his beloved or the stupidity of his way of thinking.

Come to think of it the answer was clear as day.

"Serje!" Sylla yelled, deftly dodging and weaving between two Bulloxes. "Snap out of it!" She stepped, swirled, impaling her sword through the Bullox's skull. "Serje!"

Serje found himself pressed against the cave wall, his hands shaking and his heart breaking. This wasn't the time for that, Sylla needed him. He noticed two more Bulloxes rushing from the cave entrance. He went to his pouches - only two remained. He had to be precise.

He threw one against the stalactite above the entrance, the second on the ground near the beast fighting Sylla. The area of effect had to exclude her, they didn't take the antidotes beforehand. Since neither of them expected such a crucial mistake from Serje.

The first exploded, spraying the contents over the charging Bulloxes. They slowed and then lost their footing, bumping into each other as they got closer to his beloved.

Sylla used the confusion in her own beast to land a clean blow to the head, then turn on the befuddled creatures stumbling towards her. One haphazardly raised its mace. Sylla brushed the blow aside then slid her blade through the beast's knee tendons. In the same motion still, she sliced the other's chest. Once. Twice. It fell. Sylla turned on the first again, grabbing its head, then slicing its throat.

The blood sprayed as the beasts fell. Sylla stood, her breaths quick and sharp like her sword.

Serje saw her bloodied face and couldn't stop the tears from coming. From falling down his face like endless streams. She turned on him, stomped toward him.

"You nearly killed us!" She screamed. "What were you thinking?"

Serje tried to say something, anything. Instead, he covered his face and wailed.

"You're pathetic." Sylla spat on the ground and exhaled a breath of frustration. "You have nothing to say to me?" She paced around the corpses. "Your greed nearly kills us both and you just sit there crying?" She grabbed his face. "Answer me!"

"W-w-what can I say?" Serje tried. "I fucked up..."

"That's putting it mildly." She let him go; started to pace again. "Mildly indeed." Her pacing slowed. "I am so disappointed..." She felt her sword drop from her grip, clanking on the rocks and then propping itself against a Bullox corpse.

Silence fell on the cave, except for Serje's sniffles. The fool had trusted the most unsavory sort with the most unreliable information. He had thought this man friend. Comrade. The signs were there but his wits weren't.

A treasure just waiting in a cave. Right. Because that made all the sense in the world.

How did the Bullox know to attack, however? The creatures did not possess the wit to plan an ambush, nor the fortitude nor knowledge to follow orders...

Interesting...

They looked at each other - Serje deflated, Sylla enraged. She looked away, looked back, away again. She picked up her sword, cleaned its blood from the beast's fur. Approached her beloved.

He was looking at the rocks, unable to meet her gaze.

"Come on."

Serje raised his head to see her proffered hand. "W-what?"

Sylla rolled her eyes. "Come on, fool! You think I'm going to leave you in this cave?"

Serje's lips wabbled but he stopped himself from crying again. He didn't feel worthy to accept her help. He grabbed the stalagmites at his side and pushed himself up.

"You...you forgive me?" He prodded.

"No." Sylla looked away again. "I doubt I ever will." Looked back. "Such carelessness... I thought you were better..."

"I -"

"Don't say anything." She put a finger to his lips. "Just don't. Come, let's get out of here."

"And then?"

"Then I'm going to find the people who brainwashed you and put a sword through the necks of each and every one of them. What do you think about that?"

"It was actually one -"

"I don't care!" Sylla sighed. "I don't care," Serje said nothing. "Come, fool. First revenge. Then you will explain your negligence. Repent, and I might... forget this happened." She looked him in the eyes, then. "It will take time to forgive you."

Serje nodded, it was more than he deserved. "Lead the way."

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