When Elves Die : Episode One by Richard Poche Page A

girl in the village.”
    “She's very beautiful.”
    “And she loved to sing. Songs of worship.”
    The woman placed her head on the dead girl's chest
again. Her mouth distorted into a bitter smile.
    “When a human is bitten by a Killtooth they turn
into...they come back to life as one of them. Maybe she'll come
back. Maybe because she's a half-breed, she'll come back.”
    “If she does come back. She's won't be human. Or elf
anymore.”
    She shot him an icy glare. Then she looked up at the
white sky.
    “Lord Pegasin,” she cried out. “Why have you allowed
this to happen? We have been good. We are a faithful people. We are
a peaceful people. We have spent our entire lives worshiping you.
Singing to you. Praising you. And yet, you allowed this to
happen?”
    He looked at the young dead girl. Her blouse had
been ripped away, only the torn sleeves remained. There were
bloodied hand prints along her breasts and thighs. Dried mascara
tears streaked her face and trailed down her nude body.
    “Do you think I can live on with these memories?”
she raged with her fists clenched. “Why don't you just kill me? I
don't want to live....I don't want to live anymore. How could you
allow this? We worshiped you!”
    She ripped off a medallion that suspended from her
neck on a leather cord. Throwing the religious symbol on the
ground, she spat on it then looked to the sky with hate in her
eyes.
    Tholan looked up at the heavens himself. Some fast
moving clouds were coming in from the east. The winds were starting
to pick up and he could feel the temperature getting colder.
    “We really don't have time to give your daughter a
proper burial. The snow will cover her body. Protect it from
the-”
    His voice trailed off. He did not want to bring up
the topic of scavenger forest animals digesting what remained of
her loved ones.
    “I have no place to go,” she said. “We were supposed
to go to the next village and set up a revival. I have nowhere to
go and nothing to live for. My husband is gone. My daughter is
gone. I have nothing now.”
    The woman turned her back to the Barbarian.
    With nothing more to say, he started to walk
away.
    “Wait,” she said.
    Tholan kept walking. He did not want further
involvement.
    “I know who you are.” The woman's face now a picture
of delirious hope. “You are Tholan the Feared. You are an assassin
for hire.”
    “How do you know?” Tholan stopped in place, now
interested.
    “I remember you. Our village elders hired you four
or five years ago. We had a chief in our town that was abusing our
people. He was a brutal man. They hired you to take care of him.
His name was Rodius.”
    “Rodius,” he said. “Yes. I remember.”
    “I have thought of you for many a night since then.
How you saved the day when no one else would.”
    “Because they paid me.”
    “I have no money,” she said.
    Tholan turned back around. He called his horse over
and mounted the animal.
    “But I can offer my body.”
    “In exchange for what?” Tholan dropped off the
horse.
    “I want you to go to the caves of Shaian and kill
the lot of them.”
    Tholan paused for a beat as he looked over at the
carnage.
    “We could set fire to the rest of the bodies,” he
said. “Otherwise carrion will come and feed on what is left of
them.”
    “There's nothing left of me!”
    The woman twirled around in a pirouette of
grief.
    “I cannot help you,” he said as he turned his back
toward her once again.
    Her bloodcurdling scream startled him as it reached
a volume he would never have expected. Nor did he expect her to be
racing toward him at supernatural speed.
    Her jaws snapped at him, saliva dripping from her
fangs. Holding her back by her shoulders, he could see the bite
marks on her neck.
    Unable to get close enough to bite him, she spat
into his face.
    Her sputum burned like acid. He pushed her hard and
she fell on her back. Screaming like a psychotic banshee, she
bolted back up and attacked again.
    He half-hoped that