Bite Back Rose
Who knew a mere lump could invite such dread.
Sellen, by lake’s edge, ready to bathe, froze with her body half submerged. The Highland Tower, knotted with muscle and worn with experience, seemed for once so frail and vulnerable. Her skin, weathered by an artistry of old scars, reddened at her left hip. The Bite Back Rose.
She knew then her days were numbered.
What of Rina? Of Colt?
She punched the sore. Princess Rina didn’t deserve weakness. She had sworn to Rina, fist to heart. Body still stained from the day’s efforts, Sellen stepped out from the lake and strapped the leather pads and iron plates across her body. In her armour, she stood just as tall as ever.
She found Rina and Colt huddled by the campfire. Concordia’s rotation, the island far up in the sky, smothered out the sun and drenched the land in an overpowering fog that blurred from grey to black. Rina brightened at the sight of Sellen and ran to hug her, but only reached as high as her waist. Her hair streaked gold just like Hallan’s had. Colt, who tended to the crisping boar, managed some sort of smile.
The land sloped down to the Stricken Strand, a thin shoreline between two opposing seas, which joined Lordundum to the south and Tamria to the north. The Zanzaian army pursued from the south. If she pressed her ear to the earth, she could almost hear the marching.
Sellen warmed her hands by the fire. Death approached from three sides: the Zanzaian armies, Concordia’s winter, and the Bite Back Rose that had found itself on her hip.
Despite it all, Sellen managed a smile. Rina needed someone who could smile.
“Did you hunt this yourself, Rina?”
Rina thrust out her chest and gave a proud humph. “It was easy.”
“You should have seen her,” Colt said as he cut the boar up and sprinkled it with chopped garlic.
“She’s always been a good shot,” Sellen said. Rina glowed with pride. Her cheeks wrinkled the same way Hallan’s had.
They split the boar three ways, checked their provisions, snuffed out the fire, and took the first step into the Stricken Strand, where wind whipped wild, time blurred, and the air sapped them dry.
#
Sellen killed the final Zanzaian assassin with a strike to his head.
Anyone else? She faced the looming fog and begged for another shadow to approach. No one did. Rina huddled by Colt with one hand and held her bow with the other, as if torn between fear and fight. Sellen’s fingers itched. Her sword hungered. She hungered. But no one arrived to satisfy her.
She drew herself to her full height and admired her work. Four lay dead at her feet. Why did they always underestimate her? Send more.
“Thank the Heavens you’re helping me,” Rina said.
“Thank Colt for that.”
“Colt paid others. They didn’t care.”
“They’re cowards.” Sellen thought it over and opted for something stuck up and noble. “I made an oath, too, and cowards who forsake their oaths all meet death.” She felt at the plate above her hip. The Strand stretched into the shadows from both directions. “Go back to sleep, Rina.
“Sellen and I will deal with their bodies. This isn’t for a princess to watch,” Colt said.
“Princess no more. I can deal with a dead body.” Rina pouted. To prove it, she glanced at the red-and-blue uniformed Zanzaians at Sellen’s feet, paled, and turned to hide her face.
“Go and sleep, alright?”
“Yes, Sellen.” Rina groaned and settled onto her blanket.
Sellen and Colt worked in silence, stripping the Zanzaian men of their equipment and provisions until Rina’s snores drifted about. The tide wet the shore, converging in from both sides and connecting at the centre for a moment before retreating. It made for terrible sleep.
“Colt, what do you know about the Bite Back Rose?”
“A lot of superstition. That’s what.” Colt scratched at his head. “Why do you ask? You never struck me as the sort who’d care about drama and make-believe. In fact, the Highland Tower I knew would slam someone’s head into a table for that.”
“Drama?”
“Well, that’s the point of it, isn’t it? Drunk, disloyal men would blame lip stick marks on the Bite Back Rose to hide that they had had an affair.”
“Shamans and oracles spoke of death. Of blooming flowers that swallow the body whole.”
Colt gave a long, drawn-out sigh. “Look, I get it. I practice medicine. I’ve seen it all. People see a tiny little bump somewhere and immediately think it’s the Bite Back Rose. Thousands of people think they’ve had it at some point, yet I’ve only seen the real thing once. Where is it? I’ll check for you, but I doubt it’s anything beyond a bruise or a bug bite.”
“It’s on my hip.”
“Well?”
“Help me out of this armour.” She clipped off the various straps and bindings with Colt’s help. Free of the metal, she felt at the skin of her hip. Even under Concordia’s shadow, she could make out how the mark had developed.
Colt peered close, running a finger around the skin. It bulged as wide as a coin, and its edges perforated the skin to the shape of a rose’s petals, pinching up at the ends, threatening to rip free.
“Does it hurt?”
“Not yet.”
“It will.”
“Then that means …”
“Yes. It’s the Bite Back Rose. I’m sorry.”
Sellen let the words sit. Colt continued.
“Do you know the tale of the Godborn?”
“I’m not Godborn.”
“The Godborn are extraordinary. Your strength is extraordinary. And your size.”
“The other kids mocked me and called the same thing. Not that it meant anything. It’s just a dumb term for freaks of nature.”
“Ancient scholars think the Godborn exist for a purpose. A way for God to secretly prod the world in the right direction as he awaits his trial. They say the Bite Back Rose acts as the signal for the Godborn that their purpose approaches. Don’t lose sight of that, Sellen. Maybe it all led up to this. Maybe the universe needs you to see Rina safely to Tamria.”
“I’m not a blasted Godborn, Colt. They’re not real. I’m just a freak. Maybe my mother had a fling with a giant, or some witch cursed me. I’m not special, Colt. I … I don’t want to die, but I deserve this, don’t I?”
Colt said nothing.
“What of Rina? I can’t fail her. I can’t.” Sellen shot to her feet, alight with panic. “I can’t fail again like I failed with Hallan.”
“We’re almost to the Tamrian outpost.” Colt reached up high to grasp her shoulders and calm her down. “If you fall, I’ll get her the rest of the way.”
“But—”
“Trust me, Sellen. I won’t fail her.”
The words dulled the brunt of Sellen’s panic. She recalled days of old spent by the cedar tree, listening to her sparring teacher’s instructions. Breathe in. Hold. Breathe out. Like the sway of its branches and the reach of its roots. The breath trailed through her veins, and she found calmness once more.
“Rina can’t know,” The Highland Tower said.
“Tamrian land holds a pain killing balm. I can make some for you when we reach it. It’ll make the end a little more bearable.
They waited in the darkness and contemplated the silence. The wind howled and wailed, like lost spirits lost at the sea.
“Why did it come for me?”
“Fate is cruel.”
“But why me? What did I do?”
“Fate is cruel,” he repeated.
“Why me?” she said, more hopeless.
“What did Rina do to deserve rebellion? Nothing. Fate is cruel.” Colt hid his expression as he tore through the men’s supplies. “Would you like it better if you died to an enemy’s sword instead?”
“Yes.”
“Then make sure you take down as many of them as you can before you fall. Sellen, be the person that Princess Rina always needed.”
She thought of Hallan’s limp body, cradled in her arms. She recalled the rage that had controlled her and spurred her to first brandish a knife pointed at human flesh. The Rose had come to punish her for her failure. If she failed Rina, it would swallow her whole.
“That was the plan.”
Colt’s smile reached to his eyes. She knew then that he saw her not as a brute or a bandit, but as a warrior.
Warrior.
Would a warrior feel this fear? This uneasiness? This dread?
Did warriors flee from their fate and make excuses at every step?
Warriors died for their cause, but she wanted nothing more than to live.
#
The pain crawled out from Sellen’s hip with every step. She couldn’t see it through the armour, but she could feel as the skin seemed to peel out from the muscles. The pain dug like roots through her abdomen and down her leg. Less than a week left.
The weather in the Strand had snapped to freezing and the wind tore at her. Colt positioned himself to shield Rina from the brunt of the wind.
Pastel white fog smeared around them so thick she could hardly see a metre ahead of her. Shadows flickered about, and distant shouts broke over the chaos of the wind. Pursuers. Somewhere. Sellen guarded the rear, dragging the sword tip against the sand, lost in her own thoughts.
Was it her past that had summoned the rose? Failing Hallan and those years spent roaming the Lordundum Highlands, stealing from merchants and cutting down rivals. The past that she had never told Rina of. Colt knew it, of course. Colt had vouched for her and staked it on his own life as she waited for her sentence.
“I do it because I care for Rina,” Colt had said. “Her mother’s a madwoman, but Rina’s innocent. I care for her, and I hope to see her grow into a fine ruler, and an even greater woman.” And Rina had, in leaps and bounds. Who could have expected that that eagle-eyed princess, always smiling, always chipper, could have come from that monstrous Queen? But the people didn’t care for her innocence. They wanted all royals dead.
She thought of Rina, and how she used to climb up her body for a piggyback, holding onto her ears for balance. Hallan had done the same so many years ago. A true Godborn could have saved Hallan, but she wasn’t a Godborn. She was a freak, and her failure must have earned her the Rose. It existed as a blemish upon both mind and body. You’ll fail Rina, it seemed to say, just as you failed Hallan.
Sellen kept the sword close to her as she watched the fog for shadows. A pursuer could leap out, revealing Zanzaian red-and-blue. She kept watch, eager for the fight. The sensation irritated her. The impatience before the brawl. But nothing jumped out. Nothing distracted her from the Rose’s growing pain.
Under Concordia’s movements, the sky never changed except for sunset and sunrise, where the sun burgeoned on the horizon, a distant light shrouded by grey. They used those brief flits of light to mark the arrival of day and night, so that they could maintain some attempt at regular sleep.
“Keeping watch again?” Colt said as they prepared for sleep, drawing his cloak tight. Rina lay curled by his side, face buried in her blanket, legs shivering.
“Always.” She held the sword hilt in both hands and dug the tip into the dirt. Even now, the pain writhed inside her, but The Highland Tower held tall.
“Feeling alright?”
“They feared me for good reason, Colt,” she said. “They thought nothing could ever break me.”
“They were right.”
“They were right. For now,” she added under her breath. She waited for Colt’s snores to join Rina’s before dropping to a knee. She tore off her helmet and ran a hand through her sweat-soaked forehead and tangled hair.
The Rose mocked her as it twisted and destroyed her body.
She … she needed to fight something.
She marched southward, marking her location every few steps. Shadows loomed and whispers grew louder. The Rose flashed in her mind, and she struck out, finding the empty fog. Zanzaians! Pursuers! Show yourself!
No one came.
Colt had called her a warrior. What a laugh. She wanted to kill. She yearned for the heat, the thrill, the danger. Let them remember the brute – The Highland Tower. The one Colt had merely tamed.
She had to find someone. She had to kill. The Bite Back Rose would die with every kill. Let her destroy something tangible. Let her destroy her problems. It made things easier. It fixed things. It always did. It would with the Rose, too.
But again, no one came.
Why did the enemy evade her? To watch her suffer? To mock her?
When Sellen returned to camp, the Tower crumbled.
#
The wind clashed in from both sides, kicking the waves so high that their legs plunged almost knee deep into the water. For Sellen, it reached only as high as her shins. They had spent days of tiring, mindless travel.
“Come on, up you get.” She grabbed Rina by her arm and draped her over her shoulder. Rina blushed red in shame.
“Stop it. I can walk by myself,” Rina said. Sellen held her tight until she stopped squirming and resisting. “I’m your princess. I’m an adult. You can’t do this.”
“Relax, Rina.” Sellen patted Rina’s arm to calm her. “Count yourself lucky you still have someone around that can do this for you.”
Rina leaned forward and loosely wrapped her arms around Sellen’s neck. The sky gloomed just as impenetrable as yesterday, and the wind seared twice as cold. “Is everything alright, Sellen?”
“All is okay. Just thinking.”
“Of what?”
“Of life and death, blood and steel, skin and bone.”
“There’s something else, right?”
“Nothing.”
A shrill, inhuman laugh split through the murky fog. Rina leaped off Sellen’s shoulder and whipped up her bow, pressing her back into Sellen’s own and aiming into the fog. Sellen found one hand around her sword and the other around Rina’s forearm, which she used to push her to Colt.
“I can fight, Sellen. I can fight.”
“Make her shut up, Colt.” Hallan, too, once preferred the bow. She died with it clutched to her chest. What a gaffe, a child dying to protect her mother.
“I can fight with you, Sellen. I can help. Please—” Colt found her mouth and pulled her into his hold. Another cackle rattled the air and Sellen shifted her posture, poised to strike. The fog shadows twisted and jumped about.
Come. Fight. The Bite Back Rose burned.
A cretch – wiry hair, hunched back, less than half a metre tall, with clawed hands and feet, and a maniacal pair of eyes, jumped out from the shadows. Two more followed, mouths frothing. They had a bony, rattling laugh, as high as the kookaburra’s call, and rot coloured their chipped nails. Despite their height and the water that reached to their chest, Sellen knew well the terror of the cretches.
She met the first one at its neck, cleaving it in two as the others bounded around her and lunged for Rina and Colt. The pain in her hip exploded as she rammed a shoulder into the second and sent it flying, breaking its ribs. But as she did, the remaining cretch tore its claws deep into Colt’s thigh.
Sellen bellowed. She let the sword drop as rage bolted through her. She pounded on the cretch, ripped it free of Colt, and punched a gauntleted hand into its snout, caving its face it.
The Bite Back Rose ravaged her mind. She wrenched the cretch up, hand around its neck, and found the one she had knocked aside.
She marched into the fog so that Rina couldn’t see her and slammed their heads together.
“Do you see, Rose,” Sellen said to the curling mist. “I can protect her. I’m not a failure, right?” The pain lingered. She dropped the bloody pulps into the water. Why give her a sword if the only threat gouged her out from within? “Why me?”
She returned to find Rina pressing her palms to Colt’s wound in an effort to stem the bleeding. Blood circled the water around them. His cheeks paled like the fog.
“Sellen,” he murmured. Sellen ripped off the bag Colt kept by his side and found the rolls of bandages tucked inside. “Sorry.”
“Shut up, old geezer.”
“Don’t think I’ll be able to make that balm for you.”
“I said shut up.” She tightened the bandage around the wound.
“You saw those nails. It’s infected. If it’s not blood loss, it’s infection.”
“I thought I told you to shut up.”
“Can you take your helmet off? For just a moment?”
Sellen cursed and plucked the iron off. Rina began to sob besides them.
“I’ll hold for a bit, Sellen, but I’m just dead weight. I always have been, compared to you. You’re powerful, magnificent. All I’ve done is dangle a carrot ahead of you. See Rina to Tamria, please don’t abandon her here.”
“I never would.”
“Even without someone to pay you?”
“I never cared for the money.”
“You’re a greater warrior than I thought.”
“You’re wrong.” Finally, she began to cry. “I don’t fight for you or Rina. I never have. I fight because I love to fight. If I can’t fight, then what’s the point? I’m nothing without it. If I can’t rip something in two, I’m useless. There’s nothing noble or honourable about it. I’m just a mindless lump of muscle and metal. A brute.”
“The thing. How is it?”
“It hurts. I’m afraid, Colt. I really am. I really did end up as something useless and pathetic, didn’t I?”
“The Godborn exist for a reason.”
“I’m not a blasted Godborn!”
“All people exist for a reason, then.”
“I failed my reason, Colt, and I’ll fail it again.” She managed a few calming breaths. Just like the swaying cedar. “Come on, we’ll see what we can make of it.” She lifted Colt and cradled him in her arms, grunting up to her feet and continuing north. Rina followed Sellen as Colt drifted to a nauseated sleep.
The tide receded as they camped for the night. Out in the fog, while Rina watched Colt, Sellen risked inspecting the Bite Back Rose. Red-orange petals stemmed out from her hip and torso, leaving bloodless holes that peered into her innards where the bulbs should be. The petals curled out down to her knee, to her crotch, and up her ribs, growing smaller along the far reaches. It had grown faster than she could have expected.
Armour refitted, she returned to camp.
“I need to sleep,” she told Rina. “Four hours. Wake me up then.” She fell into a doze, praying to the Heavens hidden behind Concordia that the Rose wouldn’t claim her in her sleep.
#
Dread struck Sellen the moment she woke. Not out of urgency, but the satisfaction in Rina’s voice. She pounced on Sellen’s plated armour to shake her awake.
“I did it, Sellen. I protected you,”
Sellen sat bolt upright. “You did what?” she looked from Rina’s grin to the bow she kept by her side. “Rina. What have you done?”
“I just wanted to protect you and Colt.” Rina’s expression dropped.
“You should have woken me up.” A dead Zanzaian lay half submerged in the fog. “Why, Rina? Why?”
“I want to fight by your side. I can do it, Sellen. I could have protected Colt if you let me.”
“You would have gotten in my way.”
“I can fight with you, Sellen. I don’t miss.”
“You’re not meant to fight. You need to get to Tamria. My purpose is to get you there. I’m meant to fight. Not you.” Grunts and winces weaved through Sellen’s speech. She could feel the Rose gnaw into her brain. She had a day left at most.
“Letting others get their hands dirty was my mother’s job.” Rina let the bow drop by her feet. “I just wanted to help. I wanted you to rest well. I wanted to make you proud.”
“Killing isn’t something to be proud of.” Oh, look at her. What a hypocrite. “It’s just something that must be done.” Sellen looked to the horizon and found the sun slotted in the crack between earth and Concordia. “I thought I said four hours.”
“You needed your rest.”
Sellen sighed. “So did you. Is Colt awake?”
“He’s not doing well. I’m not sure what to do. I’m scared, Sellen.”
Sellen hoisted Colt up and draped him over her shoulder. “We continue north.”
She thanked her helmet for hiding the pain that pronounced itself with every step. How much longer could she manage it? Who would die first, her or Colt?
She learned the answer that night when she set Colt down and found him dead. Rina burst alight with tears and howls. Sellen didn’t know what to make of it. She said a silent prayer to the Heavens hidden behind Concordia, wherever they were. She always knew Colt to be the one man who kept straight with her in a world of people who lied and hoodwinked.
“I’m sorry, Rina.” The size of her hand easily cupped Rina’s shoulder. Rina’s safety depended on her now. A searing surge of pain from the Rose accompanied the thought.
“Why does everyone leave me?” Rina managed through sobs. “They all leave. And keep secrets. All the time. Then they go and die. Princess this. Princess that. I don’t care. Do as Colt says. Follow Sellen. Never take risks. Never learn secrets.”
“Rina …”
“Shut up.” She twisted herself free of Sellen’s hand. “I know the truth. The Highland Tower. Ruthless bandit. The woman who torched fields and sparked terror through the land. How much did Colt pay you to pretend to care? Do you really care about me?”
“Hallan, I …”
“Hallan? Who the foggy hell is Hallan?” Despite the size difference, Sellen felt so small under the weight of Rina’s tear-stripped fury. “She’s your dead daughter, wasn’t she? I overheard Colt way back.”
“I’m sorry, Rina.”
“You thought I was your dead daughter, didn’t you? All this—” she waved her hand about “—your oaths, your promises, it was for your blasted daughter. Not me. You don’t care about me. And now I’m out here. Alone. Stuck in the middle of the Strand.”
“Of course I care about you, Rina.”
“Well I’m not your blasted daughter. I’m not some hopeless girl. I can fight and defend myself. It’s my duty as both human and princess to fight with you.”
Light twinkled. Behind. Sellen swept out, caught Rina by the chest, and lifted her into the air. A crossbow bolt found Sellen’s forearm, right where Rina had stood a moment ago. Sellen dropped Rina, wrenched up her sword, and swung into the fog, finding no one.
With the fog circling around her, she found herself back in that moment a few nights ago, with the figures looming in the shadow. Distant laughs sounded and the Bite Back Rose’s pain beat in her skin. Her sword hungered. She hungered. Another bolt found her shin plate and tinkled off, followed by an arrow that whizzed out from behind her, finding a figure wreathed in the fog.
Rina fitted another arrow to her bow.
“I told you, Sellen. I can fight with you. You don’t have to do it alone.” A red-and-blue uniform burst out from the fog; spear tip pointed at Rina. Sellen found his head and ripped through it. Another bolt landed, another arrow swished, and another Zanzaian soldier cried out.
Sellen laughed at it all. The Bite Back Rose hurt, from her feet to her skull, but she basked in that thrill. The fight! The all-out brawl! Of dancing shadows, thumping hearts, heavy breath, and pain that makes you want to keep on pushing.
When the last Zanzaian fell, Sellen dropped to her knees. Chips criss-crossed her armour and her hands bled. Rina let out a whoop and punched the air.
“Did you see that, Sellen? I did it. I did it. Are you proud, Sellen? Sellen?” Footsteps pattered close to Sellen, and gentle hands cupped her knotted palm. “Sellen? Are you okay?”
“I’m alright, Rina.” She pulled off her helmet. “I’m sorry for keeping it a secret.” Sellen studied her reflection in the water below. Petals consumed up to her ear and trailed down her neck. “But I am proud of you, Rina. I always have been.” She let slip a grunt and jammed the sword into the ground to hold herself steady.
“Sellen …”
“I’m sorry, Rina. I’m just like everyone else. I’m going to die on you.”
“Sellen. No. Please don’t die.”
“Colt predicted a week. It has been a week. I’m gone soon. I can’t escape the Rose.”
Rina had to jump to hug her neck. “You’re a warrior, Sellen. You can’t—”
“I’m not a warrior. Warriors are proud creatures.”
“You’re a warrior to me.”
“There’s a difference, Rina. A warrior dies for their cause. A brute just loves the thrill and exhaustion. Godborn be damned. I’m just a freak.” She grunted to her feet, hoisted Rina up onto her back, and stepped northward. “I’ll get you there, Rina. Rose be damned.”
Sellen fixed Rina into a piggyback.
“You could have lived a life of comfort on the side of the revolution, Sellen. What did you gain by protecting me?”
“Do you remember when we first met, Rina? Summer. By the lake with the lily pads and the dragonflies. So hot I wanted to rip my armour off. But I kept it on. Colt hired me to protect you, and he promised to keep me out of prison if I obeyed. He kept me in line with the promise of coin and freedom. But he never had to do that. That day, you convinced me to take my armour off. You should have seen your face when you realised just how tall I was. You climbed me like I was some sort of great oak. How I miss those days. You reminded me of my daughter.
“I committed a mother’s most grievous sin – having her child die in her stead. Her death awoke something in me, and I gained satisfaction not in vengeance, but in violence. I care for you, Rina, more than anyone, but I loved you the most because you gave me a reason to fight. I had to fight to protect you, and I could not stand failing you like I had failed Hallan. I’m sorry, Rina. But I really am heartless. It’s all ego.”
“Please don’t die, Sellen.” Rina rested her cheek against the petals that crawled along Sellen’s own.
“Rina, I will die. There is no fleeing it.” As she said it, it felt as though a great weight lifted from her shoulders. “The question now is whether I’ll die as the woman who failed Hallan, or the person that protected you. Get to the Tamrian outpost. The Tamrian scouts are waiting for you.”
Kilometres upon kilometres of the Strand stood before Sellen. Did the Rose not know how much she adored toeing the line between life and death? How pain and exhaustion only invigorated her?
#
On mainland at last, Concordia had rotated enough to allow for a beautiful morning. Sellen set Rina down and allowed herself a moment to catch her breath. Pansies coated the ground from Strand to distant hill.
“Go, Rina.”
“Not yet.”
Sellen sighed and unclasped her chest piece, revealing a body of flowers that twisted out from the skin. She hardly looked human anymore. A rose consumed her left eye entirely, and petals curled out in place of her hair.
“Now that I think about it, Colt was right. I am a Godborn. I’ve wrestled bears, I’ve gone seventeen days without sleeping, and I just carried you three days straight. They say Godborn are made for a reason and die for that reason.” She slid out of her breeches and faced south; more plant than woman. Exotic and strange.
“But they are wrong,” she said. “For I die on my own terms now. In battle.” Below, squadrons and Zanzaians emerged from the Strand’s fog, heralded by war horns and the marching rhythm. “Go, Rina. Reach the outpost.”
“I can fight with you, Sellen. Please, let me stay.”
“Go. You did me proud, Rina, and I treasured my time with you. Let me die knowing I didn’t fail you. They won’t step past this point.”
“But—”
Sellen shut her up by taking her into a powerful, bone crushing hug. When she let Rina down, Rina said no more and continued north.
Sellen contemplated her sword. She breathed like the cedar and let her emotions flee. She assessed the army with neither bloodlust nor fear. The wind ruffled the pansies, and the rare morning light soothed her skin.
She thought of Rina, so like Hallan, yet so different, who would probably tell the Tamrian royal army of her heroics. Of Sellen’s noble, warriorlike spirit.
Maybe Rina was right.
END