Restart Again: Volume 2 by Adam Scott (hardest books to read txt) 📕

the hesitation passed, and her sword drove straight through his chest and emerged from his back, gleaming a dark red in the light of the flickering campfire.

I held out an arm to catch Val as she stormed forward to assist in the fight. I knew the last man would be dead before either of us could reach them, and there was no doubt in my mind that Lia could protect herself from a single thug. My concerns were focused on a different thought. That’s her first kill. The weight of the idea was heavy on my heart as I watched her move gracefully across the camp.

With a hard push from her shoulder she sent the man impaled on her sword stumbling back towards his partner. Using her smaller frame to her advantage, she approached the last combatant completely hidden behind the dead man on his feet. When the final man dodged out of the way of the toppling body, she was there to meet him with a rising slash. It cut through his leather cuirass with ease and splashed a gout of red from his hip to his opposite shoulder. He fell to his knees and screamed, but the sound was cut short as she skewered him through the center of his torso in one clean thrust.

“Take care of that one, would you?” I said quietly to Val as I nodded towards the man whimpering over his arm. “He’ll have more information about what we’re walking into than your scouts did. I’m sure he’ll tell you if you ask nicely.” I moved forward to cross the camp, but paused to call out over my shoulder. “His right arm is shattered from his elbow to his wrist. Do with that information what you will.”

Lia was panting heavily and staring out into the darkness beyond our camp when I approached. At the sound of my footsteps growing near she whirled around with her sword held at the ready. Her face was expressionless apart from her eyes, which darted around wildly in search of another opponent. The right side of her face was smeared with blood, as was a large section of her dark braided hair which curled over her shoulder.

I knew what she was feeling all too well, and stood patiently as I watched her come down from the battle trance. She scanned the camp over and over as her breathing began to slow. The impassive mask of her face broke all at once, and emotions flashed across it in rapid succession: anger, confusion, sadness, and finally, fear. Her shoulders fell as the strained muscles in her body relaxed, and her hands shook hard enough that she dropped her sword. Her mouth opened as she tried to speak, but nothing came out aside from a hoarse squeak.

“It’s okay, Lia,” I called out to her softly. I walked over to her and cupped her face in my hand, doing my best to wipe away a large splotch of blood with my thumb. “Come with me.” With one arm around her shoulders, I carefully led her to sit on a log next to the fire. I sat down next to her and took her hand in mine as I waited for her next reaction.

She stared into the fire in quiet contemplation for a few minutes, then turned abruptly to look at the two men she had killed. “Did I...kill them?” Her voice was flat aside from a small tremor of uncertainty.

I squeezed her hand as I followed her gaze to the two dead men. “Yes.”

“I don’t...I-I don’t remember...doing that.” Her eyes blinked rapidly as she stared over the scene before us. “I can’t remember.”

“You will. Your brain wasn’t focused on remembering, it was trying to make sure you stayed alive. When the adrenaline wears off, it’ll come back to you.” I turned and rested my forehead against the top of her head. And the shock will set in, too.

The night grew quiet around us as we sat together in silence. I could still hear the cries of the man with the broken arm somewhere off in the distance; Val had dragged him away from camp to spare us from the uncomfortable sound. The fire continued to crackle beside us, boiling away the stew that was to be our dinner. Apart from the smell of blood and the two dead bodies across from us, it was a beautiful evening.

I saw the moment of recognition clearly on Lia’s face when her mind finally caught up with the events of the night. Tears ran freely down her face, but her features revealed no emotion. “I didn’t want to do it.” Her voice was small and shaky as she spoke, nearly too weak to break the silence.

“I know.”

“He could have run away.” Her eyes were unfocused, and I knew she was watching the scene over and over again in her mind. “There was a moment before I...killed him. He didn’t have to die.”

“I saw. You gave him a chance.”

“So why didn’t he take it?!” She shouted suddenly, her voice cracking. “Why didn’t he run?” Twisting away from me, she reached down to grab a small rock by her foot and hurled it across the camp at the corpse. The projectile flew wide of its intended target and impacted into the dirt before bouncing away into the darkness. “WHY DIDN’T YOU JUST RUN?” She pounded the log beneath us with clenched fists and shook her head wildly, flinging teardrops out to sparkle briefly in the firelight.

I stayed motionless as she raged beside me. “He made his decision, Lia. You didn’t have a choice.”

She turned on me in a fury. “But I did have a choice! I could’ve run away, I could’ve wounded him so he couldn’t fight anymore, I could’ve done anything else, but I didn’t. I just KILLED him!” Her tears ran down through the dried blood on her cheek and drew red lines down the side of her face. “I didn’t...why did he...I just—” She scrunched up