Later in the night, the flurries had turned into full-on thick, heavy flakes falling from the sky, and the winds howled outside the cabin. With boundless snow and wind ricocheting into the night sky and bouncing off the outer walls, it was practically a lullaby for Liesa who continued to snooze on the floor of her bedroom while the human knight was still snoring on his back in her bed. They didn't even hear the door was creaking open slowly to reveal Respen sneaking inside, the gleam of a butcher's knife shakily gripped in both hands.
Respen quietly and cautiously approached the bedside, though he could barely control his own trembling heaving breaths. As he believed the human knight laid sleeping soundly, Respen lifted his arms high above his head, the butcher's knife still in hand and its pointed tip aiming downward directly toward the knight's neck and chest. Hot sweat rolled down Respen's face and his teeth were gritting with uncontrollable fury. In the dark, his eyes lit up with pure malice, which was completely unlike him. He let out a short yet loud scream as he used all of his strength that his aging elderly body could possibly muster to strike the knife down.
But in that very moment, the human knight's eyes opened wide suddenly and he simultaneously grabbed Respen's wrists just as the butcher's knife was mere inches away from piercing him in the throat. The knight then squeezed so hard until he heard Respen's bones crack and he dropped the knife while letting out a shrilled shriek of pain. This was what awoke Liesa from her slumber, her head lifting up quickly from being buried in her own lap.
Just then, Respen tried to break free from the human knight's tight grasp. He struggled by jerking back and even trying to kick the knight in the torso, but the knight was too strong and swift for the elderly elf. It got to the extent that the human knight stepped off of the bed while continuing to wrestle Respen and he pinned the old elf to the ground, binding him in a headlock while sitting on top of him with Respen's stomach on the floor.
Then Respen said, "Ah, how are you possibly this lively?! I poisoned your food!"
"Yeah, and that was a dirty trick," the human knight stated, "But I reset myself as soon as I started feeling the symptoms."
"Reset yourself?" Liesa questioned as she stands up. That was when she glanced over at her bedspread and noticed a huge splotch of dried blood on it, which she deduced must have been his and realized what he meant with a gasp escaping her lips. But what really tipped her over the edge was the fact that Respen was so good at hiding that he was also effected by the spell that she'd learned about from Sillavana earlier up until now.
"Let me go! Please, let me go," Respen suddenly pleaded. "I can't breathe!"
Liesa became more worried than she had ever been before in her life. Her breaths turned shallow and she almost jumped into action to try and save Respen before realizing that she may not be able to overpower the human knight's strength by herself. She was still in a haze as to all that had happened earlier in the day, and she had little to no energy to fight back at this moment.
In a panic, she eventually shouted at the human knight, demanding that he'd let Respen go. "Please, Sir Knight, don't kill Respen! Get off of him, now!" He didn't listen to her. In fact, he tightened his grip and pushed further down on Respen's back like it was about to crack. "Sir Knight, please!" she begged again.
"It's Felix." The knight said as his eyes glanced up at her without moving the rest of his body.
Liesa's head tilted to one side out of confusion. "What?"
"My name is Felix, Felix Jalbagir. And I'd prefer it if you addressed me as such, not 'Sir Knight'. If you do that, I'll release him," he told her in a domineering tone despite the humble nature of his request.
A moment went by like a lag as Liesa was trying to process what was happening. Eventually, she gritted her teeth and clenched her fists even tighter as she said, "Please, Felix, let Respen go. He's one of my only family, so please! I can't lose him, Felix Jalbagir, I just can't!"
In that moment, upon hearing her pleas, the knight relaxed his biceps and released his hold on Respen's throat, stood up and backed a couple of feet away from the elderly male elf. Respen immediately gasped for air to fill his lungs again, his chest heaving and one hand clutching at his heart. He was on all fours on the floor, with Liesa and Felix standing by looking at him, waiting for him to recover. But when Liesa was about to lean over and check on her elderly caretaker as he appeared to have started crying, Respen pushed her away. Her back slammed against the wall behind her, and she had no time to recover as Respen had drawn a hidden knife from his back pocket and started coming at her.
In a split second, Liesa saw the same dark vengeful aura enveloping Respen as she had seen from the elven platoon earlier. Liesa's eyes went wide and a chill ran down her spine.
Overcome by a rage that was not his, he yelled at her, "You damn traitor, you dare side with the enemy?! You have failed us all!" That last remark really hit home as he prepared to strike the tip of his blade into Liesa's heart.
Everything went blank for a brief moment in Liesa's mind before a splatter of blood splashed onto her left cheek, and then she heard someone's throat gagging for air, but it was not her own. In fact, she didn't feel a knife impaled in her chest at all, but there was a massive pain tugging at her heart, like trying to rip it out of her chest, when she realized who had taken the blade for her.
Sillavana didn't resist her son. She just hugged him briefly, one last time, before his hypnotized state made him kick her off of him and she fell back into Liesa's lap.
Respen, still breathing through his teeth and his knife yearning to be used again, suddenly closed his eyes and lifted his free hand to his head as though he was trying to fight off the aura. Just then, Felix seized this opportunity to swat the new knife out of Respen's hand as it clanked on the floor, and then he used a tactical move he had learned in the military. He struck the side of his hand into a pressure point in the back of Respen's neck to make him lose consciousness, and he let the old elf fall sideways to the floor before rushing over to Liesa and Sillavana.
The knife was piercing her heart, blood gushed from the wound and she was coughing it up, too. Liesa squeezed her hand as tears welled up in her eyes and streamed down her face. Felix knelt down to Sillavana's side, seeing if he could determine how bad to injury was. Eventually, Liesa ripped off a piece of cloth from her skirt and pressed it down on the wound to try and stop the bleeding. Her survival instincts kicked in, and she was not about to say goodbye. She began rambling, "I… I'll stay here and apply enough pressure to get the bleeding to stop… Felix, there's a first aid kit in the kitchen!"
Felix tried to interrupt, "I don't think—"
"I need you to get the," Liesa ignored him and continued, "No wait, the knife is still lodged in her heart… We need to get her to a doctor! But she can't be moved, but maybe I can—"
"Hey!" Felix immediately grabbed Liesa by her shoulders and gripped them tight, quietly looking her straight in the eyes with a glare that said it all. There was nothing they could do to save her.
Liesa's lower lip quivered and her eyes watered up even more. She began to hiccup from the crying, and then she felt Sillavana's hand caress her face wiping a tear away. With her other hand, Sillavana placed something that felt cool and metallic into Liesa's hand. Despite her situation, the elderly female elf was smiling. She then tried to say something to the young winter elf, but she'd already lost her voice. Liesa leaned her ear in as close to Sillavana's mouth as she could get to hear what she was saying. Her voice sounded hoarse and croaked, very unlike her usual sweet loving tone. The message was ominous yet simple, "Find the others. End this war."
One final breath escaped her lips before she passed on. She didn't even have time to close her eyes, and thus the dark gray hue in her eyes had faded into something whiter.
Liesa slumped her back over so that her forehead was resting on Sillavana's torso, her skin was now as cold as clay. The young winter elf could no longer contain her misery, and she let it all out, her tears staining Sillavana's wool dress and aprons that were also now drenched in blood. Felix just stayed where he was and let Liesa grieve for a few minutes until the golden glint in Liesa's hand caught his eye in the candlelight.
After a while, he asked her, "Hey, I know you're probably not in the right state of mind right now, but I got to ask: what did she give you?"
Liesa turned her head to her left and looked at the amulet from earlier in her hand. She remembered how Sillavana looked regretful as she told her why there was a war in the first place. Going back further, she recalled how Sillavana had saved up enough money to buy her a new quiver when her old one had broken. Going back even further, she then remembered her fourth or fifth year living with Sillavana and Respen, playing in the snow with them when she was a little child.
Those memories were things she never wanted to forget, but she should have known that it also came with memories she'd want to forget. Having Sillavana there for her, the only true parental figure in her life who actually cared for and supported her, and she thought she would have moved out by the time her death came. Not this soon, not this brutal.
All of a sudden, Liesa's eyes narrowed into a determined stare, and while still crying, she decided to make good on Sillavana's dying wish. She lifted herself up off of Sillavana's fresh corpse, wiping her tears with her sleeve, and then stood up without a single word. After shoving the amulet into one of her belt pockets, she grabbed and lifted Sillavana's body by the armpits and began trying to haul her outside, dragging her legs across the floor and streaking blood in the process. Felix asked her what she was doing, to which she replied, "I need to give her a proper funeral."
"Then let me help you," Felix said as he sidestepped for a second once he started feeling lightheaded. Just then, his stomach growled again, having realized he had vomited up his poisoned dinner from earlier. Thanks a lot, Respen… He thought to himself.
"You still need to recover from earlier. I need to do this on my own," Liesa told him, "There's some elk jerky in the cupboards in the kitchen. You can help yourself to that."