• “Listen! Take your brother and run as fast as you can! Get out of here!” A cold armored boot pressed itself against the struggling man's face, pinning it to the earth as he lay there helpless. He tried to clamber to his feet weakly, but each time he tried more pressure was applied to his head. His body was bloodied, beaten, and tired, and he had given up all hope for himself. Glancing over through carmine tears at the body of his wife, which had been tossed aside like child's unwanted doll, he knew his fate was sealed and returned his glance to his children. Reaching out to them with one trembling, defeated hand, he cried out with what little strength he fought to retain.
    “GO!”
    The distant, emotionless face of the soldier standing above him broke out in a snarl and the boot was lifted--
    “Silence you filthy dog!”--and brought right back down on the dying man's head with crushing force, sending a spout of red bursting from between victim's lips and inducing an audible crack in his skull, a few loose teeth scuttling away from the mess like dice. The seven-year-old girl stood frozen, cradling her baby brother close to her chest, locked in a terrified stare into the glazed eyes of her father, from which the life slowly crept. The soldier turned his gaze to the girl, still set in her place by sheer terror and unbelief at the tragedy unfolding in front of her. She shut her eyes tightly, hoping to wake from the nightmare as if it would disappear if she could not see it. Slow, heavy steps crossed the dirt before her.
    “I'm not going to hurt you, just hand your brother to me...” Her eyes reopened uneasily at her family's attacker, vision distorted by a film of tears. “The General absolutely loves little girls... Maybe you could even come back with us to the continent and be a princess, how does that sound? Just give me your brother and all your dreams of grandeur could be realized.” The words rolled from his silver tongue and lips like honey. A few stray tears streamed down her cheeks, arms tightening around the infant. Placing the small boy at her heels, she looked down at the charred ground beneath her feet and the tears pooled there. With sudden, intense ferocity unlike she had ever displayed, the girl's broken and tired eyes shot back up to meet the soldier's, the innocence had left them, now empty like marbles.
    “Stay away from my little brother, you b*****d!” She rushed the invader, flailing at him like a wild animal, the unexpected shock of the impact knocking him from his feet to the dirt. She screamed and cried frantically, beating at him until her hands were red with her own blood.
    “You killed them! You killed them all! He's all I have left and you won't take him away from me!”Without second thought she reached for the soldier's waist, retrieving his weapon and holding it high above her head. It was spotless, pristine, and glinted in the sunlight like an idol to some foreign god. The soldier was frozen, partly from the shock of the girl's sudden revolt, and partly from his own inability to stop her. His eyes caught the light that caressed his own blade, and they danced with fear he'd never before felt.
    “LEAVE MY BROTHER ALONE!”
    The sword came down with her hands, blade first, the steel sliding like a snake between the metal grates of the soldier's helmet and into his forehead, cleaving it in two effortlessly like butter. Blood sprayed up at the girl in crimson spurts, showering her in a light red mist. She ripped it out in one heavy, forceful jerk, splitting his head the rest of the way. Fragments of his skull clattered on the ground as glass amidst the pinkish-gray color of what it used to protect. The limp, lifeless body put up no fight. She turned her attention to her left, more soldiers were rushing toward their fallen comrade, less trusting than he, blades raised offensively at their sides. These same blades had ruined her village, killed her people, and destroyed her home.
    She took the borrowed brand with her, its master's blood draining down the cool steel, crawling off of the body and sweeping her brother up underneath her arm in one fluid motion then running for the village gate with everything she had left in her. The invaders from the continent with their heavy armor and weaponry couldn't keep up with her and she narrowly slipped out of their sight, taking refuge high in a tree. Her eyes watched them run below like madly hungry dogs chasing after a rabbit or a fox. They passed by the girl and her brother, not ten feet beneath their targets, without so much as a glance upward as they tore down the road. She waited for a long while for the attackers to return, but they never did. It was daybreak the next morning before she felt safe enough to climb down from the arms of her natural savior.
    The weak and world-weary body of the young girl fumbled back into the village she had known her entire life. It was in ruin, bodies littering the streets like trash. Homes and places of business were knocked over and demolished. She passed the carnage by and her knees met the earth as she fell to them beside the limp forms of her parents, weeping into her bloody, filthy palms. All she wanted was to go back to her home, her safe haven in her peaceful world with her loving family, but she knew she couldn't. They'd taken everything. Home, safety, these words no longer existed for her. She heard a soft gurgling noise and shifted toward her baby brother, who sat wide eyed and oblivious on the ground, a couple of fingers in his mouth as he drew in the dirt with the other hand. He was too young to understand. A little smile parted her face as twin tears rolled from the corners of her eyes. It was just her and her brother now, two against the world.