With the Roc's Divine Protection--End
By Natasha Weber
It was time. Clarice and her army of humans, Trolls, Elves, and goblins, kraats, and all manner of creatures of Dru were battle-ready. They stood miles from the Ant Goddess' temple before thousands upon thousands of charging Night Beasts. Their duty was to distract the Wicked Goddess while the Roc got the jump on her.
At the front of the army were Clarice, Nana, Jonathan, and Asha. Clarice was happy. Ironically and strangely more happy than any other time in her life. She had found her purpose; she had found friends she loved. And the Roc would always remember her. She had her immortalization that she always craved.
Her friends were happy as well. They had all come far and had gotten what they wanted.
The first Night Beast charged right at Clarice and she sliced it in half easily. It squealed and burst into smoke.
The rest of the Night Beasts clashed with the army and Clarice could hear swords swiping and screams as her army grappled with the dozens upon dozens of Night Beasts. Archers who were at the back of the army perched on a hill launched arrows at the oncoming beasts and slaughtered dozens of them.
Clarice couldn't help but constantly check on her three friends.
Asha was doing extremely well. The gift of wellness and life from the Roc empowered her. She wasn't breaking a sweat as she sliced the heads of three of the beasts and then tackled a different one that almost killed Jonathan.
Nana was struggling. She was being beset by five of the beasts to Clarice's left; she was being pinned down by their sharp claws. Clarice stabbed two of them and Nana was able to free herself from the two that were pinning her down, slicing them in half easily.
Others of her army were getting killed quickly, and Clarice simply couldn't save them all. It brought tears to her eyes.
***
The Wicked Goddess was in her gigantic temple. It had no roof. It was really just a patch of rectangular stony ground with four pillars at each corner of the rectangle. She kept summoning her Night Beasts. It took much of her concentration. She was moving her ant legs in the most odd fashions; she needed to in order to summon her beasts.
But, out of nowhere, the Roc cawed ferociously and swooped down upon the Goddess from above. The Roc grabbed her body with his talons and he tackled her--pecking her ferociously. He had the upperhand.
***
Clarice and her army were holding their own, but they were simply getting overrun. There were just too many night beasts. She and her other three friends were still alive, but their army was dwindling.
There was screaming in Clarice's large troll ears. She was sweating with exertion. She looked to her side and, in horror, she saw Jonathan being dragged into the enemy army. Immediately, tears sprang to her eyes. She dashed after Jonathan, as did Asha who had noticed as well. They dispatched the monsters who had dragged him away to reveal his lifeless body.
***
The Roc snapped at one of the ant's legs and it was severed. The Goddess screeched in pain and grabbed the Roc with her remaining legs. She took a bite out of his wing as she held him there between her legs. The Roc tried to fly away from her, but was caged within her legs.
***
Asha was in tears as was Clarice.
Asha was being reckless. She launched herself into the midst of a crowd with ten Night Beasts and managed to kill them all. Clarice joined her, making sure she wouldn't get killed. All the while, Clarice was keeping an eye on Nana, who was also crying from Jonathan's death.
Nana was trembling in fear from seeing Jonathan get dragged away. She was having trouble concentrating. Her movements were slow and sluggish.
A Night Beast seized Nana's thin bird leg and bit down on it. Clarice was dashing to her friend's side in a second, but a crowd of Night Beasts had already swarmed her bird friend as she collapsed to the ground.
It was just Clarice and Asha now.
***
The Roc managed to wrestle free from the Goddess' legs and take flight again. His wing was damaged, and he had trouble keeping aloft. He had to end the fight soon. He looked in the distance. Due to his distracting the Goddess, she couldn't be summoning Night Beasts. Clarice's army was fast approaching. They could help him if need be.
***
It was a miracle. The Night Beasts were dwindling. There looked to be only one-hundred left. Clarice's army was also dwindling, but her army far outnumbered the Night Beasts.
She and Asha still lived; and Clarice had to fight through her emotions about the death of her friends as well as the Night Beasts. Asha was angry and fighting better than Clarice was; her anger fueled her abilities. Asha loved her friends deeply, just as Clarice did, but her emotions were dragging her down. She couldn't get their lifeless forms out of her mind.
Luckily, she survived the battle as Asha decapitated the final Night Beast.
Clarice looked to the distance and could see the Roc fighting with the Ant Goddess. Clarice was exhausted, physically and emotionally. Weakly, she began moving towards the Roc. She didn't need to say a word to her army. They followed her of their own volition. That's how inspiring they thought she was.
***
The Roc and the Ant Goddess were evenly matched. The Roc's feather were now dirty and ragged from the fight, and he was bleeding all over. The Goddess was much the same. The Roc had grabbed the Goddess with his feet and lifted her out of her temple--he attempted to drop her from a high height, but she screeched and cut him with her sharp legs and he dropped her. It was from a high enough height to hurt her, but not enough to kill her. He dropped her in the mud, and he swooped down and clawed at the Goddess' eyes. She seized him with her legs and rolled him into the mud with her.
She had him pinned down.
Suddenly, an arrow nocked against Goddess. A bowman in Clarice's army had fired it. Clarice herself stood before the Goddess with what was left of her army in tow.
The Goddess looked panicked. She knew she was in trouble. She shrieked and released the Roc. She had to take care of the mortals first.
She sped towards them on her gigantic Ant legs; a terrifying black mass who instilled fear into the army facing her.
They shrieked in fear, but Clarice said, "it's alright! don't run! This Goddess is nothing but a coward and a bully! We can take her down!"
Clarice's army stood their ground. The Ant Goddess trampled many of the army right off. She grabbed others of the mortals in her legs and ate them.
Clarice was fearless. She swung her sword deftly at one of the Goddess' legs and the Goddess focused on her. She said in a shrieking whisper, "so this is the mortal who has rallied the creatures of Dru back to the Roc... If I can no longer have this world, then I will have your life!"
She seized Clarice and was going to eat her, but the Roc was back in the air and he tackled the Goddess, pecking at her ferociously--tearing at her black body. She dropped Clarice.
The Goddess was enraged. She knew she had lost. It was now her goal to kill Clarice. She pushed the Roc off of her and turned to Clarice.
Clarice stood her ground as the Goddess charged her.
Clarice artfully moved out of the way before the Goddess could trample or seize her. She was a distraction at this point. She kept dodging the Goddess' slow movements. Her army joined in; her archers were still nocking arrows, her foot soldiers were slicing the Goddess' legs.
The Goddess shrieked again in annoyance. The Roc was coming for her.
Clarice was getting tired, however. The fatigue of battle was enclosing on her.
But, all was well. The Roc engaged the Goddess again and had her full attention. Along with the mortals doing shreds of damage, she was done for.
They whittled her down slowly over the course of ten minutes. The Roc was tearing at the Goddess and ripping up her skin.
Eventually, the Goddess collapsed from all the damage done to her by mortals and Roc alike.
Asha and Clarice stood by one another with tears in their eyes.
Asha asked, "have we won?"
Clarice breathed out a relieved sigh. The Goddess' reign of terror seemed to be over.
Asha was crying uncontrollably, both with joy and sadness. "Now all the dead can stop crying and rest in peace."
The Roc was damaged badly. He was bleeding from little cuts all over his body and was covered in mud in dirt. But he stood up and cawed mightily.
With his cawing, the sun rose high in the sky and the eternal night was replaced with a pristine blue sky.
Clarice clapped a hand to her mouth with joy. "Oh my...!"
It had been so many years since the sun had shone. It was enough to make Clarice and Asha fall to their knees with joy and amazement with the rest of their army.
"It's so bright!"
"I haven't been able to see your face so clearly in forever!"
"Look at the gravel! I've never been so happy to see gravel so clearly!"
"The sky is so blue!"
"Look at the ivory clouds!"
The Roc then shifted into his human form and looked up at the sky himself. He smiled.
***
The Goddess' body seemed to be festering with purple smoke as it gradually began dissolving. She was definitely dead, and hadn't moved for days.
The Roc had flown home to his mountain in Yab. He had asked Clarice to come with him. Clarice gingerly agreed.
Clarice climbed off of the Roc and looked at the blue sky with a happy sigh. "It's so beautiful!"
The Roc shifted into Connie and was silent. He just smiled and looked up at the sky with her.
"Clarice..." He said. "It's all thanks to you. Thank you so much. You lost your friends over this... I failed you..."
Clarice cried when she thought of Jonathan and Nana. Nana's family was being well taken care of by others in her village due to her participation in the war, but Clarice was having trouble moving past losing her friends. Asha was incredibly unhappy about losing Jonathan. And, she was very unhappy about losing Nana. She cried about both of them equally. Jonathan had no family left, and so, Asha spent much of her time with Nana's family, telling them about their brave older sister. They pretended not to get along with one another, but Clarice realized they loved each other very much.
"You'll remember all of them, too, won't you? You'll always have a special place for them, right?" Clarice asked, wiping tears out of her eyes.
Connie-Roc nodded. "Always..."
After a few moment of letting Clarice remember her friends fondly, Connie-Roc said, "don't you want your reward?"
Clarice looked away--blushing with a smile. "I--I suppose..."
Connie-Roc walked towards her and swept some of her yellow hair out of her face and then kissed her. Clarice was embarrassed and blessed at the same time. She got what she wanted. She had lost too much to get it, but here she was. She leaned her head on his shoulder just for a moment. She knew, no matter how long she lived, she would love no one else. It was a selfish wish to be loved only by a God, but that was all she wanted. No one else could compare.
Connie-Roc said to her, "I wish... I wish I could always be a human for you."
Clarice shook her head. "I don't want you to. I'll always love you. I'll love you no matter what you are, but I can't marry you. You would never have enough time for me anyway..."
Connie-Roc frowned and looked down. "I would... Like to have time for you. I would like to marry you. I like you..."
He ran a hand through her hair and Clarice blushed a little. Clarice put a hand on his shoulder. "I'll visit you often?"
Connie-Roc nodded. "I'd like that."
Connie-Roc frowned after a moment. "I'll always love you, too..."
Clarice smiled silently. There was an unspoken bond between them. There always would be. Clarice had been one of the few people in the world who had never lost faith in him. She always believed in him, and she always would.
The Roc, on the other hand, was her silent strength. Someone she had never met before recently, but someone who had always made her strong. That bond was unbreakable.
***
The Roc took Clarice home after a few days, and he went back to doing what he loved; helping the mortals of Dru with their many problems and issues, so long as none of their wishes were violent and they had a genuine need for his help.
Clarice did much of the same. She worked to feed the poor in the Yab village in which she resided and helped any who genuinely needed her. She mended fences and took care of the sick all in the Roc's name.
After a month passed, the Roc became lonely and wanted her company. He picked her up and flew her back to his mountain.
They talked together until sunset, and then something happened that neither of them could have guessed.
The Goddess' body was dissolving, but just as the last bit of it did, the Roc suddenly felt it. He was going to be caged. He turned to Clarice. "She set up a spell on her defeat by me... She is going to cage me in an egg made of iron!"
Clarice shook her head, "what?"
Connie-Roc kissed her forehead one last time and said, "I will be uncaged thousands of years from now, and the Goddess will return as well. But you will be gone by then..."
Clarice was in tears. "I don't understand! Don't go..."
The Roc held her in his arms for a moment, and then an egg of iron appeared around him, separating him from her for the rest of her lifetime.
***
The Roc was gone again, but Clarice was not alone like she had been through most of her life. She lived with her troll kindred under her bridge and had made many friends with them. She always had a friend in Asha, and she had friends she hadn't met around the world because of how she had awoken the Roc and saved the world from eternal night.
Clarice and Asha, for the most part, spent their lives doing good deeds in the Roc's name, and that is how the people of Dru came to worship him for eternity.
Clarice, Asha, and their friends who died in battle, Jonathan and Nana, would always be remembered through memorials and statues erected around the world. For their good deeds and for their faith in the Roc.
But things in history are jot always clear cut. As time went on and the story of the Roc became more and more distorted, groups of people emerged who worshipped the Ant Goddess as the one who had saved the world from the Roc's eternal reign of darkness. They called themselves Antheists.
As for Clarice, she had gotten what she always wanted and could ask for no more; a kiss from the person she loved most.
Comments (0)
See all