"So you found Bast?"
A man asked George outside his home as he was holding a bag of feed he'd bought.
George gave a strained and forced smile. "Yeah, got her at home now."
The questioning man nodded. "Good to hear she's safe, even if she scared the life out of us all. What a disobedient daughter you have huh? Should marry her off quick, should fix her."
The man turned and walked away, not noticing how George flinched at his words.
George's hands shook as he tried to open the door, finally managing to go inside his own house.
'How can I face my own daughter now Zemata? This is my fault... I should've left, taken Bast and run from that madman and his father.'
Will and resolve shine in his eyes as he looked up.
'You'll never forgive me for letting this happen... I'm sorry my desert flower. I can't make this right... but I can do what I should have done the second that arrogant boy pressured me to agree.'
George began getting a saddle ready with a bag of feed off both sides, and gathering some supplies and food together.
He came to a chest under his bed, and opened it.
A spear of northern wood with the fang of a desert magical creature as the tip, made by Zemata for him when they'd married as a gift custom to her tribe.
And beside it a bow he'd made as part of that same custom that he gave when he asked her to marry him.
The bow was made from the horns of the same magical creature, treated in a special way unique to the desert tribes he'd learned, and with northern techniques used for the string and fletching as well as its arrows, with the string and wrappings being from the north.
The arrows were made from the bones of a bird-creature, making them lighter than should be due to their hollow nature.
The quiver had the long bow bound to it by a strap, like a belt buckle fastening the bow to the quiver.
He picked it up and put it on, lifting the spear as well to put into the loop on his back after putting on his old gear and the weapon harness with knives and daggers attaches to it as well.
He went out back to his horse, the colt of his old horse he'd ridden during his time as a mercenary.
"Okay, time to do what your daddy did."
He put the saddle on and went inside.
He went into Bast's room... and she sat right where he'd left her.
In the center of her bed, wrapped within many blankets after he'd dressed her, catatonic seeming in her lack of reaction to the world.
He slowly picked her up.
He walked out, and sat her on the horse, jumping into the saddle behind her so she was held between his arms holding the reins as he set out in the early morning dawn.
They left, attracting a few strange glances and looks as they did so, but nobody stopped them or asked what was going on.
They left the gates, and George headed forward.
'We couldn't move fast, and once that rapist piece of shit finds out we've run him and his father's men will come after us.'
They had to go somewhere they wouldn't follow.
He headed to the mountain.
~ ~ ~
The horse moved uphill, and against the evening light George saw a bright flare of light on a distant lower peak.
"What the hell? As if the risk of orcs and trolls weren't enough..."
He kept pushing down the trails, bow across Bast's lap as he had her back against his chest, easily reachable to defend themselves, though if more than one threat appeared they were likely screwed.
Hours passed as that distant light was long gone, and he circled around away from it as he guessed the Fallen would go there to seek whatever caused it.
"Swish!" A small sound tore though the air...
And he didn't even react as an arrow landed in his shoulder.
He looked down at the black shaft sticking out, with thorn-like protrusions along it, and then the burning hit.
He ground his teeth together as he pushed past the shock and pain, grabbing his own bow and turning the horse with his knees to cover Bast with his own body from the angle he'd been shot from.
He was rusty from lack of practice, but his draw was still smooth as he pulled an arrow back, the feathering tickling his cheek as he breathed, and then...
Released.
The arrow flew into the darkness, and the orc who once again stood up from his cover to take another shot, only to have George's arrow bury itself in its chest.
It fell back, and George kept going, knowing he couldn't pull the arrow out yet seeing as the barbs along the shaft would tear out his flesh as he pulled it out and make it much worse.
He needed a campfire to heat a knife to cauterize it as he cut the arrow out, but he couldn't do that and incapacitate himself with Bast defenseless!
A rustle in the leaves, and he turned to see 3 green orcs walk out of the underbrush to freeze at the sight of the two on their horse.
"..."
George immediately spurred to horse to run!
The orcs belatedly reacted, one running after with a hatchet while another took out a bow, the third taking growling out a signal before running after with a crude broadsword.
"Need to get away, need to get away, need to get away!"
Pain through his back as an arrow went between his ribs... right into his right lung.
He heaved a few faltering breaths as he pushed forward, and then...
Coughed out blood all over his daughter before him.
Bast sat, unreacting, as blood flew into her hair and over the top of her head.
'Can't... stop... need to... escape...'
His vision began to pulse red and black, splotches of darkness beginning to grow across his field of view.
'I can't hear anything.'
'I can't feel anything. Is Bast still there? Am I still riding? What's happening now...'
He slowly tipped... and fell off, taking Bast with him, as his last act was to instinctively curl his arms around her to protect her as he fell.
He breathed his last, facing his daughter.
Slowly a spark of light glimmered in the depths of Bast's eyes.
"Dad?"
She slowly reached out to touch his face, grizzled hairs brushing against her hand.
"Dad? Hey... dad. Dad. Hey. Wake up."
She began to shake him, denial blocking realization until his head fell limply away.
"...no. No. No. No. No. No. Nononononononono."
"Crack."
Her head slowly turned with despair...
To face the green orcs coming out from behind her, leering with grins as their tusks gleamed in the moonlight through the trees.
Fear, the same as the night before, of being helpless and a victim sent her gibbering and crying.
The orcs came closer, and one even began to lift his loincloth.
'No. Not again. Never again!'
"I'd rather die fighting bandits." It was so easy to say within that relative safety she'd felt...
What was worse? She'd already suffered through this from Jonathan, surely just letting them do what they want wouldn't be so bad. She could find a way to escape later...
Or she could die now.
But why bother. She wouldn't die protecting her dignity. Jonathan already stole it.
An orc reached for her, the clawed green hand coming closer...
~ ~ ~
"We are woman of the Nesphirii. We fight, and survive. Northerners claim that a woman should only sleep with one man her entire life, be subservient, but we do not believe this."
A smaller Bast, maybe 4 years old stared at her mother.
"Really?"
Her mother smiled, a dusky and gentle sun.
"No. I have slept with other men, but it doesn't make me lesser than other women. I am a warrior, I fight, I love, I cry. I have been attacked and beaten and met death, but I always fought to the end."
Her mother lay a hand on Bast's head. "The northern ideas of honor and purity are hollow. True honor is found with yourself. You will always be pure as long as you fight for yourself."
Bast processed this for awhile. "Mommy?"
"Yes dearest?"
"What do you mean by sleeping with men?"
Her mother laughed, a full throated chuckle.
"It does not matter. Just promise me you'll fight."
"Always fight."