"But before that, I will thank the brave warrior who put his life at risk to warn of this traitor's location."
Both me and Aurelius look confused, but then the beastkin holding down Daragh let him go and he comes over to Dáire.
Aurelius seeing this says, "Daragh, what's going on?"
"The tunnel we passed through on our way here releases orange dust when one makes lots of noise within it, and as our horses went through it the orange dust was released everywhere showing our pursuers that we had gone off the main path and had taken a shortcut. Any member of the village would be aware of this."
"You sold us out?"
With a disgusted expression, Daragh says, "Of course I did you human. No matter how I am treated I know not to make deals with the devil that could curse all my people."
Daragh walks away and as he does a man comes out from the mob of people throughout the forest, and says, "Good work my son, you have truly shown that it was worth raising you."
As his father rubs his head, he makes the brightest smile I have seen from him yet, and as he does, I grit my teeth and look at Aurelius while panicking.
Aurelius will be killed at this rate. It will be a long and incomparably horrible death that will make him suffer in the worst ways possible, and there is nothing I can do to stop it.
No that's not true. Setanta is without a doubt coming so all I have to do is delay them.
"Dáire you talk about protecting your people from humans, that I am a traitor because I didn't do just that. But it seems you're forgetting that just like me you allowed your wife to be slaughtered by a bunch of slaves."
He smacks me across the face right into the ground, and then he grabs me by the head saying, "I was thinking about leaving you till I broke the human, but I think it would be more scary for the human to see what we are going to do to it first, don't you agree?"
I spit in his face, and his rage becomes more visible than before.
Soon he pulls me with one arm as Aurelius is dragged by his men behind him and he takes us right in front of a large crowd of beastkin all gathering in one place.
Many of them are dressed in the clothes of commoners and are carrying a series of sharp objects from spears to knives, essentially anything they could have gotten a hold of.
In the middle of this giant crowd, he throws me, and then he jumps over to me and starts to say, "See here is a man once known for being a member of the red branch. He has built countless weapons to strike fear into the eyes of humans and to allow our greatest warriors to overcome their enemies.
Even our hero King Fergus, he forged his great sword which he later refined into a weapon that none could match. In the eyes of our people, he is nothing more than a hero who has staked his years for us. It is for this contribution that I sought to leave him alone all of these decades, but I can't no longer.
But he has been corrupted. Years before he met Fergus, he was a slave to a human, this human beat and trained him so much that in his mind, humans are a necessary part of his existence that he will never be able to break away from.
This caused him to make a great blunder that not only got his own, but even my wife killed. He had lost his title, his family, and his life due to this blunder, but even that punishment wasn't enough to remove the poison from his veins, even know he still wished for humans.
An utter tragedy that humans were able to pervert a man such as this. But take this as a lesson my people as to why we must be strong and stay on our path.
Do you know why all of us Tuatha Dé Dannan were spread all over the world far away from our homeland? It is because we held such kindness such compassion in our hearts that we would happily move all over the world to help all of the humans.
But due to that we were fractured and removed from the place where we lived, and our culture, the history of our people was nearly annihilated, while the history of the humans lives on.
Kindness isn't wrong, compassion isn't wrong. But we have given humans far too much and have weakened ourselves. So that is why we of the house of Laoch embrace our beastly nature to undo the medicine of compassion that has turned into a poison for our people.
We must strike the humans down, we must remind them of their place, and we must elevate each other to reach the greatest heights we could ever think of reaching, and for the beastkin, like Culainn who refuse to do such a thing, we can give them a death that will make the rest of those who watch immune from ever falling into that trap. Now my soldiers begin."
The crowd cheers, and soon a group of beastkin in red robes move around me. The beastkin are all venomous animals who one by one take turns striking me with their different concoctions.
Then when they finish beastkin with strong bodies inflect blow after blow onto my body, and when they finish beastkin with sharp appendages take their time cut into my body.
My body feels like it has already died a hundred times, and my mind cannot make sense of my surroundings, the only thing I can hear is the screams of the crowd, and the only thing I can see is Aurelius shining golden hair.
Right now, I feel like just letting them kill me since the only reason I have to experience such pain is my fault and no one else. I have had the option to change my life.
I didn't have to save humans, I didn't have to save Ciarán, I didn't have to live my life under a lie, and I definitely didn't have to let my legacy end with this.
I could be at home spending time with my wife and daughter unaffected by any of the world's plights. My wife would compliment even my most horrible creations and encourage me to keep going.
I would ramble on to her about all of my different ideas, and she would go out of her way to learn things she didn't care for just so we could have longer conversations.
My daughter would pine for our attention, and when she noticed her mother wasn't giving her enough she would move over to her to get some hugs.
She would tell us about her day, and about all of the fun she had with the other kids in the city while hiding her identity. Then at the end of the day, we would all return to my room where we slept as one big family.
My wife would place me on the bed, and my daughter would make some jokes about my condition to make me feel more normal, and then we would laugh at each other until sleep came to us all.
It would have been a simple life, and it would have been here for as long as the empire stood. I would use all I have for those that mattered most, it is what I should have spent all my life aiming towards.
As the beatings continue the fantasy grows ever so much more vivid, and I imagine a life spent with just the both of them for the rest of my life, a time where I would still be able to have drinks with Fergus, and butt heads with the rest of my peers. Where my title of Ollamh would still be intact, and I could demand respect where I went without fail.
But as I would move through those halls, I would stare out the windows, and see humans treated as slaves, and memories of my past would come back to me again and again.
And I would yet again, bring them into my shop, teach them all I know, find Ciarán on the battlefield and bring him into my home, and yet again forget to heal his heart and end up right back here.
Nothing would have changed, since I would have acted like the man my wife would have fallen in love with.
I guess I was destined to be here as long as I continued to be the man my wife loved. If that is the result of the single greatest decision in my life, then I have no regrets except my own ignorance.
I was happy to have started my shop, happy to have trained many young craftsmen, happy to have met Aurelius and Setanta, and happy to be on this journey.
As the pain from the beatings decreases, I wonder if my body has all but died, but soon I feel dripping on my face which causes me to compose myself, and looking upwards I see Aurelius is covering my body from the attacks of the beastkin.
I say, "What are you doing!"
As beastkin whacks away at him, he says, "I am a very simple guy. If someone comes to my aid when I am down, I remember that. During my life as a slave, I learned to remember those who have helped me so I can make sure to pay it back hundreds of times over to them, so I won't let you die Culainn. Because you have allowed me to leave behind countless beauties that I never imagined I could have."
As the beastkin keeps smacking him, I say, "Spirit energy?" as I notice that the aura has surrounded his body.
Smiling, he says, "Even if I die, the rest of Clan Anima will be able to know I actually did something with my life. I won't disappear into nothingness."
The beastkin becomes more vicious and I scream, "Let me go, and run away or I will bite off my own tongue."
As I put my tongue in my teeth, Aurelius says, "Go ahead, but I won't allow them to desecrate your body any more even if your soul leaves."
Crying, I say, "You fool."
They continue to attack him more and more and as they do his blood spills everywhere people cheer throughout the area and as they do Dáire says, "See this brutality. It is necessary, as a reminder to all of us of the dangers we will face if we don't understand the differences between us.
This sight you see is violent and the epitome of it as well, but it isn't a sad one because as long as we understand what humans are and they understand what we are this pain and suffering will never have to be inflicted on humans or beastkin ever again."
The attacks continue until my tears have long dried up and as they finish, Aurelius falls on top of me with his back bleeding, and his body ravaged by venoms.
"Hehe, they were weaker than I thought."
Holding him, I say, "Thank you. When we go let's leave together."
"Setanta is going to be angry."
"I am sure he is, but he has a strong will I am sure he will be able to build himself up again."
Dáire says, "In the man's last moments he rejected all of his love for humans and apologised for all his mistakes hoping death would be the start of his redemption. That's the story I will tell to your daughter and your grandkids, so they remember you."
"How kind."
"Now die!"
As Dáire starts to swing his axe a screech moves through the sky, and which is quickly followed by a shadow that hangs over everyone's heads. This pulls the eyes of everyone upwards where they see a cockatrice, and falling from it is a hungry wolf with eyes of vengeance.