[ How vastly different their lives had been five years ago. Bruises and minor scrapes have become broken skin and cuts deep to the bone.

That Hidla hasn't managed to lose her sanity is terrifying and it's something she doesn't want to consider why that may be. Sure, she's cried - but the salt from her eyes only mingles with the sweat from her brow and the blood that is not hers until these liquids are impossible discern from one another.

She can't be certain how long they've been fighting. Somehow she's lost sight of her friends and it's only desperation that keeps her fighting to get back to them. To keep them safe. But what all the Goneril warriors and her brother had said about fighting and how easy it was to be swept away in the battle tide had been true in some respects. Because, when there is no other wave coming after her, she finds herself alone on a hill top gazing down at the carnage below.

Smoke - or perhaps it's fog or both - make it difficult to see. But it doesn't matter, does it? The forces down there don't carry Leicester flags. It's all Adrestian red and Faerghus blue as far as she can see. And as much as her heart aches to find her friends from those territories, she knows she can't because it would be a fool's errand. But then, inexplicably she sees a hulking figure that can only belong to one person. ]

Dimtiri?

[ It's a whisper to no one but herself; it seems all of her old classmates - enemies - are dead beneath her feet. The adrenaline that had coarsed through her is quickly fading away and soon enough the ache of muscles and her injuries will make themselves known. By now she should be turning around and heading back to her friends, pleading with Raphael to deposit her butt-first into a hot bath because her hair is matted, her lips are cracked, and there is more blood on her than she's ever wanted there to be. Yet none of these things that would normally bother her seem to matter now as she stares at the heaping mound of viscera-coated armor and blood-soaked cloak that is Dimitri who has collapsed to his knees on the ground.

All the cowardice in her tells her to leave. What else had all those years of whining been for? She doesn't even know if he'd recognize her, let alone care to do anything but slaughter her for breathing in his direction. But then she sees movement - Adrestian soldiers - and she remembers everything he'd ever done for her in those peaceful, blissful, innocent years. The moments they had shared despite their different houses. How she had grown to genuinely like the both endearing and exasperating prince turned friend.

Mad King or not, he couldn't die this way. He couldn't die alone. Before the realization of what she's doing sets in, she darts forward meeting the advancing men with a clash of her axe. How she manages to fell them is beyond her. But it doesn't matter because they're dead and she and Dimtiri are not. Dimitri - she's not thinking straight as she drops her to knees (into the muck and the grime and the Goddess knows what else) as her blood stained gloves try to find the worst of his wounds. There's so much blood. There's so much viscera. It makes her stomach curdle but she pushes through with a sob as she strains to pour whatever reserves of her magic left into him as she can, babbling to keep him awake. ]

You're okay. You're okay! Oh Goddess, I didn't study enough Faith for this when we were in class- please be okay, Dimtiri. [ Failure and doubt push at her senses but she shoves them away. Surely her meager healing skills would work to stabilize him. They had to. A sound - something between a choked sob and a nervous laugh croak from her lips. ] And maybe don't kill me? I'd really love a bath after all of this is over.