Chapter 4

She was completely aware of how much Morgan was hurting because of her, but she couldn't allow herself to become close to her. The girl's destiny was to lead her to the Demon Blade and she didn't know what that would entail. If, for some reason, she had to sacrifice the girl's life to "open the path", she didn't want to mourn her passing.

But Morgan was constantly shooting her sad looks that were, to put it frankly, really starting to get on her nerves. There was also a tiny little part of her felt guilty that she was causing such anguish. The entire translocation business had to have frightened her and being so far away from home with a grumpy warrior as your only acquaintance would eventually take its toll on anyone.

However, there really wasn't a good reason to be kind to her any longer, was there? She'd already spent enough time around her to know for sure that she would be the one to lead her to the Demon Blade and there was no way Morgan was going to leave her side in a world where she knew no one else no matter how harshly she was being treated.

Still, that look was making her stomach clench painfully. "Morgan."

The girl looked up immediately and Jorga swore that she saw the beginnings of tears in her eyes. "Yes, Jorga?"

She kept her eyes firmly on the trail before them. "I'm not known for my people skills."

"That's all right. I'm sorry for making you angry."

It was those words that made her look directly at the teen. "Don't say that!" she barked, causing Morgan to flinch involuntarily. The warrior calmed and gentled her tone. "Don't ever apologize for things that aren't your fault. I've been a bitch to you; it's all right that you think so."

"I don't know you, Jorga, so I can't presume to judge you," she said very quietly.

'And if she doesn't know you, whose fault is that but your own?' A little voice whispered. As an apology, she wrapped her arm around Morgan's shoulders and pulled her close. She felt the girl snuggle up to her side and inwardly sighed.

The trail was long and featureless. Never a big fan of nature, Morgan grew tired of seeing the same scenery over and over again a half hour into the trip. It was quiet save for the occasional bird call; even other travelers were few and far between. When asked about this, Jorga commented that the planting and harvesting times, along with midsummer, were the biggest traveling times for merchants. Everyone else, it seemed, were content to stay at home.

"That will change the closer we get to the Four Corners. Halcyon is a busy hub for people heading off to all corners of the world. It's also the largest city in the north."

"How large? Is it as large as New York City?" Morgan asked eagerly.

Jorga snorted. "Hardly. That place has far more people than any one city ought to have. The population of Earth has to be many times greater than the population of Fiore. At best, Halcyon has a few hundred thousand people."

The girl was disappointed. "Oh, it's that small?"

"It's small to you. When the average population of a settlement on Fiore is only about six hundred people, Halcyon is a bustling metropolis."

Day slowly faded into night and the nocturnal animals awoke from their slumber. Morgan could hear the mournful hoots of owls and the rustle of creatures she would rather not know the identity of. As the two of them settled down for dinner in a small clearing just off to the side of the road, a particularly loud rustle caught her attention.

"Jorga," she whispered urgently.

"I heard it," was the terse reply. With the quiet whisper of steel on leather, Jorga drew her sword and crept off towards the perimeter of the irregularly shaped clearing. Frozen with fear, Morgan could only watch as she waited for a demon, or worse, to leap out of the bushes and take a slash at her guardian.

In a sudden burst of movement, Jorga threw herself into the forest, sword extended. There was a frightened squeal not unlike that of a small, terrified animal, then silence. For several long moments, Morgan held her breath and waited for the warrior to reemerge, then Jorga did appear and looked to be hauling someone behind her.

"I've apprehended the bad guy," the woman said in irritation. She set a small person down on the ground beside the teenager, who tensed and moved away as quickly as she could. The sound of sniffling caught her attention and she cautiously crept back. "It seems that this forest is infested with miniature juvenile delinquents."

"I am not a delinquent," the child shot back, but the air of defiance was ruined by another sniffle.

"Yeah, yeah. I assume that it's perfectly normal to be skulking around in bushes in the middle of the night."

Morgan felt incredibly sorry for the child and pulled the still-whimpering youngster into her arms. "It's hardly the middle of the night, Jorga," she said. "Leave the poor kid alone. What's your name?"

"Hanna," was the soft reply. By the light of the small fire that Jorga had started, she could see that the intensity of the little girl's deep purple eyes could rival Jorga. "You won't let the mean lady hurt me?"

"She won't lay a finger on you, I promise."

Hanna smiled and grabbed Morgan around the neck with skinny arms. "You're nice. What's your name?"

"Morgan. The lady over there is Jorga. What are you doing out here all alone?"

The girl shrugged. "Living, I guess. Eating whatever I can find. My mommy died a few weeks ago and I don't know where my daddy is."

"And you were just living out here all by yourself for weeks?" Morgan asked incredulously. She had a "you poor thing" look on her face that made Jorga feel uneasy.

"Hey, wait a minute," she started. A different look was directed at her, one that instantly made her cringe. "No!"

"But she has no one else. Can you, in good conscience, leave a little girl out here in the forest to fend for herself?"

Her first thought was to quote one of her favorite sayings: Only the strong survive. The bad part about the entire thing is that Jorga really couldn't apply the most basic law of them all to this situation and that made her scowl. Little children, in her opinion, were even worse than teenage girls who may become sacrifices in the near future. "Fine, she can stay." The two of them cheered. "But only until we reach the next settlement. Then she becomes someone else's problem."

Hanna smiled happily. "I'm glad you'll let me stay."

"I'm not," was the short reply.

After all the dinner dishes had been cleaned and put away, Jorga lay awake in her bedroll, contemplating how complicated her life had become. How the hell did she lose the Demon Blade in the first place? For decades she'd been asking herself that question and had yet to come up with an answer.

Even though she hadn't wanted to, Jorga had been ready to proclaim the blade lost to time. It wasn't beyond her power to create another even though centuries of blood magic had been stored within it. It was a powerful, deadly sword worthy of a powerful, deadly master and she wanted no one but the Deathbringer to ever wield it. But since it was, for all intents and purposes, lost, she wasn't too worried about the unthinkable happening.

Unfortunately, making another Demon Blade proved to be a disheartening experience. First, she had been unable to procure the perfect sword as the base. It had to be of a specific size and shape and made of the right material in order for her magic to have the greatest effect on it. Then, after she had finally settled on a sword, she couldn't coerce a demon into merging with it. Apparently, losing the previous sword hadn't gained her any favor with the demon crowd.

It was then that she decided that she had to have the original weapon in her possession once more, and there was nothing more to do than to search for it. So Jorga had returned to the place it had fallen, staring over the edge of the precipice at the height of Gunder's Peak and down into the deep and twisted canyon that was Gagazet Gorge, hoping against hope that the whorrie, a large beast that was a strange cross between a bat and an ostrich with a long spiked tail, had accidentally dropped her sword from its great black talons and it was waiting for her on one of the many small ledges that lined the canyon walls. However, even as she'd peered down into the gloom, she knew without a doubt that it wasn't there. To make matters even worse, she knew that the whorrie hadn't been working on its own agenda (they didn't possess the intelligence for that) which meant that there was something else, a something that walked on two legs and catered to no one's wishes but their own, who had instructed the beast to steal the Demon Blade from her.

Knowing this, Jorga had been fairly sure that it was an nigh-on-impossible task to locate her sword, but then she'd met Horatio and Josan and everything had changed. Now she was on hot pursuit of a magical sword and had been for a very, very long time. Even with the differences in the way time passed from one world to the next, it had still been a long time. Some days she just wanted to give up, but when she felt as if she could go no farther, Jorga only had to think of unworthy hands touching her Demon Blade and the fires of Hell ignited within her once more. There would be pain. There would be suffering. And she would be the one to mete it out any way that she saw fit.

***
Hanna chattered non-stop the entire way to the village where she was born, but mysteriously fell silent as they came within side of its outermost buildings. She clutched at Morgan's hand very tightly and attached herself to her side as if daring anyone to try and remove her. Morgan glanced down at her in concern before sneaking a look at Jorga.

"What?" the warrior asked.

"Something's not right here. She doesn't want to go back." Morgan kneeled and placed her hands very gently on the little girl's shoulders. "Hanna, please tell me what happened to you and your mommy." When the small body began to tremble and tears threatened to trickle down her cheeks, Morgan felt her heart constrict. "Please. It's the only way that we can understand."

"They-they killed her," she sobbed. Both women stared at her in shock. "They said that she was evil and chased us away from the village. Then my mommy told me to run away and hide while she held them off. I was afraid, but I did what she said. Then I heard her scream so I went back. The mayor... He-he-" She took a deep, shuddering breath and the rest of the words all came out in a big rush. "-he took a big knife and he stuck it in her stomach. There was so much blood! Then the men threw her body to the ground and walked off like she didn't matter anymore. But she does matter! She's my mommy!"

Deep, wracking sobs shook the frail little girl and Morgan embraced her. Hanna pressed her face tight against her chest, fists clenched in her tunic. She could still see very vividly how the blood at spread across the white dress her mother had worn that day and how she had seemed to stare directly at where she was hidden in the bushes, one hand outstretched as if seeking help. Hanna had emerged, then, and run over to the dying woman, patting her cheeks in a desperate attempt to get her to wake up. When she realized that her mother was truly dead, Hanna had let out a howl and collapsed over the body, her little fists beating helplessly against the ground.

"You aren't going back there," Morgan promised. "We won't let anyone hurt you." She gave Jorga a challenging look, daring her to say anything different. For her part, Jorga was in complete agreement and had been ever since she'd gotten a good look at Hanna's amethyst eyes. No one would take a child in who they perceived as being touched by the death god, Jakan. Purple eyes were an uncommon color and it was usually associated with witches who were reported to have immense power over life and death. No, Hanna would have to stay with them for now because only they would treat her like a person instead of a devil.

"Do you have anything left there?" Jorga asked, her voice and expression both unusually kind.

Hanna shook her head. "They burned it all," she choked out. "Everything. My mommy's clothes, her art, my books and my teddy bears. They did it to purify the village. They think we're both bad."

"You are not bad and neither was your mother," Jorga said firmly. "Those people ought to be ashamed of themselves for punishing someone because of their heritage." She looked down at the little girl who had only a ragged little dress to her name. "At Halcyon we'll get you more clothes and a pair of shoes to go along with them."

Shyly, the little girl smiled up at her, no longer afraid of the woman whose sword had nearly come close to killing her. "You're nicer than I thought you were. Thank you for helping me."

"Well, I couldn't have left you in the forest to live like an animal nor could I turn you over to those fiends in good conscience." Jorga shrugged. "I'm not that much of a bitch."

"Don't curse around her!" Morgan scolded, but she couldn't help the smile that had spread across her face at the woman's words. Jorga did have a heart, after all.