Kosa and Helios walked through the twisting forest for what felt like forever. The farther they went, the more tangled and impossible it was to progress. Giving up, they started heading back towards the Trinity Tree. They didn't really know why they headed that way. Something in them just made it feel right.
"It's going to rain soon," Kosa said suddenly, after hours of silence.
Helios scrunched up his nose in confusion, "What makes you say that, love?" He asked.
"You mean besides the ominously dark clouds?" She asked, gesturing towards the sky, "The smell. It smells like rain."
Helios rolled his eyes, becoming slightly fed up with his mates' weird antics. Before he could respond, however, he heard something. It sounded like fighting. He took off towards the sound, Kosa yowling after him in confusion. Before too long, he burst out into a large clearing filled with cats and rotting wood. They couldn't stop the fighting. It was too late. Helios sat down in disbelief, Kosa soon joining him. He rested his head on top of hers and pulled her closer. As they were cuddling, Helios felt something brush up against his side. He looked over, and saw a tiny brown striped cat. Her blood red eyes stared up at him.
"Hello?" He asked.
"You failed," She said simply, laying down and pulling her tail around herself.
"No need to rub it in," He muttered, "so what's your name?"
"Virtue," She said, "I've been following you since the decaying tree god."
Helios looked down at her in surprise. Then looked back over at Kosa, who was now watching Virtue with wide eyes. Noting her apparel, he shouldn't have been surprised at that. She looked like she would be excellent at sneaking around.
"Virtue?"
At that, she jumped and turned towards the bushes. Vice stepped out, and gracefully walked over to her, nuzzling her forehead with his nose. She jerked back and hissed.
"I've been following you for a while," he said, promptly ignoring the huge cats staring at the both of them with poorly hidden intrigue. Virtue hissed at him again. She was embarrassed that she let herself be followed like that. Although she was more focused on not being spotted herself, she should have known better by now.
"Why? I made my choice, and since I haven't seen you since, I can assume you made yours?" She said angrily, her fluffy tail whipping behind her.
"And just like you, Virtue, my opinion of something can change," he said, now slowly padding towards her.
Virtue, having all the class in the world, literally jumped into Helios' mane and hid with only her face sticking out to get away from him. He tried to get her out of his mane for a bit, before giving up with a resigned sigh. Kosa chuckled at him, ignoring the glare that earned her.
Vice looked at her in surprise, slowly blinking, before smiling up at her gently and continuing, "Anyway, I was looking for you, but you seemed really busy so I didn't want to bother you. I was hoping that we... we could maybe go back to what we had before. You know, before our fight," He said hesitantly.
Virtue looked at him for a minute, before bursting out laughing. Vices' ears and tail drooped in embarrassment. This idiot thinks we can go back to before? Fat chance. She thought, snuggling deeper into Helios' mane.
"You're right, Virtue. It was foolish of me to think that was a possibility," He said disappointedly, turning away from them and curling up on the ground. Virtue jumped out of Helios' mane, much to his relief, and returned to her position next to him, watching the chaos unfold.
"It's going to rain soon," She mentioned idly.
Kosa looked at her mate proudly, "I told you, Helios! I was right!" She exclaimed.
"According to a tiny cat who just jumped into my mane to avoid her problems," He retorted, sinking down to the ground.
"And this tiny cat is right here, remember?" Virtue said, moving away to sharpen her weapons.
Vice looked at her in surprise, "You're not going to join in on the fighting?"
"Just like you said, Vice, my opinions of things can change," She said coldly. Nodding, he turned away from her once more.
Kosa joined her mate on the ground, "You know I wasn't being serious, don't you love?" She asked. I hope I didn't do anything to upset him. I'm not too good at comforting others. The last time I tried they ran away from me. Oh gods I hope he doesn't-
Her thoughts were interrupted when Helios touched her forehead with his nose softly, silently reassuring her that everything was fine. She relaxed into him, twisting their tails together. She fell asleep with her face in his mane, soaking up the fluffy heat that seemed to radiate from it. Helios laid her down on the ground in a more comfortable position, before noticing that the battle seemed to have stopped. Waking her up, he stood and walked over to the small cats, informing them of the revelation. The four of them stared at the battlefield. The fighting seemed to have come to a short standstill. Both sides were evenly matched. Everyone looked exhausted. Cats and wood creatures alike were bleeding, and the dead cats were few and far between, but still there.
Kosa felt a pang in her heart at the sight of them. Their deaths could have been avoided. But instead, they had failed to find the third tree, if it even existed. They very well could have wasted time that would have been better spent trying to come to some sort of agreement between the tree gods.
Helios looked at the injured tree creatures in surprise. He had no idea that they could be injured. Their only states seemed to be alive or dead. At least, those were the only states he had ever seen them in. Their blood seemed to be the black goo holding them together, and he couldn't help but feel disgusted.
Virtue noticed the weapons scattered in the grass. She could collect them after the battle, and use them to create memorials. Every soldier, in her eyes, deserved a proper funeral in order to be laid to rest. Any weapons that could not be identified would be added to her collection, only they wouldn't be used, they would be hung up and respected.
And Vice... Vice watched the healers running around, dragging the fatally wounded to a safer spot to try and nurse them back to health. He knows that he's done wrong things in his life, and so to make up for it, he wants to become a healer. He wonders about studying under one of them for a bit before it's time to return home.
The four of them watch as the army of decay retreats back into the forest, as the sun rises over the horizon.
1141 Words