Aliana instinctively stepped closer to Iora so they were standing back to back. "I don't like the look of this."

The ring of burly, angry men had surrounded them and was slowly closing in. At least five of them were brandishing weapons of their own. The rest of the tavern's patrons had moved to the outer edges of the room and were watching with eager and anticipating eyes.

"I've faced worse odds." The guard fearlessly made a rude gesture with her hand to one of the approaching men. "This is nothing."

One of the burly, vicious men spat at them and cracked his knuckles. "Filthy brat. Who ya' think ya' are, comin' here?"

"You're too cocky," Aliana grumbled, glancing out the corner of her eyes at Iora. "We have one weapon and are about to get attacked by five men who are armed."

Their attackers all grinned maliciously in response to her frightened remark. Aliana looked at them and found herself frightened to see no humanity in their cold, dead eyes; there was only what could be described as evil in their pupils.

"Would it make you feel better if we had three weapons?" Without giving the princess a second to respond, Iora leaned down and pulled two daggers from each of her boots. She handed one of them to Aliana.

The princess yelped as the blade was shoved into her hands. "I don't know how to us this! And my arm is still broken!!"

"I know that!" Iora shot back. "That's why I only gave you one dagger!"

"You're the opposite of-!"

Her sentence was interrupted by the first man lunging at the women. Iora immediately sprung into action, throwing her body in front of the Princess and raising her blade. The sharp clang of metal rang throughout the tavern as they attacked each other again, Iora narrowly missing the man's arm.

Aliana, caught up in watching Iora, jumped in surprise as she heard the woosh of a blade slide past her ear; one of the other tavern patrons had attacked. She ducked down to the ground, bringing the blade up to cover her face.

The man swung his dagger downward, aiming for her head. She brought her blade up, stopping his attack. Her good arm rapidly grew tired as she struggled to push him away. The man was slowly pushing her to the ground and obviously planned to kill her the second her arm gave out. In a burst of desperation, she kicked her foot upwards. It fortunately connected with the sensitive area between his legs and he bellowed in pain. The dagger dropped out of his hands and he fell to the ground.

Aliana had no time to celebrate, for as soon as one man fell, another lunged at her. This one had a broadsword, similar to Iora's. His muscled arms hefted the blade high in the air before swinging it down at full speed directly over her stomach.

She rolled out of the way at the very last second, the blade missing her at the last second. The man had swung it so hard that the blade lodged itself firmly in the wooden floorboards. That didn't save Aliana for long, as he effortlessly pulled it out and swung at her again.

She rolled over again, her broken arm howling in pain as she did so, but knew that she couldn't use it as an escape for much longer. She tried to get to her feet, but only made it to her knees before the blade came whizzing by her for a third time. A quick dodge to the left and parrying the blade with her dagger was the only thing that saved her from losing her head.

Just as she was beginning to feel confident from her numerous escapes from death, she watched - almost in slow motion - as another blade, seemingly coming from out of nowhere, swung towards her neck. It belonged to yet another attacker and was moving so swiftly that she had no way to dodge out of the way soon enough. The only thought she had time to process was I'm going to die. She screamed and covered her face with her arms.

And then, just as quickly as it been flying towards her, the blade halted, inches from her throat.

When she didn't feel the cold metal piercing her skin, she slowly lowered and was terrified to see a second blade, this one dripping with crimson blood, protruding through the chest of the man that had just tried to slit her throat. There was a startled look on his face and his mouth was partially open. After a few seconds, he crumpled to the ground, dead.

Standing over his corpse and wiping blood off her face was Iora. She had a mad glint in her eyes and looked almost insane. Behind her was another dead man laying face down on the floor, this one with blood pooling from under his abdomen. Iora pulled her blade from the chest of the man that had tried to kill Aliana and it slid out with a squish.

Aliana only had time to blink as another sword sailed down toward her. She rolled over onto her back and thrust her dagger upwards at her attack, slicing him down the leg. Blood began to stain his woolen trousers and he looked down in surprise at the damage inflicted by the scrawny person laying terrified on the floor. He didn't have time to make another move before Iora's blade, dripping with the blood of other men, jammed itself into his shoulder. He too cried in agony and fell, writhing, to the floor.

The remaining man that had been preparing to attack the women stepped back, suddenly fearful. He clearly hadn't expected the two young outsiders to hold their own against five grown men.

The people in the tavern stood in shock as far away from the women as possible, and the owner was nowhere to be seen. Iora cleaned her blade on one of the tavern towels, grabbed Aliana by her good wrist, and led her outside, packing the food they had purchased along with them. No one stopped them as they made their hurried retreat.

The princess was shaking in fear and confusion as they made their way hastily through the streets of the town, all eyes drawn toward them as if knowing what had transpired. She struggled to walk in a straight line, her mind constantly jumping back to the cold, hard expression that had been in her eyes when she had killed the man in the tavern.

As they strode along the long route back to where their horses awaited deep in the woods, Aliana began to come out of her trance. "I--I'm sorry."

"What for?"

"For causing trouble for us, plugging my nose while eating the stew, for not knowing how to properly help you and defend myself."

Iora's voice was blunt and unemotional. "None of that is your fault. You can't help that they saw a young man whom they thought should be attracted to dishonorable women. You can't help that the stew was possibly the worst fish stew either of us have ever had. Nor can you help that you are a spoilt brat used to being pampered and cared for without having to think about anything nor anyone but your desires at the moment and how to please your future husband."

Aliana was not sure how to respond to her comments at first. Were they meant to comfort or put down? "At least I am educated, and at least I tried my best back there to defend myself," she retorted. "Better I am who I am than the scum that attacked us."

"Huh, not by much," Iora said with a wry grin. "And the fish stew may have been horrid, but you do need to learn to eat whatever is in front you you, or you won't survive the North."

"I am adapted the best I can. I will try to do better. But..." She trailed off, not knowing how to ask the question that had been bothering her for a while.

"But what?"

She sighed and stared down at the road. "Why did you... how could you..." The words refused to properly come out.

"Are you trying to ask why I killed those men?"

Aliana nodded.

"They were trying to hurt us."

"But... you killed them. You killed two of them."

Iora stopped in her tracks and firmly gripped the princess's shoulder. She turned Aliana to face her, but the princess made sure to avoid eye contact. "When we started this journey, I promised to protect you, no matter what it took. And back there in that tavern, those men were trying to hurt you. I did what I had to in order to save you, and I don't regret it."

"I keep seeing the blood. You didn't even seem to care that you killed him."

"I cared about you, which is why I killed him. The Frozen Lands are different than where you come from. The people out here are heartless and will slit your throat without a second thought. I can almost guarantee you that everyone in that tavern has killed at least one person. If I had let them live, one or both of us would have died."

Aliana pulled herself away from Iora and continued walking down the road. "Let's get back to the horses. I don't feel well." In all honesty, the princess felt horrible. Her head ached and her stomach churned everytime she recalled the tavern fight. She desperately wanted sleep, but feared the violent images engraved in her mind would prevent her from doing so.

Iora could see how upset Aliana was, and followed her wordlessly down the road.

They walked for another hour before somehow, rather miraculously, finding their way back to the horses. The horses were just as the women had left them. After loading the food into the saddle bags, Iora announced they needed to mount up and get back on the road.

"But it's been a long day! It was more than an hour to the town, more than an hour back, my arm is sore, and I can't get the image of those ruffians out of my mind!"

"That's exactly why we need to get on the road - we can't stay too close to the town or they will surely scout us out to seek revenge as we sleep! The best defense we have is to ride for at least five hours to gain enough distance that they won't bother. I am certain that at least one person from the tavern will seek us out to slit our throats."

The princess sighed, knowing there was wisdom in Iora's words, but not wanting to mount up. Reluctantly, she did so anyway, causing Iora to smile.

"Thank you. I'm sorry this has been so difficult for you. On the plus side, at least they didn't discover you were a woman. You're getting better at acting your new role."

They did not stop until it was too dark to travel any farther, and both women were beyond exhausted. Iora lit a torch, then a fire, and finally began the work of building a shelter for the night. Aliana tenderly touched her guard's arm. "Don't bother tonight. I have warm clothes, we have a fire and a blanket, we don't need a shelter. It's late, and we've had a rough day."

"We need a shelter to protect us from the cold.."

"I just want to go to bed, that's all. I don't want to have to wait for a shelter to be built."

The guard reluctantly relented.

They lay under the stars, knowing their troubles were far from over, and wondering what was around the next corner. Iora was certain they had not been followed from the town, but there was still an assassin after them, an accomplice to uncover, the Frozen Lands to survive, and a throne to reclaim. Life was not going to be simple any time soon. But for once since leaving the comforts of the inn, Aliana was warm. For once in so long she could not count, she had a real friend. A real friend that would do everything to protect her, even kill. Aliana could survive, she could learn to eat fish stew, to defend herself, and to act like a man, she was certain of it. And if she could do that, she could find a way to do everything else as well.

With those optimistic thoughts doing their best to block out the images of the dead man, the princess rolled over, snuggled close to Iora under the blanket, and drifted off into a deep sleep.