I:II | Haec Barbara Est

"Wo wo, help!"
She tries to grab the small fir bough she slips off, but her hands fail to grasp it.
She screams.
She feels the wind rushing around her.
“Gllk!”
She almost chokes as her cloak catches onto another branch. She tries to free her neck from the Cloak, turned glider, now noose.
With the claws on her gloves, she cuts open her shoot, it's caught in the branch, she slips out of the cloak.
Now with only her grey-brown pocket laden shirt and pants exposed, the contents of which begin to fly out.

"Oof!"
She hits a branch on the way down.
The girl cries out in pain. The branch might have supported her weight if she had landed on it gently, but it buckles from the weight of the fall.
It fails to support her and bends to slide her down to the forest floor below. But not before snapping back to give her a sharp cut on her head and take her hat.
She spins and falls using her right arm to brace the fall.
Darkness.
Her eyes open, and she attempts to rise to her feet:
Fails.
She tries to sit up and instinctively grabs her arm.
It's not moving:
Dislocated.

She hears the thuds in front of her. One of the monsters lumbers towards her on its massive feet and its burly arms swaying side by side. The Sling is useless now, she moves her good arm to find her daggers. The waves of pain tell her they are safely sheathed inside her leg.

They aren't coming out.

She can't move. The adrenaline pumping through her body is useless, leaving her to watch her fate with intense awareness.

Between the terror and the pain, the elf is paralyzed. She gives a cry out. Not sure who it will reach.

The strangers?

Her colleagues?

Maybe her mother and father from beyond? Anyone will do at this point.

"Help Me!"
She cries out again, this time a little softer. Her voice failing.

The creature is snarling and a large tongue licking its sharpened and broken teeth. She goes to reach for the flare in her chest, it's still there. As good a time as any to use it. She fishes it out of the always sealed pocket.

"Illum Audio, Vini. Senex."

The voices of the stranger speak behind the monster.

The voices are closer than she thought, but she barely notices, she pulls out the metallic and wooden flare launcher and prepares to fire, flicking the safety. Her thumb desperately flicks the activation switch as the device whispers itself to life. What sounds like a deeper and warped form of her own voice crackles out of the device.

Khee-no-tah-mah.

A loud pop can be heard and a sphere of fire emerges from the weapon, twice the size of the barrel. The two figures see the flash and run towards her. The Flair lands in the creature's giant snarling mouth. The Cavernous orifice lights up. The Creatures' eyes widen. She doesn't just hear the roar, she feels it as it splits her ears. The burning creature runs towards her.

Oh. I should have thought of that.
She thought hopelessly to herself. Realizing she avoided getting eaten, only to be crushed.

The two strangers are speaking to themselves.

"Too Late." She thinks with final clarity.

The monster grabs its mouth and whimpers as it lunges towards her. It can no longer roar, so that was pleasant at least. A spear land on the top of the creature’s body. The creature doesn’t notice.

"I'm sorry Father, I shouldn't have wasted it." She says to no one listening. “The villagers who find my body would need it.”

As the creature lunges towards her she hears the "twang" of a cord. The creature stands up straight. Its bulging eyes crossed together. It leans forward but cannot fall, suspended by the rope. The figures pull at the cord and the now stiff creature falls backwards. With the crunch of leaves and sticks it falls with a thud. Feet standing upright in the ground as grave markers.

"Resolve funem, Senex, dum Magoulo locquo."
The figure with the torch spoke, while the other, next to the rope, nodded and began to untie the cord.
She can see the flicker of the man speaking as he holds the torch.
She tries again to move, but the sharp pangs in her legs prevent her from doing so. She gives a yelp in pain.

“Iactare flamma, Barbaram veto” His words carried threat and command. His sword emphasized it.
She couldn’t understand him but she got the message. She held her one hand up. And dropped the flare gun.

It was useless now anyways, but perhaps they don’t know that?
Her eyes dart around the site, the clean-shaven one with a torch pointing at her with his sword. Seeing she understood, he let the sword drop a little.

He comes up close to her and squats down. He takes off his helmet. His dark curly hair matted in sweat. His brown green eyes looked with an aged wisdom, but his face looked youthful.
“Were they elves too?” she thought? She couldn't see his ears. Tucked behind his hair.

"Barbara?" Asked the man in the distance.
She mimicks the sound. With her one useful hand she points at herself?
"Vere, Barbara es!" The now helmetless man nods while pointing at her.

She tries to mimic the sounds she heard.
“Essss…”
The man perked up as she spoke. She felt emboldened to ask
“Erufu?”

The man looked confused.
“Erouphou?”
He turns to his friend, and calls out?
“Plinie unde est Eroupho? Estne in Graecia?”
She hears the man in the distance call back
“Forte dicere “Europa” intendit.”

Barbara watched the exchange between the two, straining her eyes to see the figure in the dark.

Whatever they were, they clearly weren't elves. And apparently had never heard of them either.

The figure next to her spoke again. She turned to listen though her head was starting to spin.

“Eroufou, Non. Neque a Graecus Neque ab Europa.”

He points to himself, and pride emerges as he speaks.

“Sumus Romani. Sum Romanos.” The figure points to himself, then his friend. A small smile crossed his face. “Amicus qui primus ab oris ab italia vinerunt.”

“Non nunc, Senator!”

The man nods at his friend's charge and offers a hand in apology. The girl is fixated on the man’s helmet on the floor, seeing her reflection for the first time. The man is speaking more slowly and softly now.

"Quid tibi nomen est?

Unde es familia tua? ….

She wasn’t able to pay attention, instead her eyes toured the aftermath of the battlefield. Monsters lying on the floor, hanging from trees. trees bent over with ropes. It finally dawned on her that the men had set the trees up as traps. She thinks back to her fall. And what the man said.

“Expecte”

At first she thought "Expecte" meant "gotcha?" But looking at the two now, she realized it meant "look out!" She smiled.

"Barbara," She said outloud

That’s what they called me. Is that my name?

She had never had a name, none of her village did. She was Scout, because that was her job for the village. Just like “Silk-spinner,” “Hunter,” or “Cook,” none of them had real names. They hadn’t been old enough to receive them, and no one had been there to give them.

But does she have one now?
“Barbara,” she said again. There was a strange comfort to this, as if she was given a surprise present.

"Senex, veni veni, barbarae aures specta"
The shaven man gestures to his friend to come to him.
The other one wore a short beard. She gasped.
Humans! They are real…
The figures wore armor she had never seen before, shining steel with red cloaks and. Their boots were cloth and leather protecting bare legs and…
Skirts

She stifled a giggle.

Are those leather skirts?
Her head felt light and spinning. "Strange humans this Romanuses."
It hurt to sit up so she let herself down as gently as she could. Her head caught by the bearded man before being gently let down on the leaves.He seemed to chastise his friend.
"Iam Non Caro! Est Libera! Specte! Sanguinis profluviat!"
He spoke briskly while moving his other hand across her body. His face showing both calculation and concern

“What is he worried about?" She mutters to herself. "What is sanguinis?"
Her good hand touched her leg. She feels the warm liquid. She hisses in pain.
“Oh. Blood.” Her voice now almost singsong. "That makes sense."

The man looked grave as he fetched material from a pouch. The clean-shaven figure nodded, and the two seemed to work in tandem. He struck the torch into the ground, then grabbed his cloak off his back and laid it down.

"Castra Nostra Portamus. Cure illa."
The clean shaven man says. Pointing at the cloak on the floor, and gesturing towards her. The bearded man nods.

The ranger's eyes are getting heavy, the thumping in her head begins to pound. But she won’t let it distracter.

"Barbara" she says as a whisper. 
At least I had a name!
She smiles.
Strange name, but it sounds nice.
Her vision fades as she sees their faces loom over her. She feels light. Like she is floating in the air.
I wonder what it means?
Barbara thinks as she fades away.