PROLOGUE - THE END

“The day is saved, hero…” His body twitched with the leftover spasms of battle, and the annoyance at the name. I always wondered, was there anyone but me who ever noticed? “What now?” How much it came to irk him?

Silence. For but a few seconds, the edge of eternity was filled but with the crackles of dying embers. Then he turned, choosing the practiced mask of neutrality. I bit back a frown. ‘I won’t let you, my friend.’ “The ultimate victory is yours. Your homeland, and much more, is saved. No dark mystery is left unsounded, no threat is left unchallenged.”

“…no threat?” He asked. Confusion. Getting somewhere.

“An old song and dance which I now understand to be folly. You won’t see me forcing any further engagements.” I answered, and his posture relaxed the more his eyes widened. “Your loved ones and cherished things are safe from me, now and forevermore.”

“Why? Isn’t that why you chased me here?” He shot back. “The reason why you joined your blade to mine?”

“I helped protect creation and, with it, the opportunity. But there won’t be any battle.” I declared. Then smirked. “Not unless you desire it, my friend.”

“…desire it?” His body tensed again, his voice low. “Why would I ever desire it?”

“Why, indeed. You ask the same question I had been asking myself after our last aborted engagement.” I closed my eyes, reliving the disappointment I felt. All the carefully prepared plans, all the time wasted on the perfect form, the ultimate challenge… Gone at the whim of a jester. “Why would you ever desire to fight me again? What was so unique, so evanescent about our first meeting? Why have I failed to recapture it…” I turned to the right and stepped slowly. His eyes followed me, predator eyeing predator. “I revisited our first battleground, looking for answers.”

“And what did you find?”

“…nothing. I found nothing, for the answers laid elsewhere. Not in what was present, but rather in what was missing.” I stopped and my eyes found him again. “When we first met, my army already laid defeated. Victorious or not, our duel would have left me weak enough for your allies to finish me. There was literally nothing at stake but yourself… And that’s when it hit me.” I flourished to the left, the tassels of my cape echoing noisily. “That’s when my selfishness hit me, my friend! My blindness!” He stood, frown gone but body posture once again tense. “It was not your strength that made our meeting so fortuitous! It was not our shared potential for growth! It was not the grand scene we created together, greatest than the sagas recounted by the bards! Such paltry things could never be the basics of our connection!”

“Our connection…?” He repeated, in a tone so low that only the two of us could ever hear it.

“The side that you dare not show to your allies! The ones who adore and idolize the hero! Who worship the weapon standing at their side and fear the mirror that opposes them!” Our eyes met. He held my gaze, as the fever grew strong within. “The ones who forget the one who once took to the road for adventure and fortune! Way before and deep beneath love, friends and country, there’s something else!” His hands clenched into fists. “Something that you haven’t nourished in a long time, except for a few liberating moments when the fate of the world is no longer on your shoulders! When those you care for aren’t around to judge and be horrified!” They shake with ever increasing intensity. “When you’re responsible for your life, and your life alone! When the repercussions of your actions begin and end with battle!”

“You…” His breath, heavy. The pressure, blasting off him.

“Then and then only, my friend! Only when the mantle of the hero is rags in the dust of victory…!” My own, mirroring its twin as acceptance sets in. “Only then can you freely indulge in the side of you which yearns for fulfilment! Which throws itself at mighty foe and vicious challenge just to see if it can! Which engages in battle for its own sake and the thrill between the seconds! Am I not right…” My weapon is grabbed and freed, held up high above my head. “Warrior?!”

“…why.” An answer. Followed by laughter, soft at first but loud and frenzied by the end. “Why did it have to be you, of all people, who gets it!” Their weapon, like mine, is raised and freed. Laughter joins mine in harmony.

And thus, I meet my end, in glorious battle with my mirror.