[i]“This can’t be happening”[/i] thought Samantha as she realized her companion had been shot mid-stride. She hadn’t let it slow her down. He hadn’t let it slow him down either.
 
Still, as they found cover she looked at him and there was no hint of sympathy in her eyes. Only doubt and resentment and accusation. She couldn’t believe he had allowed himself to be injured like that. She couldn’t believe they had ended up being cornered [i]again[/i]. How could he let that happen?
[i]“He was shot from behind.”[/i] She tried to remind herself. He couldn’t have foreseen it. [i]“And he was weakened by none other than you.”[/i] The guilt tried to lace itself around her as he dropped the rubies and she took notice of the burns they had left on his skin.
 
The woman reached out to the arrow but Simeon was quicker. He grabbed the end of the weapon and easily snapped the wood in two – something he made look effortless. He also knew better than to try and pull the rest out, knowing it could result in severe bleeding or worse. She felt some of the resentment die down.
 
Samantha left the jewelry on the ground between them and puffed some air out of her nose with obvious displeasure at the next request her new leader posed. “I need you to form something to glow. Something that I can shoot and will flash above us.”
[i]“I am no fey and concentrating Lef without a shell isn’t as easy as it sounds.”[/i] She opened her mouth to protest but then came his next words. “If you honestly can't manage that I suggest you take arms.”
The Wisp bit her lip. It would have been better if it was an order. Now, with the way he said it, it sounded like… an offer. A proposition, to make herself useful or not stand in his way. It played on her pride and her pride wasn’t something to be played on. She wasn’t a team player but even when she had to be she would never allow herself to be useless.
 
She quickly repeated the process of shaping Lef into a loose ball, this time making no attempt to cover the glow of its strength under the moon. In fact, she even concentrate so much of it into the ball that it was beginning to illuminate her face and everything around. To make something that glows wasn’t that hard, in this sense. To make it breakable upon impact and to make it flash bright enough to really serve any purpose, that was harder. It was something that she assumed the people at Léva were studying. She wasn’t good at weaving Lef into elements. Even if she had known how to do so once, she had forgotten it long ago and to remember would definitely take longer than the set time-limit of 30 seconds. 

But what she could do was use existing light. There was a lantern only a step away from them. She sneaked up next to it and touched it, letting the heat and light of the fire transfer from it to the ball, illuminating it from within. Then she quickly drew a stiletto and ran it over the back of her hand, easily drawing blood and peeling skin. Those substances then stretched out and over the sphere in her hand, dimming its glow and making its outer walls susceptible to physical contact.
 
Pulling her arm back Samantha glanced at Simeon, gave him a nod and threw the sphere into the air. She really hoped he was a good shot. 

Simeon steadied left wheel-lock just above the glimmering sphere. Faint light betrayed it against the deep night, but pain and intensity sharpened his senses. Experience guided every breath and all of him focused. The hand adjusted to the eye, which followed the black veins running from around the gears to the narrow mouth of the barrel. A small click sounded as the gears twitched and the left twin roared. 

A flash from behind the stone wall where the assassins hid. Greater, however, was the explosion of pure light above. What attention allowed the shot to fly true left Simeon all too aware of his wound. Yet, despite him, the Wisp divided her glances between the spectacle above and their assailants now bathed in her light. When she finally looked to Simeon, she found the mad dog smiling and looking opposite the threat. 

“I wouldn’t trust the crews’ marksmanship. You should duck,” he grumbled, following his own advice.

What faint lights hinted at the Sogna before were nothing compared to the false-sun above. Like rain, light streamed down from the sky from the still glowing smoke of the explosion. Brilliant and magnificent and unapologetically revealing, those falling beams showed the tooth of the Sogna. Two dozen rifles shouldered, leveled, their triggers now pulled. A series of shots and white smoke boomed from the line. The sound echoed in the corner where the assassins hid, yet the shots continued forward. Several figures staggered, a mist glistening behind them as they fell.

By the time Simeon stood with his sword drawn, half a dozen of the crew had joined them. A pistol hung on the hip of half of them, but each stood with curved swords drawn. Darkly clad like Simeon, their tattered, loose attire looked a more casual sort of deadly. They gathered like professionals around their charge, reporting what they saw as if on sea. And like that, they fanned out. 

Only a few of the assailants remained. Nine held their wounds or had given into blood loss already. Once Simeon and Samantha joined the fray, the crew had already dispatched four more. Simeon weaved between the fighting with the right twin drawn. A reaper, he walked from body to body, hovering briefly while looking them over. He’d come to the tenth body when he heard relieved sighs and sheathing swords. 

“Many thanks to all of you. Four of you, keep on guard. Expect two comrades trucking a cart. Don’t fire on them, they’ve got the wine. If I could trouble the rest to bring her aboard,” Simeon pointed the pistol to a wounded woman cupping a shot to the left bicep. “Check for weapons. Keep her alive.”

He turned to Samantha then, a broad smile as he tipped his head toward the Sogna, “Posh lightshow.” 

Samantha stood quietly and worked on reattaching the rubies back around her neck and wrist. Her eyes examined the crew of the ship and followed them as they joined Simeon, followed them as they spread out, followed them as they started wounding and killing. They worked with diligent confidence, like multiple hands of one creature, of one mind. [i]They trust him.[/i] she realized and the thought made her both proud and ashamed. Sometimes she was forced to realize just how important trust was for completing a mission. Her eyes darted back to Simeon, his hand wounded from her jewels and his shoulder pierced, possibly for the same reason. Guilt edged on her but didn’t reach far. It didn’t matter whose fault it was that they had ended up cornered and wounded. None of them could predict how things worked out and they had made it non-the-less. They had survived.
 
And despite herself she had to admit the chances of her walking out unscratched from such a situation would have been slim without Simeon’s caution. Samantha had underestimated the number of their opponents, she realised now as she watched more and more wounded and dead appear. She would have been rash, let arrogance get to her and get her killed. She had to accept the feeling of respect form for the new leader. Things could perhaps have been smoother, but they were smooth enough for now. Him approaching her with a smile on his face only sealed that impression.
 
“Indeed it was.” She agreed with a thin smile of her own, unwilling to thank for a compliment that felt unjust and only partially true. He had his own marksmanship to thank for the ultimate result. “Is there a way for me to help you with those?” She asked, pointing in the general direction of his wounds.