Prologue

            Inhale, exhale, inhale, exhale… the silence of the world around me as I dash to my goal… the rush of blood flowing hot all throughout my body… I typically enjoy these feelings, but today it was all different.

            It was too difficult for me to breathe through all the smoke, and the world was as loud inside my head as out. My body was hot before running, and the blood-rush only made it all the worse. I kept having to stop and breathe what air was left, and my running was only in short bursts because people kept running past me, pushing me out of the way, and if I had kept trying to run I’d have fallen and been trampled upon like dirt.  Not only that but breathing... I had to focus on it if I wanted to continue doing it.

            The fear in me was heavy, but not dominant. I had to keep myself calm if I hoped to find Alexander and get us out of here in time. “Alexander!” I screamed, hoping that amongst the crowd someone would respond to me in his sweet voice…

            “Alexander! Where are you!?” I shouted in my native Greek tongue. All I heard in response were the screams and yells of all the people of Troy panicking as they all scrambled around like decapitated chickens. “Alexand--!” I had a sudden coughing spell and had to stop to catch my breath, but mere minutes after I decided I'd pursue on, the only thing on my mind being Alexander.

            I turned the corner and then saw one of them…our enemy, the Greeks. He gave me a smiled that almost insisted he was drunk, saying with a slurred voice, “Hey there girlie…you’re pretty cute…” He stopped talking and hiccupped. “Come ‘ere and give me a big kiss, won’t ‘cha?”

            I silently glared at him.

            “Oh, that’s how it’s gonna be, eh?” He spit to the side as if to insult me [or perhaps he actually did have something disgusting in his mouth], and then put two of his nasty fingers into his mouth, letting out a loud whistle. From behind me I could hear two feet stomping on the mud beneath him and two more came at my sides. “Now there, pretty girlie, why don’t you just slip outta that robe nicely and maybe we’ll be a little nicer to you in return.” I hardly understood the slur of his Greek, but the hiccups he had in between gave me a moment to process the words.

            I bent down slowly to my sandals and began to loosen the thick, decorative strings down the side. I went through the same process with my other shoe, watching the men circle around me for different views as I did so. I put my shoes down to my left, neatly out of the way of any water or fire damage that may come to it. Now on one knee and slowly lifted up my lavender robes to reveal my thigh better. The men began to whistle, obviously enjoying their drunken selves, when they noticed the dagger I had strapped to my leg.

            “She’s got a weapon!” One of them shouted, and two began to come at me. I smirked and jumped up, just above their heads, in the position of a cat. My arms were at my ankles and my legs bent, while I kept my eyes thin and snake-like. I kicked downward twice - one for each guy - the moment they butt heads, pushing the two of them down and into the muddy marble ground face first. I then lifted my legs and did a twist kick in mid air, kicking away the two other men as they charged at me.  I missed one because he backed away in fear, after he saw the other guy get hit, in which I ended up hitting square in the neck.  As gravity did its job and I headed back down myself, I landed on both the previous 2 men's heads, the ones who charged at me first, shoving their faces down hard and fast, hard and fast enough to break their noses into their faces and kill them.  This left nothing but a deep crimson pool below them that scared the other two out of their robes. The third and fourth men were too fearful to want to continue fighting me. “She’s a demon!” they screamed as they ran away, hoping the flames of my city would make me fall, or at least that they'd never see me again. I mercilessly let them go, for I had better business to attend to… My brother needed me more than they needed to die.

            I fell to my knees and breathed, dropping my dagger.  I coughed every so often, but whenever I nearly gave up I would repeat my brother's name in my head and force myself to find the oxygen my lungs were lacking more and more of every second.  Eventually I forced myself to get ready to go again.

            Grabbing my sandals and placing my blade back in its place, glad I needed not use it, I looked up at Athena’s temple. I was almost certain that Alexander was in there. Coughing hard at all the smoke I’d inhaled, I sprinted in as fast as I could �" sadly a quick-paced jog at this point �" and stopped in horror at what I saw.