By the evening of the fourth day, the donkey stood up, and no matter how hard Alexandra tried, she couldn't move it from its spot. The donkey brayed, stomped its hoof, and planted its legs, refusing to continue the journey. Although Amon had taken a considerable portion of the luggage, the long road with short breaks had worn the animal out. And not just the animal!
Alexandra also felt like she had no strength left, and eating on the go wasn't helping her mood. Only Amon, as if nothing was wrong, kept walking steadily forward like a machine.
"We should've gotten horses," the mercenary muttered. But where could they find horses in a port town? At least they managed to get a donkey! Otherwise, Alexandra would have had to carry part of the load herself. She stopped.
"That's it, break time!" the mercenary declared, wiping the sweat from her brow.
"The sun hasn't even set," Amon replied, walking on. "We'll rest in about three hours."
"Then carry the donkey yourself," Alexandra snapped, throwing the reins.
The animal perked up, realizing it didn't have to keep walking. It flapped its ears happily and bellowed again, demanding food.
Amon turned around. He walked over to the mercenary, took the bags off his shoulders, and sat down on the hot sand. The mercenary removed some hay from the donkey and tossed it on the ground. The donkey immediately began to munch on the yellowed grass.
"I keep forgetting how delicate you are," Amon said teasingly. "If I were alone, I'd already be in El-Farrah."
Alexandra picked up the water skin.
"That's unlikely. You'd probably be fucking a girtablilu without a second thought. I saved your dick from an unpleasant fate, and what did I get in return? You didn't even let me rest after yesterday's fight!"
The mercenary took a pinch of white sand, grimaced, and placed it on her tongue. She knew the body loses a lot of salt with sweat, so it was essential to drink and snack on something.
"Want some?" she asked the warrior.
"No."
"Your loss," the warm water washed the salty taste from her mouth.
"Thanks for the protection," Amon said thoughtfully. "But the fight seemed strange to me."
***
The previous day, after stopping for the night among the sand dunes, they encountered their first enemies.
Closer to midnight, Amon took the watch, and the girl crawled into her sleeping bag. About half an hour later, the warrior shook the drowsy Alexandra awake.
"They're surrounding us," he said calmly. "Three of them. And they're not human. Are there giant arthropods around here?"
The mercenary quickly climbed out of her sleeping bag and jumped to her feet, drawing her sword.
For several minutes, she stared into the darkness without success. Not a sound disturbed the night's silence, and no movement broke the darkness.
"They're here," Alexandra lowered her sword. "Girtablilu – half-woman, half-scorpion with a poisonous sting. But everything's calm, it seems."
"No," the warrior said confidently. "It wasn't just a feeling. I can clearly hear the creaking of their chitin and the small steps of their legs. One is coming from that side, another from there, and the third is hiding behind that mound," Amon pointed in the direction.
The mercenary became alert. She hadn't noticed or heard anything herself, but Alexandra knew very well that girtablilu had the ability to sneak up completely unexpectedly. It was no wonder they were called "desert assassins"!
She glanced around once more. The hunter's instinct told her Amon was right. Alexandra could literally feel the imminent threat with her skin.
"We need to provoke them," the mercenary quietly told Amon.
She picked up a small crossbow, which she carried for dealing with flying creatures, aimed at the mound Amon had indicated, and released the trigger. With a dry snap, the bolt sliced through the air and embedded itself in the sand. At that very moment, the mamono revealed themselves.
***
"Yes, the fight was strange," Amon repeated. "You really surprised me."
"I'm worth my money," Alexandra replied proudly. She sat on a hay bale, letting a light breeze hit her face. "One against three, ha-ha! Did you see how they ran? With me, your body's safe."
The girl deliberately acted as rough as possible. Clients liked it when a mercenary behaved like a warrior. However, she didn't need to pretend much.
"It was that which surprised me: you let them go. Severed jaws, crushed pincers, damaged tails – something tells me those wounds aren't fatal. Monsters have more vulnerable spots – their human body parts. Three injured mamono, and not a single one killed."
"Do you think it's easy to fight in the dark?" Alexandra said with annoyance. Instead of praise, she had received condemnation, which upset her. "What's the problem? I was hired to protect you – and I did. What's the issue?"
The wind picked up slightly, and tiny waves ran across the sand. The donkey pulled its head away from its food and pricked its ears.
"The problem is, I don't understand you," Amon said, looking at Alexandra intently. "You fought very well, for a human. Powerful blows, decent speed, accuracy. You can feel the experience. Footwork – downright excellent! A rookie from my league... people would envy that. The half-pirouette you did to cut off the sting of the last mamono, that really impressed me. The thing is, with that move, you could've cleaved the girl from shoulder to waist, but instead, you went for the tail. Strange target choice, don't you think? Do you like seeing them suffer?" Amon smirked.
Alexandra shrugged irritably.
"Fight yourself if you're so smart. Oh, I forgot, you don't kill monsters! What do you want from me?"
"In my case, it's a necessary measure. The vow, remember? But you fought consciously. Don't be offended, I just need to be sure that at a critical moment, your hand won't falter."
"It won't falter," the girl promised. She adjusted her scabbard. "But tell me, was killing them really necessary in that situation?"
Amon thoughtfully touched his chin.
"I don't know. Could they have brought reinforcements?"
"Don't make me laugh," Alexandra snorted. "You don't know anything about monsters. The fact that the girtablilu acted in a group – that's unusual. They're loners and sadists, you know. What reinforcements? These mamono rarely team up – they don't want to share husbands."
"Is that so?"
"I rarely kill," Alexandra continued with blunt frankness, "Especially the intelligent ones who have something in their skulls besides raping men. I don't take contracts to kill them; after all, they're just ordinary women, just depraved. They live their lives – let them, as long as they don't mess with anyone against their will. Wild ones are another matter, but even they, I prefer to just chase away. As for succubi, I usually have a short conversation with them."
"So, this is the philosophy of a monster-slayer," Amon said with an unclear intonation. "How often do you get contracts to destroy them?"
Grains of sand swirled up in the air, dancing in a vortex. The mercenary inhaled the cooling air with pleasure, still not replaced by the icy breath of night.
"Not rarely, much more often than I'd like. A lot of people fear and hate mamono. They hate them because they don't understand them. But as for me – don't interfere with each other, and everything will be fine! Among men, many would willingly spend their lives with mamono. You just want a beauty with swollen udders and a slender figure," Alexandra said with a touch of resentment.
"And mamono have it all. Just be honest, do you like them? Well, physically?"
Amon laughed.
"You can't impress me with a pretty face."
"There you go!" Alexandra exclaimed approvingly, raising a finger. "Exactly! And most people only care about that. Then they swing between extremes – love or hate, especially when they're fighting their own desires, like the orderlies, for example. Though in their lands, things are more complicated – war, both sides acting like beasts. It's bad there," the mercenary sighed.
"So, you don't feel negative emotions toward monsters."
"No. To fight something, you have to understand it, feel it. After that, hatred gradually fades – you can't hate what you're hunting. To be honest, I regard humans much worse than monsters. Monsters are simple creatures by nature, straightforward, you always know what to expect from them. But with humans, it's more complicated... Hey, where are you going?"