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Blood. She could feel the wetness of her blood seeping down her side against her skin with every ragged inhale. And every exhale brought a new flash of pain as the arrowhead nestled against her rib.

Strangely, the smell of grass pieced through the pain and caused her nostrils to flare. Her eyes fluttered open and there above her was the obsiden night sky covering her like a blanket, closing around her. There were no stars, or if there were they were blocked by the arms of the trees.

 Their branches seemingly reaching out above them as their trunks wound down to the ground beside her, as if they were going to take her up to meet the Gods.

The thought didn't instantly invoke fear, and she let her head drop to the side like a dead weight until she was staring through blades of grass. She hadn't felt her arm then until she saw it stretched out beside her, her fingers reaching just like the trees had been. But instead of reaching for the sky, she was reaching for Diomed. Her chest became light with relief.

He was led a few feet away from her and mirrored her position. He was on his back staring up at the sky with his arm stretched out towards her. Her eyes travelled down his arm towards his hand as she looked for the place for her fingers to land. But her stomach twisted when she saw there were no fingers. Just ripped flesh oozing blood around a startling white jagged bone. At that moment Diomed's head rolled to the side and she screamed, her chest exploding with pain. His face was gone and insects were crawling through his eye sockets whilst his mouth had dropped open in anguish.

Frieda startled awake in a cold sweat. Her fingers clutched the bedding beneath her as her eyes adjusted to the darkness. As they did she listed everything around her from the double bed beneath her, to the wooden stool in the corner along with the wooden dresser at the end of the bed to remind her where she was.

Once her eyes adjusted and she knew she was no longer bleeding to death in a field, she risked a glance to the space beside her but already knew what she would see. Or rather what she wouldn't. Diomed. Her heart was now heavy for another reason. She sat quietly apart from her own heightened breathing and listened for any sounds that would tell her where Diomed was but all she could hear was the distant chirps of creatures outside their house.

Swinging her legs over the side she walked over to the bowl of water a top the dresser and wetted a cloth. Wiping away the beads of sweat, she was thankful her hair had been braided back the previous evening otherwise it would have been sopping. Even now though wayward tendrils stuck to the back of her neck and shoulder. Drying her hands she picked up the sheathed dagger beside the bowl and tied the leather straps around her leg so that the blade rested flat against her outer thigh.

Wrapping a blanket around her shoulders, now shivering in the cool morning air despite the earlier sweat, Frieda walked out of the bedchamber and navigated her way through the front rooms from memory until she reached the front door. She looked down and saw Diomed's bow and sheath were missing from the corner. Her heart gave another sad tug as she opened the door and stepped out into the early morning.

The sun was a few hours from rising but the first tendrils of light were beginning to swarm the sky banishing it from an opaque black to a cool blue. The dagger against her thigh was comforting as she walked down the path they had made from their font door passing a small herb garden to her left and a vegetable patch to her right where the green leafs of potato plants and carrots were sprouting through the soil. She had tried to hand at more complictated items but they did not like her.

Pulling the slightly lopsided gate open, squeaking as she did so, she stepped across the boundary and into the small stretch of grass that ran parallel to their home. Pausing as she let the gate close behind her she pondered for a moment where he would have gone this time. The path to the left led to the woods which had a small clearing a few hundred yards to the east, or the path to the right led down an embankment to a creek which then led to a brilliant lake home to glorious tasting fish.

It would depend on Diomed's current feelings as to which one he went to. If he was angry he would go left into the woods, if he was remorse he would go right as if the water would reflect something back to him. Frieda pressed her hand against her lower back and looked down as she deliberated. She went left. Keeping the blanket tight around her shoulders she enjoyed the feel of the damp grass between her toes as she stepped through the curtain of trees and headed for the clearing, navigating past the sharp rocks in the floor. Her nightmare flashed in her mind as she swooped under a low hanging branch and she heard a shout of frustration come from the direction ahead of her. She had guessed right.

Since she was a child Frieda had been very light on her feet and even now she approached the clearing without nary a sound to give her away. The previous evening's deluge had helped soften her footsteps. As she approached the opening, which was marked by two large boulders on either side, Frieda was once again reminded by how the clearning resembeled a bowl. A twenty foot high cliff wall formed the back of the clearing with a two crescent-moon shaped mounds of earth stretching out from each side and encircling a hollow basin in the middle. The half crescent mounds came to an end on either side of the boulders which left a six foot wide gap to serve as an entrance.

Frieda paused behind one of the boulders and peered into the hollow. The sparse tree canopy above them provided enough early morning light for her to make out Diomed's off-kilter shape in the centre. His back was to her and he did not give away that he had heard her. Frieda took the moment to watch her husband. She could not help but think back on when they first met and how irksome he was to her, but now she rather thought that was the first sign of something between them as much as she would have been loathed to admit it at the time.

Since Eoghan, whom she thought she had loved but only in the way a child knows nothing or no one else, she had been reluctant to open herself up again but Diomed had chipped away at that through the years. He had been patient with her despite how stubborn and plain awful she had been to him at times. Now she looked at Diomed and felt love and pain. She would always feel love but the overriding feeling was now of pain, pain for him.

His bow and arrows were fifteen feet away from him in the dirt as if he had flung them away in frustation and in his hand he was gripping an axe. He would twirl it around his fingers, the axe swinging in an elegant arc, before regripping it in his palm. Diomed let out a howl as he pulled his arm back, his body twisting, before he hurled the axe toward the mud wall. Trees had grown into the side of the cliff made from earth and roots and the axe imbeded itself in a groove. Diomed had been an artful bowman and it was tied into his sense of being. Frieda understood that; after their last battle Frieda had wrestled with finding a new purpose. All she had known was battle but now they had a different journey ahead of them. There were no more battles for them to fight.

Frieda stared at Diomed's back as his shoulders deflated and he hung his head in despair. He was marvelous creature with broad shoulders that travelled into a narrow waist and strong legs, however it was hard to miss the incompletness of his body as his arms rested by his side and one arm finished shorter than the other due to the lack of his hand. Frieda saw his lone hand resting on the chopping board in the roman garrison as the sound of an axe cutting reverberated through her body. Snapping her eyes open she saw Diomed had thrown the axe once more, past and present colliding.

"You shouldn't be here, go home Frieda," Diomed called out but did not turn around.

"How did you-" Frieda frowned, she could always sneak up on him.

"-Go home," Diomed ordered, his voice constricted.

"Only if you come with me," Frieda stepped out from behind the boulder and walked towards him.

"I- I cannot," Diomed sounded tortured, "I need time,"

"I need you," Frieda came to rest beside him and curled her hand around his stump but Diomed pulled away as if she had burned him.

"You don't need me, I'm useless," Diomed grunted, his face contorting, "I can't do anything anymore,"

Frieda looked at the axe imbedded in the tree trunk and wanted to disagree but knew no matter how many times she told him differently he needed to believe it himself. She would continue to tell him though.

"I'm useless to you and to the babe growing inside you," Diomed stalked away from her. Frieda looked down at the small swell of her abdomen and her hand instantly came to rest on top of it. They had not long been joined together before she realised she had missed a bleed. She did not say anything because she could not believe it to happen so fast, but it seemed fate was not waiting around for her to make decisions anymore.

Frieda wanted to tell him that it was yet further proof that Diomed was not useless; far from it in fact as she remembered the previous evening and her cheeks warmed.

"This babe will not care if you have two hands or one-" Freida began.

Diomed scoffed, "-until I need to protect them from something and I cannot."

"We've adapted so far," Frieda reminded him.

"I wish I was just-"

"No." Frieda stalked up to him and wrenched the axe from his grasp, "Do not say it. You could be missing all your hands and all your feet and I would still love you," Frieda cried, she could not bare for him to receed back into that darkness that plagued him the weeks after the battle. Even her declaration of love could not bring him from his revere, she could not lose him to it again. He needed a new purpose. She gripped his hand and brought it to the swell of her stomach. She felt his fingers twitch as if he wanted to pull away but she held him there until he relaxed.

Diomed sighed and rested his forehead against hers, "I'm just scared I won't be able to protect her,"

"Then I shall have to teach you how to fight with a sword," Frieda smirked when Diomed let out a small breath and his mouth tilted up at the corner. It wasn't a full smile but it was close. Thats when an idea formed in her head. Looking around the ground, Frieda located Diomed's bow and arrow that he dropped. As she picked them up she remembered the last time she had used a bow and arrow and pushed it out her mind.

Diomed stared at her in confusion as she stalked back towards him and held the bow and an arrow out to him, "What are you doing?" He frowned.

"Teach me."

"What?"

"Teach me to shoot," Frieda encouraged, "I can shoot for you and I can teach you how to use the sword so that you can protect our child if the need arose,"

"Oh just our child?" Diomed arched a brow.

"Well, if Krista could do it I'm fairly certain I can look after us both whilst they're inside of me," Frieda did recall that they were still wanted by the romans.

Diomed's face blanched and a stern expression cut across his eyes, "You will not be fighting whilst you're with child".

Frieda crossed her fingers behind her back and sarcastically bit out, "Yes, husband,"

Diomed narrowed his eyes at her, not appreciating the sarcasm but nevertheless did not dismiss her idea straight away.

"We should get practicing straight away," Frieda said.

"Later," Diomed said as he dropped the bow and arrow and encircled his arm around Frieda's waist until his stump rested at her lower back and he pulled her closed towards him, his hand reached up and cupped her cheek, "Right now I want to do something else," There was a twinkle in his eye that had been missing.

Frieda felt a warm flush inside of her which came to rest between her legs, "Oh really, again?"

 She reached up and entwined her fingers behind his neck.

"Forever," Diomed swooped down and stole a demanding kiss that left her breathless and wanting to give him everything. And she did.

She gave Diomed her life and he gave her his in more ways than ever before. And approximately 6 months later they gave everything of themselves once more to their daughter, Marcia.