Life Goes On

Beatrix looked at the chaos around her. Her lifeless enemies strewn about the once peaceful meadow. She looked down at her hands, sticky with the hot blood. She knew, however, that it was not her own. The accursed flame in the heavens beat down on her armor as a cool northern breeze caused her cape to billow out behind her. Her lips parted, drinking in the breeze as if it were an elixir. Crystalline water for her parched soul.
What’s the use? She thought. I could slay a thousand, no, a thousand thousand more and still, your face would not gaze up at me from the bloodied ground. The whole world could instantaneously incinerate, and still, your face would haunt my dreams, my thoughts…
What’s the use?
Beatrix fell to her knees, head bowed, body as broken as her spirit, her heart. Twittering brought her attention to the skies. Two nightingales flittered about, soaring in and out of each other, all the while singing gaily the earth’s song. The same song that they had been singing centuries ago. The same song they would still be singing, long after her body had corroded and wasted away into dust. If there was peace, the nightingale sang. If the entire world were consumed in turmoil, still the nightingale sang the same sweet song that graced the wind and carried it into the souls of all those who would hear it.
You did this to me, Beatrix thought, turning her gaze, once again, to her gooey fingers. You did this to me, but no more. You may have controlled me once, but now, now it is my turn.
Beatrix threw her head back and laughed aloud. Her voice was not accustomed to being used, let alone in such a gleeful way as this, and cut her off in a half-choke, half-gurgle, but still, she had laughed.
"The willow can age and topple over, whether by menacing axe or of its own accord, and life goes on. The fox can consume all the chickens in the world, and still, the heron’s life goes on. You. You can destroy my love, my heart, my soul, my home, and still—still life goes on."
Beatrix stood. Stood taller than she had in years, and took in a deep, shuddering breath. Not shuddering with fear; not any more. Shuddering with exaltation and renewal. Extracting her sword from its embediment in the soil, Beatrix walked on. And life went on.