The Hydra Sin

Training

Durendal whistled as it cut through the air and I panted; I had been training for several hours, and I was finally getting to the point of being tired. Unexpectedly, my sword met metal as I swung it and I stopped myself just as I was about to counter-attack.

Meliodas stood on the other side of my sword, holding his own in a defensive position as he smiled gently at me. "Hey Janis, do you want some help? I've found sword training on my own is never very effective."

I simply nodded then moved into position; this was the first time Meliodas and I had really talked ever and I was more than a little nervous, thank heavens for Durendal. He swung first, and I blocked, which smoothly moved into a jab at him; He blocked that and for a moment we just sat, testing the other's strength by pushing as hard as we could. Finally, he jumped back and ran at me again, delivering a flurry of punishing blows; I fended all of them off, then jumped at him, aiming for different parts of his body as I swung in precise, controlled motions.

We fought for what felt like hours, neither of us gaining any ground, while the ferocity of our attacks grew by the blow until the land shook under us.

Elizabeth's POV

I walked towards the pub with Diane, we had been gathering some food in the forest, which had quickly turned into regular girl talk. "So, Elizabeth, what do you think of Janis?" Diane asked me curiously.

"Well," I said, then paused, trying to gather my thoughts, "She seems really sweet. When she found me on the hill after I passed out, she didn't have to save me, but she did. From what I understand, she's done a lot of kind things that she didn't necessarily have to do; I'm actually really looking forward to getting to know her." I smiled shyly and Diane nodded.

"Okay, I was just curious, you've spent some time with her outside of the suspicion we treated her with, so I just wondered. There is just something about her though that seems odd, I can't really explain it, but I'm having kind of a hard time trusting her entirely." She said quietly, which was odd for her, her usual happy smile was nowhere tp ne seen, and her eyes were very serious. I sighed and nodded, then paused as I heard rumbling coming from the direction of the pub.

"Diane, what's that sound? It almost sounds like thunder." I asked tentatively.

"I'm not sure, we're too far away, let's go in case everyone needs us!" She offered me her hand and when I climbed on, she began running; the sound became louder until Diane called to me, "Elizabeth, it sounds like swords!" She exclaimed with worry in her eyes and ran even faster until we burst into a clearing near the pub; what we saw made both of our jaws drop.

There were two figures flashing around the clearing, only becoming identifiable when their swords clashed, then they disappeared again with how fast they were moving.

"Incredible." I heard Diane murmur and I looked up at her.

"What is it, Diane?"

"Meliodas and Janis are sword fighting. I have never seen Captain fight with a sword at full power, from all the stories, he has never crossed swords with his equal and has to hold back or he'll kill his opponent. However, he seems to be holding nothing back and yet he and Janis are almost equally matched."

When she said this, I remembered what the old man Cain had said to me when he gave me a sword for Meliodas that had once been held by someone that Meliodas loved.

Flashback

"Do you know the reason he won't carry a decent sword around with him?" I shook my head and he continued, "He's too powerful, no one who has crossed swords with him has lived to tell the tale; he doesn't like to put himself in that position."

End Flashback

My mouth gaped open and I realized that Meliodas really must trust Janis' strength to fight her like this. I wasn't great at feeling power, but even I could tell the energy that these two were giving off was immense, even greater than when Ban and Meliodas arm wrestled back at Baste prison.

Suddenly the fighting was done and standing in the middle of the clearing, smiling innocently, was Janis and Meliodas, "Hey you two, what are you doing here?" Meliodas asked with that famous sweet guy smile that always made my stomach flip a little bit.

Diane spoke up, "We heard fighting and we came to check it out; what was going on?" She asked and Janis answered.

"I was practicing my sword fighting on my own, but Meliodas swung by and asked if he could help, so we decided to spar."

I looked between the two in worry, "But Sir Meliodas, I thought that you didn't fight anybody with a sword? Cain told me that you didn't want to be put in the position of killing anyone."

He smiled at me gently, "Generally that's true, but I remembered something Zaratras said to me back in the day about how Janis had even beaten him in a sword fight. Zaratras was one of the best swordsmen in the kingdom, and he could even hold his own against me when he tried; so, I knew that if Janis was really that good, then she wouldn't have a problem fighting me."

Janis smiled gently at the compliment then turned to Meliodas, "Are you feeling better? You had a lot of tension and frustration in you at the beginning?" He looked a bit shocked when she said that, then he slowly nodded.

"Yeah, that really helped; how did you know that, Janis? Was it some kind of Banshee thing?"

She actually snorted when he asked that, "What? No, I can't sense any emotions, my magic involves working with the soul's energy directly; I'm just observant and have learned different cues for each of you. It's pretty easy for me to read what you're thinking most of the time.

With that, Janis turned away and started walking towards the pub, I jumped out of Diane's hand and took a step in her direction, "Wait, Lady Janis, where are you going?"

She turned and smiled at me gently, "To drag Ban out of his drunken stupor, it's time he got up, and I want to practice hand-to-hand combat with him before I'm done training for the day." She turned to leave, then paused, "Oh, and Elizabeth? Drop the Lady, I'm just Janis." Then she was gone.

Janis' POV

I walked into the pub and nearly gagged at the overwhelming scent of alcohol; the source was Ban, who was sitting at the counter with a flagon in his hand, "Really Ban? I thought morning drinking was reserved for unbearable circumstances?" He looked up groggily and shook his head.

"Who says this circumstance doesn't call for drinking, besides, I like to start the day off drunk." I shook my head and gently took his cup out of his hands, then grabbed his collar and dragged him out of the pub. "Janis, what the heck? Let me go!"

I remained silent and walked over to a stream that was near where we were; he gave me a stink eye and growled at me as best he could, "Janis, don't even think about throwing me in-" I cut him off as I slung him into the water and he was submerged. When he came up, I was sitting cross-legged on the bank, looking at him blankly.

"You stunk and needed to bathe, but it was pretty obvious you weren't planning on moving anytime soon, so I decided to help you out. Besides, I wanted to do some hand-to-hand combat, and you weren't in any condition to do it like that."

"So I should say thank you?" He sputtered out angrily.

"Now that you mention it, that wouldn't hurt." Then I laughed at the look he was giving me, "But Ban, don't you feel like beating me up now?"

"When the heck did you get this mischievous?" He grumbled and then reached out his hand for help climbing out of the water; I knew what he was probably going to do, but I took his hand anyway.

As expected, he pulled hard on my hand and yanked me into the water with him, I went down with a splash, then while I was underwater, I whipped around and grabbed his legs; heaving upwards and dunking him in the process. Obviously, this led to an all-out war between the two of us, and we began to fight with everything we had; though I did notice that Ban's reaction time was a little slow, probably because of the alcohol that was still in his system.

It was probably a half hour before he had me pinned beneath him, "You admit defeat yet, little one?" He whispered in my ear.

I struggled with everything I had, but there was no getting out, I was well and truly trapped in the mud so I sighed and stopped struggling, "Fine, you win, just get off of me."

He leered down at me slightly and said, "Who said I want to get off, Little One? I rather like the view here." I blushed than transformed into mist and reformed near him.

"Can I give you some advice Ban? If you want to keep your head attached to your shoulders, then don't do crap like that again." I started to walk away, but I was stopped by a hand on my wrist.

"Please stay, I don't want to be alone right now." My eyebrows furrowed at the change in his tone; I looked at him and almost gasped, his expression was sad, and his shoulders were slightly slumped.

"Ban?" I asked, and his eyes just kept pleading with me to stay so I nodded and walked back to the bank of the river and sat down hesitantly. "So, what's up?" I asked and he looked at me, trying to throw me off by looking confused, "Oh come on Ban. Both you and I know that you wouldn't do this unless something big was happening, that and you were drunk this morning; which, from what I remember is relatively rare, so tell me."

He sighed, "Why can I never hide things from you, Janis?" He smiled gently at me and I laughed, "Okay fine, you win; today is the anniversary of the day I lost the woman I loved." He went on to tell me the story about how he tried to steal the Fountain of Youth but was stopped by a mysterious maiden. He was persistent, and eventually, the young girl grew to love him, and he loved her back. Sadly, she was killed by a red demon, right after saving him with the water from the Fountain of Youth.

This was the closest I had ever seen Ban to crying, so I scooched closer to him and wrapped my arm around his shoulders. He stiffened at first, but eventually, he relaxed and allowed me to hold him. when he had finished his story, I moved till I was kneeling in front of him, and looked into his eyes.

"You saw her when you went to the Necropolis, didn't you?" I asked gently, and his eyes widened.

"Yeah, I did, how did you know?"

"It was the way you talked about it, it was way too fresh sounding to have happened twenty years ago, so I took a guess on all that could have happened, and that seemed most likely. I'm sorry Ban, I know what it feels like to be in your position." He looked at me in confusion but waited for me to explain.

"When I was a kid, I lived with my parents and brother in a human village, who had accepted us with open arms. Because of what we were, we kept aloof because otherwise, we would risk them learning the truth about what we were, and nobody wanted that. We lived there peacefully for several years, keeping up the pretense that we were normal humans, but people started to get suspicious when my parents didn't age."

"My Father, was a Holy Knight, one of the best in the kingdom, and he taught my brother and I everything he knew. At one point, there was a bunch of murders in the village, which put everyone on high guard, I wasn't too concerned until it was discovered that the murderer was a Banshee. The villagers became paranoid about everything, and they started to investigate us; once they learned that we were banshees, there was a public uprising against us. We were bound, gagged, and dragged through to the courthouse where a farce of a trial was held. We were found guilty and sentenced to death."

"The villagers knew that banshees were nearly immortal, so they knew that the execution had to leave no chance of survival. They decided that we were to be torn into as many pieces as could be managed, then those pieces were to be burned. My brother and I watched as my parents were killed right in front of us, and all we could do was scream out their names through our gags." I was pulled back into the present briefly by a hand being placed on my shoulder, Ban's eyes were flooded with surprise and sympathy.

I swallowed deeply then continued, "I don't know how Jonas did it, but somehow he managed to loosen his bonds, and he pulled me to my feet and pulled me away from the crowd as they were coming to get us. He stopped to free my legs and told me to run, I obeyed. It wasn't long before I heard the sounds of his screams echoing around me. I don't know how it happened, but my guess would be that they caught him while he was trying to free his own legs and then they executed him. I was able to watch from the shadows as they threw the chunks of his body into the fire, then I ran again, not stopping until my legs gave out from under me."

"Somehow, I had made it to the forest of White Dreams with my arms bound and a gag in my mouth. I laid there until I was found by the prankster imps, who took me in; I stayed there until the King sent for me to become the Kingdom's assassin, which I did grudgingly, not wanting anything to do with the same species that killed my family. What led me to do it, in the end, was remembering that Father was a Holy Knight, and if he could trust the Knights for so long, then so could I."

"Ban, I tell you this not so that you'll feel sorry for me, but so that you know that I do understand what you feel like, what it feels like to be distrusted and blamed, to watch those you love die, and watch the bravest souls who sacrifice themselves for you take your terrible fate. Please know that you can always talk to me... That includes everybody." The last part I said with a slightly raised voice as I looked towards everyone else who had been listening from the sidelines.

They stepped forward solemnly and I smiled, placing my hand on Ban's cheek one more time, then I stood and offered him help to get up.

Meliodas was the first to speak, "I had heard some of your story from Zaratras, but I had no idea... I'm sorry."

I quickly shook my head, "Don't apologize, Meliodas; this all happened over a hundred years ago, so I'm not going to sit here and complain. I just want you to understand why I am the way I am; I would never hesitate to die for any of you, since that's exactly what Jonas did for me."

Everyone nodded then Elizabeth spoke up, "So is that why your sin is the sin of deception? Because you deceived the whole village?"

I grinned, "Well, that may be part of it, but I think the main reason is that the King and Zaratras thought it would be funny to have a spy and assassin whose sin was deception." I chuckled slightly and heard the others do the same.

"Well, if that is it, I really need a bath, so I'm going to have to leave you. Don't have too much fun without me!" I turned around and walked away, hiding the tears that fell down my cheeks because of the stirred-up memories.