----------------------------

  Sara

  ----------------------------

  Sara stood with both feet on bodies, sword still in her hand, but with its tip drooping to rest on the ground. Smoke still rolled off her skin, but it had lightened to a deep, brownish-pink, like old blood spat into a roadside puddle. The sputtering mist coated the ground where she stood some dozen feet in front of the main Tulian line. On the field of canister-shredded bodies. She stood vigil before her army, the first obstacle any Knight would have to surmount before they could reach the general troops. Her shoulders were heaving with every breath, and she felt the weight of her armor like never before, which was odd, considering how little of it she had left.

  Her helmet had been torn away by the spiked hook of a Knight's voulge early on. That had wrenched her neck hard enough that she'd felt several distinct, dangerous pops, forcing her off the frontlines to let a potion swirl its way through her gut. She'd lost both gauntlets at some ter point, though she couldn't remember how. Looking at her knuckles now, she guessed it may have been self-inflicted. Pieces of twisted steel were embedded like wooden splinters in her skin. Of her original suit of armor, she was now only left with her bcksteel breastpte, her boots, and the left set of leg coverings. The right set had been cut off by Evie after a warhammer had smashed it to pieces, locking her leg into immobility.

  Evie, for her part, was watching the battle with the same royal air she always possessed. Her hair was mussed and specks of blood coated her head to toe, but that was it. She had stayed directly behind Sara for the bulk of the fight, engaging only when absolutely necessary. She still hadn't recovered fully from her wound, which had been so severe that not even magical healers had been able to fully repair it. The only part of her that showed true wear was her massive revolver, which was choked to near uselessness by powder fouling. Every time the feline pulled the hammer back a tide of half-burnt grains would fall from within, coating her hands in soot. It was a miracle the thing's chamber could still cycle after suffering through the better part of fifty shots, but Sara was thankful beyond all belief that it did. Almost every one of those shots had saved her life.

  Sara dragged her sword back up into a proper stance, at least doing the part to look intimidating. As if she weren't nearing the point of total exhaustion. The battle was gasping its st all around her, the inevitability of their defeat finally drilling its way into the thick skulls of Sporaton nobility. The commoners had realized it a long time ago, of course. They just hadn't been allowed to retreat, not when doing so would run them into the bdes of their own commanders. The Knights at the rear, the ones in glittering armor wielding enchanted weapons, didn't seem to understand why the cloth-wrapped peasants thought their fight hopeless.

  Through the haze of her fatigue, Sara could scarcely believe it herself.

  He got so close, she thought, staring up at the distant hill. At some point the Sporaton command tent had lost its illusion, leaving Shale to pull back the Ordnance Rifles for bombardment while the Napoleons continued holding the line.

  He got so close, she repeated incredulously. I had everything. Guns. Cannons. Armor. Training. She looked out over her shattered army, which was clinging to the barest thread of resistance. I had everything, and he still nearly won. She swallowed. He could have killed us all. Just a few more men, just a few more days of preparing, and he would have sughtered us to a man.

  Sara felt a shudder roll through her, one she couldn't suppress. The manuscripts Evie had forced upon her often spoke of the danger of thinking too often of an enemy commander's reputation, of becoming paralyzed by fear before the battle had ever started. But she'd never heard of it happening after you'd already won the battle. Of being struck still by fear, feeling at your throat, wondering when the moment would come that your body would finally realize it had been dealt a fatal blow.

  I never would have fought him if I knew, she realized. Never. I never would have left the city if I understood what he was.

  Even with it all but certain that she had won, the battle had been an inarguable disaster. The interwoven lines of marching blocks of spears had danced across the fields under mage shields. The enveloping of her army, the precise way just enough room had been left for her troops to flee, inviting them to break and get run under by cavalry. The thick blocks of reserves that sat just behind the front were rotated forward with the precision of a machine, never ordered too te, never ordered too early, ensuring a constant, unceasing pressure across her entire front. Graf had painted a masterwork of blood across the field with nothing more than half-trained, unmotivated conscripts. Sara was a general. Graf was an artist.

  And then there had been the Knights. As far as she'd been able to tell, once the illusions of the enemy mages had finally fallen, there had only ever been a hundred of them in that final charge.

  Just a hundred Knights. A second shudder rolled through Sara as she thought of Graf's warning before the battle. They have thousands. Five thousand Knights the King could call on in the southern regions of the Kingdom. More than twice that, if he ends end up willing to send everything after us.

  And only a hundred did this.

  Under Graf's command, those hundred Knights had been wielded like a scalpel. They had been plunging straight for the core of her army.

  The cannons.

  They'd survived it, in the end. But gods, it had been close. It had cost them so much. The mess that had been created was what she'd spent the st two hours fighting through, every minute a desperate, half-forgotten struggle. The center of her army, the ones originally to the left and right of the cannons, had panicked. They'd realized that the near-mythical weapons were close to being run under, and they'd dropped everything to sprint and defend them. That had been against her orders. They were supposed to hold the line no matter what, trusting the cannons to defend themselves. Instead the halberdiers arrived nearly in the same moment the cavalry had broken through the hail of canister shot, smashing into the fnks of the charge at the single most important moment.

  It had been pure coincidence. Random luck. Something she had specifically pnned to avoid, something she had ordered them not to do.

  And it had saved the entire battle.

  She hadn't even realized in the moment– only that things had gone to hell, horses and soldiers sprinting past with no one showing any idea of what the fuck was going on. She'd done her best, fighting whoever she found, and that had turned her into a rallying point for her scattered troops. The Sporaton spear blocks, finally seeing a group of soldiers who were pointing their guns somewhere else, had turned the cavalry charge into a general one, inadvertently choking the Knight's only avenue of retreat with a wall of pressed bodies, all the while thinking they were helping.

  And that had been that. Both sides had ignored orders, both had been on the brink of irrecoverable disaster, and when the teetering pendulum of fate had fallen, it was the Tulian Army that had been left standing.

  What can the Night's Eye do? What would he have done to us then?

  Sara wobbled slightly as she stared up at that distant hill, the one that was growing more and more pockmarked by shots from the Ordnance Rifles. Shale was firing solid slugs instead of shells, hoping to nd a hit on one of the tiny dots of gray steel.

  Why is the battle still going? She wondered. Graf had promised he would end things once it became unwindable. That he wouldn't extend the bloodshed beyond what was necessary.

  The King, Sara realized. He stopped Graf from ordering the retreat.

  Thinking back, she could see the moment clearly. The sudden disolving of the army's remarkable maneuvers. A mere minute or two after the cavalry had been held back, the constant bring of bugles had tapered away. Her Blessings kept her appraised by that. The volume of orders had plummeted, control reverting to the Nobles on the field, as was more typical of a Sporaton army. That had been when Graf had stopped commanding, refusing to fight a losing battle.

  "Evie," Sara croaked. She was surprised by her own voice. It was ragged and torn, blood doing more to wet her throat than saliva. She cleared it, speaking again. "Evie."

  "Yes?"

  Sara had been about to say something else, but she suddenly couldn't remember what it was.

  "Water, please," she rasped instead.

  "Of course. Step back from the front line, Master."

  Sara forced her aching muscles to unclench, her exhaustion finally betrayed by the way her legs quivered. She began the slow process of stumbling over bodies to rejoin the line. At the sight of her struggling, a half-dozen halberdiers broke away, rushing to her aid.

  Evie's slowly swiping tail went rigid, her ears swiveling to face the approaching halberdiers even while she kept her face twoards Sara. The soldiers skidded to a stop with the same acrity as if the feline had whirled on them in a frothing rage, then practically threw one another out of the way in their haste to retake their pce in the formation.

  Sara chuckled, a sound that was little more than a breathless huff. Still, Evie smiled lightly as she slipped under Sara's arm, supporting her weight.

  "It seems they've learned my mannerisms well, Master. Neither my mother nor I spent enough time among the commoners to foment such familiarity with a Feline's body nguage."

  "Maybe-" Sara stopped to cough into her elbow, which came away wet with blood, "Maybe they know from the Catfolk. There's more of them here than in Sporatos."

  "For some reason, the instinctual behavior of a Catfolk's secondary characteristics differs greatly from my own, Master. As different as cats and dogs, really. In your parnce, I believe that would indicate we share no evolutionary lineage."

  Despite herself, Sara let out another huffing ugh, spitting another wad of blood. Even sparing the breath to ugh forced her to lean harder on Evie, who took the weight easily.

  "The hell are you talking about, girl? Why does that matter right now?"

  "I've read that distraction can be good at times like this. Drink."

  Sara blinked, looking down at the canteen Evie had raised to her lips. They were already well behind the Tulian lines, standing in a space that had been cleared for them.

  Sara didn't question it. She drank, putting her lips on the metal.

  Her eyes shot open as she tasted the sweet, sludgy alcohol of Hurlish's favored drink. She tried to pull away, but Evie pressed the canteen forward.

  "Drink," she instructed firmly. "If you need a clear head, you will drink a potion for it. You've spat more blood in the past few minutes than has fallen from your other wounds throughout the entire battle. Honey and alcohol are disinfectants. I fear that st mage's spell scorched your throat."

  Sara blinked in confusion, but didn't resist. She didn't remember any mage spell like that, much less another gas attack. After Midwich, she'd have thought any mage throwing poison or acid around for her to breathe in would have been pretty damn obvious to her. Then again, she was slowly realizing there was quite a lot she couldn't remember of the st few hours.

  Sara took the canteen from Evie and began to drink in earnest, allowing herself the small pleasure of its fvor. The southern mead Hurlish preferred was uncommon, disliked for the thick, syrupy texture it acquired from the volume of honey required to hide the truly shocking volume of alcohol it carried. Swallowing hurt the muscles of her throat something fierce, but the scratches that lined it welcomed the soothing honey with open arms.

  A sudden cry from somewhere behind caused Sara to drop the canteen, fumbling for her sword while Evie leapt in front of her, pistol and rapier ready in a fsh.

  As her eyes focused and the shouts became more distinct, Sara lowered her sword back into its scabbard. The troops were shouting because the shattered remains of the Sporaton army– which had retreated to hold position just out of musket range– were finally turning around. They'd begun the slow march across the field they'd crossed so quickly a few short hours before, hurried on their way by growing cries of etion from the Tulian army. Many soldiers were dropping where they stood, starting to peel off their baking armor. Sergeants were already beginning a tear up and down the lines, verbally or physically assaulting anyone who was foolish enough to disrobe while the enemy was in sight, but it was almost useless. After spending hours staring death itself in the face, the exhausted troops were discovering that an officer red in the face with fury was a far less intimidating sight than it had been a few short hours ago. They'd won. Getting their armor off was the most important thing in the world at that moment.

  Sara hardly paid attention to that, however, because she saw something else. Behind the Sporaton army, at the very crest of the hill, was a gathering crowd of cavalry.

  They weren't the shining paragons of strength Sara knew from before. At least, the animals themselves weren't. The Knights still wore all their armor, but the fnks of their steeds were bare, creating a wall of brown and gray fnks. It was the rest of the cavalry, the st of the original five hundred that had marched south with the Sporaton army. Maybe a hundred and twenty horses and riders, and when she managed to fumble her spygss up to her eye, she saw that many horses and riders showed the signs of recently treated wounds.

  But they were facing east. And they were accelerating.

  ----------------------------

  Evie

  ----------------------------

  Evie recognized what was happening several seconds before Master did. That early start allowed her a precious few moments to prepare.

  Master tried to lunge forward, putting her fingers to her lips to whistle for Trot, but Evie was ready. She snagged Master's wrist and forced it down, arresting her charge by grabbing the rger woman's armor at her waist.

  "No," Evie snapped simply, spinning Master to face away from the cavalry.

  "They're going for the city!" She hissed, the once-dying fire relit in her eyes.

  "They may be going for the city," Evie conceded, "but they may be simply feigning such a maneuver. Why form atop the hill? Why so btantly dispy their intent?"

  "Because the King's a fucking prick," Master growled, taking a step forward, dragging Evie with her.

  If Master's statement meant that she suspected the King, recognizing the battle as lost, was petuntly making sure the Tulian Army knew the city would soon be under an assault they could not readily stop? Then yes, Evie would have been forced to agree. Fortunately, her Master's statement left enough ambiguity for misdirection.

  Despite her prompt dismissal, it took several moments longer before Master fully registered Evie's words. Only then did she straighten slightly, gncing back.

  Evie met Master's gaze evenly. Her lover's eyes were vibrating with a barely restrained, utterly contemptuous rage, as if all the world could be torn like tissue paper in her hands. Yet those hate-filled eyes couldn't quite focus on Evie's face. They were looking as they were in two slightly different directions, their pupils unevenly dited as they bounced between Evie and the distant cavalry. The woman was delirious, likely concussed several times over, and barely capable of standing. It didn't matter if Evie was acting as the second in command of an army, as the Steward of Tulian, or a lover: she could not allow the risk of Sara riding the twenty miles back to Tulian. She took a deep breath, preparing her argument.

  "You've already thought once before that an apparently foolish move was the King's doing, only to be taken unaware by Graf's hidden ploy," Evie reminded her. "Do you wish to take that risk again? To abandon your army, only to find that the commoner's retreat is nothing but a feint?"

  Her Master blinked several times, slowly. Evie could see the words working their way through her mind, picking up momentum as they went.

  "Things have changed. Graf gave up. You can tell this one isn't fake."

  "How can you be certain?"

  "Nothing's ever certain in battle, but some things are more likely than others."

  Evie frowned at Sara using one of her own maxims against her. "What of your army, then?" Evie tried instead. "They are wounded as they have never been before. They need your support."

  "The city needs my support."

  "You are half-dead." Evie's voice rose, fury getting the better of her. "Yes, you are powerful, and yes, you are a Champion, but your body has nothing left to give!"

  Master stepped forward, looming over Evie. "I have enough left. I have to. I don't have any choice."

  Evie's hands clenched. She nearly raised a fist to prove just how weak her Master was, but stopped herself. A better idea had occurred to her.

  "Sergeant!" Evie snapped, pointing at a nearby soldier who had been pretending not to hear the argument. "Come over here and shove the Champion."

  The man looked between Master and Evie, abject terror pin on his face. Master ughed, however, and didn't countermand Evie's order, so the Sergeant reluctantly approached, raising a hand.

  Master spped his first shove away with what seemed like contemptuous ease, until her knees suddenly wobbled, the basic motion throwing her off bance. The Sergeant immediately shoved again, and this time Master was struck square in the chest, stumbling backward. The Sergeant, no stranger to such an opportunity, instinctively flung his leg out, sweeping Master off her feet. The Champion of Amarat nded on her back with a grunt, shock clear on her face.

  "Don't let her up," Evie instructed. The Sergeant obediently stepped forward, pcing their boot on Master's chestpte. Evie stepped around the prone woman, leaning forward to look her in the eye.

  "If you cannot even protect yourself from a single Sergeant, Master, how will you fare against a Knight?"

  Master's only response was to growl out her frustration, shoving the boot off her chest. The sergeant slipped to one side, but quickly recovered themselves, pinning Master back down before she could get up. To the man's credit, his fear had been repced by disbelief– and no small amount of pride. The number of people throughout history that could truthfully cim to have restrained a Champion were very, very few. Evie doubted he would include the rest of the story's details in ter recountings, of course.

  "If you could stand up, Master, I would entertain the thought that you are capable of defending the capital. But you cannot. Look at me and speak honestly. If you were in my position, would you allow me to ride off into battle?"

  After a few more limp attempts to free herself, Master fell back, breathing hard. She gred up at Evie for a long moment, then gnced away.

  "...no."

  "Exactly." Evie raised a pinched pair of fingers to her lips, whistling loudly. Trot's handlers would be releasing the deaf horse shortly. "I will move to take control of the capital's defenses. You will recover with the army, preparing for an enemy attack. Sergeant, you may release the Champion."

  Profoundly relieved to be freed from a domestic dispute between two inordinately powerful Irregurs, the man all but sprinted back to his squad. Evie's ears flicked to the sound of Trot approaching, the horse, as always, unerringly seeking Master out the moment it had been freed. She reached out to help Master up, setting the woman back on unsteady feet.

  "You will see the healers next," Evie instructed. "Then the surgeons to inspect your throat and lungs. Only then will you resume command of the army. In the meanwhile, Colonel Targ will be pced in charge."

  "He's dead," Sara stated simply.

  Evie frowned. Colonel Targ had been one of the army's only commanders with prior experience in the Tulian Kingdom's army. A considerable loss.

  "Colonel Sarig, then," she said. "Colonel Alsen is still too hot-tempered, and Ese and the First Combat Engineers will be required to construct temporary defenses."

  Master looked as if she wanted to argue, but had no energy for it. She blew out a long, suffering breath.

  "Fine. Fucking fine, then. I hope to god they're not actually going for the city, but..." She shook her head. Even the subtle movement caused her to nearly lose her bance. She had to pnt her feet more firmly to avoid falling ft.

  "I will be leaving, then. I will communicate as necessary."

  "Goddammit," she swore yet again. "God-fucking-damnit. Shit. Fucking... Alright."

  "It will be alright, dear," Evie replied calmly. She turned to Trot, who had approached the discussion until Evie had felt his hot breath blowing over her neck. His ears flicked at her as she moved to pull herself up into his saddle, but that was all. He was among the only horses in Tulian who had grown accustomed enough to Evie's feline features to not immediately buck her from the saddle.

  Evie tugged on the reins and circled Trot around, negotiating her way through the still-chaotic press of the disheveled Tulian Army.

  The very instant she was out of Master's sight Evie leaned forward in the saddle, cracking Trot's reins. The horse burst into a sprint as Evie's heels dug hard into his fnks, the panic she had worked so hard to hide finally bursting forth.

  ----------------------------

  Emeric

  ----------------------------

  The distance between the battle and the city had been trivial to cross. A day's march on foot, barely a half-hour's ride on horseback.

  The walls that had greeted them upon their arrival were in disrepair. Their grandiose enchantments had spent a decade wasting away.

  The defenses which sat upon them were ughable. It had been weeks since Emeric had first condemned wooden ballistae to the pages of history.

  The strange white stone the Champion so favored had been attached in cancerous lumps to the dark walls of Tulian, a narrow slot cut in each fortification. Had they been occupied by cannons as was reportedly intended, they would have been a deadly, nigh-insurmountable obstacle. Without those mystical weapons, however, they were simply a weak link in the once-mighty walls. Their attached mages ripped a hole in the stonework within a minute of their arrival, scattering powdery chunks across the grass with ease.

  Behind the now-shattered fortification was a hole to the interior of the wall, a narrow passageway that ran the length of the city's defenses. Presumably this was how the cannons would have been transported to the fortifications. The gap that had been opened was hardly something that an army could have traveled through, but it was more than enough for teams of Knights to enter. They passed into the shadow of the Tulian Republic without so much as a scratch suffered, ignoring the paltry, panicked reaction of the so-called Tulian Guard atop the walls, who offered only a desultory rain of arrows and two lonely, wildly inaccurate firearms shots.

  Despite the fact that he was at the head of the formation, Emeric had watched these events occur with an impassive eye, as if he were not truly present. He had been given his task. It had been expined to him in detail. He had nodded and saluted, saddling his horse. From the moment he committed the orders to memory, he did not think further of them. He left them for a ter self, secreting them away within some bckened, shriveled part of his conscience he had not known existed.

  And then he had turned his attention to other tasks. To ensuring his cavalry would return safely from this raid. To providing them the best opportunity to accomplish their objective that he could. There was little else he could do, restrained by the chains of duty as he was.

  Once he was within the city, however, he felt himself beginning to wake. There was too much to be done for him to continue floating in a fog. He called for a halt within the immediate shadow of the wall, ordering his Knights to dismount. Without their armor, their horses were far too exposed to risk in the tight confines of city streets. A contingent of the less-experienced Knights would remain behind to guard them while the rest continued on.

  The Knights split up into several groups, following the directions they had been provided to the centers of Tulian's industries. Emeric heard the sounds of citizenry fleeing in terror as word of their arrival spread, which he forced from his mind.

  He was too busy scanning the side streets. His eyes crawled along each door and window, peering deeply into the shaded corners of twisting alleys. Paranoia was a sickly companion to the rot in his gut, conspiring to make this final task of his a miserable hell.

  Not that it wasn't already. Emeric had been prepared for much in the event of the army's defeat. The shame of failure. Accepting bme heaped upon him, both deserved and undeserved. Seeing the scorn in his peer's eyes as he told them of how their friends, their families, had been torn to shreds by the Champion's firearms, all whilst under his command.

  But he hadn't been prepared for something so heinous. So degrading. So...

  Shameful.

  He had been ordered to bring shame to the Kingdom of Sporatos. By its own monarch, no less. He had been ordered to kill, to sughter, to take the lifetime he had spent honing his talents and turn them to nothing more than senseless killing. To do so when the war was still in its most violent phase was one thing. He would have accepted this. It would have been a dark, bloody affair, but it would have made sense. Killing those who could manufacture more of the damnable firearms was a sound strategy when doing so could mean fewer of the weapons turned against the Kingdom. But after the battle was lost? When the army was on the retreat?

  This was not sensible. It was spite. Childish, vindictive spite.

  Yet Emeric was a Knight. He would follow his King's orders, and there would be no second-guessing his Lord's order. He knew his pce in the world, and it was as an instrument of the King's will. No matter where it was swung, his bde was the King's. Though he knew it would stain him forever, the only greater failure would have been the abandonment of his duty.

  They moved through the city like stalking beasts, driving before them a stampede of panicking peasantry. The screams echoed up and down the street, floating over the patchwork roofs of the once-resplendent Tulian capital. When he turned his ear to it, he could hear simir sounds filtering in from across the city. Those were caused by the many other contingents seeping their way down the streets, working their way to their objectives across the city.

  Without the enemy's cannonry or the Champion to lead them, there was next to nothing in the city which could stop even a single one of the Knight's bdes. Perhaps the only reason he had ordered them to travel in groups of a dozen or so was his fear of the remote chance that amongst the popuce was hidden some forgotten veteran of the Tulian Kingdom, one of a Level which could prove a threat to his Knights. The Tiger of Sacia was present in the city, yes, but he was bound by Oath to nonviolence, and thus a non-factor. The possibility of a here-to-fore unidentified Irregur and the limited supply of firearms which might be present among the Tulian Guard had persuaded him to keep the Knights in groups.

  As if summoned by his thoughts, there was a sudden crack from an alleyway, powder smoke vomiting forth from the shadows.

  Emeric arrested his sprint in a spray of chipping cobblestone, lowering his head and charging in the direction of the fire. He raised his armored forearm over the eyeslits of his helmet, bracing for the shots he knew were to follow.

  But there were none. He reached the point where the shot had been fired and lowered his arm just long enough to gauge the location of his target, feinting right, swinging from the left. He held back the full strength of his blow, readying himself for it to be knocked aside, for the inevitable fsh of silver reaching for his eye–

  Only for his poleaxe to crash through meat and bone, an uppercut from the hammer striking with such force it lifted the overly-brave Tulian peasant up off their feet, flung skyward like a ragdoll. Their body hit just beside a second story window, falling in several mangled pieces.

  Emeric wasted no time. There were other figures in the shadows, and one may be her. He id into them all with a roar, crushing heads and severing limbs as his poleaxe whipsawed from left to right, lunging forward to spear the spines of those who attempted to run.

  His Knights reached him a moment ter, having reacted far too slow to the shot. No more than a handful of seconds had passed, but twelve bodies y on the stones around him. All were dead. He stood over the bodies, panting heavily, white knuckles clenched around his poleaxe.

  "Nervous, are we, Emeric?" One of the Knights chuckled, nudging a body with her foot. Ser Leida, he recognized. Amongst the more skilled of the Knights present, owing to the training afforded her by her Father's status as a Duke. Normally, though he was in nominal command of her, Emeric made a point to treat her gently, always aware of the disparity in their status. Fifth child or not, the daughter of a Duke far outranked any unnded Knight.

  Normally.

  Today he whirled on her, grabbing her by the colr of her armor to sm her into the wall, drawing his face close.

  "You have no idea what waits for us here," he hissed violently, covering the inside of his facepte in spittle. "If you do not react promptly to each threat, do not fight each foe that appears as if your life is on the line, you will lose it."

  The woman scoffed at him, as aware of the disparity in their statures as Emeric was. His threatening dispy was incapable of intimidating her, no matter the disparity in their Skills.

  "Cat got your tongue, Sir Emeric?" She asked, the words dripping sarcasm. She did not make even a cursory attempt to break his grip, choosing to remain dangling quite merrily against the wall. "Who would have thought the uded commoner-turned-Knight would be so afraid of a mere sve? I hear she did quite a number on your knee some weeks back. Is that it? Does it ache like a demon-wound, warning you whenever she is near? Or are you simply cowed by the mere thought of her presence?"

  Emeric dropped Leida without warning, taking selfish gratification in seeing her stumble. He put his back to her, looking over the bodies to confirm their identities while he spoke. They were not even members of the city Guard. Just peasants who had found a single firearm and some short swords and thought they could kill a Knight.

  "Insult all you want, Ser Leida," Emeric said, grunting slightly as he collected the musket which had fired the errant shot. He could still feel the heat of its barrel through the leather palm of his gauntlet. "If the former Lady Eliah appears to face us, you will not engage her blindly. We will gather ourselves and attack her together, in coordinated fashion. I forbid any other action."

  She ughed again, louder, and was this time joined by several other Knights.

  "You think she is such a threat? We number twelve, Emeric. If she is foolish enough to face us in the open, we would run her under in a moment."

  Emeric dug his fingers into the wooden stock of the firearm, crushing the wood to pulp. "She will do no such thing. She is not a Knight, Ser Leida. She is of the Night's Eye. Trained by Graf Urs. And Graf Urs, you well know, does not fight with honor. She will ambush from a position we do not anticipate, silently killing several before we register her presence. When we do finally notice her, she will continue danging through our formation while we are still in a state of shock, likely maiming several more."

  Emeric's fingers finished crushing their way through the firearm's wood, finding the weapon's metal mechanisms at the base of the barrel. He tore them out, tossing the to the cobblestones, speaking in low, even tones as he did so.

  "Only when multiple Knights engage her at the same time will she be forced to retreat, and she will inevitably do so into some pre-prepared location, likely a chokepoint which forces us to face her in single combat. If she is successful in this, none of you will engage her. Only I. The rest of you would be but mbs to the sughter."

  "A gloryhound then, Sir Emeric?" Leida asked. "So desperate to prove to the world you're less a fool than you appear, so you demand we leave you to your prize?"

  "Had I any real care for your argument at this time, I could easily enough dig into the impossibility of your accusations. Am I a coward or a gloryhound, Ser Leida? One cannot be both. But I do not, and will not."

  The woman sneered at Emeric, proper disdain entering her voice for the first time. "We have every right that you do to cim the blood of the Mad Champion's consort, Emeric."

  Emeric's bootheel smmed down onto the mechanisms of the musket, bending them to uselessness. "You have every right to kill her," he agreed, shouldering his poleaxe. "But not the ability. Silence now. We are nearing our first objective."

  ----------------------------

  Hurlish

  ----------------------------

  Hurlish sat in her forge, idly twirling a bit of rope between her fingers. Around her sat just about every one of the kids that worked her forge, looking nervous as all the hells. They were sitting in chairs, or on anvils, or on work tables, each of them clenching their own bits of rope like their life depended on it. Sweat stained their clothes, and they flinched at each and every sound that filtered in from across the city, wide eyes darting back and forth, waiting for a shining Knight to break into the courtyard. Hurlish hadn't bothered to shut the storm shutters, so they were all in pin sight, which clearly added to their anxiety.

  Hurlish wish they'd unwad their panties. Not like wood shutters would do shit against a Knight, anyway. If she was gonna go out, she wanted to go out with a bit of a breeze on her face.

  Not that she pnned on dying anytime soon, of course. But still. She was risking a whole hell of a lot here, and she wasn't going to do it without at least a bit of bravado. 'Pregnant woman killed cowering in corner' made for good martyr bait, but it wasn't the epitaph she was aiming for.

  Across the courtyard, the first Knight jogged into the open, followed shortly behind by a gaggle of other pretty-armored fucks. She whistled out a leering catcall, both to draw their attention, and because it was, admittedly, some pretty damn nice armor. She'd kill for a set half as nice, and she wasn't afraid to admit it.

  The Knights saw Hurlish sitting at her forge, surrounded by her apprentices, and seemed to pretty damn shocked about it. Sure, they'd come looking for her here, but she doubted they thought they'd actually find her there.

  Evie's gonna be goddamned pissed, Hurlish thought, pushing herself up from her chair. I'm not gonna get any head for a week if I live through this.

  Evie had, of course, prepared an exhaustive list of escape routes for Hurlish, including temporary safehouses scattered throughout the city in the even she couldn't leave. Each of them had enough food and water to keep her going for literal months, going so far as to include health potions to help her through giving birth if she was still in hiding. They were good pns, good safehouses, and with how much warning Hurlish had, she could have chosen any one of them to keep herself safe.

  Problem with doing that was two-fold. First of all, every escape pn would've ended up with her getting separated from Sara and Evie for weeks at best, months at most. Part of the pn involved ditching the communication crystals, in case the Sporatons captured others intact and tracked her down using them, so she'd have no way of knowing what went down. She'd be separated from Evie and Sara for weeks at best, and more likely months. She might've already had the kid by the time they next meet up.

  Second, it was a bitch move. Running or hiding would mean Hurlish would be leaving everyone she'd met in Tulian to their fates, and from what she'd gathered, it was a shitty-ass fate. Best case scenario, the kids Hurlish had spent so long teaching would end up being tortured for everything they knew. Most likely, they'd just be killed. Worst case, they'd be tortured for nothing more than fun, raped, and then killed.

  So no. Hurlish wasn't running. As she stood to greet the Knights, she lifted up the tiny little rope in her left hand and held up a crystal firestarter, lighting the rope's end. Behind her, the rest of the smiths and apprentices clicked their crystals together, doing the same.

  "Hey!" Hurlish yelled at the Knights, who were approaching in a loose semi-circle, watching her with no small amount of suspicion. "Y'all know what this is?" She waved her burning, sparking fuse at the barrels that were littered around the forge, and the loose powder that was held in open flour bag.

  "Hurlish of Hagos?" The lead Knight called. A woman, by the sound of it.

  "Hurlish of Tulian, these days," Hurlish called back. There were maybe fifty feet between them. Hurlish wasn't stupid enough to think that was a safe distance from a Knight. If they were worth their shit, they could cover that distance in a blink. "You never answered my question, though, and it's a big one. You know what this shit is?"

  Hurlish once again waved the sparking fuse over the barrels, which made her apprentices recoil in terror, as if a few extra inches would make any difference. They were all holding lit fuses, anyway, so she didn't see why they should care.

  Ended up being helpful, though, because it was their flinch that gave it away to the Knights.

  "Bck powder," Hurlish heard one of them say. Not the leader, some other shiny fuck, but it was good enough for her.

  "Sure is! And do any of you know what happens when you light bckpowder on fire? Any guesses?"

  The lead Knight took a step closer, their voice dropping to a growl.

  "You would not dare."

  Hurlish made a face, looking between the lit fuse and piles of literally knee-deep bckpowder.

  "What? What do you mean by that?"

  "You would die. All those behind you would die. You would condemn yourself to death in an instant."

  Hurlish's expression grew bewildered. "Huh? The fuck are you on, dy? What do you mean 'I wouldn't dare'? You think this is a fake fuse?" She waved it back and forth, its glowing tip trailing a thin river of smoke that drifted upward. "It's not. If you kill us, any of us, we'll drop it, and what happens next is between you and the gods. And seriously, you actually think I wouldn't? Why the hell would I not? You're gonna kill us all anyway, so we might as well take your pretty asses out with us."

  "We seek to repatriate and learn from you, not murder–"

  "Bull-fucking-shit," Hurlish interrupted.

  The Knight, of all things, seemed most taken aback by this comment.

  "You were of Sporatos, Hurlish. A locally renowned bcksmith, were you not? You should know how to speak to your betters. If you recall your lessons in propriety, you may survive the day."

  "First of all, no I won't. Ain't no way your King is gonna do anything other than go home and take a sad jack-off into his wife's urn or whatever the fuck it is you weird rich assholes do, and he sure as shit isn't going to build more of the guns that just whooped his sorry ass." The Knights sputtered under this assault, taking breaths to begin shouting, but Hurlish wasn't done. "And second, yeah, I know how I'm supposed to talk to your types, but if you think all those peasants you talked to ever really wanted to lick your taint while you gave them orders, you're a dumb motherfucker."

  "You are utterly revolting."

  "Champion of Amarat didn't think so," Hurlish countered, patting her belly-bump. "And I guess that's another reason why you aren't gonna do shit to me. To throw your own words back at you, you wouldn't dare."

  "We have no reason to fear that woman," the Knight spat. "She is not a Champion born for combat. Your threat falls on deaf ears, peasant."

  Hurlish raised an eyebrow. "Really? Really? You think that killing the pregnant lover of the Champion of Passion would go well for you? You think she'd just up and forget about it? Her?" Hurlish jabbed the fuse towards the Knight's chest for emphasis. "You're fresh off the battlefield. You've probably seen her fight. Probably seen her kill some of your friends, too. Seen the smoke coming off her skin. Heard her ughing right in someone's face while she kills 'em. Do you actually, honestly think that if you kill me, it's gonna end up alright for you? That you have any idea what she'll do to you when she gets her hands on you?" Hurlish took a step back, deeper into the forge, further into the piles of bckpowder. "I bet one of you has got a bow. You could probably shoot me, if you really wanted to. Maybe you could even do it from far enough away that me dropping this fuse won't end up with your guts painting half the city."

  Hurlish's lips split in a wide, toothy grin, tusks bouncing as cold steel entered her words.

  "Speaking honestly with you, though, I wouldn't recommend it. If you're gonna kill me and blow this whole fucking pce up, I think you should do it right up close and personal. Maybe even take your armor off first, just to really make sure there's nothing left but paste. Because I assure you, no matter what happens to your body when this powder goes off? It'll be nothing next to what she does to you."

  Silence fell over the courtyard. There was little more than the sound of sparking fuses, distant screams, and Hurlish's heavy breathing.

  Silently, one by one, the Knights began to turn away. The leader of their little group was st, her fury made pin in the way her sword trembled in her grip. Hurlish stared her down.

  And eventually, just as silent as the rest, she straightened. Turned. And walked away.

  "Fucking pussy," Hurlish mumbled, sitting back down. She kept the lit fuse over the bckpowder, wondering if any other Knights would be stupid enough to head her way.

  -----------------------------

  Emeric

  -----------------------------

  The building which housed Tulian's fledgling artificers was a mundane, blocky structure. Three stories tall and perhaps half a block wide, what few gss windows it possessed were simple unadorned gss panes, the rest of the openings having been covered with cheap wooden sts. Multiple entrances dotted its exterior, the doors swinging limply in the breeze. It had clearly been abandoned within minutes of their approach to the city.

  "Burn it," Emeric instructed. He joined the other Knights in retrieving oil-soaked torches from their enchanted bags, lighting them afme. Though the building's exterior was stone, its interior was wood. Once the supports failed, it would colpse like tinder.

  Streaks of fme crashed through windows as the Knights set to obliterating the artificery building, not bothering to enter, simply whipping the projectiles in from the street. Among all the city's objectives, destroying this structure was perhaps the most delicate of tasks, which was why Emeric had assigned it to himself. The King had been unsure of the exact arrangements the Champion had made with the Carrion Navy to acquire the service of their artificers, and was concerned the artificers were still considered citizens of the Carrion Navy. Should Sporatos be found responsible for killing several dozen skilled Carrion artisans, a war would be inevitable. The Carrion Navy would raze the Sporaton coastline to the ground.

  Emeric was therefore profoundly relieved that the building had been evacuated before his arrival. It circumvented a great many difficulties he had feared to overcome.

  It was in the course of this sacking of the Artificery Guild that Emeric heard the first sounds of true combat echoing out over the city. Gunfire. Several shots in rapid succession, not like the roar of a volley, but sequential, one after the other. He counted six before the firing stopped, repced by the faintest crash of steel sounded.

  "Form up!" Emeric yelled. "The building is already afire. We will move to the sounds of combat!"

  For perhaps the first time since the greater battle had been lost, the Knights followed Emeric's orders without so much as a mutter. They tossed the torches that were already lit into the upper windows of the Artificery Guild and turned away, drawing their weapons. Disobedient and disrespectful though they may have become, Emeric could not fault their eagerness for battle.

  Emeric set off at a quick jog just as a second series of shots sounded. Echoing over the rooftops as they were, the sounds took on a quiet, tinny quality, ill-fitting for the devastation he knew they were unleashing. Once more, he counted six shots, followed thereafter by the csh of steel. He adjusted his course, turning down a thin, winding street, seeking out the most direct path.

  The sounds of conflict grew louder. A fight that should have been over in seconds continued to escate, bde meeting bde. Indistinct shouts began to filter in. He could understand little. Only that there was someone challenging the Knights in a way that could not be expined by simple firearm-wielding peasants.

  The sounds of the melee faded once more, repced shortly thereafter by another sequence of gunshots. They were louder now, far louder, and Emeric could hear the cries of pain which accompanied them. Yet again, it was six shots that were fired. Something deep within his gut told him that the number was significant, though he knew not why.

  Just as the st echoing boom faded, the street Emeric had been following deposited him onto a far rger thoroughfare. The former King's Keep of the Tulian Kingdom stood across the road, spires twisting high into the sky. The building had once been surrounded by finely worked stone walls and elegant metal fencing, but it seemed most of this had been torn away for the material to be used elsewhere. Only the smallest glimmers of its once resplendent beauty had been spared, and only because the Champion's workers had not yet gotten around to salvaging the once-elegant materials. The great gates which had opened into the King's greeting hall were missing, repced by shoddy brickwork and a ughably small door at the center. The green gardens which once enveloped the entrance were overgrown and untamed, pnts far taller than a man showing no sign of care. The entryway to the Keep was rgely patterned in a U shape, the wings of the great halls branching to either side of the gardens which surrounded the fine cobblestone walkway.

  And, as if to accentuate the Champion's disregard for the history of the Tulian Kingdom, eight dead Knights y on the ground.

  The shudder that ran through his own troops went ignored by Emeric, who took slow, measured steps forward, keeping his attention roaming across the courtyard. There was no one else. His Knights walked with him in a loose line, weapons drawn and held at the ready.

  Emeric stopped at the first body. Confirmed with a quick gnce to either side that he was being covered, he knelt down and rolled the Knight over.

  Their facepte was a mess of twisted steel and dark blood. A hole as rge as Emeric's thumb had punched through the center of the visor. Tilting their head to one side, he saw that the entire back half of their skull was missing.

  Emeric lowered the Knight's head with respectful reverence, then stood. He took his own poleaxe into a ready position.

  "She is here," he stated simply. "Remember what I said. Attack her as one or not at all. Is this understood?"

  A series of nods went up and down the line. While their disdain for Emeric had not lessened, the sight of their comrade's bodies had at least sobered their arrogance.

  Emeric stepped over the first corpse, slowly making his way towards the Keep's shoddy front door. Even knowing there was nothing that he could do for them, he could not keep his eyes from flicking over the other Knight's wounds. Each had been struck through the head in one way or another, and in such a fashion that Emeric could see how the ambush had occurred. They had been making their way towards the Keep when the first shot had taken the leading Knight through the head, throwing them to the ground directly next to the spray of blood. The other Knights had charged forward, only to find themselves struck down one by one. That they had died on the run was obvious from the way that the blood spatters coated the stones some distance from where they eventually fell, their body's momentum sending them skidding across the stone. All y face-down.

  Except for the st two. They y just before the Keep's door, helmets facing the sky. Emeric paused, looking through the right Knight's eye slit. Their left eye was in bloody ruin, as if a needle had been pced through the pupil, then jerked violently from side to side. Leaning over, he saw the second Knight's death had been the same. They had both tried to force their way through the Keep's door, which forced them to engage her one at a time.

  With a quick gesture to the other Knights to follow, Emeric began backing away from the Keep. His eyes quickly scanned the open windows he could see. There was no sign of waiting eyes, which would have been silhouetted against the dark interior of the Keep.

  "Brace," he whispered. The other Knights looked at him, expressions hidden behind their helmets, their posture betraying confusion.

  A few months ago, Emeric never would have done what he was about to do. But times had changed. The foes he faced no longer left room for chivalry. His fingers closed around the gorget of a fallen Knight.

  With a sudden shout he could not quite suppress, Emeric flung the body at the flimsy wooden door. As it left his hand, he spared the briefest thought for the fact that he had not even checked to see who it was. If he had trained with them, dined with them, considered them a friend.

  The armored Knight's corpse blew through the Keep's door, its impact not quite loud enough to ward off the horrified gasps of his fellow Knights.

  There was no time to care. Emeric lowered his shoulder into a charge, once more throwing his forearm over his eyes as he sprinted as fast as he could.

  Only to find his right ear deafened, a shot ringing out. He threw himself to the ground, tucking into a roll that ended just before the steps up to the Keep's former gate, where he sprung to his feet facing the direction of the shots.

  The former heir to House Eliah had appeared within the tangled garden plots, some camitous bck weapon in her left hand. She held it with a strange stance, turned aside with her feet in line, gring down the length of her arm, which was wreathed in white smoke. Her right hand held her rapier loosely, its tip just barely dangling above the cobblestones.

  From handle to tip, the bde was coated in a deep, crimson red. Viscera clung to it, chunks of flesh that had been torn from the bone. Somehow, even though his ears were still ringing from the first shot, Emeric thought he could hear it. The thick, bck drops of blood dripping off the bde.

  She's going to kill them all.

  "RUN!" He cried.

  Emeric broke into a true sprint, as fast as he had ever run. His boots shattered the cobblestone's mortar as he threw himself forward, trying to cover the thirty feet or so before she could draw her next firearm.

  Then the gun bucked again in her hand, sparks flying, and another Knight joined the others on the ground. Emeric could only watch as he ran, the world slowing to a crawl. Deep within the cloud of smoke, her thumb lowered the hammer again, pressing against some hidden lever within the weapon, spinning the thick cylinder into pce. The firearm barked, sending another Knight to the ground as her hand was forced up into the air by the recoil. By the time the weapon fell down, the cylinder had finished rotating, her aim adjusted. Another Knight was shot dead in a spray of sparks. In a span of as many seconds, four of Sporatos's finest Knights had been felled.

  "RUN!" Emeric bellowed again, just as he reached her.

  The woman's eyes flicked towards him. What he saw there nearly stumbled him.

  Nothing.

  She was expressionless. Devoid of emotion.

  Then the moment was past, and as fast as he had been running, Emeric could not bring his poleaxe around for a proper swing. Instead, he lowered his shoulders even more, bracing for impact.

  The great maw of her titanic pistol flicked towards him and, for the most infinitesimal of moments, Emeric saw straight down the bck, spiraling barrel.

  Then it raised, firing a shot that tore over his head with a hiss, and he struck her.

  They smmed through the underbrush, his tackle sending them both off their feet. He heard a soft grunt as he hit her, but little more until they abruptly hit the ground, sparks flying as his armor and her breastpte scraped across the stones.

  Even before they stopped moving, Emeric was trying to position himself overtop her, straddling her hips with his own. He was too close to use his poleaxe and had no time to draw his belt knife, so instead he tried to raise his fist, preparing to cave her unarmored face in.

  She jumped upward to, of all things, bite him. Emeric shouted in fury as her canines pierced the leather protecting his palms. So taken off guard by this was he that he reacted like he had any other time something had bitten his hand: by shaking it furiously, trying to tear the limb from her mouth.

  Instead of doing anything else, she raised the pistol again and fired it right next to Emeric's left ear, deafening him. The head of a Knight that Emeric had not even noticed was ripped open, gore spttering the stones. They dropped beside him, and the shock of their death finally brought him to his senses.

  Emeric brought his other hand down and started to shove his fingers into her eyes, forcing her to release the bite. She spat his right hand out, only to try and tch onto his left, which had him jerking up and away with both hands, raising them for a hammer blow.

  Her rapier appeared just as he began to swing, aimed to impale him through the bicep. Emeric just barely managed to arrest his swing, which, seeing as he had been aiming to crush straight through her head, threw his entire body off bance.

  With a snarl Emeric was too deafened to hear, she threw her hips up and twisted to one side, bucking him off her waist. Emeric scrambled to keep her pinned down, but it was too te. Her legs kicked and writhed in a blur until she was free, scrambling across the stones.

  Emeric rose with a roar, retrieving his poleaxe as he ran.

  His feline opponent came to a standing position some ten feet away, her arm already locked, gun aimed.

  Emeric did not bother to shelter this time.

  Sulfur filled the air with a dull thud as the bullet struck something behind him, no doubt killing some other damnable fool who hadn't listened. The fight had begun only seconds ago, and so he supposed some might be forgiven for hesitating, but not a Knight. They should have known better.

  "I said FLEE!" Emeric bellowed, bringing his weapon down.

  Sparks flew as the edge of her rapier met the head of his poleaxe, just barely deflecting the weapon aside. Emeric wasted no time in salvaging the blocked blow's momentum, bring his weapon around in a spiral to strike again, and again, and again.

  The impact of each hit sent painful reverberations through his arm, warping the steel of her rapier as the metal sung under the sting of each blow. She was forced back each time, one step, two steps, three, until her back was pressed against the wall.

  And then she lunged.

  Emeric threw himself backward in a desperate arch to avoid the bloody tip of the rapier, which was aimed with inhuman, unerring precision for his eye.

  His head was turned aside as the bde scraped across the front of his helmet, forcing him to stumble backward even further. His foot hit the cobblestones which surrounded the garden plot, and, recognizing that he was almost certainly going to fall, training told him to commit to the error.

  Emeric leapt aside with all his might, throwing himself out of the way of her next blow, which had been aimed for the thinner ptes protecting his armpits. He nded in an awkward heap, praying he had gained enough distance to stand up before she was on him again.

  Only when he stood, he found that she hadn't followed him. She was still standing where he had left her, looking down in disgust.

  A Knight had crawled their way over to the site of the duel, trailing a long smear of blood. Leida, he recognized. She'd grabbed the feline around the ankle, her belt knife drawn and embedded into the woman's calf.

  The former noble, now a sve, looked down upon the Knight's dying efforts with contempt more commonly directed toward dog shit one scraped off her heel. She jerked her leg out of Leida's grasp and stepped away, condemning the Knight to a slow death, ignoring the thin wound her leg had suffered. Leida rolled over with a sputtering gasp that covered her face in blood, revealing to Emeric the bloody hole in her chestpte where the feline's bullet had struck her. A lung wound. She was not long for this world, and there was nothing that could be done for it.

  Emeric took his stance properly for the first time in the duel, sliding one foot forward, holding his poleaxe high. She had almost invariably aimed for his eyes, both in her duels with him and the other Knights. He would have to protect his head above all else, and could not trust to his armor's protection as he could against most foes. She would not miss.

  Conversely, he could now properly observe his opponent for the first time. She wore a simple cuirassier's breastpte, unenchanted and unadorned. Simple leather duelist's gloves protected her left hand, which held her rapier, while her right hand was bare, holding the bck firearm. She sheathed that massive weapon in a soot-stained leather pouch shed across her cuirass, moving her hand to pce her knuckles against the small of her back.

  With the rest of the Knights dead or dying, the pace of the combat briefly slowed as they sized one another up. Emeric's poleaxe was of a shorter variety compared to most, meant to be used in pce of his nce should he be unhorsed in the midst of battle. It was perhaps only a few finger width's longer than the feline's rapier, which was no advantage, particurly when one considered that her single-handed grip allowed her to extend into a full lunge, increasing her range well beyond what Emeric could match. However, doing so would be an incredible risk on her part. Emeric's weapon had a bded spear tip, axe head, and hammer backend, any one of which could be swung to cause devastating damage to her exposed limbs during such a lunge.

  In a more normal duel, Emeric would have continued to evaluate his opponent, trying to work through the rationale of their combat stratagem. Knowing whether his opponent was angling to dey for reinforcements or to hastily press an advantage was of the utmost importance in most single-opponent duels.

  But he did not think there was any such insight to be found here. The woman facing him belied nothing; Emeric had seen statues with more emotion.

  "Why have you not shot me?" He asked. The words slipped from his mouth without thought, surprising even him.

  The feline cocked her head, considering. After a moment, she shrugged.

  "I am out of ammunition."

  She lunged. Better prepared than he had been the st few times, Emeric knocked the blow aside, turning the motion into a thrust of his own. She stepped aside, letting his poleaxe slip through the air beside her, and began her retort.

  Emeric became keenly aware of just how thin a thread his life was hanging in the opening exchanges of this second duel. Her blood-soaked rapier flickered in and out of reality after every csh, coating his armor in his comrade's blood as she wove through his swings. He was almost always on the offensive, afforded a certain degree of recklessness by his armor, but it was a shallow illusion. Every swing, every riposte, they were each an opportunity for her to find a gap in his defense that he hadn't known existed. She, in turn, turned aside his bde with maddening reliability, her feet drawing circles in the dust as she paced around him, their duel tracing a dancer's trail across the stones. Occasionally their weapons would dip low as they were turned aside, striking the ground, only to pass through with the same speed that carried them through the air, scoring thin lines in the stone. Between the blood that spshed from her rapier, the lines their feet cleared in the dust, and the cuts in the cobblestone, an experienced enough swordsman could have recreated the duel blow by blow just by looking through the aftermath.

  As they twisted and spun, Emeric was keenly aware that with how poorly armored she was, he only needed one solid blow to nd home. A single cut, a single stab, and she would be fatally weakened, the outcome rendered inevitable.

  But he could not find it. There was never a single moment to spare for thought or breath as they moved, any lull in the combat instantly filled with uncompromising aggression. The exchange stretched on and on, longer and longer, seconds ticking by until Emeric felt certain that he had never spent so long fighting at such a blinding pace. Ten seconds became twenty, twenty seconds became thirty, and still they continued to dance, even as Emeric's arms began to burn and his lungs began to seize.

  He was convinced, irrevocably so, that if he allowed her the moment to prepare a single decisive strike, it would be the end of him. And so he continued to attack, because his only refuge was in offense, the only way he could survive found in spilling her blood.

  An opportunity suddenly passed before his eye. A broken window at her back, leading into the unlit Keep. He acted on instinct alone, throwing himself forward in a wild, reckless swing, one that meant certain death if she avoided it.

  And avoid it she did, neatly stepping backward to let the weapon blur past her, her foot sliding back to take advantage–

  Only to sm into the wall, stumbling her.

  Emeric shoved forward with the full length of his poleaxe, bowling her over into the window. She fell through with a furious hiss, and Emeric wasted no time lunging after her, stabbing downward like a fisherman trying to spear fleeing prey.

  He felt his poleaxe bite wood. He cursed and, before he could think better of it, leapt into the dark Keep.

  She was standing twenty feet down the corridor, a hand pressed to her stomach, breathing hard. Emeric's eyes began the slow process of adjusting to the gloom, the warmth on his back fading as he slowly stepped out of the window's light.

  "You once cimed your master wished for me to live," he gasped, trying to prolong the impromptu opportunity he had been afforded to catch his breath. "That you spared my life to fulfill this goal of hers. What has changed?"

  "Nothing," she stated, backing further down the corridor. Her hand was still on her gut. Emeric did not think his blow to her stomach had been so decisive, and suspected she was feigning her weakness. "She still wishes you to live through the war. She thinks you an excellent candidate for future manipution. Your obsession with honor and duty are easily exploitable, and with your proximity to the King, you will be a predictable, known quantity at a high level in Sporaton politics."

  "Then why this?" He asked, following her deeper into the darkness. "Why try and kill me here? You could disengage and see to the other marauding Knights, severely weakening the overall assault. You could flee with your loved ones, or personally coordinate the defense of the city. Why continue this?"

  "You seem to think that because I follow her so fervently, I possess my Master's sense of morality." She flicked her wrist, shaking blood onto the wood flooring. "You are wrong. I want to kill you, Sir Emeric. And I want it for nothing more than my personal satisfaction."

  "The bloodied bde, then?"

  For the first time in the fight, he witnessed a flicker of emotion pass over her face. A smile, there and gone again in an instant, like lightning on the horizon.

  "You are keener than you seem, Emeric." She stepped to her left, backing down a hallway, leaving him no choice but to follow her. "What of you, then?" She asked. "Are you satisfied with your orders this day? My Master saw you as a creature of honor, Sir Emeric, and from the Champion of Amarat, that is no misnomer. Is this honor? To sughter indiscriminately at the orders of a vindictive tyrant?"

  "It is not," he stated pinly. "And I would not stain myself so. Had I the opportunity, I would have offered clemency to any who asked for it. Sughter is not the pce of a Knight."

  "I think you have a very confused notion of what Knights do, Sir Emeric."

  And with that, she finally stopped her slow retreat. Their conversation had found its way into a narrow servant's corridor, a thin stone hallway that seemed to be born of an older era than the rest of the Keep. A relic from the earliest days of the Tulian Kingdom, when the city was little more than the diminutive outpost of a distant Empire, and this Keep was its only defense.

  It was what she had been searching for, Emeric realized. There was no way around her, no way around him. The fight would be a direct, head-on engagement, one that prevented him from leaping aside as he had earlier.

  Truthfully, he should have retreated. There was still a considerable distance between them, enough that he could have made it out of the Keep, possibly escaping outright. He could rejoin with the other Knights and either continue leading the ransacking of the city, or he could gather a party to defeat her with far more certainty.

  But her words rang in his head, so close to those he had already been thinking. That his battle was without honor. That he was without honor.

  Emeric no longer cared enough to abandon this fight.

  He covered the distance in several quick strides, striking forward with all his strength.

  She knocked the blow aside, smming his weapon into the wall, where it blew a crater from the stone. She flicked her weapon forward, aiming to pierce him through the armpit, until he stepped forward into the blow, sending the tip of her bde skating under his arm, rather than through.

  Emeric clenched his arm down, gripping the bde in pce beneath his armpit, twisting his torso to rip it from her hands. It flickered out of existence, reappearing in her hand a moment ter.

  Emeric had been ready, however, and he shoved her back with a knee, gaining just enough distance to parry his blow with his poleaxe. She stepped back, preparing a lunge, and Emeric followed after with a roar, his poleaxe rocketing down from above.

  The furious pace of the exchange resumed as if it had never ended, weapons blurring through the air as they moved down the corridor. The hallway was so narrow that their weapons constantly raked through the stone, creating a webwork of deep gouges in a circur pattern about them. His poleaxe created deep, jagged lines, occasionally tearing entire bricks from the wall, while her rapier sliced precise, neat lines.

  The air became choked with dust as they battered back and forth, stances flowing from one to the other as they shifted in reaction to the other's maneuvers, constantly vying for the advantage. Emeric began to hear stones cttering to the ground behind him, their blows so numerous and forceful that the tunnel itself had begun to colpse.

  Emeric pressed on. Even as his lungs began to fill with dust, he pressed on. Even as his aching arms began to tremble between every swing, he pressed on. He no longer knew why. Only that he would. That he would continue the fight until its end.

  She met his blows with nothing more than grunts of effort, the simple mechanical result of air being expelled from her lungs. It was as if she felt nothing for this fight. As if there was nothing he could stir in her, no matter how close his blows came, no matter how near she was to death in each passing moment.

  Emeric felt a snarl bubble up out of his throat. He brought his shoulders in, tucked his legs together, and began to drive forward, swinging faster, faster, as fast as he was able. Red and bck warred to tinge the edge of his vision, his lungs no longer able to draw enough air to fuel his ceaseless assault.

  And then, suddenly, without his ever consciously realizing it, her bde was knocked aside, and this time it took her arm with it, her rapier not dismissed soon enough to avoid throwing her off bance.

  Instinct consumed him. His poleaxe speared forward, aimed for her face.

  Her eyes went wide. She brought her offhand up, as if to catch his bde. There was a fsh, and he felt the weapon strike home.

  Her head snapped back, an audible crack filling the air, but she did not fall. Emeric twisted his weapon, jerking it from side to side, trying to free it from her body.

  And then she leaned forward.

  Holding a white handkerchief.

  The simple square of cloth covered her hand, under which poured a votile river of blood. It spurted in great torrents, coating the entire front of her body. Her hand dropped, the handkerchief disappearing with the same fsh that accompanied her rapier's summoning.

  Emeric recoiled.

  The hand which had caught his bde was pulverized. There was nothing left that could be recognized as belonging to a human body. Just tendons wrapped around shards of bone, twitching wildly.

  And her face was worse. From her upper lip to the center of her eyes was simply gone, repced by the ragged flesh beneath. He could see directly into her nasal cavity, at least when it was not covered by spurting blood. It was if a stone thrown from a mountain had crashed into her face, ripping the skin away to reveal all that the gods meant to be hidden.

  Emeric had seen demons emerge from the hells. He had seen archmages press their spells unto the masses. He had seen Graf Urs moments away from drawing his bde in anger. He had seen countless die, meeting their fate by fire, bde, or broken bone, and he had been the cause of a great many of those deaths. He had faced all these things with all the bravery he could muster, confident that, even if he had not acted as he wished, he had not allowed his fear to overwhelm him.

  But when that broken, jagged face split in a... in a grin? In a smile, almost warm in its complexion? With blood bubbling as her torn lips tried to form words for him?

  Emeric turned.

  And he ran.

  He dropped his poleaxe as he sprinted down the corridor, then tore off his helmet, flinging it blindly behind him. He could hear her chasing after him, coughing and sputtering, gaining on him.

  Emeric's foot hit a fallen stone, sending him crashing to the ground. He hit more bricks as he bounced along the floor, agony fshing through his body even as he scrambled to his knees, trying to cw his way forward.

  A hand suddenly cmped down on his colr, lifting him up and throwing him onto his back.

  He was forced to stare up at that broken woman. Blood fell from her in a torrent, coating his face, seeping into his skin, past his lips and onto his tongue, filling his mouth with the taste of copper.

  She raised her rapier high. Emeric's eyes locked onto it. She said something. It was unintelligble, her face far too ruined to form words.

  The bde fell.

  He welcomed it.

  Emeric, Son of Rawlin.

  Emeric was somewhere that was not. He was not in his body. The pain continued.

  Sir Emeric, Honored Knight of Sporatos.

  The words tore through his formless self. His innermost self shook under their force, threatening to tear itself apart.

  Knight Emeric. The failed prodigy of a King.

  He became aware of something beyond himself. Something massive. Something he should not have been able to comprehend, but was forced to look upon.

  You have nothing left. You are nothing. You await death, body and soul.

  But there is no God left to cim your Soul.

  The truth of the words poured through him like molten metal. That he was unbound from the world. That his immortal self had been abandoned, left to drift to dust.

  Of all your attributes, you betrayed them all. You sacrificed your Honor. You went against your Duty. You have failed to Kill, and you have failed to Bind. In your st moments, your soul has been weighed. And you are found to have achieved nothing.

  He knew it was true. Every word spoken was more than just sound. It was unrepentant, unyielding Truth. If the words had not been true before, the force of their existence would have altered all reality to make it so.

  Save for one thing. One dismal, fetid remnant of your soul.

  Passion.

  You go to your death having betrayed all. Every ideal, every person you have held dear. You have left them all wanting.

  Save Passion.

  You go to your death with Passion in your heart.

  Fear. Desire. Anger.

  But you, whose only virtue is Passion, has turned it against My Champion.

  Sir Emeric, the Failure.

  Sir Emeric, the Abandoned.

  Had he lungs to gasp, Emeric would have. Fear like nothing he had ever known entered his body, leaving him nothing more than some primeval, cowering insect.

  You will be made an example of.

  Emeric felt fire enter his veins. His muscles. Pathways in his mind, billions and trillions of them. Uncountable creatures which composed his greater whole. He felt something enter them all. Had he a mouth, he would have screamed. And he never would have stopped screaming.

  Sir Emeric.

  The Last Knight.

  Emeric was somewhere. He did not know where. It was ter. So much ter.

  He was sitting atop Galnt. He was in full stride, his mace at his side. Above, the shadow of something swooped down, columns of dirt erupting in two lines to either side.

  You seek Honor?

  He was kneeling amongst bdes of grass, something raised to his eyes. He could see far. Too far, farther than should ever have been possible. He was looking at something moving across a rolling hill, belching bck smoke. It was made of metal, but it moved like a living creature. Its head swung toward him, and there was an orange light.

  You think Honor can be found in War?

  Emeric walked beside Galnt, leading the horse by his reigns. They were on a beach of fine silt sand, moving towards some distant cacophony. Thunder boomed endlessly in the cloudless sky, and burning lights streaked in every direction. Distantly, just visible over the waves, were steel Leviathans. They spat smoke and fire, orange dots reaching up to disappear as invisible dots, only to come back down with a shriek, tearing a hillside to pieces.

  I will let you search for Honor.

  Emeric walked on an endless pin of colorless dust. He wore a suit of cloth, steel, and gss. In his hands was something rge and blocky, and it was not as heavy as it should be. Suddenly, a hole opened in his shoulder, flesh smoking without cause. Without fme. Emeric raised the block to his eye, pointing towards something only it could see.

  You will search for it.

  Endlessly. Eternally.

  And when you have found a war fought with Honor?

  Then I will allow the Last Knight his Death.

  Emeric was suddenly in his body. A rapier was embedded in his eye, jerking from side to side.

  He screamed. It was a pitiful, agonal scream, an animalistic cry of mindless suffering. His body convulsed wildly as his brain was shredded to pieces, but the oblivion that should have consumed him did not come.

  His opponent retrieved her bde from his skull, her blood spattering onto his own. Before Emeric could gain control of his seizing body, she stabbed again, this time piercing through his forehead.

  The world doubled, tripled, quadrupled. He could see so much that wasn't there. His back arched as something within his body rebelled against the rules of Nature, tying his soul to this ruined body.

  She pulled the bde out once more, then jabbed it through his temples. In one side, out the other. Emeric continued to scream. He could not help it.

  She took the bde out again, this time by pulling it up and through his skull, ft of the bde emerging from his face. The wound reknit the moment her rapier was gone.

  She stabbed him through the heart next. Then both lungs. Then she shoved him forward, walking around him so she could stab through the top of his skull, continuing through his neck and into his torso, striking his heart.

  Emeric lost track of time. He did not know how long she continued trying to kill him. Only that his body was subjected to things which no creature had ever survived.

  Eventually, regrettably, his senses came back to him. There was no steel in his skin. No weight pinning him to the ground, nor blood spattering onto his body.

  Emeric's eyes had never closed, but he began to see once more. He began to feel the bricks underneath his back, the cool stone against his skin.

  He looked down at himself.

  He was naked. Covered in blood. The floor, too, was covered in blood. He looked to his left, then his right, and finally upward. All was coated in a thick, dripping yer of blood.

  He looked down at his body, old, useless instincts telling him to search for injuries he hadn't yet felt.

  Instead, he saw her.

  She was sitting cross-legged on the floor, some dozen feet away from his body, just beyond the furthest edges of the bloodstains. She, too, was naked, but her clothes had not been torn off. Her ruined face was in the process of reknitting itself, the alchemical magic of a potion regrowing the muscuture that he had torn to pieces. Skin would be next, but for now, she was still faceless. Beneath her breasts was a deep, ragged scar, still pink and tender, the sign of an injury which a healer could just barely repair. She was holding her shirt, pouring water from a canteen onto it in a vain attempt to cleanse it of the blood.

  Emeric shifted, and her ears flicked towards him. He froze, but she did not react further. She did not even look up from her shirt. But she did speak.

  "I could not kill you."

  "...No."

  She gnced up. "Have you any idea how I might go about doing so, by chance?"

  He swallowed. "No."

  "Hm. Unfortunate." She turned her attention back to the shirt, scrubbing at its threads. "The battle continues, outside. It hasn't been but fifteen minutes."

  "...I see."

  Emeric slowly sat up, expecting his body to rebel after all that it had suffered. But it did not. There was not even the slightest twinge of pain.

  Emeric swallowed, looking at the naked feline. The naked woman. The former heir to House Eliah, a woman turned to a sve, then to the lover of a Champion. Her kind were renowned for their beauty, designed as such by Fae Lords, but he could not bring himself to see her in such a light. She seemed something outside the paradigm of desire, some ancient monolith, raised to worship the very concept of violence.

  And she was cleaning a shirt, occasionally pausing to tuck her hair back behind an ear. Just a woman. A person, like him, no matter what she wore around her neck.

  Evie Brown, the woman who had killed him.

  His eyes tore away. Emeric saw her rapier sitting beside her. It was coated in more blood than ever, red from pommel to razor tip.

  He could simply leave. She had clearly realized the futility of trying to kill him. Whether she understood why it was impossible, he did not know.

  But something compelled him to ask her a question.

  "Are you going to clean your bde?"

  "Of course," she answered immediately, scrubbing harder at some stubborn clot of blood. "It would be unseemly to be seen in public with such a thing, and besides that, the blood would rust the steel."

  "I know. But are you going to clean the bde before you must?"

  She looked up at him sharply, eyes narrowing.

  "That is not your question to ask."

  "It is not. But I wish to know anyway."

  They stared at one another for a long, long moment. A minute. Maybe more. He said nothing else. There was no need. She knew what he was asking. Without the heat of battle blinding him, Emeric could finally see emotion in her. Hidden, well hidden, but flickering behind her eyes. Anger. Trepidation. Disgust.

  Satisfaction.

  And finally, as she gnced at the weapon, guilt.

  She reached over, summoning the handkerchief once more. She lifted the bloodied bde, discarding her shirt, and began to wipe it down.

  Without another word, Emeric stood. She did not look at him again, and he did not gnce at her. He began to walk down the byrinthian halls of the once-vaunted Keep. He did not know the way out. He simply began to wander, taking turns at random, walking until he found his way out into the sunlight.