“So, what happened? Did the shot hit Dale?” asked the pale lady. Her voice was like silk sliding over a blade—smooth, yet dangerous.

  Lucius froze mid-breath. He collected himself, the tension in his chest slowly uncoiling as he exhaled. “No,” he whispered, his voice rasping against the silence. “That would have been much better. Much better than his later fate…”

  The pale lady wrapped her arms around his neck, her skin feeling like polished marble—beautiful, but unnervingly cold. She tightened her grip slightly, her breath ghosting against his ear. “Tell me, Lucius. Then what happened?”

  Lucius grabbed her wrist, his fingers digging into the pale, translucent skin. “Why?” he demanded. Before she could offer a rehearsed reply, he pressed on, his voice cracking with a mixture of exhaustion and resentment. “Why do you always scratch me where it hurts the most? Why do you always remind me of my worst? Why do you… and in spite of this, why can't I seem to let go of you? Why am I always drawn to you?”

  The pale lady let out a long sigh that Lucius could feel vibrating against his spine.

  “Do you know why you always come back to me? Why you can't let go? Because I am the only anchor you have left. If my existence vanished from your life, what else would you be clinging to? You can't cling to your vengeance, because somewhere deep down, you know that it wouldn't matter if you killed Gazer. Sable is not coming back.”

  She leaned in closer, her lips brushing his jaw. “So, why don't you do us both a favor and continue your story? Loosen your burden, and let me guide you on the path you are meant to follow.”

  Lucius tilted his head, forcing himself to look into her eyes—depthless pools that seemed to swallow the dim light of the room. “I will continue,” he said, his voice hardening. “But I want something—a token of trust. I have been pouring my soul into this story, yet I don't even know your name. Tell me, at the very least, what should I call you?”

  The lady offered a small, enigmatic smile. “What does it matter, Lucius, what you call me? You could call me anything you like; it wouldn't change who I am.”

  “NO! I want a name,” Lucius barked.

  The lady’s grip tightened, the pressure bordering on painful. “Do you really want to know who I am, Lucius? My name is Rynn. And I have been tasked by my Master to guide you, to nurture you, so that you can fulfill your purpose.”

  “Lucius… Luciu… Lu…” The world around him blurred. Rynn’s voice stretched and distorted until it was nothing more than the whistling of a summer wind. His consciousness drifted, plunging back into the stifling heat of the past.

  He was standing outside the tavern. The air was thick with the smell of cheap ale and horse manure. Dale was hunched over the soldier he’d been pummeling, his fist cocked back like a loaded spring. Lucius looked toward the sound of the gunshot.

  There he was: Sir Hans.

  He sat atop a pristine white charger, looking every bit the royal peacock in his crisp white and blue Greystone uniform. He was a man in his early forties, his hair beginning to silver at the roots, looking down at the commoners with a gaze of practiced indifference. His revolver pointed toward the cloudless blue sky, a thin wisp of acrid smoke curling from the barrel.

  “Surrender now!” Hans bellowed, his voice carrying the weight of unearned authority. “You have raised your hands against the guards of House Greystone. No one goes unpunished for such an atrocity.”

  For a heartbeat, time seemed to fracture. Lucius watched a single drop of sweat roll down the nape of Dale’s neck. He saw the way the sunlight glinted off the brass buttons of the soldiers' uniforms. He knew where this path led. He felt the heavy, suffocating sigh leave his lungs as reality snapped back into motion.

  Dale didn't hesitate. His fist descended one last time.

  CRUNCH.

  The sound was sickening—the wet, splintering noise of a heavy boot stepping on a dry gourd. The soldier’s skull gave way under the raw, primal power of the strike. Blood pooled instantly, a dark crimson halo spreading across the dusty ground.

  Dale stood up slowly, his knuckles dripping. He leaned to his right, spitting a glob of blood into the dirt. “If your guards lay hands on our women, they have no right to live,” he growled, his voice a low rumble. “And if you encourage them, stay a little longer on that horse and you will receive the same fate.”

  Sir Hans’s face went pale, then flushed a deep, angry purple. He raised a gloved hand. Within seconds, a battalion of twenty guards—armed with repeaters and heavy batons—swarmed the yard, surrounding Dale in a ring of steel.

  The air grew heavy, charged with the ozone of impending violence. The twenty guards moved in a synchronized contraction, a ring of blue and steel tightening around the lone man in the dirt. The sound of twenty repeaters being cocked—a series of sharp, metallic clack-clacks—echoed against the tavern walls like the snapping of dry bone.

  Dale didn't wait for the order to fire. He exploded.

  He lunged at the nearest guard before the man could level his rifle. Dale didn’t punch; he collided. His shoulder hit the guard’s chest with the sound of a mallet striking a side of beef. Ribs shattered instantly. As the guard collapsed, Dale’s massive hand clamped onto the barrel of the man’s repeater, wrenching it away with such force that the guard’s trigger finger snapped like a twig inside the guard.

  Two guards to his left raised their weapons. Dale didn’t aim the stolen rifle; he swung it. The heavy iron barrel caught the first man across the jaw, sent teeth flying like white gravel, and continued its arc to smash into the temple of the second.

  The remaining guards panicked, the circle breaking as they scrambled for distance to use their range. "Fire! Level him!" one screamed.

  Stolen from Royal Road, this story should be reported if encountered on Amazon.

  Dale snatched a guard by the throat, hoisting the grown man off the ground as a meat-shield. A repeater barked—crack—and the lead slug thudded into the dangling guard’s back. Dale didn't flinch. He surged forward, still holding the dying man, and slammed into the shooter.

  With a roar of pure, channeled rage, Dale reached out and grabbed the barrel of a second guard's repeater while the man was mid-aim. Instead of pulling it away, Dale twisted the weapon—and the man’s arms with it—forcing the muzzle toward the line of guards closing in from the flank.

  Dale kicked the back of the shooter's knee, folding him, and then brought his elbow down on the crown of the man's head. The impact wasn't a thud; it was a wet, final thump that drove the man's face into the mud.

  The yard was a chaotic blur of blue fabric and crimson spray. Dale was a whirlwind of "raw power"—he wasn't using martial arts; he was using physics and fury.

  He caught a baton mid-swing, the wood splintering against his forearm, and countered with a headbutt that flattened the guard’s nose into his skull. He seized another man by the belt and the collar, lifting him high above his head. For a split second, Dale looked like a titan of old, silhouetted against the unforgiving sun. With a guttural snarl, he threw the man into two others, the collision sending them sprawling into the blood-soaked dirt.

  He finished the last three with the butt of a discarded repeater.

  Dale stood in the center of the quiet. The only sound was the wet drip, drip, drip of blood falling from his knuckles into a puddle. He wasn't panting; his breath came in deep, rhythmic draws, his chest expanding like a bellows. He looked at the mountain of broken bodies—his "harvest"—and then slowly turned his gaze toward the dust cloud where Sir Hans had vanished.

  The sun beat down, hot and indifferent, on the twenty dead men of House Greystone.

  None of the twenty survived. Sir Hans pulled hard on his reigns, his horse rearing back in terror. The "royal" composure had shattered into pure, unadulterated fear.

  “You… you will not be spared when I come back!” Hans shrieked, spurring his horse into a frantic gallop.

  The transition from the slaughter to the silence was jarring. The heat of the sun seemed to bake the metallic tang of blood into the very dirt, creating a cloying, sweet-iron scent that clung to the back of Lucius’s throat.

  Dale stepped over a cooling corpse, his boots squelching in the mud, and made his way toward Lucius. He wiped a streak of dark crimson across his forehead, leaving a smudge that looked like war paint.

  “This doesn't look good,” Dale said, his voice gravelly and devoid of its usual mirth. He looked at the carnage, then back toward the horizon. “He will be back with more—a lot more. And I want all the help I can get. Are you willing to help me?”

  “Yes,” Lucius snapped back without a second thought. The word was out of his mouth before he could weigh the suicide of the mission.

  Dale nodded, a ghost of a grim smile touching his lips. “I knew I could count on you. Then take my grandma to the far end of the village. Get the others out, too.”

  Lucius blinked, the adrenaline stuttering in his veins. “Dale, you can't hold off an army alone. You need me here, on the line!”

  Dale stepped closer, his massive hand coming down on Lucius’s shoulder. The weight of it was immense, but the look in his eyes was heavier. “I know you want to fight beside me, but evacuating the villagers takes priority. My grandma is the only family I have, Lucius.” He paused, his voice dropping to a low, painful register.

  “Besides… I don't want to break you anymore.”

  The words hit Lucius like a physical blow, a stone cast with perfect, agonizing precision. He wanted to argue, to scream that he was already broken, but the finality in Dale's gaze silenced him. He nodded once, a sharp, jerky movement, and turned toward the village.

  Lucius ran. He moved through the village like a specter of doom, urging families to the outskirts, his voice hoarse as he repeated the lie that they were just moving for safety. Finally, he reached the small, weathered cottage Dale called home.

  Inside, the air was a cruel contrast to the yard outside. It smelled of slow-simmered onions, dried thyme, and the comforting, earthy scent of a seasoned iron pot. Dale’s grandmother was hunched over the hearth, stirring a thick stew. When she heard the door, she turned, her face a map of kind wrinkles.

  “Oh, come in, dear!” she exclaimed, her eyes crinkling. “The stew is almost ready. Let’s eat. And where is that good-for-nothing grandson of mine? Probably off causing trouble as usual.”

  Lucius stood in the doorway, the sunlight at his back casting a long, dark shadow across the scrubbed wooden floor. He didn't say a thing; he just stared at her, his heart hammering a frantic rhythm against his ribs.

  “Grandma, let’s go,” he finally said, his voice sounding hollow. “I want to show you something. There’s a fair at the outskirts—Dale asked me to take you there. He said you’d be happy, and that you haven’t left your house in ages.”

  The old woman stopped stirring, her wooden spoon dripping broth back into the pot. She looked at him in genuine astonishment. “Did Dale really ask you for that? What a nice boy he’s turned out to be.”

  Lucius felt a crushing weight settle on his chest, a physical burden that made it hard to draw breath.

  “He has grown so warm since meeting you,” she continued, a soft, proud smile lighting up her face as she reached for her shawl. “Good for him. Don’t ever leave him, Lucius.”

  Those words were the final nail in the coffin. Each syllable felt like it was sealing Lucius into a tomb of his own making, a promise he knew the coming army wouldn't let him keep.

  The trek to the outskirts felt like dragging a mountain behind him. Every step away from the tavern was a betrayal, a slow-motion retreat that made Lucius’s skin crawl with a cold, oily sweat.

  They reached the crest of the final hill, where the village orchard met the wild forest. Lucius stopped, his breath hitching in a throat that felt like it had been scraped with glass. A sudden, biting breeze swept down from the northern peaks—a sharp, wintry gust that didn't just chill the skin but seemed to pierce straight through to the bone.

  He turned back.

  Far below, the village was a cluster of grey stone and thatched roofs, looking fragile in the fading afternoon light. And there, emerging over the ridge like a rising tide of steel, were the banners.

  Huge, rectangular sheets of blue and white silk snapped violently in the wind. The silver crest of the Greystone wolf shimmered, even from this distance. There weren't just twenty men now. There were hundreds. The rhythmic thump-thump-thump of their march was a low vibration in the earth, a mechanical heartbeat of impending doom.

  “Lucius? Why have we stopped?” Grandma’s voice was thin, trembling as the cold wind whipped her shawl around her narrow shoulders. She looked at the horizon, her eyes squinting against the glare. “Is that… is that the fair? It looks so formal.”

  Lucius felt a surge of nausea. He knelt in the dirt, his hands shaking as he took her withered palms in his. His own palms were slick with sweat, yet his fingers were deathly cold.

  “Grandma, listen to me,” he said, his voice a frantic whisper. “Stay here. With the others. Do not move until the sun goes down.”

  “But Dale—”

  “I’m going to get him,” Lucius interrupted, the lie tasting like ash. “He’s just… he’s finishing up some business at the tavern. I’ll bring him back. I promise you, I will bring him back.”

  He didn't wait for her to see the terror in his eyes. Pop-pop-pop-pop!

  The rhythmic, mechanical bark of repeaters drifted up from the valley, softened by distance but unmistakable in its violence.