She heard no other shouts and didn’t dare spare time to look as she leapt the outer wall, this time landing out of sight lodged between the outer wall and the stable. She had seen the scout entering the stable and knew her time was running short.
Slipping in where a board was loose, she saw the scout, but the stable master was no slight boy like the stable hands. Either the big bald brute was also a smith or he was making a fashion statement wearing that big rubber apron and no shirt.
There was no other choice but to watch as the scout saddled the horse. Nothing could be done there. Making her way back out through the loose board, she pulled herself up onto the roof, careful not to make noise as she fled low over it. There was a slim chance here; it was a wooded area and a bank of stone stalls where some of the armored war horses were kept provided a stretch that would take her into the trees.
Slim, because there were guards milling about and it would only be the luck of the Gods that she could cross without being seen.
She didn’t have time to look for an opening—it was either do it or miss the chance and skulk away. Holding her breath, she leapt, sprinting along the foot-wide stone ledge and onto the first branch.
There were no warning shouts, no arrows whizzing past, but she didn’t dare look back, launching herself along the branches as far and fast as she could to where the trees dangled along the dirt path ahead. Her only hope was that the scout would be coming this direction at all.
She heard the thundering of hooves, not daring to look back, feeling a sting in her thigh as an arrow bit through the thin material of her body suit. She had known it was too good to be true.
An archer had caught sight of her, but the scout came closer. She leapt down, narrowly missing a fatal shot. She collided with the scout but didn’t knock him from his horse. She swung around, straddling him from the front to make it damn near impossible to take a fatal shot without killing the scout. It didn’t stop another arrow from lodging into her calf.
She held her Key to the young man’s throat, drawing blood along the hairless jut of jawbone there, careful to balance it so that the jostle of the frightened horse didn’t kill him accidentally.
The young man had gathered his wits, tilting his head with self-importance as he stared her down, one arrow whizzing by his head, another falling short. They were precariously close to being out of shooting distance, so she wrapped her ankles over his to spur his horse into a full gallop.
“Whatever you’re after, cunt, I’ll die before I tell you anything,” he squeaked, his voice betraying the fear that didn’t show under his stony gaze.
Sweat was beading on her brow. She wasn’t losing a lot of blood, but the jostling made the arrows’ bite fresh with each bump. She laughed weakly.
“You lack conviction or you would’ve leaned into my blade by now,” she challenged, one hard bump causing her to cry out.
His eyes drifted down to the arrow sticking out of her hip. His hand slid up her leg with the mocking gentleness of a lover before he gripped it, twisting it in deeper. A cruel grin spread across his face with the confidence that the tables had turned.
Aster panted with pain but slid her body in closer, digging the arrow in deeper. Leaning in, she grabbed his earlobe with her teeth, passing her tongue along the bottom ridge before liberating it from the rest of his ear with a hard chomp.
He cried out, forgetting the arrow as he grabbed for the damaged ear. Blood ran down her chin and she spat the chunk of flesh out.
She sheathed the Key and grabbed at his collar, baring her teeth as he howled in her face.
“I can take you piece by piece or you can tell me where the King is. I promise the next piece will not be so minor.”
She grabbed at the not-so-soft bulge at his groin. Sick little fuck was actually enjoying this.
Those indecisive eyes flashed with a multitude of emotion, but he nodded, blood oozing between the fingers from his disfigured ear.
“He’s on the Crest of Dalren, just outside of Dragon’s Den.”
Too easy, but she reached into his leather satchel and found the message to be delivered. It would have to do for now.
She grabbed the reins of the horse, steering it away from the main path and further into the woods.
Slowing the horse, she leapt from it, dragging him off with her. Yanking him as she limped, she lunged into him, slamming his back into a tree.
“Take off your clothes,” she demanded, seeing his eyes widen with misunderstanding. “You can keep on the underclothes. I just need the uniform.”
His eyes narrowed, but he started to comply.
“You’ll never get away with this,” he sneered, yanking at the fabric. There would be blood on the one shoulder, but that could be explained away.
“Damage the fabric and I’ll even out your ears,” she warned. Bracing herself she grabbed each of the arrows still protruding and yanked them out with a cry of pain and anger.
Once down to his loincloth, she brought out a rope. He tried to flee but she tripped him. When he sat up, his eyes went round with terror.
The Rain Maidens had grown more terrifying as they had gathered, her solid blue-black eyes and lips stark on the pallid white of her skin. The gown agitated around her with seeming sentience, a direct contrast to the menacing stillness on her face.
“I can drag you to the Gates of hell or you can be a good boy,” she purred, stroking one ebony nail over the drying cut on his jaw, flaking away the blood as the trail welled anew.
He stood and plastered himself obediently against the tree, at least one other part of him rising to the task. She tied him up and gagged him for good measure. Taking her human form back on, she slipped his oversized clothes over her tight bodysuit. She counted herself lucky he was slight for a man to begin with. He frowned at where one of the arrows was and she smiled.
Laying a finger on his ear, he winced at her ice cold touch as she sealed the wound.
“It’s the least I can do since they’ll probably kill you for failure anyway,” she said cruelly, hearing horse hooves in the distance. “Can’t stay, but I hope you’ll put in a good word for me.”
Hurrying over to the tethered horse, she swung up to mount it and took off before they could catch up to her.
She should have come back by now.
He cursed for the eleventieth time that hour. Flower looked nervous that her sister hadn’t returned. Amber looked like she was about to spontaneously combust.
“She’s not dead or I would know,” Flower said, when the tension grew around them.
There were worse things than death and he had seven of them crowded around him.
Fajja.
No sooner had he thought it than the sulfuric smell signaled the Flame God’s arrival.
“You want to know where the girl went,” Fajja said cutting to the chase.
“Since when did I have the power to summon you?” he asked annoyed.
“Always, but you’re too fucking stubborn. Not that I wasn’t appearing anyway. Your little upstart is heading off to kill the King by herself,” Fajja said, the tone of exasperation sounding strange considering his usual cockiness.
“She what?” Flower gasped.
Fajja tilted his head at her, but looked back at the mercenary.
“Dragon’s Den. And do take a tour once you clean up your mess. There’s a prize inside,” Fajja added, before disappearing without his usual theatrics.
Dragon’s Den was probably the only damn place in the whole of the Anders territory that didn’t hide some ancient sleeping dragon. It had been cleaned out long ago and often housed bandits looking to pick off passersby.
If there was ever a prize inside, there was no way anyone had missed it. Then again, even Cherry had to admit that magic wasn’t off the menu.
He started off, the others scrambling to follow. He spun around.
“No. You stay. Go back to the barn outside of the city and wait.”
He saw the stubborn tilt of Cherry�
��s chin and captured it with his clawed hand.
“Do this for me. There is no telling what the King has that could kill you,” he pleaded.
There was no historical record of how the Maidens were killed. Like any part of the recorded legends, details were vague. Historically, he could have been the one to lead them to their deaths rather than the assumption they had been tracked down individually. Just being here, knowing what he knew, could have altered way too much already.
Cherry had nodded, but he still had the feeling she was only placating him, that they would follow regardless.
He bent forward, stole a kiss, then dashed off with the speed of his thrall.
For a King on a ‘secret campaign,’ his retinue had been just about as stealthy as a train of drunken bards. The grasses along the plains were trampled and matted. The uncovered ashes of cooking fires were surrounded with the greasy discarded sticks of spitted animals.
He had slowed to track as the evidence piled up, but it wasn’t until he found a woman’s handkerchief soaked in still-wet blood that his senses went on full alert. His eyes scanned the area and landed on the barely visible thatched roof of a quaint farmhouse. It was far enough away from Dragon’s Den that it wasn’t a bad place to farm. It’s only flaw was being nestled on the path between the Palace and the Den.
More blood spattered, weighing down the blades of grass it dripped from. The smell grew strong enough to taste, making something sinister of the gentle breeze that carried it. A broken pitchfork next, reminding him of Cherry once more. Please don’t kill anyone. Whoever this blood belonged to probably wished they were dead if they weren’t already.
A small discarded shoe made the bile rise in the back of his throat. It was a humble shoe, calfskin laced with twine, not even soled since whatever child wore it probably couldn’t even walk yet.
A quiet rage rushed over the edges of sorrow. The grass had been mowed away and the scene of carnage he had feared was far worse than he thought.
The shredded bodies of an old farmer and his wife were splayed out. Not just their bodies but their livestock had been laid to waste as well. There was so much blood that the dirt beneath it was saturated crimson sludge.
His eyes drifted to the body of a young woman, her skirts torn away, eyes still wide open in terror but glassy and lifeless. The one breast that was exposed still had a bead of milk on the nipple. The body of a baby, wearing only one shoe, laid a few yards away. It had probably been flung there, its head caved in from the impact.
It was the young man’s body that had been ravaged the most though and fear coursed through the mercenary now. He was a teenaged boy, missing most of the lower half of his body, shredded by giant teeth. The wet bubbling foam of saliva pink from mingling with the blood around it. None of that chilled him as much as the deep gashes of claw marks carved through the torso.
The King took his Gardell with him as well…
As a boy no older than the one he couldn’t tear his eyes away from now, he had narrowly missed death himself. Even with Fajja, the Rain Maidens, his thrall and the gradual descent into becoming a borog, he felt the cold grip of terror and despair.
I can’t let Cherry find this.
That thought snapped him out of the destructive chain of thinking and he pushed his way into the farmhouse. Other than a woman advanced in years slumped over dead in a rocking chair, the butchery outside had not crept its way in. It had clearly been ransacked, but he gathered what cloth he could and headed back out.
Grabbing a rusty shovel by the shed, he set about digging a mass grave.
Blayde had found her way back to the main road. She should have been relieved that the sound of hooves had not followed behind her for long, but there was no way the King’s Guard would give up so easily.
The horse was foaming, exhausted, and she was sore besides so she had to risk stopping.
She led the horse to a creek to drink, gathered reeds to rub it down. She’d never had a horse, but she’d heard an old farmer talk about it before.
Loosening the buckles on the saddle, she slid it away, the horse emitting a grateful whinny as she massaged the grass into its skin.
“Slow down, guy; drink too much and you’ll regret it,” she murmured, using the reins to guide its head up so she could massage the neck.
Once she was satisfied, she submerged her own hands in the ice cold water and splashed water over her face. She drank deeply, expelling a satisfied sigh as she did.
Limping her way back over to where the saddle fell, she rummaged through and found enough to make a hearty lunch out of. As she ate, she continued to look through the pouch: a compass, a cluster of maps, a multitool, a photograph.
She frowned at the photograph. It was a picture of the scout, holding a little girl, her twin clutching at his leg. Swallowing the food in her mouth took greater effort as her mouth had suddenly felt dry.
I should’ve killed him.
Even with that thought in the front of her mind, she felt the exact opposite, glad that she hadn’t. Were those girls his sisters or his children? She despised the softness that made her care. In her mind, anyone who allied with the King deserved no pity. Yet she hadn’t killed him and he knew what she looked like.
She shook away her thoughts, berating herself for not staying vigilant as she removed a fresh saddle blanket to lay over the horse. She almost gave up trying to get the heavy saddle back on the horse, but had managed to do so, buckling it back in place.
She pushed aside the baggy clothes, looking at the pink puffs of scar tissue over the fresh wounds that she hadn’t been able to heal fully. They ached like old wounds, but there was little else she could do. Without her sister, she could only ever do things by halves.
Mounting the horse once more, she started back on the path towards Dragon’s Den.
The twins’ father had been a practical man; some would even say he was patriotic. In his youth, he had done his duty as a Guard and made sure everyone knew it. He had instilled the same sense of duty in his prized son and had been equally as unsure what to do about his twin daughters. He hadn’t been cold, but it had been clear that the miracle of twin girls was not in his grand plans, happy to delegate their proper upbringing to his wife.
Now, his wife was a very different sort altogether; a freespirit with a draw to the aesthetic forces in life. She had done her duty by the family farm, but she also unnerved her husband with her insistence on keeping a garden. Wanting nothing to do with that bit of fluff, she had happily shared that passion with her little girls and even her considerate son, who would sneak time in to help her keep the soil once he was done with his own duties to the practical side of farming.
It had been a great source of pride for their father when the King called upon his people to increase his Guard and the son had been picked to train among the elite. However, it had meant that the farm was short one valuable hand and he had begrudgingly decided to settle for the help of his two girls. The farm did well enough to get by but hiring an extra hand would have been a problem on their humble finances. Surely two girls could handle the job of one boy.
He hadn’t been so certain that that would be the case, but his daughters had been surprisingly adept at the work. However unimportant he had considered the garden, the girls had been handling large bags of soil and pulling at stubborn weeds well enough to carry their own weight. Their bond had increased through hard work and he had felt guilty that he had ever underestimated them.
He had thought that whenever his son returned on visits, the boy would simply launch into his old job once more, but his life as a Guard had given way to laziness and excess. His son would make excuses and become obstinate about his service as if it privileged him to be above such work anymore.
The twins loved their brother no less, always excited to hear his tales of life in the city and the antics of his friends. When their father passed by during their talks, he made his displeasure clear with loud harrumphs and the loud clashing of tools and tasks
that were usually of a much quieter nature.
Aster had only made matters worse asking if she could join the Guard too. Girls were not excluded, after all, and she was quick as well as good with a knife. Her father wouldn’t hear of it, but it did little more than spark her rebellious nature.
She had snuck back with her brother, had even gone so far as touring the Barracks, but the stars in her eyes didn’t last. Her father had shown up in a rage, making a scene as he practically dragged her back home.
She might have continued her defiance, but a skirmish during a field training exercise had turned into something much worse. The impulsive King had allowed the usual sparring to take on higher stakes for little more than his own amusement and the boys’ life had been forfeit.
Their father had become somber and withdrawn, anyone attempting to speak to him met with explosive outbursts, further dividing the already broken family. With little else to keep him focused on his work, he had re-enlisted himself.
The work of the farm had then been thrust on his wife and two daughters. His wife knew they could never handle everything themselves and had taken to selling flowers to secretly fund the hiring of a farmhand. Unfortunately, the farmhand had been a grifter that had gotten his hand in their finances and devastated the farm with losses that they could not recover from.
Not long after, luck had frowned on them further and their father had been killed on a campaign. Their usual bright and kind mother had been overworked and out of options, reducing to sighing by the windowsill at her neglected garden. Aster and Hyacinth had been fueled by youth and hope, doing all they could to turn their fortune around.
They found their mother dead one morning, having simply passed away sitting in their father’s favorite chair. Drawing back her sleeve to check for signs of life, the cold skin of their mother had been drawn to the bone. She had starved herself.
It had only taken a couple months before debtors were pounding at their doors and before long, they were evicted with nothing but their clothes to their name.
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