The Final Life Read online

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  An hour later Azrael stood on crimson grass, in front of the leading line of what appeared to be a gathering of most of the influential martial arts guilds in the area. At first it seemed to him that they were unaware of his identity, but after a scout tried communicating with him in his native language and Azrael refused to respond, someone seemed to realize who it was and they stopped their forward progress. It was a disconcerting feeling, facing an entire army in a staring contest, but the necromancer made the best of it.

  Azrael was pleasantly surprised. He didn’t think one of the leaders would be here so close to the front, but he could spot a man called Ken Sei not too far from the front rows. The head of Red Phoenix, an old man placed as the leader of a martial arts group nearly five times as ancient as he was, looked uncomfortable to see Azrael watching him with a smile on his face. The old man stroked his long greying beard, presumably wondering if he should move back a bit. Ken Sei’s eagle-like nose sniffed indignantly, and then the guild leader did move back, stepping slowly while yelling unnecessary instructions to mask the sound of his shuffling feet.

  Ken Sei used to have long proud nose in the past, one he used quite passionately to look down on people with. That was all in the past though. Now the thing was rather unsightly and crooked, much like the rest of him. The guild head turned to look around himself, almost as if to make sure his followers were still around him and supportive, before speaking. "Azrael! Great necromancer! What a pleasure it is to see you, old friend," he yelped more than anything else, the long rune-engraved walking cane he used as a weapon trembling in his long bony hands. The rest of him did likewise. Azrael couldn’t see too clearly in the light of the moon or stars, but he thought the man stepped back a bit more.

  "I’m surprised to hear that, master Sei," Azrael responded pleasantly, his blood red lips quivering as he fought to hide his smirk. "Your nose doesn’t seem to have that good arrow straight look to it anymore," the effort proved to be too much, and Azrael grinned widely. “In fact, I think it might be quite broken. And long, and crooked, and long. Did I mention that you have a great long nose, master Sei? You do, you know. It’s an amazing thing. Almost loops right around, it does." He then waited for Ken Sei to find words with which to respond. Azrael was not in the mood for games of intrigue today. One of the soldiers directly behind the guild master stifled a laugh, trying to pass it off as a cough. His traditional eastern armour shook a bit with the effort and clinked. That earned him a strike in the throat from the guild master, staff thrusting quick and hard behind his shoulder.

  "Anybody else care to laugh?" Ken Sei quietly questioned his soldiers, his voice seeming to echo across the field and carrying clearly. Azrael was certain none of the soldiers cared to laugh one bit, and for good reason. Mock him as you might, the old man was a guild master worthy of his seat, if it came to strength in his art. It was the rest of him that was rotten to the core.

  Ignoring the man for a second, Azrael searched the energies he felt with his senses. Strangely, despite masses of soldiers being here, some of the people he knew to be high rankers in some of the Martial arts guilds were not present. He wondered where they might be. Some he considered friends, and others had as much reason to hate him as Ken Sei himself.

  Azrael counted guild banners to know their military strength, or at least guess at it. The ruby red of Flaming Drake’s banner stood next to the black and yellow of the Thunderhoof guild, carried proudly by two minor members of the respective Guilds. The two flapped in unison, as if bound together. Far behind them Azrael glimpsed a banner the colour of lapis lazuli. Waves were depicted upon it. That had to be Bagua. Azrael missed the green and brown of the Dark Forest guild banner and the Mountain guild, but he knew they must be present as well. Since guilds from all five elemental disciplines were here, as well as Ken Sei, Azrael was not at all surprised to see a flapping depiction of a great white tiger, Sabertooth. The leader of the guild and the apparently newly formed martial arts alliance had the banner in her hands herself.

  Natsumi Crimsonhair was a monster of a woman, one who had earned her position the hard way, for she was a freckled outsider from a sub region of Brittania. She was deeply respected for her strength, and even more deeply feared due to her nasty temper. It was said she could flay a man with her glare, leaving nothing but brittle bone. "Hello, Natsumi," Azrael breathed, his voice reaching her as surely as if he were standing next to her, since the entire army was still shivering in fear of Ken Sei’s anger. She was standing near the left wing of the army, to Azrael’s right, watching the man intently as if he were an interesting puzzle she wished to solve. Her green eyes narrowed and she massaged her chest absentmindedly. Azrael had kicked her in that same spot a few months ago at a banquet in Duke Frest's castle, after Azrael had found out the way she was exploiting peasants who’d had hired his protection.

  There seemed to be a pattern here. Krall, the head of the electric element guild, had also been injured in a similar fashion...

  "Now that I think about it," Azrael remarked, "a martial arts alliance was recently reformed." He tilted his head thoughtfully. "It seems to me that it is comprised almost exclusively of guilds whose masters that I have slighted in one way or the other in the past." He put his fist on his upwards facing palm in a gesture of mock understanding, in that way managing to infuriate the seven heads even further than usual. Come to think of it, a few guilds were missing, not least of all Kobra... why leave out a death energy guild when fighting a necromancer? All the while he kept speaking while thinking. "Oh my, is this little party just for me?" he asked, taking a long formal bow not many feet from this army’s huge front line. Azrael had chosen a bow that was not only charming, but unpractical. He was bent down, eyes closed, had one hand folded across the chest and the other folded behind his back. In short, the necromancer had left himself open to attack so completely that anyone, but for those who were already familiar with his strength, would think that Azrael was vulnerable. It may not be well lit here, but Azrael knew that even in darkness his vital spots must be glaringly obvious. Thus it was no surprise that one very young, very unlucky sod at the front row broke formation and came at him, seemingly in slow motion.

  He was a boy.

  From his insistent shaking, which set his armour jiggling like some sort of demon infested belly dancer, Azrael deduced that the cub had never been in battle outside of training before. An apprentice in one of the sub guilds belonging to Katsura’s Flame Drake, if the weak spit of flame running along his drawn blade was any indication. What more, the boy was fat. For goodness' sake, these days nobody was fat. Overfeeding was a thing of the past. How could a warrior be fat? The only way it was conceivable was if he were in one of the guilds where the fat was necessary and utilized, or was perhaps a noble. Azrael sighed absentmindedly, waiting for the boy to get close enough to him to enable the necromancer to make a show out of defeating him. This one looked more like the latter.

  keeping his head bowed, Azrael was still aware of every weakness in the child's form, of the angle at which the blade was raised one handedly, of the irregularity in his breath, of the heavy sound of steps coming in his general direction so slowly that the necromancer had time to stifle a yawn. Moreover, he was aware of two things. Firstly, Azrael knew that this attack must be stopped spectacularly, in order to bring the moral of the entire army down and stop them from rushing him all at once. After all, he was a magician, incapable of dodging axes and spears and blades and punches and kicks and qi blasts coming at him from all directions. Secondly, Azrael was aware of the exact amount of death energy swirling about fatty.

  The chick was unlikely to live a year, for he had an illness of the heart even he was probably unaware of. Flab the noble child was poorly trained, and training had taken its toll severely on his ill body. Azrael found Flubbers quite amusing, however, and thought his death would be a great tragedy. Thus he decided to save him, in his own way.

  In less than a heartbeat
, perhaps faster than an eye could blink, Azrael had made his decision regarding his counterattack. He allowed a trickle of death energy to escape from his pinky finger, whilst making a grandiose gesture and shouting something purposefully vague. Energy sprang out in a hungry yet controlled manner, and although few in the alliance would be able to see spiritual energy in its true form, they could see its effect upon the surrounding life force and feel it. In a circle around Azrael red grass sagged as its entire life was depleted, destroyed by his energies. It was a fate that he would never inflict upon a human, so horrible it was.

  A hundred warriors crumbled onto the now blackened grass silently with blades still in hand, the falling metal making a loud din that instantly cut off the cheer the alliance soldiers had started in celebration of Cheek boy's charge. The spiritual artists present, as well as physical energy users with high enough capabilities to be able to sense Azrael's death energy or see its manipulations upon the astral plane, tensed at the surge of power he had released. With how large this ancient killing field was, Azrael’s area of effect was as small as a coin placed upon a palm. Before him stood legions still. However, Azrael felt a bit more confidant, because each of them was horrified by what seemed to be a slaughter.

  Contrary to popular belief, necromancy and other arts using death and darkness energies were not only useful for killing people and raising souls of the dead. In the proper hands and with a bit of creativity, necromancy could be as versatile a tool as any other. In a remarkable testament to that fact, Azrael had left every single person within the range of his attack alive yet unconscious, and had also used just the proper amount of power to spark Largebottom's body into working better, making the flame of his life force burn brighter in reaction to the danger and raising his life expectancy to about a Normal life span. He was unlikely to ever be a remarkable person, and would die early in comparison to most Ability users, but the child would have a chance to live, at the very least.

  Of course, Azrael was the only one who knew that little fact. Thus, none of the soldiers outside the ring of drooped grass around him knew his meaning when he murmured, “No need to thank me, Fluffy... yes, Fluffy! That is a good name. Wear it with pride.” He then pulled himself to his full lean height, towering above most members of the alliance. With a hint of mischief in his voice, a twinkle of playfulness in his in his beautifully carved features, he shouted, “Any other challengers?"

  Natsumi was the first to regain her voice. The red queen of martial arts took a deep breath, and with venom in her voice she bellowed, “Attack!"

  Her voice carried like a tiger’s roar to those pillar like mountains all around, far off and uncaring. Azrael thought he saw one tremble a little, so loud was her shout.

  After a moment of hesitation, Natsumi’s soldiers rushed to comply.

  Chapter 3

  Despite the shine of the sun upon the camp of the Armoured Boar, Glint found himself chilled to the bone on the dusty clearing created by the camp’s presence. This had less to do with the fact that he had run the entire way, thus sweating buckets, and more to do with the fact that Kob was laughing at him again.

  Kob was a large man, exceedingly so. More than six feet of corded muscle amounted to his total size. This effect was enhanced by his plate armour, strapped on tightly years ago and never once taken off, according to what Glint and the others could divine. The man never took his armour off, believing that danger was always near. It was rumoured among the Boars that the steel plates were actually welded to the man's skin. These rumours never reached his ears, naturally.

  "The village madman, a magician?" the man boomed with renewed laughter. "Did a wee little fairy teach him magic? Or was it a witch? eh, little Glin’?" Even though he laughed, there was no mirth in the man’s cold expression. The sound was also devoid of happiness, and as sharp as it was ruthless. Quite like the big oaf's pig-like eyes, Glint reflected. Those same eyes looked Glint over suspiciously. "I was thinking to meself, you know. I said, “now why would little Glin’ be late for his training today?" his eyes narrowed, “And guess what? The bastard was sleeping while the rest of us were out here, busting our arses off!" his voice now carried a brutal edge to it. People started to gather around to watch, coming out of short tents and leaving their duties to witness the show. A young bowman called Maze gave Glint a friendly wave from off to his right, out of sight.

  Normally, Glint would have cowered in fright when Kob was displeased with him, but not this time. He waited a second until he regained his breath, and then silently held out the fruit he had brought with him in anticipation for this moment as proof. The dark blue strawberry glistened upon his palm, apparent for everybody to behold.

  Kob recoiled from it as if he’d been bitten by a snake.

  "Believe me now?" Glint said with spite, as he was prone to doing. Kob cuffed him for that at least twice a day. This time, however, all the burly man could do was nod his large bald head with its dark black mustasche, dumbfounded.

  A crowd had encircled the two by now, watching the spectacle. Men and women alike, each and every single person who travelled with the Boar was a hardened warrior in addition to doing another job. At first they laughed, entertained by the spectacle of "little Glin'" getting bullied by Kob, as he was every day. But then the crowd, about half of the fifty fighters, became unusually quiet as uncertainty crept upon their faces. They saw the evidence and Kob’s reaction to it. Some turned to look about them in confusion, some were in the back and thus incapable of seeing what was going on clearly but heard the murmured explanations of those before them. Their leather armour or chain mail protested loudly against the movement. A creak of plate could be heard nowhere. Only the two in the middle of the circle, Kob the leader and Glint the novice, owned plate armour. It was the reason Glint had been allowed in the band in the first place.

  Suddenly, out of the circle a thin, reedy man stepped forward confidently. Reaching the two taller warriors, he waited silently for a moment, then slashed the strawberry balanced on Glint's outstretched palm with a short straight edged sword belted to his hip. Once and then a second time the blade flashed, leaving neat quarters on Glint's hand before returning to its sheath. Glint had seen the movement, and chose to remain still rather than scurry about when there was no danger of his hand being cut.

  The man's nickname was Blitz. No one knew what his real name was, and nobody cared to ask. They all called him Blitz because despite his great age showcased by his grey hair and tired, mean eyes, the man was the fastest swordsman in the band. In fact, nobody in the Boar could catch a glimpse of his blade, let alone follow it with their eyes completely enough to dodge or counter, except Kob. Not unless the swordsman with the hiltless shortsword purposely slowed himself down. Till this very moment, Glint had never been able to see it.

  Blitz and the onlookers around seemed satisfied with this display of skill. There was a collective sigh, as if the speed of the blade had grounded them; pulled them back to a real world where magicians with little control over their sanity and people who could create them were the stuff of fantasy. Blitz strutted towards Kob smugly, his leather armour protesting loudly. "If what the little bastard says is true," he announced loudly enough for all to hear, drawing even more warriors from their respective duties and into the ring that was slowly becoming his own private audience, “and we have a farmer turned magician? We should take the chance! It’s no threat to all of us. Ability users are dangerous, but if they’re not trained and can’t think, what’s so frightening? This one went unnoticed for so long, it can’t have any control. It’s like a child. Imagine the bounty, brothers and sisters... I say we kill it!” The man accentuated his point by slashing the air experimentally and sheathing his blade faster than they could see; although the single bladed sword looked slow enough to the dumbfounded Glint. Kill Crab? He thought to himself sluggishly. Blitz looked over to the leader of the band, and nodded sagely.

  There were murmurs of consent all around, even a few "h
ere, here’s”. To those who weren’t convinced, Blitz said, “We do a lot of smithy work here. The thing is bound to come looking for that sort of thing. These monsters can sense heat, can’t they?” People looked at each other in uncertainty at that. Nobody knew. “Besides, we could make a pretty penny from the local guilds if we kill it, enough to never have to work again. We could say we were saving the town under their protection. I’m here, our leader’s here. What are you afraid of?"

  Blitz was a cunning man, Glint concluded. He had successfully used the people's fear against them, while implying that he could save them single handedly. He’d become a shining beacon of hope for them to bathe in. Furthermore, he pretended to know what he was talking about. Glint saw through the man’s lies as well as he could see through his bladework.

  "No!" Glint exclaimed, "Crab hasn’t done any-"

  "Silence!" Kob and Blitz bellowed as one, the first in discipline, and the second with pure seething malice. Both seemed diminished, less intimidating than they usually were. Earlier such a reproach would have been enough to leave Glint petrified with fright. The two warriors seemed hollow for some reason. At the same time, the young warrior felt great, almost larger than life in fact. He was energetic, electric. His thoughts chased each other aimlessly, trying to make sense of all that happened that day, and he shook his head to clear it.

  Oblivious to Glint's mental confusion, the two men eyed each other warily. Although they were almost equal in terms of battle power, Kob was the official leader of the band, and was also the swordmaster responsible for everyone’s training. Added to that, the seemingly thick headed brute could be every bit as cunning as Blitz. However, Blitz had the advantage of having nothing to lose from prodding the band into action. At best, Crab would be defeated and he would become a hero. At worst Kob's authority would be diminished and the Boar would lose a few fighters before retreating. It was a win-win situation for him, and both men knew it perfectly. The crowd around the two remained silent, waiting for Kob to say his piece.

  After a lengthy pause, Kob's features softened into what he must have believed to be a smile. It looked like a painful expression to make, Glint thought. The man spread his arms, his armour glowing in the sun. "Brothers!" he announced loudly, “little Glin’ does happen to make a good point once in a while. Well, this just happens to be once in a while!" he chuckled at his own joke whilst everyone else tried quite hard to conceal their groans. Some actually managed it, although they still looked away from the man. "You don’t need me to tell you that a magician strong enough to make this kind of- of devil fruit is a very dangerous foe to wage battle against. Tree magic is not to be underestimated. Vines can choke you as fast as any man could, then drag you into the ground for a free burial. These trees will feed on you like scum. We are a mercenary band. We have no obligation to throw our lives away for the good of others. Let the villagers deal with it; let the guards deal with it. Pyro’s insane skull, let the guilds slay this beast! We should all pack and go somewhere else to do our work and get some real, easy money."

  The onlookers, Odin be thanked, began to see reason and nodded along. The big oaf had almost lost them with the fancy word, “obligation,” but the mention of money seemed to bring the issue of effort into reconsideration. It was better to run, go get other work, than to risk lives for a kill that may bring back some gold. The authorities only paid for kills they themselves commissioned, usually. Sobered by that thought, the tanks began to put their armour away, swordsmen resheathed their blades, and the bowmen and rangers turned to hang their respective bows and daggers back in their tents. Kob smiled in relief, and looked at Glint hungrily, probably in anticipation of throwing a couple of congratulatory insults his way.

  Before the bald mass of human could do more than open his mouth, a loud cackle resounded from behind him. Turning in the smoky haze of cooking fires all around, he saw Blitz laughing. "Sklaver's savage shanks, Kob! What’s your helm shaped like, a chicken?!" Kob stiffened at the insult. He was a proud man, and like many overly proud men, he had no real accomplishments to speak of. Most of his pride came from being in the Boars, for he had apparently inherited his position from his father, who in old age had been killed by a rather wild and extremely savage chicken. As a result, this insult was enough to send Kob flying into a rage.

  However, the fighters under Kob’s command were watching. Blitz himself was also a very prized fighter, almost his equal, and his lieutenant to boot. Kob could do nothing but watch as the greying man continued, “No it ain’t huh? It's a Boar! We are the Boar! Our job is to charge and crush. Not to run away from fights. Besides, if we kill this beast, we could be rewarded with more money than we could ever use. The authorities might even sign us up into one of the lower guilds. None of us are ever going to reach the essential success, anyway. We’re all Normals for life! Might as well take this chance, I reckon. Sklaver knows we ain’t ever gonna land us a better one." Then, he sealed the deal by walking right up to Kob, his nose almost touching the giant's dirty breast plate, and slyly adding, “Or if yer too scared, I might just go alone and keep all the money.” He wasn’t even looking at his leader at first, but rather straight ahead, as if he could see through the man’s chest. Then he slowly glanced upwards and locked eyes with Kob.

  As Glint and the others watched, the two leaders of the Boar remained locked in a staring contest, seeming but an instant away from trading blows. The contrast in size was almost comical, Kob being more than a foot taller than Blitz and maybe twice his weight. A steel gauntlet brushed a leather cuirass, pushing the shorter man gently further. The crowd held its breath in anticipation.

  Without taking his eyes off Blitz, Kob barked, “Gear up and head out!" He grinned evilly, his browned teeth drawing attention to themselves. "Let's hunt us a monster, shall we?"

  Glint stood surrounded by the cheers of the entire band, outraged. Blitz had done it, the entire band was going to hunt old man Crab down. They were going to kill poor, innocent, harmless Crab. And it was all his fault. He had told Kob, believing the man would come up with a solution that would benefit everyone. When had he ever done that? No, Glint realized, he had come here not out of hope, but out of fear. Kob expected obedience, and Glint had been too afraid to keep a secret from him.

  As the warriors prepared themselves, he walked up to the two, kicking up dust in his wake, mouth starting to string out protests and pleas against their decision, but the youth was met with a massive backhanded blow. Blitz sucked his breath in with mock sympathy, grinning. Normally such a blow from Kob would have sent Glint flying unconscious, but today his head swung a bit to one side, despite Kob putting his entire weight behind it. Glint's eyes burned with anger as he spat out blood into the dust beneath him. Kob made a surprised sound at the youth’s resistance.

  The swordsmaster eyed the youth with sympathy. "Somethin' is different about you today, little Glin’. You have spirit in your eyes," he said, facial expression kind as he bent down to look the apprentice in the eyes. "Look, there isn’t any use being stubborn. I would have liked to avoid this mess as well as you, but this bastard is sly as a fox." He pointed at Blitz’s back, whose owner was walking away looking quite happy with himself, his leather boots crunching against the dirt. "I know you liked the madman... so if you can't just go along with my order," Kob's voice softened until it was barely audible, "I’ll kill you too. You can be friends in hell." He patted Glint’s shoulder in a solemn manner and turned to walk away.

  Glint's rage left him in a rush at the talk of murder. This was it; there was nothing left to be done. Not against Kob's personality and the entirety of the Boar against him. Even if he spoke out, he had no doubt in his mind that the band leader would commit to his threat and really kill him. He had seen the large man’s blue eyes go this soft before, and it was always before he murdered someone. Dying now, still weak? Glint would head straight to hell. There was no helping what would happen next. He closed his eyes, thinking about poor Old Crab’s head on
a pike, and then opened them.

  The young warrior unsheathed his blade from his side with a hiss and lunged straight at Kob’s back, his sword point aimed at his trainer's heart. Glint's eyes blurred with tears and the heaviness of his choice. He'd die tonight, there was no doubt about it, but all the Unchained damn him if he would go help them kill an innocent person.

  Chapter 4

  As Azrael realized that a fight was inescapable, he decided to switch up his tactics. The skill he had used against Fluffy and his comrades couldn’t even be considered a necromancy spell. It was simply a controlled release of the basic death energy contained within him. It was dangerous to use it against so many, he thought as he backed off a bit and stood facing the columns of the great army advancing towards him, because misusing or not controlling death energy properly could very well result in the untimely death of his foes. The greater danger was that it was far too intimidating. The lower soldiers wouldn’t be able to sense it, but scattered amongst the alliance troops were people with senses refined enough that they could see his power for what it is. Azrael could feel the fear radiating from those individuals in waves. Those same people had great skill, and might try to retaliate in the hopes of harming him in a desperate effort to escape. This the necromancer saw as insensible, and would inevitably end up harming or even killing their own allies with stray bolts of energy or elemental attacks in the night. Dark was treacherous. Right now, the only light came from what little the moon could summon, as well as some luminescent plants in the distance here and there around them. These plants exist only in dark areas like Shönö, but this field was barren of anything except red grass and warriors.

  As a result, Azrael decided he needed to finish this fight as soon as possible. At any rate, he didn’t think it proper to utilize entire guilds for an attack upon one man. Such resources could be put to the aid of many. Maybe I ought to teach them that.

  The necromancer picked out a suitable target from the group immediately in front of him, one of Natsumi's elite soldiers. This man had his guard up, spear raised steady with anticipation with invisible waves of power focused at its tip. His eyes were cool and hard, and he was an instant away from attacking in earnest. A veteran.

  Azrael stepped forward, dodged the man’s thrust at his heart, and punched into his chest. Through the veteran’s armour went the shock of death energy Azrael had gathered around his fist, and even that much energy only caused the man to crumble to the red grass wordlessly, relatively unharmed. One.

  The soldiers next to Azrael's first victim seemed to be complete amateurs. They lacked the steadiness of their comrade, and leapt out to attack Azrael's faked opening in the most futile ways imaginable. The first jumped straight up into the air, using air elemental qi to float up for half a second to steady his aim before lashing out with a kick at the necromancer's neck. Azrael opted not to use the delay to attack, choosing instead to arrange his face in an expression of shock at the man's display of control over wind to appease his pride. He then leaned back, watching the knife foot sail where his neck had been but an instant earlier, and allowed death energy to gather in his arm. Azrael reflected upon the difference between his abilities and real spells while one of his palms smacked the man’s thigh. The young soldier’s scream as he went unconscious gave his partner pause. This one wore brown and green clothing, but no armour. An earth elemental. His darting eyes betrayed fear, even as his hands remained steady.

  The fighter clapped his hands together, and mounds of brown wet dirt rose up from both Azrael’s sides in an attempt to crush him between them. How talented, the necromancer thought to himself. This attack lacked the speed to be a threat, however, and so Azrael sent a “wraith,” one of the most fundamental forms for death spiritual energy to take. This was his first real spell this fight. If one had the ability to see spiritual energy well enough, one would be met with a ghostly pale semi transparent image of a person with hands raised, eyes black holes dripping dark ink. Azrael suspected the man saw but a haze, though, going straight through him and draining all semblance of will and energy from his body. The man in green cloaks crumbled at the same time his attack did, falling back on the ground in heaps, looking like freshly dug graves. Azrael had no reprieve, sadly, for many more soldiers came to replace the few he had taken out. They howled and screamed as they charged him, and he was kept busy.

  Azrael dealt with coming attacks via wraiths or a physical attack infused with his own spiritual energy. Thus he made sure that he used just enough strength every time, so that soldiers were knocked unconscious rather than killed outright. Azrael was trying to find an opportunity to finish this without using up too much of his power. All the while he thought.

  It was inconceivable for Natsumi and the other heads of guilds to defeat him with such troops. The sly red haired woman and her fellow guild leaders knew his powers far too well for that. Above all else, the number of real fighters with experience and power was tiny. They were sparingly mixed into the wedge army like shells upon a sandy beach, as if for show. Azrael knew that the real strength of this army was elsewhere. It made him feel oddly snubbed.

  The heads were definitely planning something, of that Azrael was certain. There were far too many talented fighters missing for his liking. Each could have caused just as much devastation as Azrael had thus far in this battle. There had to be a trap somewhere.

  The problem was, the necromancer could see no clue to hint at what the trap actually was. It would be a problem if all the greater fighters were planning a united attack, or if they were going to rush him as one. Azrael would be hard pressed to defend himself against something of that particular nature without bloodshed, if a chance of their separation didn’t present itself.

  The black clad magician closed his eyes, still furiously fighting multiple opponents. He could hear his late father’s words loud and clear, an eternal presence. When you know, the saying had went, that a trap is coming, the best thing to do is the spring it, boy! When timing becomes your ally, only then can you plan. Until then you act.

  Azrael's father, a nobleman of Aetheria and a practitioner of some degree, had drummed lessons of warfare into him. The man had always shined for his brilliance in strategy just as his brother Jecht had shown his own talent for brute strength; in his dojo a few feet below the clouds. Young Azrael would often peek over smooth mahogany as Lord Windslayer discussed plans with his lieutenants at the table. He had learned well in those days, and the lessons never failed him.

  The necromancer kept battling his way through the army. Missiles of various elements missed him by inches. Cats, dogs, Boars, oxen, dragons, and one remarkably fierce looking hamster came shooting at him, all constructed out of different colours of glow, or elements in pure form. The necromancer beat down anyone who dared jump at him for a physical blow or fly in his general direction. In that particular moment he was glad for his own training in non energetical martial arts. He weaved and blocked as he skipped around. Thankfully none of the fighters were well versed in spiritual or psionic attacks, which allowed Azrael to fend them off quite easily and with abandon, leaving the greater part of his mind free for more pressing matters, such as coming up with a counterattack. They had probably thought it best not to use magicians against someone like him. In theory, body energetic arts or pisonics at long range were the best way to deal with a magician. Theory became moot, however, above a certain level of skill.

  Azrael's chain of thought was broken by five simultaneous attacks, each coming from a different direction. There was a flaming fireball directly before him, blocking his path with roaring orange flames. The heat coming from the thing was already almost unbearable, and it burnt a trail into worn red grass as it came towards him. An ice missile came at him from the left. To make matters worse a large branch, shaped like a spear, shot directly at Azrael's kidney from the crimson ground beneath him. The last two blows were both from the same person, who had sent a cutting shockwave at Azrael's back, and then leapt at h
im from his right, a spear hand aimed at the necromancer’s ribcage. A snarl deformed this last man’s features and his whiskers looked fierce.

  Azrael, however, was a master of the basics, and managed to leap straight back and land softly before hopping lightly to his right, hitting this foe with a wraith. This one wasn’t enough to make him fall, but left him sluggish enough to allow the necromancer to push him into the path of the rest of the attacks, which by themselves wouldn’t kill a veteran. This man was a veteran. In fact, he was Ariah the wise, from Ken Sei’s guild, acting advisor to the guild leader in times of strife. He was rumoured to be able to take fireballs from some of the highest class pyromancers without damaging his trademark curved mustasche. Azrael didn’t know why Ariah owned his nickname, but he concluded the man couldn’t be too wise to attack him.

  In the lull created by the failure of this most recent assault, Azrael gathered his energy. In less than three seconds new foes were leaping at him, but Azrael had finally gotten his window of opportunity, and with a snarl he let out a similar technique to the one he used in at the start of the battle, albeit far more controlled and shaped with ancient words curling about his tongue. It was a horrible waste of strength but Azrael felt he had little time, somehow. Apprehension knocked upon his mind’s door.

  All around him grass died as most soldiers around fell to the floor without a sound. Suddenly Azrael’s view become clear and he could see all around the field. He smiled, for he’d been starting to feel stuffy in this press of people. The more powerful of the bunch came woozily back to their feet after a few seconds, panting heavily and leaning on whatever they could find. There was carnage everywhere, caused mostly by their own elemental attacks, mud and smoke from flames and newly summoned trees, as well as those strange mounds of earth or rock. Had anyone painted this scene, it may have looked a slaughter and gotten itself a place in either Aetheria’s or Ya’ab’s Council walls. Shien’s Council in Kern was less flamboyant, and rather underfunded due to the continent’s lack of higher tier guilds beyond Firefaery. Seeing their fallen comrades strewn on the floor everywhere, the survivors looked up at the pale moon in horror and shouted nonsense such as “he’s killed them!” or “Lady Natsumi will avenge us!”

  Azrael wished he had used more power in the attack to shut the leftovers up, but he did need to conserve his strength, after all. Neither did he wish to endanger those whom he had previously knocked out by subjecting them to another attack of the same scale. Thus he simply called out “Relax, they’re all alive!” to one of the nearest yellers. It was a woman, he thought from her figure, in a blue hooded outfit that hid her face as well as many concealed weapons. She cradled the head of some loved one, perhaps a team member, in her lap as she wept. When she heard him she stopped crying and finally bothered to check for a pulse while Azrael tutted audibly at her foolishness.

  If the leftovers of the battle were to be ignored, Azrael thought he could have a rather nice evening here, in the serenity of crimson plains and the moon’s eye. However, he had other things to take care of. The man had noticed the guild leaders taking some of their elites and fleeing north, just a few minutes earlier.

  The necromancer looked suspiciously north, where he could sense some dubious amounts of energy flaring up briefly. “I just hope whatever your leaders are planning doesn’t cause you harm.” His words were directed at no one in particular. Any within earshot were either unconscious or tending to a friend. It was more of a prayer, for the necromancer knew the people he was dealing with weren’t beyond sacrificing soldiers for their gains.

  Azrael’s left foot shook when he tried to take a step, and he cursed silently. The necromancer had expended much energy, for he’d needed to adjust his power depending on who his spell struck. He hadn’t managed to get any sleep either. Despite all of that, Azrael kept putting one black shod foot in front of the other. Ignoring his weariness and trying to gather his strength, he headed north. Something was off.

  Earlier Azrael could sense energies. One hundred veterans, it seemed, including the heads of the guilds and Natsumi. Their strength flared up all at once, like a sun born within the eyes of Azrael’s mind, even from that distance, and the massive mix of energy was poured into something. The reaction coming from the object was strange, though, and it was like a statue of a... Azrael paled in horror and he suddenly broke into a run as the reality of the situation struck him.

  “Miserable old -” he barked aloud. They’ve actually made a human into a vessel for their own energy! He began to run faster urgently. The energies were melding together and becoming something enormously dangerous. His cloak flapped and he wished he had some way of transporting himself with higher speed, but sadly his abilities in necromancy offered no help there. He was just reaching the end of the crimson plains when energies flared up again, signalling the second stage of the ceremony. He could see his goal clearly now. It was a grove of a type of tree that had evolved to having luminescent leaves, in reaction to the perpetual darkness. Not all plant life could survive on moonlight alone, and so those trees had to create their own light. They shone with a soft greenish glow. However, Azrael was too angry to appreciate their beauty.

  The technique of creating a human vessel was forbidden, and for good reason. This skill would give the vessel an enormous amount of power, at horrible cost. To inject this much energy into an unprepared person would completely destroy mind, body and soul. The victim of this crime would live only a few minutes before being utterly destroyed, even if it was a martial artist who boasted great physical strength and endurance. This vessel was an amateur in that regard, if Azrael was any judge. The only way to save someone who had this done to them was to wait until the transfer was complete, then act. Luckily Azrael knew the spell, and it would work well with his own arts. He began the incantation, marshalling every single ounce of his concentration while murmuring the words of an age old language comprised mostly of hissing and spitting.

  Why would the heads of the guilds go to such lengths? Attacking Azrael himself was fine, since they knew they would not lose many, if any, troops in the process. He was known as someone who never killed, after all. But such a forbidden technique? To go that far for a slight or three was impossible. There had to be some ingrained motive for this kind of action. His anger soared, became a white hot ball. There had better be, he said to himself, or those sods will pay. He would do it personally, and the every continent’s high councils will condone it. The world had lost far too much to guilds using this technique as a weapon of mass destruction already. They would not care to have another century of darkness in these modern times.

  By the time Azrael neared the glowing tree grove where the guild leaders should be, his rage had reached a boil. There were many fighters here, but they did not even wish to slow him, it seemed. The number of life forces he could sense dwindled as his enemies felt his approach and his fury. They moved all to one area and disappeared, letting Azrael know that they had a teleportation circle at the grove’s far end. Azrael Windslayer was never angry, it was told, but if you managed to get it done, run. Run and never look back. It seemed they had heeded that advice.

  With alarm Azrael registered that the ritual for the vessel was nearing a close. Those earlier energy flares from the middle of the grove began to quiet down just as Azrael's own incantation was ready to be cast, held at the tip of his tongue. Now I just need to get there, save the vessel, and then find those old farts to give them a piece of my mind.

  Just as he reached a clearing in the grove, encased in the soft greenish glow of white light filtering through leaves with intricate patterns, Azrael felt others use their teleportation circle to escape until he was the only Ability user left. Here, rune-like patterns of shadow were created by the green light being obstructed by leaves. These runes mingled with fog to create further obstruction to his sight, if beautiful in nature. Azrael’s enemies were overestimating his powers, he knew. Even the necromancer could not cast off a spell like
the one he had prepared on his lips and still fight off a hundred master class opponents.

  Azrael was perplexed by the unnatural fog. He did not see the point of such a spell being used here, since the vessel could be felt a hundred feet away with the amount of energy pumped into it, even without using his eyesight. He could feel the buzz of the energy contained inside it on his very skin. Azrael could barely see the outline of a short person against the misty substance, standing with its back to him, perfectly still if not for an intense shiver brought by fear. It seemed the vessel understood what was happening to him. He guessed it was a victim, though, and not a volunteer. Nobody would volunteer for the kind of end this technique brought: disintegration without afterlife.

  The necromancer knew he needed physical contact to dispel this kind of energy, even with the spell still chained within his mind. There was enough time, luckily. Azrael ran over to the victim, put his hands on a shoulder, turned it around, and his entire world turned upside down.

  Chapter 5

  Fog dimmed all light that night, but when he looked down, Azrael could clearly see a hand. It bled from several cuts on knuckles and fingers. The hand was attached to a handle, made out of copper. The handle was attached to a thin curved metal blade, which ended abruptly in his chest. A red blossom appeared where it had sunk halfway in, darker still than the black fabric. Pain came then, and Azrael winced. This shouldn’t happen, a normal blade shouldn’t be able to pierce his specially made clothes. So all the energy was for a special blade, he thought to himself as he dimly watched the blood spread. He had the spell on his lips still, despite the pain. He could try to find healing after he saved this person. The necromancer looked up to see the face of the person who stabbed him.

  The vessel was not a he, but a she. She was shorter than Azrael, beaten severely, and crying softly into a rag stuffed into her mouth. Her eyes were closed, although tears and blood came out from under her eyelashes as her body began to come undone.

  Eyes still shut, the perfect little girl pulled the blade out from Azrael's chest with a sob of pain. It was a good blade, strong enough to take the agonizing amount of energy coursing through her young body. Although he willed her not to, the girl opened her eyes, their black hue matching Azrael's dark one, and gasped. She was supposed to be in Aetheria, not here. It was all wrong. He pulled the rag from her mouth in shock.

  "Daddy...oh, daddy!" his daughter Judith breathed, her lungs starting to lose all function. "Judith," was all Azrael could whisper. When a heart is struck a fatal blow, there remains little to be said. He could muster no power. His spell was gone, for shock numbed his mind.

  "I’m s-so sorry," Judith said with lips as red as Azrael’s own, "They killed mom. They took me and hurt me, daddy. They gave me a knife and left me to-" her chest convulsed in heart breaking sobs as she tried her hardest to explain, "I didn’t know it w-was you!"

  Azrael tried to whisper his little girl’s name, to reassure her, but the space between his lungs was devastated by the strike. She and her mother were just alchemists... The best he could do was blubber as blood spilled from his mouth. There was no hope for either of them. They were going to die here, in this soft glow of trees, lying on cold green grass, and no one would find their bodies or figure out what had happened. They would just disappear.

  "I love you, daddy," Judith wailed for the thirty fourth time that year as her body began to dissipate into golden particles of light. In the end even the dust will disappear. Her mind, body and soul will all be destroyed, leaving her existence void. At least she wouldn’t go to hell, for she would have been too young and weak to clear Odin’s stairway. That gave Azrael some comfort, at least. To think that utter obliteration was the best he could hope for her...

  Light streamed out from her slender body as she fell through his hands onto the floor, becoming slowly blinding, illuminating her black hair, cherry lips and pale skin. Azrael refused to look away as his eyes streamed with loss. He kept his eyes open and took in every detail he could see of his daughter, as well as the obvious anguish she felt. She sobbed with every fallen chunk of her, and he forced himself to watch, kneeling next to her, both wishing a quick end for her and not wanting to see her gone. Suddenly, she went out in a flash, disappearing before his semi blinded eyes, and he was holding nothing but the precious space she had occupied moments ago. He stood alone.

  Azrael took one step and fell forwards, face turned to the right. The fog was gone now and he could almost see past the grove despite the searing burn in his eyes. "Why?" he mouthed, although his voice refused to make itself noticeable past a croak.

  "You were too dangerous, Azrael," Natsumi answered, stepping out of the shadow behind a tree. "Too strong, too uncontrollable.” Her clothing revealed her powerful shoulders and calves, for the martial artist prided herself on needing no armour. The necromancer knew her cowardice.

  “N...not strong e-nough.” The words were barely being formed now, Azrael was simply mouthing them bitterly, tasting grass and dirt and blood.

  “I wish there had been another method," she explained in the tree’s patterned glow, looking as if she actually meant it, after what she’d dared do. "Anything else would have been useless against you."

  She left the clearing, walking back to the trees and into darkness. Azrael followed her muscular scarred back with his fading sight as best he could. There was a cloaked man standing behind her, but she just walked through him without even noticing. It was like he was made of smoke when she touched him, reforming only after her passing, ignoring a guild leader who could command a legion. "Curse your own strength. Curse the death that you brought upon yourself." With those parting words, a bright light in the distance signalled Natsumi’s disappearance, leaving Azrael alone with the silent grove and the mysterious man. The one she couldn’t see.

  His sight was unnerving, even to the uncaring necromancer. Azrael could feel no energy coming from the man, as if he didn’t exist at all. Yet he could see him, and all about him even the ever-present was diminished. This was not something Azrael had experienced before. How could one explain the feeling of light or heat being less than true? The man was tall and thin and still. Azrael could imagine this figure standing like this for millennia, watching empires rise and fall.

  Azrael felt a sinister smile come from under the man’s cowl, although his face could not be seen beyond a large nose. Around him the glow of the trees felt diminished, sickly even, as if light shied from his body. He held a simple black scythe behind him, its tip curving up from behind his shoulder, bare inches from his face. The man was dressed in a black cloak, even darker than true night, and he reached out to Azrael, showing hands paler than bleached bone "Come with me, child," he said almost lovingly, although his voice was feral, "it is your time.” His words rasped against one another, almost like the scales of a coiling snake. A scythe was swung downwards almost playfully

  Azrael blinked one final time, and then he died.

  Chapter 6

  As always, the warm breeze was refreshing. It was a strangely clear autumn day, hotter than it usually was around Shien. Despite that, birds chirped, grass was still holding on to a bit of green, and the sky was a bright undisputed blue. Sunshine invited the children in villages to play whilst their mothers played the role of the villain diligently, scolding them with loud ringing voices and, with the occasional whack behind the ears, kept them in order and helping out with the farming. Laughter echoed through the meadows and fields. It should have been a beautiful day.

  But not here. Glint threw up, his eventual dry heaving replacing the laughter, smoke from fires draining the day of all colours but a deep crimson red spread across the camp. The smell of flowers made way for the stench of blood and gore. "What have I done?" he barely managed to whisper out between the bouts of retching, trying to force the bare bones of reality away from him. "Pyro's holy flame, what the hell have I done!"

  Glint hadn’t expected things to go this way.<
br />
  When he’d lunged at Kob, he had been completely and utterly certain that the burly man would turn around with a backhanded blow. Glint was going to take it and fall as he always did, and then accept whatever punishment the Boar had for traitors. The trend pointed in the direction of execution.

  Glint's belief in that image had been so complete that he barely registered Kob reacting a fraction of a second too slow. That the turn wasn’t complete. That Glint's blade had not even been turned by the man's thick plate armour. It simply forced its way through as if the youth had cut through a leaf. The sound of metal against metal was closer to a human shriek than anything else. That sound had struck Glint like a hammer and kicked his head into a rush. Things went into a blur then. Glint barely felt the yank of his sword as he’d pulled it out of Kob's back. The man went on his knees, still facing away. Blood trickled down his jaw slowly as he tried to look behind him and lock eyes with his murderer.

  The world had spun back into motion as the two gazed at each other relentlessly. Two pairs of eyes, full of life and dreams and wants. Two pairs of eyes, one blue, and the other a light brown. Then suddenly, it became only one pair of eyes that still lived, and the man’s corpse had fallen.

  As Kob crumbled to the floor noisily, his bulky plate armour clanging, Blitz had turned to look at the pair with a smile. He took in the scene in less than a second, and his smile became a wild grin, feral and crazed. "Murderer!" he had yelled, pointing in their direction. Multiple shouts repeated the call.

  All hell broke loose then. Warriors came from all directions, rushing into the wide ring of tents and workstations around Glint. Most were caught unawares, but were still within reach of weapons. Maces and blades and bows and arrows and throwing knives grinned at the youth, or at least their owners did. They all had promised death in their eyes, as if they had wanted Glint dead for a great deal of time. Some were even smiling then, and Glint had caught the occasional laugh from behind the helms of a few tanks. His sword had been loose in his hand, pointing downwards with blood dripping from its tip, and he’d looked about him in a daze. What dream is this? He’d thought.

  Blitz, for his part, seemed to be in ecstasy. He’d drawn his blade slowly and deliberately whilst withdrawing behind a group of four. "I think it’s time to dispose of the bastard, ladies and gentlemen. Use the usual formation, just like we practiced." With that said the warriors retreated out of the ring, and some gave Glint obscene gestures as they went, just to spite him.

  The usual formation. That single sentence was enough to snap Glint back into reality. Some part of him had howled, deep inside of his consciousness, in fear and horror at Kob's death. He wasn’t supposed to die. Glint had locked that part away from him, secured it with chains of will and put it at arm’s length. He’d repeated an old soldier’s mantra again and again out loud, in barely a whisper. "Worry about now," he said, “Don’t worry about later, or you’ll never reach it.” He readied his stance. There was no getting out of it now. It also seemed like a hopeless fight but still, something pushed him to live. Glint was used to going along with other’s expectations of him. It was the reason he was in this mess. He’d go down spitting and screaming like they wanted.

  Their camp was created in a way that made ambushes effective for the fifty warriors the Boar had in its employment. Its setting was a star shaped market place, with an empty ring in the middle. There were five roads leading to this ring, created by stalls and tents where the warriors pretended to do business. Some actually did. Blunt was rather good at brewing healing potions and ointments. He was known for it in some villages they passed through. But underneath his clothes and cheery appearance he was ready for a fight like all the others. When the battle gong rang, unaware victims were herded into the ring. The warriors then came in waves of five, one from each entrance, lusting for blood. The poor sods would be worn down slowly at times, yet at others their frantic struggles made death swift. The bandits went in teams of a tank, a rogue, two blademasters and, usually, an archer. However, the teams were generally left to their own devices and there were many combinations that the Boar had used. There could have been no way for Glint to escape through a wave and run.

  The youth had started to back away carefully towards the mouth of one of the stall roads, keeping his back to the exit, looking around him carefully as the bell pealed. He could hear movement behind him, beyond the general bustle of chickens and pigs and work abandoned by warriors getting ready for combat, but it was better to leave his back open to one warrior’s approach than risk getting surrounded by five of them in the middle.

  Due to that decision, it was the warrior behind him that had reached Glint first. He heard the step of a man with mail armour behind him, ten feet away, trying to tread lightly on the dust of the path, keeping to the side so as to be hidden by shadows of grey tents. The youth waited then, hand gripping his blade’s handle tightly in the hopes of a perfect opportunity, feigning obliviousness. Five feet. Four. Two.

  With a whirl Glint had turned and stabbed, blinded by fear. His strike hit home. The man yelled as fell over, of course. He wasn’t dead yet, though, for the wound had been shallow. Glint studied the man. The stab had worked better than expected, and the man -Glint recognised him as Hip- was bleeding profusely from a cut in his gut. The man then swore as he’d crawled backwards, gotten up, and charged at Glint, his large sword held above him, poised for a killing strike. "Die!" he’d snarled as he came close- and stopped, Glint's sword stuck in his belly. He’d fallen to the floor silently, as stupefied as Glint. Hip was one of the better fighters in the Boar, while Glint was known to be one of the weakest. Yet the man's eyes had not registered the blow at all, as if it was some superior warrior who had run him through with a lightning fast lunge.

  Glint realized then that there was very little time to wonder at his ability to defeat a man who, by all means, should have been the better fighter. He could hear more sounds from inside the ring. Fighters were debating between them. "I heard a scuffle.” one had said jokingly, then let out a nervous laugh. "You think the little bastard is dead?" wondered another, a woman this time. He had recognised the voice. That was Sandra, an elder woman who doubled as the head cook for the band as well as a rogue, and an accomplished one at that. She was known to be the most silent huntress in the Boar. Glint swore softly. They were sending out the best warriors early.

  The boy had prepared himself hurriedly. He would do whatever he needed to fight back, and to that effect Glint took Hip's body and made it stand, then set it up in the shadows at an angle, leaning against the second stall back to his left. It had looked about as tall as the young warrior then; it could be mistaken for him in the shadows. He’d then waited as the voices debated whether they needed to go in for him. "Glinty," he heard Sandra call out softly, as if for a child. "You won’t survive anyway, honey," she tempted, “Won’t you come out and make this easier for yourself?"

  "Stuff yourself," came Glint's eloquent response. The men had laughed. A second later Glint heard a step, impossibly silent, padding the ground from an angle he couldn’t yet see from where he hid away from the road’s mouth, within a tent. Another step. An arm had appeared then, slender and covered in black wraps. It held a dagger in a reversed grip, set to stab downward at the slightest provocation. This was Sandra's style. One strike, one kill. Unable to see clearly, the woman had naturally assumed the corpse propped against the post to be Glint. She’d brought the blade down unto the muscle between Hip's shoulder and his neck with a cry, right above his collar bone. "I got you now, you little prick!" she’d started, then "What?! This isn’t-" Silently Glint had leapt out of his hiding spot to the side with a horizontal slash, catching her in the throat. He’d let her splutter and blubber to death while he arranged Hip’s dead body and hers at the entrance, stoppering the path to create a makeshift barricade. He then stood tall before it.

  The three men left standing could see him then. He had stood facing the remnants of the first wave,
bolstered by his small victory. The youth had bellowed a challenge to the two blademasters, both of whom he recognised, and the tank hidden behind a helmet. Both wore leather armour, while the third was in mail, as Hip had been. They’d cursed him bitterly when they saw the defence mounted behind him, but remained standing where they were. Glint didn’t understand the reason until an arrow whistled past his left ear, almost taking it off. He had cursed and hid behind the bodies, springing over them as hastily as he could. Damn. He’d forgotten about the bowmen. They were gathered in a bunch in the beginning of camp, the outer circle, and the soldiers were trained to fight while leaving a clear path for arrows to fly down the road. Glint had been directly in the path of their shots. He remained then low, in order to force the fighter’s hand. Instead the tank came, alone. one of the blademasters started to move behind him, to be able to quickly take advantage of any openings Glint left, but the man had waved him away, “I kill him myself," he had announced.

  The man had stepped slowly towards Glint, cutting off the bowmen's view. Glint then stood up and stepped over the makeshift barricade he had erected. He was brimming with confidence, and his sight became much like a bird of prey’s. He could see the individual links on the man's rust covered chain mail with its numerous chinks and tears, as well as the scratches on his horned helmet. The boy had killed two of them already, more than he’d ever expected. The man had looked at Glint and smiled. "I knew you were trouble, you shite," he had growled, and wasted no more time in attacking. He came in with his axe, an overheaded chop carrying enough might to split a man’s head in two. Glint had raised his blade diagonally, reflecting the blow to the side. The man couldn’t stop his momentum and his axe went wide, slamming into the dusty ground. He resigned himself to the finishing counter from the younger warrior, but it never came for instead of countering, Glint had jumped to the left, not expecting the man to be so slow, and had over distanced himself. Had that been a normal fight the bladesmater to the tank’s right would have ripped the youth to shreds. However, he’d remained where he was, finger on his hilt. Glint could see the tank’s eyes promise death for anyone who interfered. The tank had pulled his axe from the ground, looked Glint in the eye, and leapt towards him with an almighty shout.

  Glint had been prepared for a rage driven lunge. while the man was bringing his axe down upon him, Glint had leapt backwards while slashing horizontally, the blow fast enough to sever the man's carotid artery with the sword’s tip before his foe even had the chance to bring his hands down. The youth had not stopped then, but continued the slash whilst turning, directing it downwards in order to wound the man behind him in the leg. Glint was lucky, for his sword cut completely through the man's shin, before breaking free and severing the other as cleanly as a guillotine would have. The man's brown cape became smeared with blood and dirt as he collapsed violently, bleeding freely and clutching his right thigh. "My legs!" he had screamed while Glint fought hard to stop the bile from rising up his throat. He was not done yet. Don’t think about later or you might never reach it. The youth knew he had no time and no choice in this place. All his training was being put to the test in a brutal manner. All the while the man screamed in horror.

  Before Glint could face off against his final opponent, another blademaster brandishing a single bladed axe in one hand and a malicious-looking mace in the other, he had heard the telltale thwup of an arrow being unleashed from its string. The sound had been faint over the first blademaster’s whimpers, and Glint so sure that there were no bowmen nearby, that he had decided to ignore it an instant before an arrow shattered against the black of his iron chest plate with a deafening crash.

  Luckily the armour had not been pierced, although the shock drove Glint back and the breath out of his chest in one fell swoop. With that shock, the warrior was barely able to defend against the next blow coming his way. Axe, mace, and axe again had flown inches from his face as the youth dodged his foe’s violent rush. Glint had blocked and blocked again, each movement a struggle for survival, and yet he could not be slain. The man looked just as shocked as Glint felt. What he had done should have been impossible for one of his skill. A memory came that could explain his ability to survive thus far, despite fighting against men and women meant to be his betters. A memory of fainting just that morning.

  Glint’s strength, speed and senses were heightened. Kob had once said that when a person training for a physical art reached the essential success, their body would change beyond the scope of normal human ability. This was why Glint could fight better than most people now, and even hear sounds from far away. This meant that he may be capable of doing far more than he imagined. The boy was a mere Normal no more. Armed with that confidence Glint had started to hope that, instead of simply trying to fight desperately, he might be able to actually survive the day.

  The brown haired youth began to test his abilities on the blademaster fighting him. The man’s blows became more desperate, matching his laboured breath. His armour had seemed puny, his arm weak as a twig. That was when Glint decided to stop defending, just as the man dropped his mace in exhaustion. It had hit the ground with a dull thunk. The youth waited for a two handed stab with the axe’s spike, as the weapon became too heavy to be wielded with one hand only. When it came, Glint had eyed the spike’s pinpoint as it came straight towards his face. He stepped past it, almost brushing the back end of the axe with his right cheek. The boy brought his blade unto the man's head from the other side, from where he had hooked his sword arm upwards beneath his foe’s desperate attack, as if swinging at himself. He cleaved it cleanly in twain. The man fell. Glint had smiled then, the muscles in his face twitching as if they belonged to someone else. He went to finish off the footless blademaster still screaming on the dusty ground.

  ***

  A few minutes later, the youth had changed up his strategy a bit. He had fought for his life against three waves already, meaning that he had claimed fifteen lives. Part of him had wept in a corner of his mind, discarded by practicality and fear. Another part of him relished the slaughter, howled its glee through his tongue without him noticing, making his enemies cringe in fright. Still he’d picked up his sword each time at the sound of footsteps coming through the haze. He was starting to control his abilities a bit more. He had been hit a few times, but like where the bowmen's arrow had struck him earlier, Glint’s armour had mended itself, creating spots of silvery metal that contrasted with the dirty pig iron of his original plate armour. The wind howled, and the youth had been thankful it had rained earlier that week, for more dust could be his doom against this many people. Glint saw another warrior step up to him. A stocky woman named Shiela, she was one of the weaker warriors despite being a tank. That always made her cautious with her war hammer and unlike Hip or Sandra or the cocky tank, she refused to approach him alone, but instead came in with team members. "Monster, is this how you repay us?" she whispered, using the hammer to point at the bodies strewn around the ring. Glint answered with a silent charge, falling deeper into his blood frenzy and letting his vision go a red illuminating only new ways to kill.

  ***

  Blood had matted hair, face and armour, dying them a red as deep as the veins of life the colour had been plucked from. He had fought the last few waves whilst abandoning all form, as well as the circular barricade he had earlier made using the bodies of the slain. It had been an impressive stoppage for his enemies. The psychological effect was enough to almost scare them off, in fact. Almost, but not quite, sadly. By counting the number of bodies, there were just a few left alive including the bowmen, whom Glint had started to pick off by throwing the weapons of the fallen at them. His arm was strong, even more so on that day, and he had been able to send all manners of missiles an impressive distance to devastate the archer’s ranks whenever one came into view. What a disgrace it was, he had thought, to have your weapon used to kill your comrade. He’d looked back at the barricade, piled high enough to reach a man's chest. His eye caught a hand
coming out the top then, pointing towards the bright blue sky as if it were a flag. He’d giggled, the sound coming naturally as if the hand were a joke shared between himself and the dead. Glint's sense of self had escaped by this point, leaving only the will to survive and a steady emptiness. Still he had fought.

  Still he had killed.

  ***

  At some point, waves of warriors had stopped coming. They were all dead and gone. Vultures had started to circle the blue skies already, ugly visions of death, intent on leaving nothing but clean white bone in their wake. The sky itself was starting to cloud with smoke from a fire someone had inadvertently started in the far side of camp. Glint thought it would be a hard task to make the bodies disappear. There were forty seven of them of them, amputated and disembowelled, killed in the most efficient ways possible. To their credit, none of them had chosen to flee except Maze, Glint’s closest friend here. Even after understanding that fighting Glint was closer to waging war against a natural calamity than battling a man, they had stayed to meet their doom. Some had gone cursing, some weeping at the bitterness of it all, and some fighting, but none gave him their back in their final moments. Glint had noticed that none were killed by decapitation and decided that the final death should be a special one. He had broken down his castle, turning it into a simple pyramid of bodies within seconds, and then lit the thing on fire using some fire grease he had found in one of the foremost stalls. The bodies burned nicely, and he had thought this was a proper enough cremation for his former comrades.

  As Glint had stepped away from the pyramid and started his way through one of the roads leading to the outside of the camp, a figure stepped out to block that path. The blademaster had looked smug like a victorious general, and he whipped his long greyed hair back. He had immediately pulled out his guardless blade and started chattering away at the same time.

  "You little prick, think you’re tough, do you?"

  Glint had continued his dazed stumble, a broken blade in his hand. The old scabbard was a mangled mess as well, used to block a particularly heavy blow that would have broken through his guard, had he not used it in tandem with his sword. Glint had looked for a replacement while Blitz kept talking about something or the other. Through the emptiness in Glint's heart, and drained as he was, the words were little more than disconnected sounds to him. He had found a simple black leather affair that was appropriate, then sheathed the blade and belted it on his hip. Meanwhile the noise had continued. Glint had shambled over to the man, who was saying, “There is no way you can defeat me in speed, brat. I was fast before you were even born. I don’t care how-"

  A blade had flashed out from Glint's elbow, growing out of his now silver armour as a branch would from a tree. It resheathed itself into his armour. Glint never even broke a step, going on ahead as if he was the only one in this camp, until he heard the head hit the ground. The boy stopped and turned to look. The eyes were looking at him eerily; the man’s headband had come undone, snapping Glint out of his drunk like state and causing the horror locked inside him to be unleashed in honest, childlike sobs. He heaved and whispered, “What have I done?”

  Chapter 7

  The walk back to the house was barely more than a blur to Glint. He put one foot in front of the other, slipping in and out of consciousness, looking blankly at trees and grassy meadows giving way to the Bane mountains far to the north. The mountain range was one of the longest in the whole world, its peaks adorned by crowns of white snow all year round, and the highest mountain was mount Ash, where the guildsmen of Quicksilver resided. None of that mattered to Glint. All that mattered was the continued steady rhythm of his footsteps, added it to resounding clinks as he stepped on stone and dirt. It was a distraction. If he didn’t think, he didn’t need to deal with it.

  Glint had spent hours crying in front of the camp. He had killed men before, but never like that. Any other time, he would have died immediately. It was mere luck that caused him to have the essential success on that particular day. The warriors were simply unprepared to fight someone who was no longer a Normal. They were caught off guard by seeing a simple apprentice turned into a bloodthirsty beast with claws of steel.

  Glint staggered along, until he reached what he called home. The slightly tanned youth stepped inside, looking at the shaky building. There was nothing within its walls that he himself possessed. He saw but a bed, a table, and a chair. The place was not fit for a warrior. Kob had taken the mayor's house, away from town. He wouldn’t need it anymore, Glint said to himself, not after getting run through with a sword. Besides, it was his by right and law; the victor always reaps all.

  He sprang upon his bed and fell asleep instantly, despite his pillow’s coarseness. He would move tomorrow, when he was strong enough to think. The blood caking his face kept him from forgetting the day’s happenings, however, and he struggled to drift away.

  Sleep, when it came, brought no comfort with it. Glint tried hard not to dream, knowing that it would do him no good, but control eluded his muddled mind. He kept waking up in a cold sweat, not knowing where he was, but sure that the shadows would flash out to take his life in revenge for his sins, for in his dreams he was always tainted blood red. Imagined voices intruded into the daylight, calling out to him with hate, reminding him of an old man who’d also been a monster like him.

  When he had his fill of restlessness, Glint decided to move to Kob's old house, as tradition dictated. It was well known that when you kill a man in single combat, all his worldly belongings transfer to you. At least in Shien. No one would know that Glint hadn’t killed Kob fairly. Glint said goodbye to the old cottage, as well as any semblance of innocence he may yet hold, and made his way to the mayor's house, east of town but north of the small village which was also under this sphere of influence. Glint wondered if Horst Stryger had foreseen his actions.

  Kob had managed the place well enough. He had kept the servants alive so they could take care of the large estate, farm and well. He had lived in comfort as the new landlord, and none of them had argued with him. People always followed like sheep, mused Glint, as he noted how they now took his orders without argument, treating him as if he were a real master and not some brat who also happened to be a murderer. Things progressed at an unsteady pace, and he spent the first days allowing the servants to take care of him as he learnt more about the pristine two storied house. There wasn't much for him to do, since the servants took care of everything for him when it came to the estate. Thankfully he had not actually inherited the work required of a mayor (at least he didn’t think so), only the house and the tithes of the land around it.

  Glint lived lavishly for about a month, eating fancy foods and getting clothes that fit him. But that kind of life didn’t suit him, and he was always drawn back to his armour and sword, locked inside an old wooden chest behind a sturdy lock, at the foot of his bed. Glint never took them out of the ornate chest, fearful of seeing the old, nameless man’s face. Still, he always found his evening walks interrupted by a pull on his mind, forcing him to cut his stroll through the simple yet tasteful gardens short and step into his room on the second flair. There, he would sit upon the polished wooden planks and stare at the brown box that hid him from his helmet’s accusing stare, and that of another Stryger.

  ***

  A life of plenty was an alien concept to Glint Stryger. He was not a savage nor entirely uncivilised, and his manners were of better stock than most poor born. The youth even lacked the brutal fire of many warriors of the time, who were known to strike servants. Moreover, they treated him like a child, working around him as if he were a bumbling buffoon. The servants, however, still muttered about the teen, not allowing their whispers to be heard by any but autumn’s secret keeping breeze. Behind his youth and childish qualities the young master hid cutting edge ruthlessness, they said. His amber eyes were cold and dead, and he could strike you down if he felt like it. He had stabbed the old master in the back while the man bathed. So the stories wen
t.

  Idiots, the lot of them, thought Glint as he slipped out of the mansion one day after lunch, jumping the five white steps down to the courtyard and continuing on aimlessly into the edge of the yellow tinged forest. He found it ironic, how close the rumours were to what had actually happened. They knew nothing about him, and still presumed to judge. Glint wished he could exact bloody revenge and then run away, but those were simply dark fantasies. He wondered where he would go; what he would do. He was by then far into the forest, kicking up piles of red and yellow leaves as he pondered his situation. The sounds of a forest preparing itself for winter comforted the youth, but he knew the feeling was temporary, as most good things were. Somewhere in his aimless mind, a voice nagged at him to go to Quicksilver. Yet he had the mansion now, he was expected to stay. Also, Glint truly needed time to... deal with things, he told himself. At least until the nightmares about his great grandfather stopped. Was this what he’d run away from home to accomplish? Was this what the strength he’d sought meant?

  He had snuck off while no one was watching, leaving the servants to mill about their daily business. Maybe they would notice he was missing. They were supposed to cater to his every whim, after all. But in current times, a servant's loyalty was quite the whimsical thing. In the space of three months, Glint's current servants had found themselves with three different masters: the real mayor, then Kob, and now him. They had therefore come away from any semblance of real loyalty, even the old potion lady, the skittish cook, or the pretty maid with the hazel eyes. More than anything, they had learned that they should offer their abilities up to whomever owned the house, while in fact serving the land itself.

  All the while, the youth trudged along, leaving his thoughts free to wander, focusing on nothing, allowing the scenery to go right past him. Shades of green and brown and yellow and red whizzed past as Glint switched to a jog, then a run, wishing to leave reality behind him. A mockingbird called somewhere to the right, and he ignored it, focusing on escape. However, the emptiness kept pace with him. Glint did not wish for forgiveness, nor a chance to do things differently. He hadn’t even tried to go looking for old Crab to receive thanks, and simply hoped the madman with the wispy white hair could keep his blissful ignorance and play with his trees. No, what Glint really wanted was assurance that he was still human.

  Glint was not shocked by the fact that he had killed. What shook him so deeply was the ease with which his so called comrades had turned upon him, with jeers and insults and blades, trying to kill him as if they had never shared a meal or trained together. Worse still was the ease with which Glint had crushed them, both emotionally and literally. He had simply turned his heart away from the slaughter. He wondered if his wandering heart had come back yet. It was unnatural that a person could be so weak one day, and yet so powerful the next. Powerful? a voice in his mind mocked, you can’t even sleep. Glint ignored the voice. More than anything, a part of the muscular warrior had revelled in the slaughter, wished for more even. Glint ignored that too, choosing to focus on the scenery. Forests had a quiet charm which was magical in nature, and just then the youth wished for that magic to spirit him away.

  Glint ran in the forest, on and on, allowing life to fly past him, until he was inevitably tripped by a low hanging tree branch. He fell and rolled many feet ahead due to his unnatural speed. Coming to a stop, he laid upon the itchy grass on his back without moving for a second or two, and the sky above him sent sunlight streaming towards his face, unfazed by the colours of the leaves.

  Glint looked back, befuddled. That hadn’t felt like a tree branch strewn upon the forest floor. He should have broken right through such a thing. He got up to his feet, cursing slightly as he noticed that he had skinned his knee quite badly. His dark brown trousers were ripped at that spot. He had also hurt his foot somehow while rolling to a stop. No matter, it would heal in a few minutes: another side effect of the essential success. As if inhuman strength wasn’t enough, his injuries now also healed faster as well. Glint got up, dusted his plain yet finely made tunic off, and walked cautiously back in the direction he had come from.

  There, in autumn’s bundle of colour, he spotted a body. It was a man, dressed in a black shirt and trousers and a cloak tattered in the bottom to match his trestles of raven black hair. He was paler than anyone Glint had ever seen before, but it wasn’t the grey colour of a dead body, as Glint was expecting, rather the complexion that Glint assumed was meant for fairytale princesses rescued by dashing heroes, although he couldn’t for the life of him imagine why anyone would save a weak princess.

  The black haired man seemed to be alive, judging by his red lips. He was splayed out between two trees, laid out carefully on his back. The man had delicate features, and Glint wondered if he was a noble or something. As he studied the figure, Glint began to feel apprehensive, although he didn’t know why.

  In the end Glint decided, quite rationally, that had had no intention of stepping into the man’s space. Instead he pulled back and sat upon the ground, legs crossed and resting his back on the trunk of a large tree not too far but not too close to the stranger. He would simply wait for the man to wake up, Glint decided finally. It would serve as distraction.

  ***

  Glint’s eyes snapped awake as he heard movement from just in front of him. The man had lifted his head up, giving the world a generally puzzled look and seeming rather blinded by the sunlight from the way he was blinking furiously. He then sat up straight and glanced around him. He looked quite bewildered indeed.

  "Hello, boy," the man said, hardly seeming to care that Glint was as white as a sheet with fear for no apparent reason. "Am I alive?"

  Glint nodded. It was all he could manage in response.

  "I see... that can’t be good news.” A pause came as the man ran his fingers backwards through his hair, then looked around him for a few seconds. Then he looked upwards at the clouds making their way across the sky and said, “Ah.” His mannerisms unnerved the youth, and he decided to try and communicate.

  "I won’t hurt you if you don’t hurt me...w-who are you?" Glint hoped the man knew his own name, at least, despite his apparent confusion at his situation.

  The black clad man smiled. "Well... I could be called by any number of names now, but you can call me Azrael. Pleased to make your acquaintance."

  Chapter 8

  Azrael and Glint walked side by side towards the mayor’s house with silence prevailing across the forest. Silence, that is, if not for the sounds of their feet thudding quietly against the grass and fallen leaves, but even that sound felt subdued. Glint observed the tall, slender figure. He opened his mouth, but before he could say anything, Azrael interrupted, “I’m surprised you haven’t asked me for proof that I’m not a madman, young master Glint." He smiled, still looking straight ahead. It seemed that they were in Shien.

  "You aren’t crazy," replied Glint shortly.

  "Oh? And how do you know that?" the smile was now a pale ghost of its self, not faded away entirely, but showing no apparent mirth. The boy didn’t seem like he was such a calm lad, and yet he wasn't as much fun as the necromancer thought he would be. The man sighed.

  "Because the closest man to me is as loony as they come, and you're nothing like him." The conversation died out for a few minutes after that, each of the two lost in private thoughts. Azrael’s own were of his memories. He himself hoped that he was a madman, for the alternative was far worse. He eyed the boy and thought of his options.

  ***

  Somehow the two were so engrossed in their reflections that they were back in the mayor's house before Glint noticed. He glanced at Azrael, who was in turn eyeing the place with an appreciative eye. There was nothing he could do about it now, he thought. He would have to invite the man in, circumstance practically forced his hand. However, Glint had to be careful with the way he did it. He had to phrase his words to make it perfectly clear that he didn’t trust the stranger, and he spent a second devising the be
st way to put it. Glint offered, as cunningly as he could, "Uh, do you want to come in?"

  He hoped the phrasing would make it clear

  "Why, I thought you'd never ask.” Azrael pushed open the big white painted doors and let himself in, leaving the boy trailing behind him. Not knowing what to do with the strange man, he contented himself with staring at the gardeners. They weren’t exactly doing their job properly, as far as Glint could see. The hedges were untrimmed, wild weeds were sprouting here and there, and the actually useful trees, the vegetables and fruits, were dying out slowly.

  One of the friendlier gardeners pushed up his wide straw hat, wiped the sweat from his brow, and waved at Glint. The seventeen year old sighed at the sight of the man with dust sticking to his ruddy face after mixing with the sweat. It was all for show.

  Glint was getting annoyed with his servants. They had been frightened of him for the better part of the first day he had lived in the house. However, the servants were able to ascertain within a few hours that the boy who had killed Kob was incapable of ordering anyone around. Inside of a week, Glint had found himself being ushered around like a child. The servants went about their business and treated him like a remarkable piece of furniture: interesting, but still part of the background.

  Thus, Glint was frustrated. This was his home now, and he refused to be treated in such a cavalier fashion. However, he knew nothing about managing an estate, and everyone knew it. Even the man whom he had just invited in seemed to recognize that Glint was a lacklustre master, at best.

  The youth went inside the two story house. The wide staircase sprawled before him, and Azrael stood tutting in front of it. "This place lacks proper care," he said, running his finger along its rail and then rubbing it against his them, inspecting it for dust, "I think you must be new here.” He showed Glint his browned finger with a smile.

  "And what is it to you if I am?" shot Glint back, his temper flaring up at once. This man rubbed him the wrong way.

  Azrael stepped into the dining room and sat himself down on one of the chairs in front of the great table. Outside birds chirped, but they were only seen and not heard through the window behind him. The man seemed perfectly at ease here, paying even the fancy grandfather clock no special attention. Glint had been amazed by the thing when he saw it for the first time, and it had been difficult for the servants to stop him from dismantling it to figure out its inner workings. "I know a thing or two about management, and I really am quite free at the moment. You might have noticed that, seeing as how I was sleeping on the floor in the middle of a forest. How about you let me live here, in return for me helping you with the servants? They definitely do not respect you, young master. I could use the money and time spent here. Somehow, it seems like my path in life is a little... cut off at the moment," The man chuckled at some unknown joke, “honestly, I need a quiet place to think and this seems the perfect place to do it.” That Glint could understand. “Nobody even showed up to take our coats.”

  Glint bit his tongue, stoppering the insult he was sorely tempted to fire off and not pointing that they didn’t even have any coats on except for the man’s cloak. That was beside the point, he realized. The man, with his tall lean frame, easy demeanour and charming, slightly arrogant mannerisms managed to make Glint angry in a way that no one else had managed yet. Not even Blitz, and Glint had beheaded the man. He eyed Azrael now warily, knowing that he should agree. It would take him years to learn the way to turn his new vassals into an effective, loyal unit, even with someone else's help. He needed to stay here at least long enough to figure out his next step. His original plan had been to move from bandit camp to bandit camp until he reached the essential success, but now that he had an essential success but no camp to be a medium between him and the local guilds, the youth did not know what to do. If he remained stranded here with no friends, Glint was doomed. He would do well to accept Azrael's offer. The man really did look like he knew his stuff. He practically exuded a regal air with his every move.

  However, something kept nagging at Glint in the back of his mind, just out of reach. Then it hit him suddenly, and he instantly decided to keep Azrael here. This unfamiliar smell that Azrael had about him: it was the smell of strength, pure and simple. Glint had learnt early to recognise strength, and he could now tell that Azrael was far from ordinary. This man could help him, beyond the manor’s management.

  The man was strange but Glint could still feel his aura of strength. It made him somehow... jealous, to see a person look strong enough that one didn’t want to anger him. There was more he wanted to know about the man, and a lot he had to figure out for himself. He motioned at the table. "I’ll allow you to rest here today. Find what dinner you can get out of the cook, Hans. He’s fidgety, but nice enough. I need to go rest now. We will meet tomorrow, Azrael. Then, I’ll give you my answer." The youth hoped he’d sounded enough like a lord.

  Glint struggled his way upstairs, changed into his pyjamas, and laid on the white comfortable sheets of his bed. All the while, he kept thinking about his strange encounter with the mysterious man, and what had had felt so off about Azrael, beyond his apparent strength. It was like the ceiling of his room: tauntingly out of reach.

  ***

  Despite the sun streaming through the windows of his room and the overly large size of his bed, by some miracle of Odin’s heaven Glint managed to oversleep. He awoke up to a clang of metal against metal, pulling him away from the gentle embrace of sleep. The first thought in his head was that someone was coming to capture him. Glint jumped up, opened the chest laid in front of his overlarge bed, and pulled his sword out. It was broken but still enough to stab a man, with his abilities. The sword’s edge gleamed ferocious silver in the sunlight as the sounds continued from the floor below, for broken or not you have to clean your weapon and armour after every fight. Still hazy from having just woken up, Glint sprinted down the ornate staircase, on the search for enemies after him for the murder of fifty men, only to skid to a stop at its foot, slipping on the now polished floor. The kindly woman who had first helped him tailor clothes was serving Azrael lunch. They were both looking at him with their mouths opened into perfect O shapes, stunned to see a seventeen year old standing in his night clothes with a broken sword in hand, panting. The portly lady, not paying attention to the teapot she had in her hands, managed to pour almost half a cupful on Azrael's pants before he leaped away from the chair, scalded and cursing softly. "What in Skull’s nose are you doing, child?"

  The lady gasped. One Eye, Beast, and Skull were considered blasphemous names to give the Three. Azrael gave her an apologetic smile but she still squinted at him, lips pursed.

  "I, uh, I thought we were getting attacked..." Glint pulled back the chair opposite Azrael sheepishly, while the man continued to give him a bemused stare. The table was long and rectangular, made to fit far more people than were currently present. He sat, embarrassed. "Don’t mind me, what were you talking about?" he waved in the general direction of the room around him while he helped himself to a piece of toasted bread. He bit into it, still feeling somewhat like an idiot.

  "Well, I and Susan here have been discussing the sorry state of this mansion. It's absolutely horrendous. You haven’t been paying attention to it at all, Glint." he went into accusing silence, paying more attention to his breakfast than anything else. Susan nodded, still looking slightly upset.

  "But, the servants-"

  "Are supposed to take care of everything for you? That’s a stupid thought, boy. If you can’t take responsibility for your own estate, you will have nothing in the future. You'll be robbed blind." The man had earnest eyes as he said this, as if being robbed was Glint’s fault, not anybody else’s. He had somehow managed to speak while eating, and still avoided doing it with anything in his mouth. A hot flush went through Glint and he could guess what his face’s colour would be, if he didn’t stay out in the sun so often. The amber eyed youth put his palms on the table in a threatening manner. "They
can rob me if they want. I'll cull the lot of them.” At that, a sound like a strangled cat escaped poor Susan. The woman excused herself and left the dining hall, leaving the two alone. When she’d shut the door behind her, Azrael sighed, letting the silence stretch for a few seconds longer. Beyond the swinging door, they could hear her fumbling about nervously.

  "And gain what, exactly? Boy, if you enjoy murder, that's all well and good. Kill all the people in the world. Be the only one left and laugh while you bathe in their blood. That's not going to make your problems go away. You’d still have to find a place for yourself in this realm after that.”

  At the mention of murder, Glint remembered the eyes of Kob and Blitz. He recalled the screams, their curses and cries as the life drained out from their bodies. His legs turned to jelly, and he was suddenly very grateful for the presence of a chair underneath him. The wind left his sails in a rush. He wondered when he’d turned into a person who found it acceptable to threaten people with murder. Civilians. He blinked. He could feel Azrael’s expectations of him. Curious that a man he’d just met would say something like that to him. It was as if he cared, or believed in him. The silence stretched.

  "Alright," he heard himself say, "I’ll let you live here. You get a commission for controlling everyone .You act as a butler and teach me how to handle the estate while you do it, but I have a condition."

  Glint met the man’s eyes, and he gave him a hard stare that meant that he was never going to back down on this point, ever. "I can tell you’re not a Normal. That’s clear as day. I’ve never been trained beyond what they tell all the children around here, and I want you to at least teach me the basics. I’ve reached the success already.” At this Azrael blinked as if surprised, but Glint was sure that the man had already known, somehow. Azrael had spoken in a way that suggested he knew Glint was an Ability user, after all. If not, he would have known from the servants by now. “Make me strong.” strong enough that I never have to feel this helpless again. That particular prayer was silent and the youth hoped it didn’t show in his eyes.

  When next the man smiled, his air of sophistication was gone. In its stead Glint could sense a predator, pure and feral. With his grin, Glint could see the stranger’s acceptance of him grow. “Deal,” he answered.