The Executioner (Peregrine x Zarko Straadi)

[Zarko Straadi]

The coarse cloth of the black bag they'd shoved over her head compressed Twirlip's world to a tiny realm marked only by scents of blood and rot, the heavy jangle of chains, and the tramp of booted feet. Strong hands held her biceps and propelled her along. Her forearms were shoved into an iron pipe behind her back so that her hands could pick no pockets and pull no tricks. Cuffs around her arms kept her from pulling them free. Chains led from the pipe to a rough iron collar around her neck, and manacles around her feet with a short chain between them that barely offered her enough length to shuffle along.

Her heart hammered in her chest, and her mind scrambled for some clever last-moment scheme, some way of escape, even though she knew there would be none. All that matters now is how I die, she thought, gathering her resolve for what lie ahead. I have to keep the Men of the Mist from trying anything, so they can live to fight on.

"So...sounds like ye have at least eight men behind me an' eight in front," she said in the peasant patois she'd adopted since her escape from the palace years before. "I guess I should be flattered."

"Shut it," a guard behind her said, giving her a hard shove. She slammed into the guards in front of her and tripped on a stair. Someone behind her grabbed the pipe and wrenched her up, twisting her shoulders. She gritted her teeth to deny them a cry of pain, scrambling to find her feet on the spiral staircase that led up from the dungeons.

"Awww, no need t' be so mean t' poor Twirlip in her last moments o' life," she said in a teasing lilt. "By th' way, how long has the Executioner been at his work? It'd be nice t' get a clean cut by an experienced hand, rather than th' work of an incompetent hack."

"He'll have you squealin' like a piglet soon enough," the guard snapped. "Hope 'e cuts yer tongue out first."

"How long?"

"You really wanna know? Six years he's been cuttin' fer the King. They say he loves his job like no one in the Realm." Twirlip thought she heard an undertone of fear in the guard's voice.

Oh Weith... Twirlip thought. She'd had a different name when they'd pulled capers together, two lonely kids from opposite ends of the social spectrum finding solace in each other's company. Memories started to flood her mind, but she shook her head to clear them. Ulianov will want to hear me beg, she thought, so I'll need to make my words count. The King had been a cruel and capricious boy when she'd been betrothed to him. He was a cruel and capricious young man now. And Weith has--again, she pushed the Executioner from her thoughts so she could focus on what her last words would be.

After a rattling of locks and the opening of a heavy door, the dank air of the dungeon was replaced by the dry air of the Presidio, a fortified guardhouse within the Palace. Twirlip's mind automatically kept track of her progress as she was brought from the Presidio to the portico. She could hear the hubbub of the crowd, the occasional shout of a soldier keeping order. At last, she was shoved into position facing the crowd.

"So this is the fearsome 'Golden Fox?'" a haughty voice said--Ulianov's, deeper than she remembered it. "We thought you'd be taller." A titter of laughter from the assembled nobles and courtiers on the balcony. Suddenly, the hood was removed, and Twirlip squinted against bright sunlight. "Why, it's just a slip of a...girl," the King said, trying to hide the shock of recognition.

Bugger! Twirlip thought. He'd want her silenced before she could expose him.

"Ye will kill the Golden Fox today, 'Your Majesty,'" she said, "Ye have all th' Realm's best assassins an' at least a legion of troops ready t' make sure I don't slip through your fingers again, an' trap anyone who comes to me aid, am I right?" She gave him a knowing smirk. "Ye can kill the Golden Fox, but ye cannae kill th' idea of the Golden Fox," she said, then turned to the crowd. "Whenever the flame of justice burns in your hearts, the fire of outrage against cruelty flares up, and the light of compassion for the oppressed shines forth, you are the Golden Fox. The time will--"

"We have heard enough," the King said. "Executioner, we would now hear her beg for mercy before she finds none." Twirlip thought she could feel the looming presence of the Executioner behind her. She turned to look over her shoulder at the masked figure. He'd grown, and filled out quite a bit.

"Hello Weith," she said, dropping her peasant accent. "Bet you didn't think it would end like this."

 

[Peregrine]

People always gathered at an execution.

They swarmed around the grounds like flies around carrion, filling the air with their restless hum. For the nobility, that meant clogging their personal viewing balconies with hot air, either idle chatter or the latest claptrap piece of court gossip. For the merchants, that meant roaming from crowd to crowd, taking advantage of the captive audience to hawk their tawdry wares. The guards added to the mess through shouts, to each other and to the crowd, keeping the masses in line. And the peasants, whispering to each other in fear and uncertainty, there because they cannot risk the rumors that might form if they don't regularly appear at the King's scheduled executions, lest they be the next on the chopping block.

This was even more so the case for this particular execution. The King's heralds had spread across the country, carrying news of the capture and scheduled execution of the Golden Fox to every corner of the kingdom. Anyone who didn't show the suitable level of excitement, or any trace of restive behavior, at the announcement was accused of conspiring against the monarchy, and the Execution blades across the land had stayed wet for a week.

The grounds quickly become tightly packed when it came close to time for the Golden Fox's execution, but one section remained conspicuously clear of guards and observers alike. Only a single man, clothed in pure black, face covered by a heavy iron executioner's mask, waited right in the heart of the empty space.

Weith leaned against the stone wall, arms folded, only a few steps away from the gated entrance where the guards would soon be hauling in the king's next victim. The muscles in his forearms rolled and flexed as he tapped the fingers of one hand impatiently against the biceps of the other. When a guard that had drawn too close saw his shoulders roll and hands twitch, the guard flinched back in turn, quickly retreating several steps away, fearful of drawing his attention, let alone his ire.

Weith didn't care for their fear, or for their whispering, or their glances. They were nothing more than cowardly bullies, loyal to the king only because they were too afraid of the alternatives. He didn't have the time or interest to bother with them.

When the volume and restlessness of the crowd reached its peak, the sudden sound of trumpets filled the air, silencing the anxious murmurs of the crowd. The formal doors swung open, different from the iron portcullis through which the convict would enter the grounds later, admitting a procession of polished royal suits of armor into the space. However, even they gave Weith a wide berth when they caught him lingering near the gate.

There was only one person who dared completely disregard his presence. King Ulianov De Lundæsica considered him nothing more than a dog, a well-trained creature which would bite only upon command. The heavy, iron executioner's mask that covered his face hid the sneer of derision that spread across Weith's lips as His Royal Peacock swept past his platoon of guards, stopping at the edge of the executioner's platform.

Weith recognized the attitude at a glance. This was far from the first time he'd listened to one of the king's pre-execution speeches, and he doubted it would be the last. Weith ignored the speech, letting the words pass in one ear and out the other. Perhaps to match the reputation of their prisoner, the King's speech was particularly long and ostentatious. However, eventually his pontificating came to an end, and Weith heard the sound of metal sliding across metal as the gate was hauled open.

Weith lifted his gaze as well, brown eyes peering out through the gaps in his mask at the bound prisoner escorted by nearly twenty guards. For all the pompous fanfare, the Golden Fox meant nothing to him. As much trouble as she had caused the king, as much as her name and achievements had rallied the oppressed to the rebellion, for all her achievements, her head would fall off just as easy at the touch of his blade.

He almost lowered his head again as the guards stepped towards her face. He had no reason to care about the true identity of the Fox. However, some unconscious thought kept his gaze in place, and then… his mind froze.

Ulianov wasn't the only one struck by a blow of familiarity, but Weith dealt with the shock far more poorly than the monarch. Once again, his mask hid the expression on his face, but this time it was a look of frozen shock, rather than any grimace of contempt.

Urien…

His lips formed the shape of her name, but no sound emerged past the lump in the back of his throat. She was alive. How could she possibly be alive?

She was dead. Weith had seen her, head mounted on spikes along with the rest of her family the day the king had declared the regency of Urien's father at an end. That had been the moment when Weith was certain that the last, the only, good person in the world had died, leaving him alone in a bloody and cruel world.

That night, Weith had stayed up well past the darkness of midnight, sharpening his blade, wondering if he should try and take the king's head then and there. Instead, he had chosen to wait, to bide his time and gather his power, until he was certain he would succeed. Until he could have his revenge for Urien's life.

How could she be standing in front of him now?

At the summons of the king, Weith stepped forward, more by instinct than by conscious thought. His hands had closed so tight around the handle of the blade that the metal almost groaned in protest. Now, he was supposed to take her life. Was supposed to send her head rolling from her shoulders like he was certain had happened six years ago. A faint creak came from the blade.

He stopped above her, staring down at her lips as they formed the shape of his name. She seemed so small, bound as she was. She'd still been taller than him, that day when they'd parted ways for the last time. That certainly wasn't the case now.

The blade in his hands swung up into the air, as Weith steeled his heart. She'd said this was the end.

She was alive.

The blade swung down, striking accurately against the pipe that secured her hands behind her back, pulling back the instant the sharp tang of metal against metal sounded through the room, leaving her skin completely untouched. Then he was turning to the side, strength surging through his arms as the blade sliced through the neck of the guard that stood to one side of Uriel.

He's always held back when it was time for the execution, striking with just enough power to send the blade cleanly through the prisoner's neck. This time, he didn't hold back, and his blade separated the man's head from his shoulders like a hot knife slicing through butter. It had been years since Weith had gotten in a real fight, but he still remembered them. As a hot feeling coursed through his arms and jolted his heart, Weith remembered. It hadn't always been that easy.

His blade swung again, slicing right through the metal plate that shielded another guard's chest, and taking part of his arm along with it. The executioner's platform had gotten sticky with blood, and the silent crowd was suddenly screaming. The guards were shouting, and he could hear Ulianov's voice over all of it, screaming for them to be put down.

Heat pumping in and out of his heart, Weith's eyes skimmed over the shocked royal guards, looking at the two corpses near his feet as they gripped desperately at the handles of their swords, paused briefly on the battalions of soldiers that waited in the background, before settling on Urien. Blood sang through his veins.

"I'll get you out of here," he promised, voice low, calm, and confident. "Just wait a minute for me to clear a path."

He did not have to wait patiently for his vengeance any longer. No, now it was time to act.

Now, it was time to fight.

 

[Zarko Straadi]

Soundtrack:

Aereon:

She wants us to let him kill her! Aereon thought. Of course he understood the military logic of her choice; if the Men of the Mist tried to rescue her, the King would spring a trap to capture or kill them all. But if she died a martyr, and they slipped away—no matter the sense it made, when the Executioner's axe rose over her diminutive form, Aereon wanted more than anything to go for the sword hidden under his smelly beggar's cloak and signal the attack. The axe plunged down in a strike swift as lightning, flashing a streak of sunlight. A shriek—of tearing metal rather than Twirlip's dying breath, then it whirled to slash again, and again. Crimson arcs of blood sprayed through the air, and a head flew free trailing gore from its severed neck like a grisly comet.

But it was not hers. The Executioner said something to her then. The King shouted an order, and the rest of Twirlip's guard escort recovered their wits enough to reach for their swords. The Executioner seemed to dance toward them, his axe pinwheeling so fast it could only be seen by shimmers of sunlight reflected from its blade. When it came back toward Twirlip, there was a cla-clang of metal, and her ankle manacles fell away. The corpses of the guards hit the paving stones almost as one. Soldiers came charging onto the portico from all directions. The Executioner seemed to dance around Twirlip, flitting from death to death almost too fast for the eye to follow.

Blood and severed flesh everywhere—yet somehow, standing in the middle of it all, Twirlip was alive! Alive, unharmed, and not even dappled with blood! Aereon broke free of the crowd and mounted the steps of the portico. He drew his sword, slipped silently up behind a soldier, and thrust through his armpit. While the Executioner was busy slaughtering soldiers on the other side of Twirlip, he hurried to her. "It's time we were going," he said. Their inexplicable good fortune was just that—inexplicable, so who knew how long it could last, or if the Executioner might turn on her in the next second? One thing Aereon knew was that all of the Men of the Mist together could not protect their Golden Fox from such a force.


Ulianov:

Ulianov felt hate and fury rise as Urien made her little speech keeping a cocky, devil-may-care smirk on her face. Too late, he realized that she'd warned her men off from attempting a rescue and was starting into a rallying oration. "We have heard enough. Executioner, we would now hear her beg for mercy before she finds none," he said, exuding icy calm. Apparently unfazed, Urien turned and said something to the Executioner. Ulianov's hands clenched the armrests of his throne.

He had considered giving the task to his chief torturer rather than the Executioner, but decided that a prolonged, agonized death would only earn the Golden Fox sympathy in the eyes of the people. When the Executioner's blade rose high, Ulianov hoped for an artful cut that would wipe that grin off her face and start her whimpering. As long as the people's last memory of her was of cries and fear rather than courage, perhaps he could kill the 'idea' of the Golden Fox as well as the girl herself.

The axe struck her arms behind her back with a loud clang, shattering the pipe that bound her hands, but not a drop of blood was to be seen. What? He missed?! By the time Ulianov completed that thought, the axe had continued its motion in a smooth figure-eight, decapitating one guard and severing an arm and shoulder of the other. Casually spinning the axe into a two-handed grip, the Executioner spoke to Urien, then moved smoothly as a stalking cat to place himself between her and the other guards.

Treason! "What are you waiting for? Kill him!"

The guards started to draw swords and rush him as a unit, but they fell like wheat before their blades cleared their scabbards. Squads of soldiers surged onto the portico as planned in the event of a rescue attempt. Suddenly, inexplicably, the Executioner turned into a storm of blood and death, slaughtering everyone but his intended victim. Seated to the King's left, General Arakkim gave a signal. A unit of elite Citadel Guardsmen emerged from hiding, tramping at double-time to place themselves between the royal pavilion and the fighting, forming a double shield-wall with their long rectangular shields as archers formed up behind them. A bugle sounded, then others echoed it at increasing distances. Troops were moving into place to cut off all lines of escape, even the sewers. Portcullises slammed down, and heavy city gates began to be pulled closed. Crossbowmen rose from hiding along the crenellations of the Acropolis wall and from behind the gilded statues ornamenting the boundary of the portico's roof.

Yet, as the bodies piled up, Ulianov began to fear that a dragnet had been the wrong strategy. The General whispered a command to his adjutant, who quickly hurried away.

"Maester!" Ulianov shouted. "What foul sorcery is this?!"

"Uh--uh-uh-uh," the old wizard gobbed. "Uh--I...nothing like this has existed since--"

"How do we stop it?!"

"If, if you kill the girl the enchantment should break?" Ulianov did not miss the uncertainty in the Maester's voice, but there was no time to berate him for it now.

"KILL HER! Assassins!"


Mizrikan:

Blended in among the crowd, the First Blade of the Assassins' Guild became more impressed with the Executioner's skill with each passing second. His axe was not even a proper fighting weapon; it was heavy and long-handled, meant for delivering a clean, cleaving stroke to a bound victim, not for the art of slice and parry at speed against armed opponents. Nonetheless, it whirled like a hollow bamboo staff in the Executioner's hands, killing all who came within its reach. Even though the axe moved in a blur, Mizrikan recognized art when he saw it. There was no hint of wasted motion. The massacre could have been a choreographed dance, the Executioner's axe finding each target and making each parry with exquisite timing.

By the time the King shouted for the Assassins, Mizrikan was sure that neither his best fighters, or even he himself would be able to match the Executioner in open combat. His eyes shifted to the Golden Fox, in case she might have more tricks up her sleeve. Curious, he thought, raising an ocarina to his lips to pipe out a series of notes giving the order to attack with ranged weapons only. He trusted his fighters to attack in concert with the King's crossbowmen to maximize weight of fire.


Twirlip:

Weith's expression was hidden behind his mask, so Twirlip turned back to the crowd, putting on a serene smile and trying to meet their eyes. The fight is in your hands n-- A whoosh of air, a loud clang, and a hard tug at her arms, but no pain she could feel. By the time she realized that her arms were free, not of her body but of their restraints, the two guards beside her were already falling. Droplets of blood like wheeling constellations flew past her in both directions, but not one touched her.

The rest of her guard escort formed up and grasped the hilts of their swords, still stunned by the Executioner's sudden turn. "I'll get you out of here," he promised, voice low, calm, and confident. "Just wait a minute for me to clear a path," he said as he stepped forward to interpose himself.

Clear a--?! Twirlip thought. Her mind spun. The rescue attempt that she'd tried to call off was happening anyway, so if she didn't want her Men--and now Weith as well--to die today, she'd have to figure out how to get them past the whole Capital garrison and out of the city.

The guards formed up and started to draw their swords. With surprising speed, Weith stepped toward them, took a step-turn while a whirling dancer and ended in a low stance. In the same movement, his axe orbited around him in a blur, and he let the handle slip through his hands to extend its reach. It swept across the guards' bellies at the joint between cuirass and faulds just before the tips of their swords came free of their scabbards. To her astonishment, the axe gutted not just one, but all six men. The axe dipped as it swung around behind him, still moving fast enough to strike her ankles--and sever her manacles--before she could react. And he'd done it without even looking. He completed the circuit of the axe, reeling it back in to a guard position.

More men--not dungeon guards, but real soldiers this time--came boiling out of the woodwork, Ulianov's trap sprung. They came from all directions, swords and spears at the ready. Twirlip's head snapped back and forth, looking for the closest fallen sword. Before she could make a go for it, Weith was whirling around her like a dust devil, dealing death with uncanny speed. As soon as he stepped away to deal with a reinforcing troop, Aereon appeared at her side.

"It's time we were going," he said.

"Not without him," she whispered.

 

[Peregrine]

It was like time had slowed for Weith.

An almost literal mountain of corpses had formed around him, the execution platform slick with pools of blood. Weith's axe danced through the cracks in space, slipping into the narrowest openings with unerring accuracy, taking a life with every cut.

They couldn't put up any resistance, and Weith struck his blows carefully, artfully.

When the first guard's head had separated from his neck, Weith had felt the familiar fire in his heart. When he turned to cut down the second, pushing for every drop of untapped strength and speed that he possessed, the burning heat had flared brightly for a second, before dropping down to a faint smoulder. But as the wounded guard had dropped to the ground, only able to let out a couple ragged moans before his body shut down from the shock, static power had run through his body again, causing the smouldering heat to ignite once more.

Like a pounding heartbeat the fire in his chest dimmed and then brightened, dimmed slightly then burned brighter yet, spreading, growing with each life that fell before him, until it felt like there was a star burning inside his heart. And from it, molten gold flowed through his veins to every part of his body, bright and warm and powerful.

It was addictive.

A sword thrust towards him, and Weith twisted slightly to the side, the blade sliding scant millimeters past his chest before his axe flew out and lopped off the attached arm, before sliding through a crack in the guard's armor and ending his life there.

His heart burned brighter.

Weith's feet danced smoothly around Urien, every step sure even though the pools of blood that gathered around his feet. He twisted slightly, the nudge of his axe's handle enough to cause a guard's balance to slip, his stumble sending him sprawling towards the ground. The head of Weith's twirling axe rose up to meet him, slipping in between his helmet and chest plate and neatly separating the man's head from his body.

Molten power pulsed through his veins.

Weith had gotten in large fights before, back when he'd still run the streets, before people had learned it was safer to run at the sight of him. One particularly wild brawl had seen seven dead by his hand. It had taken him hours for the golden fire to leave his veins after that, while he'd hunted the street rat gangs through the narrow alleyways, bloody smile stretched across his face in a desperate eagerness for the next kill.

It was nothing compared to this.

He could feel the way his cheeks strained against the edges of his mask, the dark iron struggling to contain that familiar bloody smile which had split its way across his face. It was like he'd lived his life half blind, and now every kill brought the world into greater focus, until it shimmered before him like a crystal. In his eyes, the guards ran towards him in slow motion, fear and desperation plastered across their faces, before s flick of his wrists would send their lifesblood spilling onto the floor around him.

It felt like everything was perfectly within his control.

He didn't even flinch when the first arrow flew towards Urien and him. He didn't even bother to turn. Instead, the end of one attack placed the edge of his blade in the path of the arrow, deflecting it off course into the eye of another guard drawing close to Urien. It almost looked like an accident.

The second, third, fourth, and fifth made it clear it wasn't.

Weith released one hand from the grip of his axe, hand reaching out to deftly snag the handle of a falling short sword. He twisted and hurled the blade, which tumbled through the air before planting itself in the chest of one of the crossbowmen. The others quickly ducked for cover, one of them moving just quick enough to keep a second thrown weapon from going through his neck. Instead, it sliced open his shoulder, and the guard couldn't prevent the scream that came from his lips before he vanished from sight.

He almost missed one of the arrows, hidden behind another arrow and the path of a guard's sword. At the last instant before it would have flown past him, his hand snatched outwards and the arrow skidded to a halt between his fingers. It joined the swords Weith had stolen, flung through the air before planting itself into the widened eye of the shocked assassin who had shot it.

The Elite Guard had long since formed a protective circle around Ulianov and his most favored ministers, and for a moment Weith's feet moved him towards them. He had waited for six years, gathering power with every kill, waited until the moment he could take out every one of the bastards with one fell swoop. He hadn't realized how much power he'd gathered, but now it was laid bare before him. He couldn't wait to feel the burning power that would flood through him when Ulianov fell before him.

As he turned to parry a sword, a familiar head of brown hair slowed him, then turned him around.

That dreadful night six years ago, he'd sworn vengeance upon Urien's decapitated head. He'd sworn he'd see Ulianov killed, turned into his power in payment for the life he'd stolen. But now she was alive, she was here in front of him. There was no way he could play games with her life. He had to get her out of here.

A brief lull in the battle, a hesitation between the waves of men readying to throw their lives away, and Weith turned back towards Urien, only to see a low-bent figure racing towards her side. His axe flashed out, stopping scant centimeters away from the man's head as he realized the other wasn't attacking. The axe reversed paths immediately, taking down another soldier that had gotten too close.

He wanted. He wanted to take the man's life, to use his blood to feed the star inside him. Urien's eyes stopped him, and he turned his gaze to the guards once more. They were his prey. Their lives were his.

"Follow me," he told her, voice slipping through the screams and shouts.

It was time for them to go.

So Weith turned his feet away from Ulianov, pushing forward step by step off the execution platform and towards the closed gates, and the army that stood in his way.

As the guards continued to fall around him, littering the ground with their blood, as the peasants ran screaming and the body count grew greater and greater, the soldiers' morale collapsed. Fewer and fewer people threw themselves forward onto Weith's blade, instead backing away as he drew closer. The pounding in his heart urged him to take action, urged him to chase them down, to steal the life from within their veins and feed the sun in his chest. Only the occasional arrow that flew through the air, aimed at Urien far more often than him, kept him from ranging further afield in the pursuit of his prey.

 

[Zarko Straadi]

Ulianov:

To the King's mounting horror, everything the General threw at Urien and her monster was swept aside with impossible ease. "Majesty, perhaps we should withdraw to the Citadel," General Arakkim said sotto voce. The courtiers were already herding their wives and children away.

"Flee?" Ulianov said, unable to muster the confident contempt his voice should have held. That would all but surrender the Capital to her! As if in answer, the Executioner took a step toward the Royal Pavilion, the eye-holes of his mask locked onto Ulianov. Only an arrow shot toward Urien drew him back from what would have been an unstoppable assault. "Reinforcements?" he said, tensing to rise from his throne if the Executioner threatened again.

"I've sent for the detachment holding the Western Gate, and ordered more troops to the Citadel--" the General said, but then Urien's juggernaut turned away, saying something to Urien before leading her and one of her men off of the execution platform. Ulianov suppressed a sigh of relief.

The General leaned over to a nearby soldier. "Give the order to open the inner gates, but keep the outer gates and portcullises closed. Once they enter a gate, close the inner portcullis behind them. Start heating the pitch and oil in the gatehouses." If ordinary weapons could not stop Urien and her monster, perhaps siege defenses could.

Ulianov glanced over at his little sister Cerys, who looked on with undisguised horror. "What do you think of 'the Golden Fox' now? Still an admirer?" He hadn't exactly caught her being an admirer of the Golden Fox, or he would have hung her from the city walls in a gibbet. The girl had tried to raise the idea of offering her mercy in exchange for a public surrender though. Cerys hadn't wanted to watch the execution either, but then she had always been squeamish. He'd let her get out of witnessing executions before--she was useful when the regime needed a kind, pretty face not tainted with the harder edge of his rule--but not this time.

Cerys:

It took several seconds after the prospect of imminent death receded, for her brother's words to register. By the time she slowly turned her head to him, tears were running down her cheeks. No words came. Sometimes, when she got the chance to be alone in the Royal Gardens, she would play Golden Fox, running around among the trees with a stick in her hand pretending to win sword fights and engage in daring rescues. Now? Henceforth, she was sure she could never play that game again without seeing blood, gore, and death.

"She...your Executioner...." Cerys stammered, still unable to make sense of what she'd just witnessed.


Mizrikan:

After seeing several of his best fighters fall to the most improbable causes--deflected arrows and throwing-spikes inexplicably sent their way--he blew the signal to disengage. He sought out Nazara, his best at stealth and disguise. "Shadow them at a distance, but do not be seen. I want to know where they go." Nazara nodded acquiescence and vanished into the crowd like a ghost.


Twirlip and Aereon:

Aereon was fast with the blade. Of everyone he knew, only Twirlip could match his speed. So he could only be stunned when the Executioner's axe stopped a finger's breadth from adding him to the piles of the dead, before he could even move his sword to parry. Then the axe was gone, effortlessly bringing down another foe.

"You heard the man, let's go," Twirlip said, pausing only to snatch up a fallen longsword. How...could he... she thought, barely believing that she was still alive, much less witness to a massacre like something out of ancient mythology. No time. Get out of the city and back to the woods. Then... Right, but how?! If we try the sewers or the catacombs, it'd be easier for them to bottle us up in a narrow tunnel, and maybe even collapse it on us. Hide in the city and wait for them to open the gates? But Weith's power...I don't know what it'll do. The sooner he's out of the city, the better.

"What was your plan?" she said softly to Aereon.

"We arranged a safe-house. Hide in the city until he had to open the gates. The longer he searched for us, the more the name of the Golden Fox would be on everyone's lips. That won't work now. He'll never open the gates as long as your friend there lives."

They made it down to the Kings' Way, the broad avenue leading from the Acropolis unopposed, then Weith turned east toward the Eagles' Gate. That was a narrow gate that opened to a winding road leading down the steeper side of the rock outcropping that raised the Capital high above the fields and forests it ruled. The terrain Eagles' Way lead to was rugged, easier to disappear into and harder to place a large army on.

"We follow his lead for now, and hope there aren't any nasty surprise conditions attached to his power," Twirlip said. But how does power like that not come at a terrible price? Only a few units of soldiers were still in good order, and they limited themselves to crowd control, keeping panicked peasants from straying into the reach of Weith's axe. That, and shadowing them. Twirlip made a bird call. "They're with me," she said as a few more men and a couple women seemed to materialize out of the crowd.

Reaching the gatehouse, she saw that the outer gate and portcullis were closed, but the inner portcullis was not. "I don't like it," she said. "You got a plan? How can we help?" she said to Weith.

 

[Peregrine]

Had he thought about it, Weith would have assumed he wanted the guards to stop coming. Their fight against him was futile, they were doing nothing but throwing their lives away against the edge of his axe, and once they stopped blocking the way, he and Urien would be able to leave that much easier.

It wasn't until they stopped coming that Weith abruptly realized he wanted nothing less than for the flood of bodies to come to an end.

For a minute or two after the lull in the battle, Weith wasn't bothered by the end of the battle. He turned off the Kings' Way, following the path he'd laid out in his mind countless times, for the day when he finally had his revenge and decapitated the young king of Lundæsica. Of course, his actions would put the city on lockdown, all the gates heavily guarded, but he was certain that their resistance would not have meant much at that time. All that would be left was the gate itself.

Eagle's Gate was the smallest gate out of the city. Weith had never tried, never dared to test it, but he'd gotten hints of how much his strength had grown. He had been certain, by the time he felt he was ready to take his revenge, he'd be able to literally lift that small gate out of his way.

He wasn't certain that was the case now. Urien's sudden appearance had changed all his plans, and brought his wait to a premature end. But the bloody fight from moments before had told Weith that he was a lot stronger than he'd thought he was, his skills a lot sharper than he'd guessed. This gate, it wouldn't be an obstacle for him. He wouldn't let it be.

It had been a couple minutes since the last guard had dared to confront him. No longer fed by the constant stream of lives, the golden heat that burned in his chest began to imperceptibly tremble, before it began to slowly crumble away.

Weith's step nearly faltered, as he felt a shiver run up his spine. The star in his chest was dimming, every pulse of his wildly pounding, erratic heart causing it to dim faintly, the molten gold racing through his veins that it fed, slowly absorbed and incorporated into his body. His muscles visibly twitched and rippled under his skin, shifting and changing under the weight of the dozens upon dozens of lives that were slowly being incorporated into his being.

Consciously, Weith knew he was getting stronger. The star, the power that flowed through his veins, it was nothing but captured strength until he fully absorbed it. As a child, he'd watched the process with fascination every time he'd taken a life, as his injuries had healed, his muscles grew stronger, his bones more durable, his skin harder to pierce.

But it didn't feel like that. No, Weith felt like he was getting weaker. His vision was dimming along with the star, the crystal-sharp world that had spread out before him losing its brilliant vibrancy. His body felt sluggish, slow, unresponsive. Something between panic and desperate desire gripped him. He couldn't let the star go out.

He had to turn around. He had to go back towards Ulianov. Weith's mere proximity would be enough for the terrified king to throw more bodies at his feet in some desperate bid to bring his rampage to an end. Then the star in his chest would grow bright again, it's power driving him forward. He could take the king's head from his shoulders right then, and finally bring this nightmare to an end.

And then he could continue onward, until his blade had reaped every life in this city and the streets ran red with blood.

The sound of Urien's voice jolted through him, the heat of her body growing close causing him to act on instinct. His arm twitched, raising the axe to swing. In that moment, the bloody vision of Urien's decapitated head swam before his eyes, brought to life once more, but this time by his own hand.

He turned the axe around in a split second as panic seized his heart in a tight fist. An instant later and he hurled the blade away with all his strength, sending it tumbling through the air to split through the skull of one of the trailing guards.

Before his swimming, hazy vision, Urien's decapitated head reattached to her neck, her shocked, alive eyes staring wildly at him.

"Stand... Further away from me," Weith finally grunted, his chest appearing to spasm from his short, desperate breaths. "Them too. If anyone gets close, I will kill them."

He'd almost... He'd almost killed Urien. This beautiful, miraculous life that somehow stood before him once again, he'd almost snuffed it out, condemned it to the inglorious feat of feeding his own strength.

He would never hurt her. How many times had he sworn that in their childhood, when they'd run together through the streets, his knuckles bloody, her lip bruised from their latest brawl.

He would never hurt her. He'd kill anyone who tried. Including himself.

Weith's eyes turned back to the gate that blocked their way out, as the panic and pain in his chest ignited the slowly dwindling star into a raging nova. Once again, the world around him turned into crystal, as strength flooded through his veins like the ocean trying to bust through a dam. It hurt, but the pain kept him focused.

He had to get her out of here. That gate was ĩ̥n̬͘ ť̜͜͝h̫͍͗̌e̘̻͋̈ ẅ̦̣̜̩́͛͝͝à͇͇̮̝̎̀͘ý̫̹̥̪̍̈́́!̼͎̯̹̿̌͆͛

With sharp movements, Weith hauled the gate open, the wood creaking and groaning in complaint at the sudden, abrupt movement. For a moment, everything seemed frozen, the guards watching with uncertainty at Weith's inexplicable actions, too intimidated to move. Weith took full advantage of their stillness. He reached down, seizing the lowest bar of the outer portcullis, before hauling it upwards. For a moment nothing happened, before, with a complaining groan of metal and chains, the gate began to lift into the air.

"Go..." Weith groaned, as he lifted the portcullis further into the air, slowly straightening as he did. The words were both a curse of indignation towards the slow moving gate, and a command to Urien and her comrades, to get under the gate before the guards had time to come back to their senses.

 

[Zarko Straadi]

Twirlip's life depended on her ability to be acutely aware of her surroundings; she hadn't missed the way the exquisite grace faded away from Weith's movements, and certainly not the way his muscles started to ripple, twitch, and grow. Then, when she approached and spoke to him, his axe swiftly rose to strike, before he suddenly turned the blade away from her, then hurled the weapon into the head of a following guard.

"Stand... Further away from me," Weith finally grunted, his chest appearing to spasm from his short, desperate breaths. "Them too. If anyone gets close, I will kill them."

She nodded and backed away, gesturing for her band to do the same, then turned to the gatehouse to calculate how long it would take to assail it, and if there were any alternatives. Weith surged in, tossed the massive locking bar aside and heaved the gate open before the gatehouse guards could react. Then, he reached down and lifted the portcullis all by himself.

"Go, go, go!" Twirlip said. She trusted that her band would not have come here without plans, contingencies, and equipment. Launching surprise attacks, reacting to unexpected changes on the fly, and making "impossible" escapes was what they did for a living. Some of them drew small crossbows out from hiding under their cloaks. They were already cocked and ready; the bandits only needed to choose the right bolts from their bandoliers and snap them into place. They chose short bolts with fist-sized clay knobs in place of arrowheads, and launched them in high arcs that dropped them straight down into the crenelated tower over the gate. The knobs shattered on impact, releasing clouds of finely-ground, extremely caustic powder. Others dashed into the gatehouse, hugging the walls, and lobbed handheld balls of the same powder through the firing slits, or up through the channels that would allow boiling oil to be poured down upon them and Weith, if the guards had it ready, and the time to react.

Having been deprived of opportunity to plan or equip, Twirlip herself dashed past Weith to face what awaited beyond the gate, so she could have a plan for their next step when it came time to take it. She found herself looking down on a couple squads of troops staring in shock at one man holding up a portcullis that required teams of men with capstans to raise. The road just outside the gate was narrow and sloped, precisely to prevent a sizeable force from being able to mass there, and put them at a disadvantage. She gave a lopsided grin and spread her arms as the members of her band started arriving to join her. The reputation of the Golden Fox and her Men of the Mist was fearsome enough, but this?!

"Don't be here when he puts that down." They broke and fled.

 

[Peregrine]

The sight of the battalions waiting on the other side of the gate was almost a relief for Weith. It was a reassurance, a place to focus his attention as he heard the heartbeats of Urien's people racing past him under the gate. As he longed to reach out and break their necks in one hand.

But he didn't need to. He didn't have to. Even though the star in his chest was burning, setting his veins and organs on fire, even as he was bleeding out power to hold this gate up, he didn't need to kill them. After all, there was an army waiting for him on the other side. There was an army waiting for him to kill.

There was an army...

As the last of Urien's men slipped under the gate, and Weith shrugged himself under and allowed the gate to fall heavily to the ground, the star in his chest once more dimmed. The burning power stopped flooding through his veins, replaced by the slow, consistent flow of molten gold from earlier. It nourished his body, wounded slightly from the power he'd burnt earlier to ensure he'd be able to lift the gate, but with the dimming of the star panic once again began to crowd the edges of Weith's mind. He stumbled slightly, his vision marred by greys scanning for the soldiers that blocked their way forward, while a tinny echoing filled his ears.

The army…

The army was gone, reduced to nothing but scattered soldiers that were already far outside of his range. A growl slipped from between Weith's teeth as he stopped moving, his hands spasming open and closed as he reached unconsciously for weapons that weren't there. Slowly, he turned around, eyes facing back towards the dropped portcullis. He could just barely make out the wide-eyed soldiers that stood on the other side, but unless he planned to go back under the portcullis, they were out of reach.

Something tugged at his mind, and he turned suddenly, realizing that Urien was walking away from him. Unconsciously, he stepped after her, heading down the hill that the guards had just vacated. Wieth might have led them out of the city, but now he followed along behind her, maintaining an almost perfect distance of two arms lengths from her person. He was not going to risk attacking her again. He wouldn't.

The world was gradually dimming further and further around him, until it felt like he was walking through a world of shadow, made up of nothing but blacks and greys. The star in his chest was guttering, and if he didn't do something soon…

Suddenly, a flash of red glowed in the corner of his vision, a vaguely humanoid figure burning with life and heat. Weith moved instantly, pivoting on the spot and leaping towards the figure, crossing a dozen feet in a single leap. One step, two, his arm outstretched, and the red being was almost in his grip, all he needed was one more bound...

Urien. He was going to far from Urien.

Weith came to a sliding halt as his feet suddenly stopped moving, skidding through several inches of grass and dirt. The glowing red figure burning in his shadowy vision escaped his fingers by scant inches, as soft, heavy breaths filled Weith's mouth. He'd almost had it, and once it had been in his grip, there was no way it would be able to escape him once he had it. Its power would be his.

But...

He spun on the spot, striding back towards Urien, slowing and drawing no closer once he was again two arms lengths away from her. He had to stay close enough to her, in case another attack came. He'd gone too far from her that time, far enough away that he wouldn't have been able to react in time if an arrow had come flying in her direction. That was unacceptable. Even if the star was going out, even if it would leave him stranded in a world of permanent shadow if it went dark, he couldn't take the chance with her life. He couldn't.

He'd just have to wait for someone to get close.

Twice more, the red figures got close enough to be within his reach, and twice more they barely escaped his grasp as he lunged at them, slipping just far enough away that he wouldn't be able to protect Urien from the arrows that hadn't showed up yet. That could still be coming. And the star was dimming, dimming, dimming.

It went dark. The last of the molten gold pulsed through his veins for a couple seconds before his greedy, twitching flesh absorbed the final drops.

And then everything inside him was still, a glassy pond reflecting silence and darkness.

Gradually, the world around him brightened, as color began to restore to his vision, and the pounding, burning anxiety that had consumed his mind faded back into the dark recesses from which it had come. His gaze slowly turned, latching onto the beautiful woman walking near his side.

"Urien."

Her name escaped his lips almost unconsciously, her reaction to the sound proof that she was really there. That she was alive. He had so many questions, so many things he wanted to know, but the haze from the star still left his thoughts in a muddled state. Instead, he simply repeated her name again.

"Urien."

And then he waited.

 

[Zarko Straadi]

Urien:

"Alright everyone, let's move!" Twirlp said, leading the group away at a run. The sooner they got around a bend and put a hillock between them and the city walls, the better. She had only just got the group moving, when Weith suddenly lunged at Aereon in a superhuman bound. "WEITH, NO!" she cried. Aereon dove and rolled to escape his attack. Instead of pursuing, Weith's head turned back toward Urien, and he sprang back in her direction. Urien readied herself to take evasive action, but he landed and skidded to a stop two arm's lengths away from her, then matched her jogging pace in a fugue. "Everybody spread out," she said, giving hand signs to direct her men to move up into the hills on each side of the road so they could subject any pursuing force to enfilading fire.

"Twirlip, are you sure that's--" one of her men said, hesitating to leave her alone with Weith. "SHIT!" he said as Weith flew at him. While the Executioner hurtled through the air, he ducked behind a tree. Like a rock being pulled back by a string, Weith again returned to Urien when he noticed the distance between them. His muscles were still twitching strangely; growing or swelling temporarily, who knew?

What am I going to do for you, Weith? she thought, still trying to process--or even believe--what was happening. Will it ever be safe to take him to the main camp? What if one of the children runs up to him? This power...what's it going to do to him?! Urien thought.

Above, the sound of a raven's call. Twirlip looked up into the sky, smiling when she spotted a raven soaring overhead. "Awwwwk, awwk," she said in a close imitation of its call. The raven tilted its head to affix her with intelligent, beady eyes, returned the call, then turned to soar away. "Weith?" she said, but he was still beyond answering.

As they rounded the corner, Urien saw a welcome sight. A figure in a mottled black and dark-grey hooded cloak, face hidden by a raven mask. She rode on horseback, leading several more horses, with a raven sitting on her shoulder. Urien held up a hand to stop her before she got within Weith's reach, but to her horror, he crouched and sprang into his longest leap yet. "Nowhere! Retreat!" she cried, holding up her hands to signal her other men not to fire. "WEITH!" The shaman turned her horse quickly, only barely escaping his grasp before he once again bounded to Urien's side. "Get the men mounted and ride on ahead! Don't worry, he won't hurt me!" she called out. I hope...

Urien breathed a sigh of relief as Nowhere rode away safely. She was the only one in their band who might even have a clue as to what was happening to Weith, or what could be done about it. This 'attack everything that comes near me' thing can't go on forever, can it? Whatever dark magic this is, it has to have limits. Please gods and goddesses, let it be so!

"Urien."

The voice conjured a flood of memories; burgling, running, hiding, laughing, playing, their first kiss--

"Urien."

"Wha? Oh, sorry. It's been a long time since I've gone by that name. Normally, I'd give someone who saved me from certain death a great big bear hug and a kiss on the lips, but...you know," she said with a grin, flicking her eyes to indicate the necessary distance between them. Then her expression turned serious. "Are...are you alright? Will you be able to ride a horse?"

 

[Peregrine]

With his mind trapped in a haze, Weith could not respond to Urien immediately. Instead, he stared at the curve of her lips as she spoke, watching the way her tongue occasionally darted out from behind her teeth as she shaped the words. It did nothing to help clear the mist that muddied his thoughts, but at that moment he didn't really care. The sight of her, standing in front of him, was far too sweet.

With the star finally burnt out, Weith's body finally stopped trembling. Every now and again, a twitch would race through his body, causing his shoulders to jerk. However, as his body continued to adjust to the new strength and power in him, the twitches came less and less frequently, and with less intensity. Almost unconsciously, he tensed the muscles in his arms and chest, feeling the way the tension almost painfully strained his skin and bones. He was stronger. A lot stronger, although he had no way of knowing exactly how much his physiology had changed.

Urien had spoken. There'd been a faint change of pitch at the end of her words. A question. She'd asked him a question, and was probably waiting for an answer. Weith didn't know how long he'd already kept her waiting. Gradually, he fished the sounds she'd spoken out of his memory, stringing them together into words, and then into sentences with meaning.

She'd asked a lot, some of it more implicit than explicit. He started with the easy one.

"I can ride," Weith agreed. Even if his mind was in a daze, he had enough confidence in his balance to walk a tightrope, let alone something as straightforward as keeping himself on the back of a horse.

And then he paused, because no other answer was easy. Alright? He didn't know. His body was healthy, of that he was absolutely certain. Physically, Weith had never been in better condition than he was right now. Mentally, though? Weith had killed a lot of people, both in his time running the streets, and even more so in his years as the King's executioner. But he had never before killed that many people in such a short amount of time.

Normally, Weith's memory was crystal clear, and as he'd grown stronger his ability to recall events in exacting detail had only sharpened. But their escape from the city, their walk to wherever exactly they were now was nothing but a haze, a haze of violence, bloody excitement, followed by the rise of an almost obsessive fear. Some events he could still recall, muddled by the wash of emotions that seemed to overpower every other sensation. But not all. Not even near all.

"Urien," he said, reaching out to grab her, before abruptly hesitating before his hand could touch her. He didn't know how much his strength had grown. What if he hurt her by accident, misjudged how tightly he was grabbing her? He couldn't do that. He'd never do that.

He didn't want to see her standing so far away from him, the tension in her shoulders hinting at her unease about him. "I'm not going to hurt you," he said. "I'd never…"

Would she even believe him?

"I've never killed that many people at once before," he explained instead, trying not to sound like he was justifying himself. Justifying a wrong. "I didn't expect it to feel so…" The word on his lips froze. Good. Addictive. Necessary. Could he say that to her? Would she think he was a monster? Did she already?

"But I'd never hurt you. No matter what happened."