Merk stood there, looking around at the eight dead men, taking stock with a professional assassin’s eye and as he did, he saw one of them—the one with the club—was still alive, squirming on the ground, on his stomach. The old Merk took over, and he could not help himself as he walked over to the man, still unsatisfied. Leave no enemies alive. Never let them recall your face.
Merk walked casually over to the thief, reached out with his boot, and kicked him over, until he lay on his back. The thief looked up, bleeding from his mouth, eyes filled with fear.
“Please…don’t do it,” he begged. “I was not going to kill you. I would have let you go.”
Merk smiled.
“Would you?” he asked. “Was that before you tortured me, or after?”
“Please!” the man called out, starting to cry. “You said you had renounced violence!”
Merk leaned back and thought about that.
“You’re right,” he said.
The man looked at him, hope in his eyes.
“I have. The thing is, you have stirred something up in me today, something I would have rather suppressed.”
“Please!” the man shrieked, sobbing.
“I wonder,” Merk said, reflective, “how many innocent women, children, you have killed on this road?”
The man continued to sob.
“ANSWER ME!” Merk yelled.
“What does it matter?” the man called back, between sobs.
Merk lowered the tip of his sword to the man’s throat.
“It matters to me,” Merk said, “a great deal.”
“Okay, okay!” he called out. “I don’t know. Dozens? Hundreds? It is what I have been doing my whole life.”
Merk thought about that; at least it was an honest response.
“I myself have killed many men in my lifetime,” Merk said. “Not all I am proud of. But all for a cause, a purpose. Sometimes I was duped into killing an innocent—but in that case, I always killed the person who hired me. I never killed women, and I never killed children. I never preyed on the innocent, or the defenseless. I never robbed and I never cheated. I guess that makes me something of a saint,” Merk said, smiling at his own humor.
He sighed.
“But you,” he continued, “you are scum, you who kill the innocent.”
“Please!” he shouted. “You can’t kill an unarmed man!”
Merk thought about that.
“You’re right,” he said, and looked about. “See that sword lying next to you on the ground? Grab it.”
The man looked over, fear in his eyes.
“No,” he cried, trembling.
“Grab it,” Merk said, putting the tip of his sword to the man’s throat, “or I will kill you.”
The thief finally reached over, grabbed the hilt of the sword, and held it with trembling hands.
“You can’t kill me!” the man shouted again. “You vowed to never kill again!”
Merk smiled wide, and in one quick motion, he plunged his sword into the man’s chest, killing him.
“The funny thing about starting over,” Merk said, “is that there’s always tomorrow.”
CHAPTER ELEVEN
Kyra raced through the snow until she reached the top of a hill, brushing back the thick branches in her way, and burst into a clearing—and she suddenly stopped short. All of her anticipation could not prepare her for what she saw before her.
Her breath was taken away—not by the blizzard or the cold or the wind—but this time because of the sight, unlike any she’d ever seen her life. She had heard the tales, night after night in her father’s chamber, the ancient stories and legends of dragons, wondering if they were true. She had tried to imagine them in her mind’s eye, had stayed up many a sleepless night visualizing. And yet still she somehow could not believe it to be true.
Not until now.
For before her, hardly twenty feet away, Kyra was shocked to find herself standing face to face with a real, breathing dragon. It was terrifying—yet magnificent. It screeched as it lay on its side, trying to get up but unable, one wing flapping and the other appearing to be broken. It was huge, massive even, each scarlet-red scale the size of her, lying on the ground, having taken out a hundred trees, all of them flattened in the clearing around it, making Kyra wonder if it had fallen from the sky.
The dragon lay close to a gushing river, on a steep snow bank, and as she stared, agape, Kyra tried to process the sight before her. A dragon. Here, in Escalon, in Volis, in the Wood of Thorns. It couldn’t be. Dragons, she knew, lived on the other side of the world, and never in her life, or her father’s time, or her father’s father’s time, had one been spotted on her side of the world—much less in her own wood. It made no sense.
She blinked several times and rubbed her eyes, thinking it must be an illusion.
But there it was, shrieking again, digging its claws in the snow, which, she saw, trailed blood. It was definitely wounded. And it was definitely a dragon.
Kyra knew she should turn and flee, and a part of her wanted to; after all, it could kill her with a single breath, much less a stroke of its claws. She had heard the stories of the damage dragons had done, of their hatred for mankind, of their ability to tear a person to shreds in the blink of an eye, or wipe out an entire village with a single breath.
But something within Kyra made her hold her ground. She did not know if it was courage or foolishness or her own desperation—or something deeper. For deep down, as crazy as it was, she felt an affinity for this creature, some sort of primal connection. She knew it made no sense—and yet she could not ignore it.
It blinked at her, slowly, staring back at her with just as much surprise. What terrified Kyra most of all were its eyes—not that the glowing yellow orbs were so fierce, so ancient, so soulful—but that they were the exact same eyes she had seen in her own reflection in the Lake of Dreams.
Kyra braced herself, expecting to be killed—but it did not breathe fire. Instead, it just stared at her. It was bleeding, its blood running down the snow bank into the river, and it pained Kyra to see it. She wanted to help it. Every clan in the kingdom had an oath they lived by, a sacred law they had to uphold, which they could never violate, at the risk of bringing a curse on their family. Her clan’s law was to never kill a wounded animal—indeed, it was the very insignia of her father’s house, a knight holding a wolf. And as she watched it breathing, labored, gasping, her heart went out to it, wanting to make it well again, whatever the risk.
As Kyra stood transfixed, unable to move, she realize it was also for another reason: she felt a tremendous connection to this beast, more so than to any animal she had ever encountered, more so even than to Leo, who was like a brother to her. It was as if she had just been reunited with a long-lost family member, an ancient friend. She could sense its tremendous power and pride and fierceness, and just being around it inspired her. It made her want to think big, to feel as if anything were possible in this world.
As Kyra stood at the edge of the wood, debating what action to take, suddenly she was startled to hear a branch break and to hear laughter—a cruel man’s laughter. As she watched, she was shocked to see a soldier, dressed in the important furs of the Lord’s Men, saunter into the clearing, wielding a long spear, and stand over the dragon.
Kyra flinched as the soldier suddenly jabbed the dragon in its ribcage, making it shriek and curl up, and she felt as if she had been stabbed herself. Clearly the soldier was taking advantage of this wounded beast, torturing it before killing it; the thought pained Kyra to no end.
“My ax, boy!” the soldier yelled out, and as he did, a boy warily entered the clearing, leading a horse. He appeared to be a squire, a lad of perhaps fifteen, and he seemed terrified as he approached, eyeing the dragon.
He did as commanded and drew a long ax from the saddle, placing it into his master’s hand.
Kyra watched with a sense of dread as the soldier raised the ax high, glistening in the moonlight, and walked clos
er to the dragon. He studied its head.
“I’d say this will make a fine trophy,” the soldier said, proud of himself. “They will sing songs of me for this kill of all kills.”
“But you did not kill it,” his squire protested. “It was wounded when you found it.”
The soldier turned and held the edge of the ax to the boy’s throat threateningly.
“I killed it, boy, do you understand?”
The boy gulped, frozen, then slowly nodded.
The soldier turned, raised his ax, and took aim at the dragon’s exposed neck. The dragon struggled to move, to lift itself up, but it could not. It was helpless.
The dragon blinked helplessly, and suddenly it turned and looked directly at Kyra, its yellow eyes aglow, and she could feel it calling right to her.
Kyra could hold herself back no longer.
“NO!” she cried.
Without thinking, Kyra ran forward and burst into the clearing, rushing down the slope and slipping in the snow, Leo at her side. She did not stop to think that confronting a Lord’s Man was a crime punishable by death, that she was alone out here, exposed, that her actions would likely get her killed. She thought only of saving the dragon’s life, of protecting what was innocent.
As Kyra stumbled forward, she instinctively pulled the bow from over her shoulder and placed an arrow, aiming in the soldier’s direction.
The soldier looked truly stunned to see another person out there, in the middle of nowhere—much less a girl holding a bow at him. He stood holding his ax, frozen in midair, then slowly lowered it as he turned and faced her.
Kyra’s arms shook as she held the bowstring and aimed it at the man’s chest, not wanting to fire if she didn’t have to. She had never killed a man before, and was not sure if she could.
“Lower your ax,” she commanded, trying to use her fiercest voice. She wished at a time like this that she possessed the deep, commanding voice of her father.
“And who commands me?” the man called back in a mocking voice, grinning, appearing amused.
But she was undeterred.
“I am Kyra,” she said, “daughter of Duncan, Commander of Volis.” She added the last bit with emphasis, hoping to scare him into backing down.
But he only grinned wider.
“An empty title,” he countered. “You are all serfs to Pandesia, like the rest of Escalon. You answer to their Lord Governor—like everybody else.”
He looked her up and down and licked his lips, then took a threatening step toward her, clearly unafraid.
“Do you know the penalty for aiming a weapon at a Lord’s Man, girl? I could imprison you and your father and all of your people just for this.”
The dragon suddenly breathed hard, labored, gasping, and the soldier turned back and glanced at it, remembering.
He turned back to Kyra.
“I shall forget your act of treason,” he said, “and you shall run off now, back to your father, and count your blessings I let you live. Now piss off!”
The soldier turned his back on her derisively, done with her, ignoring her bow completely, as if she were harmless. He raised his ax again, took a step forward, and held it over the dragon’s throat.
Kyra felt herself flush with rage.
“I will not tell you again,” she said, her voice lower this time, filled with meaning, surprising even her.
She drew her bow further back, and the soldier turned and looked at her, and this time he did not smile, as if realizing she were serious. Kyra was puzzled as she noticed him look to her side, over her shoulder, as if watching something behind her. In the same moment she realized what he was doing—that he was watching someone come up behind her—she suddenly detected motion out of the corner of her eye—but it was too late to react.
Kyra felt herself slammed from the side, went flying sideways and dropped her bow, its arrow shooting harmlessly up in the air. A heavy body landed on top of her as she was tackled to the ground, so deep in the snow she could hardly breathe.
Kyra, disoriented, fought her way back to the surface to find a soldier on top of her, pinning her down, and was baffled. She saw four of the Lord’s Men standing over her, and she realized what had happened: there had been more of them. So stupid of her, she realized, for assuming that solider was alone. These other men must have been lurking somewhere out there and had crept up behind her. That’s why, she realized now, the first soldier had been so brazen with a bow trained on him.
Two of the men roughly dragged her to her feet, while the other two stepped close. They were cruel men with boorish faces, unshaven, hardened, eager for bloodlust—or worse. She could see it in their eyes. One began to unbuckle his belt.
“So we have a girl with a little bow, do we?” asked one, mocking.
“You should have stayed home in your daddy’s fort,” said another.
Barely had he finished speaking when there came a snarling noise, and Leo suddenly leapt through the snow, pouncing on one and pinning him down. Another one of the men turned and kicked Leo, but Leo turned and bit his ankle, dropping him. Leo went back and forth between the two soldiers, snarling and biting as they kicked him back.
The two other soldiers, though, stayed fixated on Kyra, and with Leo tied up, she felt a wave of panic. Strangely enough, though, she realized that, despite her circumstances, she did not feel panic for herself—but for the dragon. Out of the corner of her eye, she saw the first soldier once again raise his sword high and turn and approach the beast, and she knew that in a moment, it would be dead.
Kyra reacted instinctively. As one of the soldiers momentarily loosened his grip on her arm, caught off guard by Leo, she reached behind her, drew the staff sheathed to her back, brought it down on an angle with lightning speed, and struck one soldier perfectly in the pressure point in his temple, dropping him before he could react.
She then pulled back the staff, slid her grip all the way up so she could use it at close range, and jabbed the other soldier beside her on the bridge of the nose. He shrieked, gushing blood, and dropped to his knees.
Kyra knew that she could finish these two men off easily. They were now prone, Leo had the other two pinned down and struggling, and this was her chance to kill them with a few deadly blows.
But her heart was still with the dragon—it was all she could think of. So with shaking hands she ran to her bow, picked it up, and placed an arrow, knowing she barely had time to think, much less to aim. She had one shot, she knew, and it had to be true. It would be the first shot she had ever taken in action, in real battle, in the dark, in the blinding snow and wind, between trees and branches and twenty yards off.
Kyra summoned all of her training, all of her long days and nights of shooting, everything she had within her, and forced herself to focus.
Kyra drew and released, becoming one with her weapon, and time slowed as she watched the arrow fly, hearing its whistle, for the first time unsure if it would hit. There were too many variables at play, from the gale of wind to her frozen hands, to the movement of the soldier.
A moment later, though, she heard the satisfying thump of arrow piercing flesh. She heard the soldier cry out, and she watched his face in the moonlight as he stood there, frozen, ax still raised overhead—and an arrow through his throat.
He stood there, stunned, then slowly dropped his ax, falling face-first, dead.
The dragon blinked and looked over at Kyra and their eyes met. Its huge yellow eyes, glowing even in the night, seemed to acknowledge what she had done, and in that moment she felt they were having a spiritual meeting. As if they had just made a connection for life.
Kyra was in shock, hardly believing what she had done. Had she really just killed a man? And not just any man—but a Lord’s Man. It was an act from which there was no return—an act which would spark a war and embroil all her people in it. What had she done?
Yet somehow, strangely enough, she had no regrets, no doubts about what she had done. It was as if she felt destiny cou
rsing its way through her.
Kyra suddenly felt a searing pain on her jaw line, and she heard the crack of her own jaw as she felt thick, calloused knuckles meeting her skin and her world was filled with pain.
Kyra stumbled sideways and fell to her hands and knees, seeing stars, her world spinning, realizing she’d been punched in the jaw. Before she could collect herself she felt a kick in the ribs, then felt a second soldier tackling her and pinning her face in the snow.
She gasped for breath until he jerked her to her feet, and she stood there, in their grip, facing the two men she had let live. Leo snarled not far away, still struggling with the other two.
Kyra, breathing hard, stared back at the two soldiers, one bleeding from his nose, the other from his temple, and realized she should have killed them. She struggled with all her might, to no avail. She could see the look of death in their eyes.
One of them glanced back at his dead commander, then stepped in close and sneered in her face.
“By morning, your village, your fort, your people, will be razed to the ground.”
He backhanded her and her face filled with pain as she went stumbling back.
The other soldier grabbed her firmly, though, and pushed his dagger to her throat, while the other reached for his belt buckle.
“Before you die, you’re going to remember us,” he said. “The last memory of your life will be of us. For all time.”
Kyra heard a whining and looked over her shoulder to see one of the soldiers stab Leo. She winced as if she herself had been stabbed, but Leo, fearless, turned and sunk his teeth into the soldier’s wrist.
Kyra felt the blade at her throat, and she knew she was on her own. Yet instead of fear, she felt liberated. She felt her anger, her desire for vengeance against the Lord’s Men, well up inside her, and in the man before her she had the perfect target. She might go down, but she would go down a warrior, fighting for her cause.