Laurent

  I hadn’t meant to gather an army.

  I’d planned to travel quietly, quickly pass through towns without leaving an impression, keep my head down, and reach Angelshade before another catastrophe could get in the way. That plan unraveled the moment someone mentioned, to exactly the wrong person, that the Hero was traveling without an escort.

  After that, people started appearing.

  It began nearly a week ago. The paladins came first, just one or two met on the road. Crusaders came in their wake, waiting at crossroads, or hurrying to catch us from behind. Then clerics with too much conviction and not enough sense. Adventurers who’d decided that standing next to history sounded better than chasing monsters or counting coins in a tavern. Every one of them arrived with apologies already rehearsed and reasons polished smooth. You shouldn’t be alone. It wouldn’t be right. The gods wouldn’t approve.

  I’d tried to refuse at first. I'd even tried to explain that in every tale, the Hero's party was only a few companions. That had only convinced them I was humble.

  Sir Cedric explained, firmly, that we wouldn’t be slowing our pace for anyone. By the next morning, they’d reorganized themselves into smaller, faster-moving groups, rotating mounts and sharing wagons so no one fell behind.

  By the third night of breaking and rebuilding the ever regrowing camp, it had begun to spread wider than I liked. Banners cropped up where there hadn’t been any the evening before, and I found myself stopping every few steps to answer questions, accept thanks, or gently redirect enthusiasm before it became something harder to dismantle. I smiled when I needed to, laughed when someone said something earnest and awkward, and listened long enough to make people feel heard.

  Faith, I was learning, was louder than intent.

  Most of them blurred together after a while. Most of them felt the same… but, one group didn’t. Their group was smaller than the rest, their members older and far more experienced. Everything about them made this clear, from their wary demeanor to the practicality and wear of their armor. Their weapons caught my attention every time I passed, not because they were impressive, but because they weren’t. Shortened spears balanced for thrusting. Heavy blades shaped for close work. Tools made for a very specific kind of violence.

  They’d approached me the first night. They were polite, but their demeanor was careful, almost as if they were waiting for something. They said they’d known my parents, once. The names meant nothing to me, but Sir Cedric had gone still beside me, just for a moment, before confirming that yes, they’d visited when I was very young. It was only briefly and long ago, but that had been enough for me to agree to let them stay.

  I told myself that was why I noticed them now, sitting around a fire, eyes wary as they watched the slowly growing shadows through the snow.

  Someone knelt as I passed, murmuring a blessing under their breath. A young woman near the fire looked up at me, hesitating before she spoke.

  “It’s easier, somehow,” she said. “Knowing she’s still out there.”

  "She?" I asked, half suspecting the answer.

  “The Saint,” she said. “I knew they were lying when they said she was dead.” She paused, then added more quietly, “It makes it easier to keep going... She guides us even now.”

  I smiled and offered her a hand back to her feet. “If she’s guiding anyone,” I said lightly, “she’s doing a remarkably subtle job.”

  She laughed, relieved, and the moment passed.

  As I walked away, I couldn't help but think that she might be right. I was going to Angelshade because Mirela was there, though I doubt that's what all the histories meant when they said the Saint would guide the Hero. There'd been no grand revelation, no guiding star drawn on a divine map in the sky. Just a direction I refused to abandon. The gods knew I wouldn't need more than that.

  I moved on through the camp, charm intact, unease hidden away where no one could see it. I didn’t look back at the older group until I noticed Sir Cedric had repositioned himself between them and me without a word. That, more than the weapons, stayed with me.

  "I'm glad I'm not the only one they make uncomfortable," I said, pulling the hood of my cloak up against the wind. "If you felt threatened by them, you could have said as much. We didn't need to allow them to follow us."

  Cedric turned, looking the group over and making no attempt to hide his scrutiny.

  “They aren’t a threat to us,” he said at last. “Not here.”

  I frowned.

  “They’re dangerous to the wrong people,” he continued quietly. “And only to those people.” His gaze returned to mine, steady and unreadable. “We aren’t among them. For now, on this road, they'll be more help than harm, especially if monsters show up.”

  A shape moving through the snow ahead pulled my attention before I could decide why.

  Three adventurers rode escort, spaced comfortably, alert without being tense. A merchant’s wagon, canvas drawn tight against the snow, wheels crunching softly as it passed. The driver kept her head down beneath a heavy hood, posture closed in a way that suggested she preferred not to be looked at too closely. Nothing about it should have demanded attention, and yet…

  A charger paced the wagon’s far side, fully saddled and in good tack, its breath steaming in the cold. No rider walked beside it. No one held its reins. It moved with the wagon as if by habit, close enough to brush the canvas when the road narrowed.

  I slowed, eyes following the horse as it went by.

  “That’s odd,” I said.

  Cedric glanced at it, then back to the road ahead. “Is it?”

  “It’s a warhorse,” I said. “And a well-kept one. Fully saddled, too, with no one riding it.”

  Cedric shrugged slightly. “Could be injured. Could be trading mounts. There are plenty of reasons a horse might be walking.”

  I watched the charger step neatly around a patch of churned snow, keeping pace with the wagon without drifting or crowding it.

  “That horse is holding formation,” I said. “No one’s guiding it.”

  Cedric glanced again, longer this time. “So are half the mounts on this road.”

  “Not like that,” I said. “Most would lag, or press in. That one knows exactly where it belongs.”

  Cedric exhaled slowly. “It’s a trained horse, Laurent. Training alone doesn’t make it trouble.” He turned, moving further into the camp. “Come on. We’ve got things to do before we lose what little light we have, or the snow gets worse.”

  The wagon rolled on, the driver never lifting her head. The horse kept pace without a glance back. I let them go, telling myself Cedric was right. Still, the image stayed with me longer than it should have, and I shook my head to clear it.

  The author's content has been appropriated; report any instances of this story on Amazon.

  By the time we turned back toward the heart of the camp, the snow had settled into a steady fall, soft enough to be more nuisance than danger. Fires burned cleanly, and the smell of cooking food carried well through the cold.

  I found myself counting things without quite meaning to. The line of wagons and the number of tents that had popped up around them. How many mouths clustered around each fire. How much food we’d gone through since morning, and how much still remained packed away beneath canvas and oilcloth.

  I glanced toward the road ahead, where it disappeared into falling snow. “Behrl’s Ford,” I said. “It’s big enough to take us in, isn’t it? I know it’s on the trade route, but I don’t know what that actually means in winter.”

  Cedric followed my look. “It’ll manage,” he said. “River trade keeps it fed even when the roads are a mess. They’re used to caravans getting stuck a day or two.”

  “And supplies?” I asked. “Food, fodder, and somewhere to dry people out?”

  “You’re starting to think like a leader,” he said, his tone unreadable.

  “I’m trying to make sure we don’t outrun our own supplies,” I replied. “Or our patience.”

  He gave a low grunt. “Funny. You couldn’t wait to leave most of them behind when we started.”

  I smiled faintly. “That was before I realized how many had chosen to come anyway.”

  Cedric slowed a fraction, enough that I had to match him. “You’re taking responsibility for them now.”

  “I always had it,” I said. Then, after a moment, “I just didn’t want it.”

  He didn’t argue that.

  We walked in silence for a few steps, boots crunching softly through the snow that had begun to cling to the packed earth. I watched a pair of squires clearing snow from the edges of a tent, laughing as they worked together to keep it from sagging under the weight.

  “I want to find her,” I said at last. “For my own reasons. I won’t pretend otherwise.”

  Cedric’s expression didn’t change, but his attention sharpened.

  “But it isn’t only that,” I continued. “We’re not going to stop what’s coming without her. I need her help. And if that’s true, then these people…” I gestured toward the camp around us. “They have a right to believe that too. Whatever comes next, they’re part of it. They’ll be standing with us.”

  Cedric was quiet for a long moment.

  “I don’t like not knowing what we’re walking toward,” he said at last. “Or what to expect when things turn bad.”

  I nodded. “Neither do I.”

  He exhaled slowly, the sound fogging in the cold. “That doesn’t make you wrong.”

  We reached the fire at the center of the camp and were met by a pair of squires, eager to press bowls of hot food into our hands. I thanked them and followed Cedric to a log overturned for seating, steam curling up into the cold air as we ate.

  The light faded gradually after that, though it was hard to tell, the shadows only growing by degrees. The sky darkened without ever truly clearing, the storm swallowing the sunset until the only sign of evening was the deeper blue-gray settling over the camp and the way the fires seemed to burn brighter by comparison.

  Edgar found us by the fire not long after, his armor dusted white along the edges, helm tucked under one arm. He nodded once in greeting and accepted a bowl from a passing squire before settling onto the log opposite us.

  “We should get people out of their armor once the watches are set,” he said. “Let them sleep while they can.”

  Cedric grunted agreement. I was already nodding, the warmth of the food sinking into me as the camp settled into its evening rhythm. Voices had lowered and the fires burned steadier. The storm pressed in long enough that the world beyond the ring of light felt distant and unreal.

  I was reaching for the first buckle on my armor when someone screamed.

  It wasn’t loud enough to carry far, and it ended too abruptly to be a warning.

  For a heartbeat, the camp froze. Then, everything moved at once.

  Shouts rang out from the perimeter. Fires were abandoned as the camp erupted into motion, embers scattering into the snow as men surged forward to meet the attack. Steel rasped free of leather and scabbard. Men poured in from the dark between the trees and through the snow, fast and reckless, as if they had been waiting for this exact moment and expected nothing to stop them.

  They came in pieces at first. Desperate figures in little more than rags, gripping tools and broken weapons, eyes bright with madness and borrowed certainty. Behind them, crusaders wearing the wrong insignia, a nine-pointed star worked in dull brass at their throats, urged them on. All along the line, shapes too small and too furred to be human flooded forward, scrambling low through the snow and snapping at anything that fell.

  Then I saw the masks. Black ravens, familiar and unmistakable, cutting through the chaos in a tight line. They didn’t slow, twisting past defenders rather than engaging. They slipped past the forming lines as if they had mapped the camp in advance, heading straight toward me.

  “Protect the Hero!” someone shouted, too late.

  The assassins didn’t slow or hesitate as they charged through the camp, flowing like water around attacks meant to slow their progress. Five of them, moving fast and low, blades already in hand.

  I stepped forward to meet them, sword clearing its sheath in one smooth motion.

  Steel rang as the first blade struck mine, its magic dulling the impact traveling cleanly up my arm. The sword took it without complaint, the edge biting where it should and refusing to catch where lesser metal would have bound. I turned the strike aside and answered with a cut that split leather and sent the man stumbling back into the snow.

  They were good, every movement quick and precise. Their blades were short and meant for close work, for slipping between plates and finding joints. One darted in low while another went high, forcing my guard wide—

  —and Cedric was there, shield crashing into the first hard enough to fold him sideways. Edgar took the second with a brutal, economical strike that left the man bleeding and scrambling away.

  A thrown knife hissed toward my face. I knocked it aside without looking, felt a brush of heat as a spell followed it, thin and dark. I struck that away as well, the blade cutting through the magic with a sound like tearing cloth.

  They tried to swarm us after that, realizing too late that they couldn’t take me cleanly. We held formation without speaking, years of habit settling into place. I pressed forward, forcing them back, my sword breaking weapons, splitting armor, driving them into bad footing where the snow slowed them and the churned ground betrayed quick steps.

  One fell, and then another, so quick that I wasn't sure if the deaths were from my sword strokes or my companions.

  The last two broke away instead of pressing the fight. For a heartbeat, I thought they were fleeing. They weren’t.

  Both dropped to one knee in the snow, hands shaking as they fumbled for something at their belts. I felt the wrongness before I saw it, a pressure in the air that made my skin prickle beneath the armor.

  “Back!” Edgar shouted, too late to stop it.

  They shattered the idols in their hands. Shadow poured out instead of blood. Their bodies twisted as if yanked apart from the inside, bones stretching, armor tearing free as they grew. Wings burst from their backs in a spray of feathers and rot, half-formed and useless for flight, but heavy enough to strike like clubs. Talons replaced hands and feet, gouging furrows in the snow as they rose.

  Raven heads crowned the things they became, beaks split and dripping, eyes burning with a dull, hungry light. Their swollen, torn bodies were twice the size they had been moments before. As one, those orbs locked on me, and they advanced.

  I tightened my grip on the sword and stepped forward anyway. This was what I was here for.

  They came together, a rush of talons and wings and tearing air. Cedric met the one on my left in a full-bodied charge, shield up and sword driving hard into its center mass, the impact ringing like a struck bell. The creature reeled, snow spraying as it skidded back a step.

  I took the other head-on. Light surged down my arm as I committed to the strike, the blade flaring with a pale, mythic brilliance that bit deep into the thing’s twisted flesh. The blow landed with a sound more like splitting stone than meat, and the monster staggered, claws gouging trenches in the ground as it fought to keep its footing.

  “Edgar!” I shouted. “With Cedric!”

  He didn’t hesitate. Edgar broke toward them at once, holy sigils burning briefly along his armor as he raised his weapon and brought it down in a crushing arc that drove the creature away from Cedric’s flank.

  For a moment, it worked. The monsters were fast, faster than they should have been at that size, darting around wagons and tearing through tents, using the camp itself as cover. One slammed into me from the side, half a wing crashing into my shoulder hard enough to make my vision spark. I held my ground, boots digging in as force rippled through my legs and into the earth beneath me, refusing to give way.

  Pain followed quickly. Then more of it. I struck back, cutting and forcing space, but every exchange cost something. A talon raked across my thigh. Another blow glanced off my helm hard enough to leave my ears ringing. I felt the weight of it all settling in, breath burning, muscles starting to lag.

  Cedric went down under a brutal swipe, thrown hard into the snow. Edgar moved to cover him, shield raised, light flaring again as he tried to hold the creature at bay.

  It wasn’t enough. The monster drove into Edgar with savage force, claws tearing through his guard. He fell hard beside Cedric, both of them motionless in the churned white.

  The second creature turned toward them, wings spreading as it advanced, slow now, savoring the moment.

  I wouldn't let it happen. I focused on the divine spark imparted to me as the Hero and drew everything in. Strength flooded my limbs in a sudden, burning surge, and the world narrowed as I pushed past the edge of what my body wanted to give. I planted my feet and met the charging monster head-on, the ground shuddering beneath the impact as I held, absorbing the energy in a flash of light, and refused to move.

  I drove forward with a committed strike meant to break it, every ounce of strength poured into the blow. The sword slammed through resistance that felt like pushing against a wall, and then it gave. The creature reeled backward, shrieking, thrown clear in a spray of dark blood and torn feathers.

  I didn’t wait. I turned on the second monster and gambled everything I had left.

  The sword came down in a brutal, overhand arc, light roaring along its edge as I committed fully, leaving nothing for defense or retreat. The blade punched through the raven skull in a wet, shattering impact, bursting out the other side as the creature collapsed in on itself.

  For half a heartbeat, I thought I'd done it. But I hadn't seen that the first monster was already moving.

  Exhaustion crashed into me all at once, heavy and absolute. I felt it even before the blow landed, before the talon slammed into my side with crushing force. The enchanted plate held, but the chain underneath tore into the gambeson and flesh beneath. Pain exploded through me as claws found the gaps, lifted me, and hurled me aside.

  I hit the snow hard, breath gone, vision swimming. Something warm spread beneath me. My sword lay just out of reach, half-buried in red-stained snow.

  The monster stalked toward me. Its movements were slow and deliberate, its shadow falling across my face.

  I tried to move. My body didn’t listen.

  It raised its claws to finish it.

  Then the world detonated.

  A streak of red tore down from above, hitting the creature like a falling star. Snow, blood, and bone erupted outward in a concussive blast, the monster crushed flat beneath the impact as golden light flared through the storm.

  For a heartbeat, there was only silence and falling snow.

  He Who Defies Fate has a really strong Witcher-like vibe, with that grounded danger and monster-hunter atmosphere baked into the world.