Kill them all. Make them pay.

He intended to.

Ren honored both Fox and Shadow in his preparation, and it was a dark, dead-moon night by the time he was finished.

Somehow, the bandits were working together with the Black Claw. It had covered their tracks. Anybody else wouldn’t have been able to follow.

But Ren had trained for this. He was ready.

It whispered to him in the language of knowing. Primal. Ancient. Wordless. The Hungry Dark was the beginning and end of all things. That which reached infinitely to every corner of the heavens and earth, touching all, wrapping the stars and planets. It coveted and craved and consumed. But it was patient. Darkness was the essence of night, the color of secrets. It was the eternal element of existence that would remain when the last star burned out. It fed on light, growing stronger in shadows and folds. It sheltered the skin from burning sun and piercing eyes.

The shadow rattled gleefully in his spirit. Finally, a proper hunt. Darkness clung to his skin, poured down his weapons muting the reflections of starlight. He and the Hungry Dark formed a singular Will.

He didn’t care if he could never go back after this. What was there to go back to anyway?

The last member of Cloud Company 7 pushed forward into the dark.

*****

Silk-Skin Jack shivered and cursed his luck. It was unseasonably warm, but he couldn’t suppress the chill that shot up his spine. The woods were creepy. Especially tonight. He had that itching feeling that he was being watched.

His grandma had enjoyed scaring him and his sister when they were little with stories of angry djinn who fashioned beasts from darkness itself to punish the humans for their incursions on the astral realm in which they dwelled. He’d always made fun of his sister for burrowing under her covers at night, too afraid of the dark to move under her little cocoon.

But tonight, if she wasn’t already dead, he would have apologized. Tonight the dark was alive.

He glanced aside at Half-Hand Hari. Even her terrifying blade and massive presence seemed like it would pale against whatever stalked the night.

He shook himself. Tried to remember the instructions of that hunter the boss had hired. “Don’t look at the fire. Keep it at your back and trust the flames to betray your enemies in reflections on eyes or metal,” he repeated the words to himself, hoping the sound of his own voice might be some comfort.

It wasn’t.

Would darkness itself reflect anything?

It was comical that telling himself it was the wolf watching him somehow lessened his fear.

A flash of motion he wouldn’t have caught if he hadn’t been so on edge drew his gaze to the other watch-fire in time to see one of the watchmen fall back into the fire, the other, who had obviously been nodding off, lurched awake, spinning with his weapon raised. An arrow took the man in the leg, and he spun to the forest in time for another arrow to pierce his neck just below the helmet.

Fuck. Bleeding rat shit. Fucking bleeding rat shit.

It had all happened in the space of a breath. How many were out there? Silk-Skin Jack squinted, looking for the barest gleam or glint.

He raised his shield, more as a reflex to hide and pretend he was safe than anything else. But luck was on his side tonight as an arrow slammed into it a moment after he brought the buckler up.

“Hari, we’ve got company!”

She bellowed, loud enough that reinforcements should be there any moment.

Defying every instinct in his body, he charged into the darkness.

*****

Ren cursed silently as his target brought up a shield at the last moment. The man said something and the huge armored warrior with the massive blade that looked more like a meat cleaver than a sword howled. The two ran vaguely in his direction as more bandits poured from the entrance to the cave.

Ren got off three shots. One to the neck of the first man to leave the cave, one at the leg of the shield bearer, and one at the armored giant. The first two hit but the last skidded and sparked off the massive breastplate.

Ren was running by the time the last arrow made contact.

He pulled on the night and fed Qi into the first activation script in his pocket.

The puddle he’d made by emptying four water skins in a shallow depression in the woods began to hiss and steam over the linked talisman. Every step, the fog thickened around him.

Mist and shadow wrapped about his body and he ducked behind a tree, allowing the first two pursuers to pass. Ren drew on the limping man with the shield and shot out his other leg, arrow slicing neatly through his ankle. The man tumbled to the ground with a scream and the massive warrior spun.

Shit.

Ren drew one of his bone arrows and fired, noting at the last moment how brittle the shaft of the arrow felt in his fingers. It sailed forward and shattered on contact in a shower of splinters. His opponent halted, one hand shielding the eye slits of their helm and the other arm cradling the spot the arrow had hit. Ren’s eyes pierced the dark, allied as he was to the shadow within him, and he made out a hole in the armor before he set off to run once more into the fog. At least the arrow head had made it through if not the rest of the arrow.

The light of torches drew near and he sped up.

Dark Qi pulsed along his limbs, imbuing his movements with smooth grace and ease, and a soft, subtle power.

Ren leapt over a taut rope at shin height and ducked behind a tree as a bolt whistled through the air.

Unauthorized duplication: this tale has been taken without consent. Report sightings.

“Gah!”

“Fwauk”

The two men who’d be closest on his tail slammed into the dirt. Ren did some mental math. Four bone arrows and nineteen regular arrows left. Shit. He dropped his bow and charged the fallen men while pulling his sword free of its sheath. It sang when the steel met the air and his rage sang with it as shadow coated the blade. It slid easily into the neck of the first man, but the second was already on his knees and brought his blade up just in time to parry. Ren dropped his stance, driving the full power of his being into the next blow, knocking the man off balance. A thrust to center mass blew the air from the bandit’s lungs and knocked him on his ass.

The man opened his mouth to scream but cold steel shattered his teeth and severed his spine, cutting the cry short.

Heavy thudding footsteps and clanking armor gave Ren the warning he needed to dive into a roll as air parted above him. The massive warrior had found him again.

Ren pulled on the shadows. Their steps were uneven and their left arm was pulled in tight to where the bone arrow had pierced their armor. But somehow, even with one arm they swung that massive slab of metal like it was nothing. The swings were wild, probing the darkness.

Ren darted in, hoping to sneak past the warrior’s guard, but–impossibly fast–the sword reversed and came back at him. He had just enough time to bring his sword up in a high guard and sink his stance to absorb and deflect the blow but the massive weapon hit with such force it dented his weapon in and sent him tumbling.

More footsteps.

Ren ran and grabbed the next activation script.

*****

Silk-Skin Jack couldn’t stop the tears running down his face, or the horror pounding in his chest. He wasn’t a doctor. Was he supposed to pull the arrow out or leave it in? He gripped the shaft and the slight movement from his fingers closing was enough to make him squeal and let go.

The others had run off. Even Half-Hand Hari. They hadn’t bothered to so much as leave a torch.

His eyes adjusted more and more and he dragged himself over to a bush in the fog. He could at least hide till the attackers were dealt with.

A war cry rang out, swiftly cut off by a wet gurgle.

Thump.

Thump.

Thump.

Bodies hitting the ground.

A flash of bluish light and the crash of a falling tree. Someone cried weakly for help.

“No. Please no-” The voice cut off.

“Watch out for traps!” someone yelled.

“They’re in the trees!” called another.

If he could have, he’d have shut off his senses entirely as he made his way under the bush. Instead, it seemed he could hear every little detail. Every footfall, every trickle and burble of blood, every gasping breath, every twang and whirr of bow and arrow.

Then, feet approaching. Slowly, almost soundlessly.

The bush parted above him and he realized he hadn’t brought his sword.

Darkness clung to the figure above him like a cloak. Like the air around him consumed the light of the stars themselves.

Jackobi, son of Markal and Junni, raised his hands. It wasn’t fair. He’d only been doing his best. It wasn’t his fault the wasting killed his parents. It wasn’t his fault the only way to provide for his sister had been to work for Hari. It wasn’t his fault the Governor’s cousin’s son took a liking to his sister. It wasn’t his fault she was dead. Was it?

This world wasn’t fair, and he’d just tried to make his own form of justice. To stick by those who’d had his back when the legal system failed him-

“This is for Hamsa,” Darkness said.

A knife glinted for just a moment before it disappeared under his chin and everything went sharp white then black.

*****

Ren shoved away the tiny voice in his heart that cried for mercy.

Scum. They were all scum. And he was an agent of justice.

He stood and Hamsa’s knife dripped in his hand. A twig snapped behind him. Air parted as he dove through the bush, rolled to his feet and ran.

“Silky!” cried a woman’s deep voice. “Silky! I’m gonna-”

Ren was too far away to hear the rest.

He made his way to the spear. Inspected the haft. Brittle, splintering, like the arrow. Damn.

Ren scaled another tree and waited. Soon the giant armored woman passed beneath him. Her huge cleaver dragging in the dirt. Slow, uneven steps. No armor gaps he could see. He clipped the bow to his back and slowly drew the new sword he’d taken from one of the bandits he’d slain. It had a big, heavy orb on the end.

Just a couple more steps.

Ren leapt from the branch and brought the pommel of his weapon down on the woman’s massive helm. The blow barely slowed his fall and he slammed into her back, bouncing off and hitting the ground hard.

She barely staggered forward from the impact, but then she collapsed to her knees, and fell forward face first. He lay panting, watching her. Wondering if the dent in her helm had finished it. If not, her wound would likely take care of the rest.

What was he doing? How could he kill so easily? What could he even hope to achieve if he kept going? Somehow the bone arrowheads and spear-tip had eroded their shafts. What would he do against the Black Claw.

It didn’t matter. Nothing mattered. The darkness poured into him again, filling him with power, energy, blood-lust. Hunger.

Ren sheathed the sword and pulled his bow free. It was time to end this.

*****

Kareem was out of tears, and it wasn’t until he stopped his whimpering that he heard other sounds in the dark.

Jaws gnashing, bones crunching. The Beast.

Sniffles and sobs, a woman’s whisper. There were other prisoners.

He looked down at his hand, tried to wiggle his finger one last time. He still felt it. It was like his eyes were lying to him. His finger had to be there.

How many fingers till he couldn’t hold a sword anymore?

Kareem gulped.

“Hello?” he asked. “Who’s out there?”

The whispering stopped.

“Please, I’m trapped here too.”

There was a pause. “We know.” A woman. Cowed. Meek. Hesitant.

“Is there any way out? Do you have anything in your cell that could be used to pry the door? My cell is empty.”

“We’re not in a cell.” Another voice, slightly younger by the sound.

“Great, can you let me out?”

“No.”

“Wha- Why not?” What was wrong with these people? This was why women were so rarely good leaders.

“It doesn’t matter. If we try to run, the wolf will get us.”

A vision of those cruel crimson eyes stopped his breath for a moment.

“Believe us,” said the first. “You’re safer in there. All the men were already eaten. And anyone who tries to escape. It sucks the life out of them leaving a gray withered husk. As long as we keep them happy we still draw breath. We won’t be risking that for you. We are the only ones remaining.”

“Well, technically Maira is still alive,” added the second.

“You can hardly call that living. She just stares at the wall and laughs to herself all day.”

“Please,” he begged. Though they couldn’t see him, he was on his knees, hands clasped—carefully avoiding touching the wound that was once a finger. “They already cut off one of my fingers. I think they are going to take more and more. I don’t want to be cut to pieces.” He paused. No response. “I’d rather die trying, wouldn't you?”

He faintly made out the sound of footsteps moving farther away till he was alone again.

“Please don’t go,” he called.

“Please don’t go,” he whimpered.

What had he ever done wrong? Why would the fates curse him like this? And what was that bullshit the boss bandit was saying about his father?

He slammed his fist against the wood door, realizing too late he was using his injured hand.

As Kareem rolled on the ground cradling his fist, he somehow found more tears.