The boy stood frozen, unreacting, as Oliver's combat-honed instincts threw him forward before he'd consciously decided on a course of action. Dropping his staff and his weed whacker, he bore the boy to the ground with a thud, hand over his mouth.

The boy was still beneath him for a heartbeat, then began to squirm in an attempt to escape that revealed a surprising strength in his slender frame. They wrestled viciously yet silently for a moment on the loamy forest floor, but Oliver's hand-to-hand combat training gave him the upper hand. The boy thrashed under him, gnashing his teeth in an attempt to bite Oliver, for all the world like a trapped animal in his ferocity and his silence.

Oliver twisted him, wrested his arms to the side just so, flipped him, and pinned him with a chokehold in moments, pinning the boy so tightly so that not even a gasp could escape his lips.

After a moment the boy's struggles subsided and he went limp in the universal way of surrender. Oliver loosened his grip on his throat enough for the boy to draw breath. Then he spoke, gambling that the boy might understand. A harsh whisper, right in his ear.

"Silent, boy. I'm not your enemy. Be silent." Then, "There now, quiet," as the boy twisted to look up at him.

The boy was quiet, gazing at him intently with dark brown eyes. Oliver said nothing more, watching the boy warily in turn. Then something of an understanding passed between them, and Oliver released him. The boy scrambled away, putting some distance between them, yet keeping low. Good instincts.

"We've got to get away from here," whispered the boy. "Follow me. And keep quiet." Then he darted away silently, disappearing into the undergrowth only feet away with a woodcraft far beyond Oliver's own abilities. It was a wonder Oliver had ever spotted him, and he likely wouldn't have if the boy hadn't passed within feet of him.

He heaved himself to his feet and set off in the direction the boy set, still breathing hard. The boy was inordinately strong; it had been like wrestling a grown man, albeit one slenderer and harder to pin down by his mass.

After a moment, Oliver spotted him again, moving quickly and silently. The the two of them ran through the forest this way for several minutes, Oliver's mouth ran quickly dry from the panting and the effort that he would have avoided, if left to his own devices.

Then ahead of him there was a muffled cry and the sounds of a brief struggle. A few more steps carried him into an opening between the trees in which stood a man clad in dull gray plate armor, with his visor up. He held the boy in the air, lifting him effortlessly by one arm, gauntlet about his throat.

It was much too late to backpedal, for the man had already seen him. The soldier cast the boy to the ground and turned to face the new threat.

Oliver would have to end it quickly – gamble everything on a single decisive move. Take the combat to the ground, then choke the man out. He increased his pace, sprinting towards the soldier as the man reached for something at his waist.

He briefly considered a drop-kick but settled for tackling the man like a gridiron footballer, dropping one shoulder and surging upward as he reached him.

He had a gratifying glimpse of surprise on the man's face before he made contact.

It was very nearly like tackling a brick wall.

Oliver was not a small man – six four, two hundred and twenty pounds and most of it muscle. He'd kept up an intense training regime after getting out. For a time, it was the only thing keeping him sane.

So his momentum should have sent the man flying, especially since he hadn't bothered to brace.

Instead, Oliver's momentum only pushed him back a few feet, nearly breaking his own collarbone in the process. Without looking up he fluidly turned the tackle into a flipping maneuver, trying a takedown designed for smaller combatants – women, faced with a larger assailant – despite the fact he stood nearly a full head above his opponent.

He began the twist, then ate a mouthful of metal elbow for his efforts. He staggered back, dazed and seeing stars. Then it was over, his arms suddenly caught up and bound tightly to his sides as he reeled. Then he was being lifted off the ground, legs dangling beneath him as the pressure about his arms and torso raised him inexorably upward.

When he regained his senses he was floating a few feet above the ground, feet dangling and blood streaming down his ruined face. A tooth or two might have been broken in the headlong attack, but what concerned him more was the loops of light holding him.

Glowing blue coils of a crackling, writhing rope of energy constricted about him, a burning warmth against his arms and chest.

Stolen from its rightful author, this tale is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings.

His gaze snapped up from the phenomenon, off balance and off guard, to see the source of it the man's palm. A strand of the stuff stretched from his open, black-gloved hand to wrap about Oliver, lifting him bodily from the ground in a flagrant denial of reality.

He flexed experimentally, finding little give, then looked up to see the man peering at him with open confusion in his eyes.

Oliver said nothing, looking to the boy, who lay where he was falling. The slight rising and falling of his chest was the only indication he still lived.

"What manner of being are you?" The man's voice was devoid of accent, carrying with it no hint of locale, only the plainest English, and carried no threat – only curiousity. He might have been a midwestern American from the sounds of it. Dark, close-cropped hair barely visible within his helmet, steel-grey eyes, and a square jaw cast him of European appearance as well.

"I'm from New Hampshire," said Oliver readily, agreeably, matching his tone. He was no longer in control of the situation, treading water beyond his depth. Resistance was unwise.

"New… Hampshire," said the man, mangling the pronunciation noticeably. The s was sibilant, hissing, and the h nearly unpronounced. "An elf, are you?"

"No. I'm an American."

He chewed on that one for a minute. "What is your relation to this savage?" he asked finally, with a cursory nod to the boy on the ground.

"I just met him," responded Oliver.

The man looked him up and down, walking around him as he dangled in place, breath constricted and blood running freely from his mouth. Oliver tongued his front teeth in the pause; the one on the right wiggled loosely in its socket. His lip was split wide, cut by his tooth.

Pacing around to his front once more, the soldier said "You'll walk before me. You know what this can do?" And he shrugged the rope in his hand casually, sending Oliver bobbing upward and then downward with the movement.

Oliver suppressed a shudder, then shrugged, or tried to in his constraints. "I've never seen it before. But I'm guessing it wouldn't be pleasant."

"Ha," said the man. "You've a mouth on you. Well, you're right. So, no funny business, eh?"

"No funny business," agreed Oliver slowly.

The soldier let him down to the ground, keeping hold of rope. Then he walked over to the boy, the blue, writhing rope's pressure undeniable. Something about the rope niggled at the back of Oliver's mind; it was familiar in some way.

But he was forced to trail along behind the man or be knocked off his feet, and the thought was sent to the back of his mind as the man went down on one knee and picked up the boy easily, slinging him over his shoulder without even a grunt of effort.

Then they were walking through the forest, the man's clipped one and two word commands – "left here", "right there", speaking to a professionalism that worried Oliver. This wasn't a two-bit terrorist or a rag-tag guerrilla fighter. His equipment, training and reactions spoke to a trained fighting force.

It seemed to take forever to cross the stretch of forest that had passed in moments of frenzied flight, but in time they came back to the village, where the gray-plated soldiers were already mostly back into formation, the prisoners at the back of their line. Outriders sat on their horses overlooking the affair, hands on the pommels of their swords.

Beside the glowing rope – which again seemed oddly familiar –the whole affair was organized and mundane, with the exception that he'd yet to see a single firearm. And the more he thought about it the less he could account for the prominence of the swords, except in the context of the armor.

There were a few villagers weeping over the fallen, and a woman moaning over a man bleeding from a gut wound that would likely see him dead within two days without immediate medical intervention. The soldiers seemed blind to it all, the stark brutality depressing in its familiarity. For all that humanity professed to be civilized, they weren't as far removed from this monstrosity as they professed.

They approached the center of the village, where one of the soldiers stood bareheaded, helmet tucked under his arm as he conversed with another soldier casually leaning on a long spear, at the head of which fluttered a pennant bearing unfamiliar lettering and the head of a serpent on a white background.

As they approached they drew some attention; one of the riders spurred his mount towards them, drawing his sword at the sight of Oliver.

"What do we have here?" the mounted one said with a chuckle. "Strange looking for a barbarian. You find an elf, Akin?"

"He bleeds red, like a man. I'm not sure – taking him to see the captain. He claims to be an American?" said his captor.

The mounted rider nodded, raising his visor to reveal a younger man's countenance and peering down at him. "He'll know what to do with him. Where'd you find him?"

His captor – Akin – prodded him onwards with the rope, which somehow forced him onward, as he stumbled to keep his balance.

"He was doing a runner with the boy here," said Akin, passing by the horseman, who guided his mount alongside them. "Assaulted me, if you can call it an assault."

"With what?" the younger man sneered, "his bare fists?"

"Just about," said Akin with a chuckle.

"Well, he's got guts, I'll give him that," said the other man, and then they were standing before the commander.

The commander was a man in his fifties, short, gaunt, balding on top with his remaining gray hair cropped short, and a hard, weathered face. As they approached, he concluded his conversation with the pennant-bearer and turned his attention on them. It was the kind of gaze that could've made a rock feel self-conscious.

There was the sound of armor clanking as the horseman and presumably Akin saluted.

"Report," he said peremptorily, in the tones of one accustomed to command.

"Found this one and the boy doing a runner along one of the old hunting paths. The man tried to assault me barehanded, and as you can see, he's, well, not of the usual sort."

The captain took a moment to digest this, meeting Oliver's gray eyes with cold, blue ones of his own. Oliver stared back blandly, neither making a gesture of defiance nor lowering his gaze.

After a moment, the captain turned away, looking at Akin. "Release him."

The bonds fell away and Oliver glanced back to see the cord of energy evaporating into thin air as Akin lowered his hand. He rubbed his arms and shook himself out slightly, trying to get some feeling back into them, then looked back at the captain to find the man studying him.

After a pregnant pause, the captain spoke softly.

"What is your name, soldier?"