The world had always been a slum to Goran. A dirty rat infested slum. He was born on the fifth floor in the old attic of a Sunbury home. At ten he stabbed his first man in the cellar of that very same building. The man lived though had to spend the rest of his days lying about how he lost the eye. Goran’s first kill came at thirteen. Drowned a neighbor in the motte after drinks and doubts he didn’t have it in him. That night he had several rounds of rack in him while the younger boy’s lungs had drunk several rounds of dirty water and minnows.

He spent his life slumming it up in Sunbury’s deep and sunken alleys. The forgotten living district behind the markets and at the foot of the great guild hall. Thieving, gambling, and occasionally stabbing when the mood hit. Goran killed more fools in Sunbury than he did on the one campaign the city had forced him into. Both men then were his compatriots. The first after debating the rules of his dice game. The second over a funny look.

Now the city was under siege. Truly under siege. From the sounds outside even the most haggard of drunks could tell the Red Hand finally meant to storm the city. But Goran didn’t care. Days went by when he had forgotten they were camped outside the city, ready to cut down anyone daft enough to poke out their heads. These things weren’t very noticeable to those in the underbelly of Sunbury.

It was the same tune for when the speck came in. Nobody was getting out of Sunbury these days but apparently disease worked its way in just fine. One night there were a few coughs in town. A few red specks popping on folk’s cheeks like berries blooming in spring. By the next night bodies were already stumbling down the stairs out of the slums. Falling faster than leaves in autumn. A week after, maybe two, Goran didn’t remember, and the city boarded up the silk district where the disease was worst. “Fat help that all did,” Goran had once remarked to his overweight companion. Gus was only good for two things, Goran would often think. Drinking and nodding his head.

War and plague. Goran either didn’t notice or didn’t care. His life was comfortably removed from honor and duty. His wife too, wherever she ended up. Who cares if Sunbury fell? The bastards in that guild had it coming anyway. Drinks, dice, lying to the lads at the tavern. Goran’s life didn’t reach far out from the narrow alleyways and the back table of the tavern. It was also at that back table in the tavern Goran’s life would come to an end.

This evening there was a lot of commotion. A lot more drinking than usual. The tavern was packed with men drinking themselves to death. Trying to beat the Red Hand to the swing, Goran figured. Some of Darling’s boys were in the opposite corner. Drunk too but preparing makeshift flags in support of the Red Hand. Using wine instead of blood. Goran happened to bet that Sunbury would win when the gambling started. He didn’t expect they would but he figured if the Red Hand took the city there wouldn’t be much to collect from anyone. But of course Goran had his plans to make it out alive. Charm or hide. He could pull off either.

Mitty was at the bar, struggling to keep the tankards filled. Slimy bastard has his own hiding spot ready in the cellar, Goran thought, probably keeping the good stuff there for himself. Tart and his lot were there at the bar. Said they wanted one round before they joined the battle. That was five rounds ago.

“You think they expect to find their courage at the bottom of Mitty’s barrel?” Goran’s question got some laughs from the reguals around him and the usual nod from Gus. Presently Goran was sitting in his back corner, his new fine boots strapped around his feet and resting on the table for all to see. They looked to have belonged to a knight sick with the specks. He thought them dead until they roused from their spot. Neither a knight by the lack of armor nor sick with the specks given the clean cheeks he had realized. Who or what the man was didn’t matter to Goran. All he knew was the boots were dark and nice and the man wasn’t worth stabbing.

“How’s about three cheers to the victors of today’s battle,” Goran lazily held up his tankard.

“Aye, to the crows,” a wise ass shouted from across the room. Goran cheered with the rest of the tavern before putting the foam of his bitter drink to his scratchy, thin mustache. Foul. If he didn’t know any better he would say he was tasting the drink of death. Yet on the carousing went as the rumbles outside shook the lamps hung from the ceiling and rained dust down to the floor below.

Goran didn’t quite remember what happened after that. There were a few more drinks of the piss Mitty called liquor. Gus went to drain his snake, probably right in the barrel for all he knew. The whore with the broken lip came too close and he popped a squeeze under her raggedy blue dress before ordering her to refill his tankard. A Tart made him laugh but he didn’t remember the joke a moment later. Then the moment after that he heard the door creak open and for some odd reason a silence fell on the room.

Can’t be the Red Hand this early, Goran thought. “Bah,” he blurted as the men filling the cluttered floor began to repel themselves towards the rotten walls, “is that the town guard looking for recruits!? A little late, don’t you think?” The rumbles from catapults hitting the city walls could still be felt yet no other sound could be heard. Why aren’t these bloody fools laughing?

Goran shifted his eyes around the mass of drunks to see what they were ogling. Gus stood from his seat while Goran chose to remain cozy with his legs crossed on the table, “Hey, you. Whore.” He said to the whore with the bad lip. “Who’s here? A Sun or a Hand?”

She gave him a queer look. A look he had never seen on her. Neutral. Plain. It was almost as if she wasn’t afraid of him. That can’t be right, Goran glared back, she’s always been timid as a lamb when I talked to her. He looked at Gus and saw the look of fear and surprise was wrapped tightly to his face instead. He muttered to himself then, “Who in the damn is..”

Then he saw him. The room cleared to the sides and left alone in the middle was the man he mistook for a corpse. The one he found right beside the motte where he made his first kill. His mind had to catch up with his thoughts. It was as if he was seeing something uncanny, familiar but just not quite right. Still alive, he understood. What was more surprising, how did he find us?

He looked terrible. Miserable and bloodied and just terrible. You’d think he has the specks with how pale and bloody he is. But no marks on the face. Goran realized his lips had parted from one another. He sealed them to regain his composure as the deathly looking man with tangled, blonde hair offered a deathly glare.

Finally, the dying man spoke in a whisper all could hear loud and clear. “I want my boots back.”

At once everyone noticed the sickly man’s bare feet. Muddy and wet with traces of blood. Then all in the room traced his stare to the fine, leather boots Goran still had displayed on the table. A short pause of stiff suspense. Then laughter. Gut laughs and sick laughs and mad laughs. Goran couldn’t help but join in the fun. Stuck bloody with a plague around the corner and a siege outside and he wants his damned boots back? He hadn’t laughed so hard since he threw that stone knocking that whiny dog into the motte.

“Is he serious!?” Goran heard someone cry out.

“Aye, then go get’em,” the funny Tart from earlier added.

The laughter subsided when the room understood the sickly scarecrow of a man sincerely expected to get them back. “Aye,” Goran said, suddenly offended by the man’s determination, “so come and get’em?” He slowly hovered his leg off the table and dramatically slammed his foot to the ground. “Better yet,” he rose with his eyes locked onto the man, “why don’t I come over to you, hm?”

The man went to unstrap the plate of armor tied to his body. Not too daft if he knows where this game is going. The bad lipped whore rushed up behind him to help the armor off. He thought maybe she would stab him with how she ran up to him but no. She was just taking it off for him.

In an instant the man seemed even thinner and frailer without the armor. The whore tried to ease him back into the stool while trying to wipe off the blood from his back with a rag ripped from her dress. The man gently shoved her back but in doing so dropped to his knee. More laughs. Pathetic man just wants a nasty death. I can grant that wish.

“Stranger,” Goran said, creeping up to the man as he struggled back up, “I don’t think I’ve given you the proper Sunbury welcome. Warm as the sun they say we are here. Please. I have wronged you. Let’s shake hands and make our peace.” He stretched out his hand, tilting his wrist, ready to release his hidden dagger and plant a red smile on the man’s throat.

The man offered his limp wrist up before slowly uncurling his two front fingers toward Goran. Not a breath in the room. Even the rumbling seemed to stop. All Goran could think as their hands neared one another was I got’em now.

Goran let the dagger slip out from his sleeve and clenched the hilt. What a show the boys are in for! He plunged the dagger forward for the man’s face but he noticed something was off. He felt a chill. The death spark he had seen so many times before was not in the man’s eyes.

To Goran’s amazement, the man grabbed at his wrist. He didn’t flinch back. Goran would have been impressed if it weren’t for his being twisted painfully around. He let go of the dagger, embarrassed by the cry of pain he made, and stunned with disbelief by the strength the man had left in him.

He’s going to break my hand! Goran played the part of the fool. He accommodated his body to the direction the man was attempting to break his hand off. Looking like he was allowing the man to twirl him in a dance, Goran maneuvered his body to a disjointed angle before plunging his stolen boot into the man’s stomach.

The man staggered back as if he caught a rock flung from the catapult. He’s still hurt and light like a feather. Goran decided to throw his fist at the man next. He discovered what being light as a feather was capable of when the man swung his body out of the way. Instead of getting the first proper hit on the man, it was Goran who felt the strike of the man’s elbow.

“Bugger,” he spat, stumbling back, knowing his lip was as bad as the one he made for the whore.

He felt like a cornered bunny as the man pressed forward. Goran looked for his way out. The closest path to victory was the dagger left on the ground. He went for it but the man was on it first, sliding it across the room with his bare foot. Then he sent his leg up into Goran’s face.

Goran rolled onto his back and held his own leg up, “The boots, right? Just pull’em off, eh?”

The man made the mistake of pausing on the thought and Gus broke the stool against his fragile body. The man was launched into the bar and already Gus was picking up another stool to beat down on the man. Goran jumped back onto his ill-gotten boots with a cruel laugh.

One. Two. Three. Goran watched Gus tire the man out as he swung the stool at the man. The fat sod was missing, Goran could see, but that was fine. He and Gus worked best when one kept their victim busy while the other went in for the kill. On that thought he wiped the blood from his face, fixed the collar of his shirt, and calmly went to recover his dagger.

A heavy smack was heard in the room. Ah, there’s the strike, Goran thought. But when he turned around with his dagger back in hand, it was Gus falling against the bar. Somehow the stool had been broken against his partner and as Gus tried to stand all in the room saw the man ready with the broken leg off the stool.

“No, wait-” Gus cried before the leg broke across his face. Goran was sure he saw some of his teeth fly from his face.

All eyes fell on Goran next though it felt like the room was empty to him. “Goran,” Mitty said from behind his bar in some plea he didn’t want to hear. Goran answered everyone with the spit of blood from his mouth. He slowly approached the man with his dagger gripped in his hand.

I’ve killed nine sods before, Goran thought. The number could easily have been twenty if certain wounds he had caused festered. I’ll cut through his hand this time and he can be number ten.

The man knew he was coming without a doubt. He might not even be tired, Goran admitted, but I’ll be quicker and I’ll strike harder.

He held his dagger up high as he came in for the final step. Then he misdirected and shot down his arm, ready to plug the dagger into the bottom of the man’s jaw. Again the man was quick to move his body out of the way. Goran felt him grab and tried to power the dagger through the man’s resisting hold. He’s not grabbing, Goran realized too late.

The man changed the direction of the dagger’s path. Pushed it out of the way. Goran felt himself being spun around by the man. Bastard, he thought plainly, shoving his arms back and trying a second time to stab the man wherever he could. Yet by this point he had failed to see he was a fly caught in a web. A puppet being strung by the deathly looking man. So it was death came for Goran as the man worked the lowlife’s arms against himself. He heard his dagger swooping in for his own ear before it was cleft in two and the dagger stuck into the side of his head.

Goran let out his pained cries as his body forced himself down to his knees. He knew at once the dagger was coming for his head. His vision already turning to blur before the steel was in. He knew at once the dagger was coming for his head and he knew at once he was already dead.

* * *

The moment Myers had washed up from the motte he knew at once trouble wasn’t far from his heels. As it stood, his heels were left bare and so he went after the thieves who had taken his boots. The boots, he had thought, I need them before my sword. Standing himself, taking in the air of a city under siege, the Prince of Steel smelt death had already made itself home.

Something was horribly wrong with Sunbury. More than the debris of wood and rock flung overhead from the precise strikes of the catapults. More than the symphony of screaming as families were crushed and men called for arrows on the wall. There was more than the siege at play, Myers realized. There was plague in the streets. Tracking the two thieves would be no issue. But the lepers in rags were.

At first he knew disease had come to Sunbury by the boarded windows and doors. The markings of plague over said doors. The shivering bodies under blankets turning to the wagons of corpses under the clouds of flies. One building featured a scenic pool filled with flower pedals in front of it. The pedals were joined by the bloated and naked corpse of a woman. While he stared a beggar came to Myers then with no fingers on his open palm. His noseless face rotten and bloody with a speckling of sores. Already the death smile was curling his lips up.

Myers’ own body hurt like it was cloaked in a bed of fiery ash. That was nothing new. The wound on his back was still fresh however and he knew it would need to be addressed. There was plenty of fabric in the streets for a makeshift bandage. Some of it very fine material too. But Myers could see more specks on the faces of the gathering crowd. The specks, he saw. He ran as the narrow street filled with ragged bodies unknowing they were yet dead.

The way behind him became cluttered with a horde of the sick. Wailing and coughing. He was already sick. He could not take on two burdens of illness. Nor did he have the means to save the living dead staggering for his aide. Not without Whisk. But Whisk could wait. The boots. That was what Myers sought. He cut the bottom of his feet into the splinters of a broken wagon. There he leapt over the cracked wall at the end of the road and fell into the next part of the city.

He landed in a puddle and announced his arrival to the slums with a splash. Already a woman as pale as him was on him. Begging him to take the crying baby she was trying to push into his face. Over the small creature he saw the woman and her twisted cheeks cut open by the specks.

There were more bodies lying in the muddier streets of the narrower slums. Yet there were also the occasional signs of life. Dogs sniffing the bodies. Men leaning at the alleyway entrances to their homes, nonchalantly, as if there was no siege going on. Myers caught the unmistakable prints of his own boots fresh in the mud. The prints led him downhill where the cellars of the slums stuck further out from the ground. Soon he was in a canyon of rotted wood, surrounded by the stench of rotted flesh.

Just as Myers found himself in an open square hidden away in the thorns of the forgotten district, there were three men suddenly around him. The men were middle aged, dressed in white robes and blood stains, armed with long walking-clubs. In the center of the square was a hazardous fire under a veil of dark smoke and over a mound of darkened bodies. By this terrible peril to the city were two younger boys in cleaner robes and an older man. The older man, grey by robe, beard, and skin alike, held up the beaded necklace betwixt his fingers.

“Stay where you,” the old man’s voice seemed to roar like a lion to Myers. A lion whose territory he had trespassed upon. “You carry the ill-seed inside you?”

The Prince of Steel saw the violence in the eyes of the men around him. “I am free of the specks.”

“But not free of illness,” said the old man in grey.

His age does not betray his sight. “I am merely wounded and I seek help.”

“Merely open to the ill-seed. Seeking to undo all life that remains. No. You will take root of what exotic terror you bear in your blood. You will not rip the fruits of life from the tree we seek to protect. This time we shall stamp out the illness before it sinks its fangs into our city.”

On one side of the square there was a dice game between two men with a few onlookers sitting around them. On the other side a woman was pouring chamber pots out her window. None were giving notice of the zealots around Myers let alone the exploding roofs a district over. All the Prince of Steel could do was shrug.

“The blood,” the old man hissed, shaking his beads, “the seed is in the blood and so we shall burn it before it can be planted.”

The first man swung his club for Myers’ head. Suddenly missing his sword, all the Prince of Steel could do was block with his shoulder. It hurt when the wood whacked the side of his arm but that was all he needed. Myers did what he did best and played his adversary’s weapon against themselves. The club now still, Myers gripped and darted it into his assistant’s knee. He could hear the knee pop before the man began to scream.

Enjoying this book? Seek out the original to ensure the author gets credit.

The Prince of Steel took the club for his own. The whack of the broad end knocked the screaming man out. The jab of the pointed end into the second attacker’s eye sent him away wailing. A simple dodge and simple swing to the head took care of the third. Sloppy, Myers thought. At least I’m not out of breath this time.

Myers approached the remaining three by the fire. The first child at least tried to pull his friend along before running away. The old man only bothered to make a prayer for himself before dashing off in his own direction. The last child stood frozen by the flames. This lot wasn’t used to fighting able bodied men. The thought of when he no longer would be able bodied was one he didn’t wish to ponder.

First Grissle. Then the looters. Now these fools. What a day it’s been. His mind went back to Grissle. I handled him all wrong. I’m not the fighter I once was. The two weeks from Firstfall were more draining than I knew. I cannot swordplay my way through Grissle or the others. Soon wooden clubs might be too much to bear. He arrived before the child by the fire. There’s another child out in this mad city with Whisk. But first…

“Boy,” said the Prince of Steel, “did you catch sight of two men passing this way?”

* * *

It felt good for the Prince of Steel to again have steel in his hand. He wiped the blood off the dagger on torn cloth while blood pooled from the looter’s head. Myers had taken his boots back. He kept at the side of the stool he sat on. When the bartender called for everyone to clear out it had taken three men to drag out the fat one. That was one less than the mustached looter received, Myers noticed. After the boots were off, four men went to raid the corpse for coins. The fourth took his belt and dragged him out by the ankle. Now Myers was alone with the bartender and his broken lipped barmaid.

Myers began to remove the splinters left in his foot while the barmaid quietly went to clean the gash on his back. The door to the tavern shut and the bartender said, “Goran was the meanest bastard this city had.” Men like Goran were unremarkable in Thatch’s ranks. Regular grunts picked up one season for raving and dead by the next. His mind was again returning to the remarkable. To Grissle.

The bartender locked the door and returned to his station, “I would have preferred he had paid his tabs though. Suppose a lot of folk won’t be doing that after today either.”

“A lot of folk don’t seem to notice the city is under siege,” Myers said. He felt the barmaid's fingers find their way under his shirt. It felt good to be without his armor. There was no need for it with his tactics being reconsidered. After all, what was the point of armor when one strike seemed enough to kill him now? The touch of the barmaid came with a certain chill. He relented and she tended to the wound Grissle had planted on his back. Somehow the warm, pent up tavern air felt good on his chest.

“That wasn’t your first fight today,” the barmaid said. Her voice was like the flicker of a candle's flame. Weak and seemingly ready to expire at a moment’s notice.

It was my third fight today. Myers instead answered, “No.”

The bartender poured a glass of grog for Myers but he promptly refused with the raising of his silent hand. The bartender drank it for himself and said, “You came from outside the city?”

I might have undone this city. “I did.”

They each held their silence for a moment as the heaviest rumble yet shook the tavern. “I know who's out there. I know who mans the walls too. Tired men against savages. The sun will not set well on Sunbury.”

Sunset. “Would this be the Sunset Inn?”

“Sweet heavens, no,” the bartender snorted. “This is the Downward Spiral. Hm, maybe the same name but gruffer now that I give it some thought.”

“Aye, gruffer. This tavern is more gruffer on the whole,” the barmaid added. “I should know, my sister and I worked over at Sunset for a spell. Fancy snobs there. Even when the food was running low. Why do you ask? Are you looking for someone there?”

The air wasn’t so gentle on Myers’ chest then. “I believe I was asked to find you.” Her hair is greasy but that is no surprise in these parts. Yes, that’s blonde hair on the girl. The sister only confirms it. “Lilly was it?”

“I’m Lyla.” That was the other name. “Lilly is dead. If she owed you-”

“It was your father,” Myers said, stepping up and forcing Lyla to finish her work on his back. “I saw him at his farm on the way in. He wanted me to tell you he was okay. That he was thinking of the two of you and to remember what he told you.”

“What good his advice was to us,” Lyla said, sounding more hurt by the memory of her father’s words than the confession of her sister’s death. “Told us to go to the Sunset Inn and find honest work. Said he would be safe and could weather the whole siege there. Even before Lilly got the specks they were pushing us to stay far away. Said we were outsiders. We lived just outside the walls and they called us outsiders. I’ve been here instead for the last three, four odd months.”

The bartender kept his head bowed quietly as the glasses behind him rattled. Myers broke the silence, “I am sorry.”

Lyla shook her head, “I wasn’t sure father was alive.” She sniffed her nose, “At least there’s that. Though I somehow figured he knew about Lilly already. Enough of him though. You’re who I’m worried about at the moment.” You just met me. You should worry about yourself. “That cut in your back is some nasty business. Not for me to ask who gave it to you but I do feel compelled to tell you to sneak back out the way you came and rest. You’re in no condition to start another fight.”

Myers slipped his boots back on. Feeling them around his feet nearly dulled all his pains. Nearly. “I know.” He fixed his shirt over the bandages. He could tell he was still bleeding. The excitement reopened the wound. Or perhaps it never shut. Another rumble and some leftover tankards spilled on their tables. Outside the sound of debris raining in the streets could be heard. “I’ll have to go about my next fight differently.” Or more quickly. He slipped the dagger through his belt.

“Walls must be in ruins by now,” the bartender said. He went to close the curtain on the lone window bleeding Sunbury’s precious sunlight into the room. Immediately the tavern darkened. “Please, follow me into the back.”

In the next room over, between the rows of barrels and kegs, were several cots stuffed with hay. Myers did his best to make himself comfortable, rear to the hay and back to the barrel, but comfortable no longer appeared to be a word he knew. By red lantern light the bartender returned. Though it was not a lantern Myers needed.

“A sword?” The bartender itched at the stubble under his sharp chin. “No, don’t have any here. City guard confiscated all weapons when the siege began. Unless you paid a fee but most couldn’t afford it. That’s why all the nutters trying to round up the sick carry around clubs. Of course people kept their daggers. Plenty of stabbings everyday down here. I’d say you’ve got the best dagger of them all in your belt there too. Saw Goran near cut a man’s head off after an argument here. That dagger should serve.” Whisk would serve better.

“Say I want to recover a sword.”

“Goran didn’t take it off you?”

A boy did. “No.”

“Ah, might be anywhere then.”

“Did you see who took it?” Lyla asked.

Myers wanted to bite his tongue off. “A boy. Ginger hair.”

“Hmm. Couldn’t give a name for the boy but I sure know who he would be going to,” Lyla said. Myers and the bartender each gave her a queer look then. “I’ve been plenty close with the lads down here. I’ve heard their talk and they talk of Sweet Tooth Farley. He’s part of the Tart family. They’ve got a bakery over on the sweet street. Baking bread while Farley smuggles weapons.”

“You have heard things,” was all the bartender had left to contribute.

“I’ll look there then,” Myers said softly, hiding his steel determination.

“I can show you the way,” Lyla offered. Myers began to raise his hand as he had when refusing the bartender’s drink. “You listen here. You’re hurt and a number of the streets around here are closed off and filled with the specks. I can get you to the market and send you off to whatever death you’re hungry for after that. But if you were a listening man I would say to get your sword and get out of Sunbury.”

“That is the idea.” Though I am going after the man besieging your city. “Before we leave, can either of you tell me who holds command of Sunbury?” I’ve seen Silvertongue and Xander bargain a thousand times. From one lord’s foe to the next. There’s a chance for Sunbury to shine here. A chance, perhaps, to avoid another unwinnable duel.

“Well there’s the Lord of Sunbury,” the bartender began before a quake shook them all up back to their feet. From the sound of it the top floor of the building where the tavern was housed had just become a story lower. “Aye, but he and his entire family are unfortunately missing this show. Either waiting the war out in their summer castle or in the field besieging someone else’s city.

“If, however, you’re asking about who is in command of Sunbury in our great lord’s absence then that would be Commander Reed. If he’s still alive. We don’t hear much about the city guard. Reed’s an old soldier. Never met him. Probably sore he had to stay behind and watch over us sorry lot than take to the field. Or maybe that’s just table talk.

“I should mention there’s also the Guildmaster. Don’t know his name, I’m afraid. But I do know when all our lords and bannermen flocked to battle both Reed and the Guildmaster were given shared power. Reed was tasked with defending the city and the Guildmaster was tasked with keeping the city fed. Until today it was Reed doing the better job.”

“Two men in charge?” What a terrible idea. They’re bound to be enemies by this time. Thatch went on for hours about the need for an iron fist and the importance of clear chains of command. How does a bandit rule better than a lord?

“We’ve talked to death about the trouble with that already. Reed and the Guildmaster hate each other and they’ve gotten into fights over petty arrangements. Or so the table talk goes.”

Naturally they would be stepping on each other’s toes. “Very well. Before the end of the day your Guildmaster will betray your Commander to the Red Hand.” Merchants bargain for their life. Soldiers die for their honor. “They’ll take him for all his worth and hang him anyways. As for your Commander, I hope he’s prepared well.”

“We’ll find out,” the bartender said. Myers gave a nod and left for the door with Lyla. “Before you go,” the bartender said, making Myers wait at the door. “You seem strikingly familiar.” Myers stared, unsure of what to say to that. Then he was out the door.

Pandemonium ruled the streets of Sunbury by the time Lyla had led Myers out of the slums and up into the upper districts. Gone was the mud of the corridors and present was the cobblestone roads. Though out on the higher plain of the city the roads were also filled with more people. Panic and terror struck people. They ran by Myers and Lyla, unable to register their existence. Some dropped the goods clutched to their pounding chests. Others fell over one another. An old man was trampled though it was his wife that screamed on his behalf. All throughout Sunbury, however, there was screaming.

As the swarm in the street migrated toward the inner walls of the city, Myers and Lyla crossed the packed road and up several steps to an open patio. Between two buildings, between two withered trees, the two stood at the fence overlooking half the city. Little fires blinked across the buildings below. The main gate was gone, replaced by piles of stone, covered by what looked from afar to be the marches of white ants. Myers watched a catapult take out a small tower and fall back into the homes behind it. Horns blared and the screaming went on.

“The Red Hand has breached the walls,” Myers said with a dry voice. The sky was a beautiful blue. The clouds bold and enormous sails of art. Birds swimming undisturbed in the open sky. Utterly unfitting to the chaos spreading below. “Take me to Farley and then get yourself to safety. There’ll be fighting in all the lower streets but it won’t be limited to there for long. You should try to avoid wooden buildings at all costs.” Lyla did not protest. Myers, however, took in the moment remorsefully. This is what the Beast does to reach me.

It was around the corner and down a quiet road. The hysteria of the rushing mobs returned in the form of a rambunctious line. Men, dirtier than the crowds behind them, were lined up around the corner. Some held chests. Some vases. They eyed one another suspiciously as the signs pointing them onward read “bake sale this way.”

“You get out of here!” After the shout a man rolled out from the next corner. “He’s got the specks! Let the clubbers have him!” The thrown man scrambled to his feet and fled while the voice went on, “Nobody with signs of the specks are allowed in!”

“You should go now,” Myers said to Lyla as the sickly man passed them.

“How are you going to get through this line?” Lyla squeaked. Myers gave no answer and she sighed. “You never gave me your name.”

“You don’t need it.”

She gave Myers a disappointed look. Her broken lip quivered as if she wanted to say something more. Then she was gone from the Prince of Steel’s life. I’m no hero, Myers thought. Not nine years ago. Not now.

It was an ugly business. It was an unfair business. But such was life. Such was the blessing bestowed by Melony. The Prince of Steel went toward the middle of the line and found a young man in rags of red holding a chest to his body. If it’s rocks inside this will become very difficult. He grabbed the chest and tossed it behind him. It was not rocks that scattered and glittered on the ground. Fighting broke out and the man in the red rags was overcome with the rest of the lot diving for valuables laid on the ground.

As the men turned to animals, something Melony was no doubt delighted to observe, Myers had no issue slipping ahead in the line. There was already more chaos waiting for him at the end of the line as well. Two men were dueling with swords. Neither had Whisk however. As the clangs of their blades wrung out, Myers was again reminded of Grissle and his disastrous performance against him. You can’t beat me, Myers! You can’t ever beat me!

Myers approached the end of the line where the two men were taking up the space in the small yard. The man third in line saw him coming and blocked his path. “I’m with Farley,” Myers said.

“No, you ain’t,” the man was tall and thick in the neck and brows. Simple looking. Unready to back down. “You ain’t sneaking by-”

Faster than Goran had drawn the dagger, the Prince of Steel planted it in the man’s chest, plucked it out, and carried on. I am no hero. The remaining two men in line jumped to the wall to let Myers through and the dueling pair prioritized cursing the other’s family rather than notice Myers at all.

The yard belonging to the Tart bakery was small and sported a functional water fountain. The smell of fresh bread and acorns managed to establish itself in the air over the stench of fire and blood. A tall, gilded door was protected by two men with decent armor and pikes. They looked like members of the city guard but Myers knew better.

“I’ll only be a moment,” Myers said politely. They let him inside.

Farley was a lean man, more skeletal than Myers, eerily hungry looking despite all the dough he surrounded himself with. His red hair was cut short. Nearly shaven. There was more of it to be found on the sideburns poking off his jaw. His eyes weren’t quite right either. Something slow to them which reminded Myers of the Runt. But it was his teeth that unfortunately drew the most attention. Brown and crooked. His name should be Rotten Tooth Farley.

Myers had expected to find Farley behind a desk or maybe even on a throne with the private guard he maintained in the house. Instead he found him busy in the kitchen with several other bakers. They were all kneading bread. Working gems and coins into the dough. One guard remained in the room behind Myers. A larger variant of the two who protected the main door. Though he was taller, Myers saw the tear in the chainmail where he could end him in one strike if need be.

“Keep your distance, eh?” Farley asked of Myers when he stepped into the kitchen. “You got a sickly look about you. The specks is like bread. Has to rise in the oven to infest so I don’t want you too close or here for too long. So what are you hungry for?”

“I’m looking for a sword.” The Prince of Steel glared at the sapphires Farley was beating into the dough on his table.

“Everyone is today. I happen to have a few lying around for the right offer.”

“I saw the line.” Cut through it in more ways than one. “Quite the bake sale you have here. Hoarding weapons to sell them at the last moment.”

“That’s alf the line I’m sure. Men want weapons to protect their families or turn sides and help the Red Hand. Makes no difference to me. The rest are here to give us their valuables.” Farley smiled his crooked, rotten teeth and waved his hand over the luxury bread he was preparing. “For a small cut I’ll stow away any heirlooms you want before red hands get on them. But you’re here for a sword so tell me what flavor.”

“Titan’s Scale.”

“Pah,” Farley appeared to spit. He wiped his mouth with his wrist. “I’ve got nothing like that.” The lids on Farley’s eyes twitch as if he were remembering something important. “Who are you? You lost your sword or something?”

“I was told it would have come here. Likely not long ago.”

“Like I said, I’ve got nothing of the like. My men would have told me we had the unmending metal. They would have told me if we had Fool’s Titan as well. No, nothing so delicious. I can see what else we might have but first you should empty out your pockets. You don’t look well and that worries me about your purse.”

He’s tense like the rest of the men I killed today. “I came only looking for my own blade.”

Myers went to turn away but someone from the back ran to Farley’s side. After whispering in his ear the Sweet Tooth spoke, “Hold it.” Myers stopped. “You were at the Downward Spiral earlier. You kill a man?”

“What of it?”

“What of it? You didn’t tell me who you are and now I’m told you killed Goran. I’m trying to figure you out and I swear I’ve seen you before.”

“I’ve never been to Sunbury before today.”

“You passed through the siege? My men didn’t smuggle you in.” Farley gently pounded his fist on the table in thought. “Sickly and deadly. Even without your sword.” He reached into a basket and took up an apple. He tossed it into the air and caught it. “People are like apples. The rotten ones need to be thrown out. Who are you?”

If I don’t tell him he’ll throw his men at like the rest of them have. If he doesn’t like my answer he’ll do the same. The Prince of Steel stood still. He tested Farley’s patience while personally humoring the immature urge to throw his dagger between his slow looking eyes. What to do about the big one then? Myers was ready to give an answer. Then the door from the other side kicked open.

“Let me go you big bastard!” The voice belonged to that of a child and the big bastard wasn’t all that big. “Get your hands off me! I didn’t do anything to you!”

The arriving guard kept the child at their side, “I caught them sneaking in from the back. Little shit bit my wrist.”

The little shit was the ginger haired boy Myers had spotted running off with Whisk. Sure enough there it was. The boy went for the guard’s wrist again. He cried out in pain and Myers yanked Whisk back into his possession. The larger guard was put on alert and the boy freed himself, shoving his frail body against the table Farley had been kneading his bread at.

“I came to sell the sword,” the boy cried, “I came to…to…” The boy’s eyes widened when he saw Myers staring back. Yes, I am alive. Good to see you too.

The guard held their barely bleeding wrist, “They said you were expecting them.”

“Yet they came in through the windows?” Farley nodded slowly. “Titan’s Scale is it?”“It’s mine,” Myers said softly as ever.

“Is it now? Might be I was expecting the boy here,” Farley said, allowing a surprised look on the ginger haired boy. “Look at that red hair. A Tart cousin if I ever saw one. Might be my little cousin here was going to sell me that sword and might be I’ll be keeping it.”

Men ask in all manners of language to die. The Prince of Steel gripped the handle of Whisk. It felt good to be back around his grasp. Though the two guards, Sweet Tooth Farley, and even the boy were put on edge. “How certain are you of that appointment?”

Farley furrowed his brows. With a look of deep thought on his face, debating his so-called appointment, he went to take a bite out of the apple. He chewed his thoughts and then his eyes widened mysteriously. Either he was tasting the sweetest apple of his life or he realized who Myers was.

The Prince of Steel was pleased Sweet Tooth Farley had found more reason than Goran had. Whisk was again sheathed and hung off the side of his waist. The pain in his back subsided and the aches of his ailment were again manageable. Best of all was the snugness of his boots. Myers felt ready to return to his game with Grissle. Once led out the back he took in another view of the siege worming its way deeper into the streets of fiery Sunbury. What a game he and I are playing. We were never in Sunbury but I remember the day we weren’t far from here. The day we fought as allies.

The Prince of Steel and the Beast Among Men made a small legend for themselves outside of Sunbury. Over the mountain and outside the town that once stood that way. There was a tourney and schemes went awry. Myers and Grissle found themselves cut off and chased into the woods before they made their stands. The two of them against the entire Laputian Band. A mercenary order not so different from the Red Hand. Myers and Grissle hated one another even then. But they fought side by side. Whisk and the Beast’s greatsword. Cutting down knight after knight in the thicket and-

“Why’d you go for the boots first?” Myers turned away from the yelling and the carnage of notched arrows and flung catapults. The boy was behind him, standing stubbornly beside his shadow. Why did they let him go alongside me? Is that the best they can do to strike me back? “I saw you,” the boy said, “Goran and Gus were on you after I was. They took the boots but you went after them first.” They seemed utterly perplexed. “Why did you chase after them when I had the sword?”

“I prefer this one,” Myers answered quietly against the sounds of destruction, “I could have taken another piece of steel if I needed to.”

“Aye,” the boy left the backdoor to meet the side of the road, “but I saw the boots you had when I dragged you out from the motte.” Is this small creature supposed to be my savior? “I thought maybe I should take’em too but the sword seemed the better of the two. You could have plucked half-decent shoes off any of the dead but you got them back from Goran. Why?”

The Prince of Steel studied the boy for a moment. Ginger hair, gapped teeth, soft chest. In the better view bathed by sunlight, against the raging battle behind them, Myers noticed something else. “Little girl,” he said, putting his little savior in a worried stance, “if you’re not going to shelter with your cousin then I suggest you find your hiding spot now. Grissle might not prefer younger girls but you’re close enough to his tastes.”

The girl gritted her teeth tightly, angrily enough to pop another gap into her mouth, “You don’t tell me what to do! I saved your fuckin’ life that sword was the least you owe me! What’s Grissle to you anyways! I saw you fleeing like chicken shit from his camp! You fuckin’ yellow or something?”

The mouth on this one. “If it’s gold you wanted from Farley then try gobbling up his bread. But I wouldn’t expect him to be as merciful as me.”

“Where are you going, you stupid bastard!? Hey, get back here! I should have taken that sword straight to Grissle! I hope he fucks you in your arse!”

The catapults were easing but the sounds of swords clashing and arrows flying was rising. The fight for the outer city was beginning in full swing. The Commander Reed, Myers thought, I’ll find him. I can’t take you one on one, Grissle. I see that now. But I can bleed you in this battle. Bleed you of your men and victory. I will find this Commander Reed, Grissle. Then I shall find you.