(I apologize. It seems I published these last two chapters out of order yesterday.)

Chapter 14

By the time Titus was staring down at the empty bottom of his pint, he heard the commotion outside. The villagers were suddenly screaming and an immense thud shook the ground. When he got to the door, villagers were streaming in to escape.

“What happened?” he asked a frightened woman.

“The hunter, he’s a magician! He broke his bonds and started raising the earth against us!” she cried. Titus bolted outside and quickly followed the din of cries to their source, but whatever had happened – it was over.

The ground had indeed been churned up as if a great auger had been at work. The gallows were buried in a sinkhole and many of the men lay about with broken limbs and beaten heads. Titus came to Warin first and helped the tanner free another man from a child-sized boulder that had crushed his leg.

“Where is he?” Titus asked as he helped to lift the rock.

“Don’t know,” the tanner groaned. He too was bleeding from his forehead with mean bruises already blossoming on his arms. “He ran off.”

Once the rock was moved, Titus stood back to take in the scene that looked more like a battlefield than one man’s escape. He wasn’t sure what he was looking for until another second had gone by. Snow was not here.

“The resurrectionist? Where’d he go?” Titus asked as Warin was doing his best to secure the man’s mangled leg.

“He walked off back towards the road.”

Titus cursed under his breath.

While he hoped Waldron would be wise enough to simply cut his losses and run, something told him that the hunter wouldn’t leave loose threads behind.

✵✵✵

“Cover yourself,” Snow ordered to Lia before he reached out with his power and took command of the sliding boulder. Instead of allowing the hunter to move it to the side, he shoved it outwards towards the first figure that came into view, forcing the man to leap to the side.

The sunlight had turned a deep orange as the world was turning to night. It colored Snow’s white sleeves a fiery color and glinted off his blade as he drew his sword. A few yards away, Waldron was getting up with a snarl. The handsome, confident hunter now looked more like all the would-be henchmen Snow had auditioned back in Erbin. Snow wondered how many more villagers the man had callously killed to get away from those gallows… or if Titus had had a change of heart and helped him.

“What are you going to do with that needle, little man? Pop a blister?” Waldron chided before he made a scooping gesture with his right hand and sent a spray of mellon-sized rocks flying at him. This time, Snow needed only to raise his hand to make them pause and drop harmlessly to the ground. There was very little power in Waldron’s hand. It was clear now that the hunter was not a true magician, but a man with some kind of spell giving him this power.

Waldron blanched as he watched the rocks pelt the ground harmlessly.

“I’ll show you what I can do with this needle,” Snow replied, not caring how menacing he sounded. Fear washed over Waldron’s face, and he turned to run. Snow had no intention of chasing the man through the surrounding fields in the oncoming dark, but just as the last red rays of the sun dipped behind the horizon, a new thought came to Snow’s mind. He reached for the medallion in his pocket.

“You’re free to do as you wish,” he said as he fingered it. Suddenly, a brown blur passed by him with a rush of wind.

Lia had taken off after Waldron and it didn’t take long to hear the man’s bloodcurdling scream from beyond the tall stalks. Snow made his way towards the sound at a leisurely pace and only paused when he heard huffing sounds behind him. He turned to find Titus jogging up out of breath with a worried look as his eyes fell to the bared sword in Snow’s hand.

“Waldron,” Titus started, out of breath, as he came to a stop a few yards from him.

“He’s this way. Lia has him.” Snow said it coldly, waiting for Titus to protest or try to rush ahead in an effort to save the man. Snow still didn’t know how Waldron got away from the villagers in the first place.

This tale has been pilfered from Royal Road. If found on Amazon, kindly file a report.

“Is he…,” Titus glanced at the cave.

“He ran. He’s this way if he’s still alive.” Snow gestured towards the crops and slowly turned his back to Titus. He kept a sharp ear behind him as he made his way through the rows. He heard Titus begin to follow, but the footsteps were at a distance.

The world was growing steadily dark now, but Snow could still make out the spot where the crops flattened to a pale nest of stalks and leaves. There, Waldron was sprawled, his hands weakly trying to claw himself away as Lia sat bent over his neck. Titus’s footsteps kept coming until he too was standing on the edge of the scene, watching Lia drain the life out of the man.

Snow waited for him to intervene, but it never came. Eventually, Lia pulled back to reveal the gaping wound she had made in Waldron’s neck. She regarded them both with satisfied eyes, not caring that Snow’s coat sleeves and lapels were now soaked in blood.

Waldron tried to sputter a few words with his last breath as he stared up at the two of them with fingers twitching in their direction. Snow took one step forward with his sword still in hand.

“Wait,” Titus spoke up as he took a gentle hold on Snow’s shoulder. “What are you going to do?”

Snow shuck off his hand. “I want answers.”

Before Titus could ask anything more, Snow lunged down to thrust his narrow blade into Waldron’s chest. But instead of blood, the same eerie blue light erupted from the new wound. It was the same blue magic that had resurrected the baker’s daughter, but instead of a gentle baptism by Snow’s silver cup, the blade sent lightening bolts of the power through Waldron’s limbs shaking them back to life.

Only when the crackling energy had reached the man’s eyes and knitted dark purple flesh over the gaping wound at his neck did Snow pull the sword away. But unlike the baker’s daughter, Waldron did not return to himself – waking up as if his death had been just a bad dream. Instead, he laid in the blood-soaked crops like a zombie, his glowing blue eyes staring up at the early evening sky.

“Sit up,” Snow commanded.

He did.

Snow glanced at Titus briefly and found quiet shock on his face. He could see the man working it out, how Snow could have done this to any attacker and had a slave ready to fight for him. Snow wondered if he had already known; if the Saviors had told him this terrible fact, and he simply didn’t want to believe it.

Lia too was disturbed by such power and slowly stepped back from the sight, coming closer to Snow’s side.

“Why did the Saviors attack Bal Lorn?” Snow asked Waldron.

“To kill the lord and take his men,” Waldron replied in his trance.

“Why do they want his men?” Snow continued.

“For soldiers.”

Snow briefly looked at Lia and the collar around her neck.

“Are the Saviors using these collars on vampires?”

“Yes.”

“Why?”

“They fear an army of vampires and monsters is being assembled in the east.”

Snow turned to Titus. “Did you know about this? Answer me honestly for once.” He barked it with a glare, but Titus didn’t see it. The man’s eyes were still fixed on Waldron, half dead and under Snow’s power.

Eventually, he nodded, “Something about… if we have them under our control, then they can’t join this army.”

Snow scoffed in anger. “Fighting monsters with monsters,” he grumbled before turning back to Waldron. “Where did this rumor come from?”

“I don’t know.”

Snow looked again to Titus, who finally turned towards him and shook his head. “I don’t know either.”

“Wonderful.” Snow said to himself.

A terrible realization then bloomed in Snow’s mind. If this enemy was truly their fear, why bother with a handful of vampires when one man could fashion and command an army of the undead?

“Am I on their list to be acquired to aid this army?” he asked.

“Yes.”

Snow gripped his sword tighter. The point was suddenly laying at the base of Titus’s neck as he fixed the man with a vicious glare.

“Was that your job? To collect me?”

Titus stood still and as calm as one could be with a deadly blade against his skin.

“I was telling you the truth. I don’t believe in what they’re doing anymore.”

“But that doesn’t mean you wouldn’t deliver me. Look at the terrible things I can do! I’m a monster, aren’t I? Like Bal Lorn.”

Lia then stepped close and gently laid a hand on Snow’s sword arm with the other alighting on Titus’s chest, just above his heart. Her eyes were on Snow, and despite the feeding, they were soft and almost child-like in their pleading.

“Please,” she begged as she took a step closer to try to stand between them. The men staring at one another as the moon started to rise.