There hadn’t been much for Collin to do, of late. But he supposed that was one of the states one could expect to enter, when one happened to be confined within a cell.

His little room was a hard one, that much was clear. Bars of iron were mounted over the window, which itself was barely larger than his head. Through it, he could estimate the walls to be over a foot in thick, and solid stone all the way through. Diabase, of course, no doubt the work of some very gifted magi. The fuckers. He wanted to find those magi, then slam their big, ancient tomes down onto their scrotums. Collin bet he’d outright burst the things, started wondering how wide the blood spatters would end up.

It was not a particularly productive train of thought, he had to admit, and even moreso, it was not the kind his father would have encouraged.

You’re a Kaltan boy, Collin. He could practically hear him saying. People expect the worst of you, everything you do will be criticised and scrutinised just because of how you talk. It’s not fair, and it’s not right, but it’s the way things are. So put on a show they can’t find fault in.

Fat lot of good such teachings had done him, in the end. Collin hadn’t found much use for them in the field of battle. He’d not found much use for anything there. Save his skill, his power, his quickness. And even they had been of limited help. As evidenced by his being trapped in a fucking cell within the enemy’s lands.

Collin got to his feet, making his way across the room and nearing his window. He jumped. The thing was built about seven feet off the floor, so if he ever wanted a decent look at the world outside, he had to elevate himself a bit. It wasn’t hard, fortunately. His training may not have kept him out of prison, but it’d made a fathom-high jump no issue at all.

He caught the ledge of the window, holding his body up with the strength of his fingers and peering out. The angle wasn’t ideal, thanks to the sheer thickness of the wall Collin could see nothing within half a mile of the tower’s shadow. But he saw enough.

Black dirt, dunes of corrupted sand. Putrefying air. He dropped down a moment later, then moved back to a corner, sitting. It had been a mistake to remind himself where he was.

What he’d do for just an hour outside. Just a minute. One minute, one bow and fifty arrows. He’d have fired each one and killed as many of the Dark Lord’s bastards before the time had expired, that much Collin was certain of. Even one would be something. Even one would be more than his weeks of worthlessness. In his cell, there was little to do save focus on keeping his strength from waning.

Collin’s musings were interrupted when the door blew up.

It was rather an abrupt thing, abrupt enough that he just sat and gasped at the ruined, mangled heap of smouldering metal rather than move to do anything about it. Fortunately, it wasn’t an enemy responsible.

The man was not one Collin had ever seen before, and his foreign features were apparent at a glance. Hair the colour of coal, skin like copper, eyes a vibrant glare that somehow rang empty as they fell upon him. No more invested in what they might behold than a butcher studying a slab of meat. The stranger was ridiculously tall, closer to seven feet than six, and lean as a duellist. His skin had a curious texture which took Collin a moment to identify as similar in appearance to the exoskeletal armour of an insect, all hard and ridged. It shifted slightly as he moved farther into the room.

“You are Collin Baird.” The man said. Said, not asked. He did not seem to doubt the fact at all, but Collin nodded anyway.

“Are you here to…You were sent by my father?” He asked, finding his shock abating as he spoke, hope finally flaring up like an inferno in his chest.

“Yes.” The man replied, as if the matter was of no more consequence to him than the weather. Collin supposed imprisonment did tend to carry less significance for those outside the cell.

“What sort of forces do we have?” Collin asked, realising only then that he’d heard no combat outside. The walls were thick, the spaces in them few, but even so he’d have certainly caught wind of armies clashing outside the fort. Clearly this was a stealth mission, which meant the destruction of his prison door had alerted every enemy nearby. There’d be fighting soon.

“None.” The man replied. “I am here alone, save for a single companion. I believe he should be finished now.”

Before Collin could speak, could do anything more than panic at the thought of being swarmed by enemies, a new figure emerged at the doorway. This one was bigger even than the first, almost too broad to fit through the opening. His shoulders were like those of a draft horse, hands like dinner plates. On his back there hung the biggest sword Collin had ever seen before, a great slab of ugly iron that dwarfed even its gargantuan wielder.

But all the size in the world was little help against a force of undead thousands strong and led by Fomori.

Stolen content warning: this content belongs on Royal Road. Report any occurrences.

“You found him.” The giant grunted, with a voice so low and rumbling it sounded almost like the marching of armies itself.

“We need to leave!” Collin snapped, finding himself almost stunned at the sheer stupidity of these men. “The enemy will be on us any moment, we have to-”

“Enemy?” The giant asked, with a grin. “You mean the ones outside, and throughout the fort, yes?”

Collin wavered slightly. Clearly, there was something known to his rescuers that he’d not been enlightened on.

“Yes.” Collin snapped. “What are, what have the two of you got planned?”

“Nothing much.” The giant shrugged. “We’re going to march back on foot, nothing fancy. But the fort’s occupants aren’t an issue anymore. We killed them all.”

Collin looked from one man to the other, scrying their faces for sign of the joke. He found none. The first man, the leaner, smaller one, looked more impatient than anything, as if human conversation were a mere inconvenience he’d learned to occasionally tolerate. The larger one seemed to be in rather a good mood, grinning broadly like a man who’d just been handed a particularly enticing barrel of wine by a particularly curvaceous woman. Neither expression struck Collin as that of a person waiting for crushing defeat to descend upon them.

“My God.” He breathed. “You’re…Both of you are serious, aren’t you?”

“It never ceases to amaze me how simple your kind are.” The smaller man sighed, turning for the door. “Let us go.”

The giant followed, glaring at his companion with more hate than irritation.

“You keep saying that. You keep being stuck here with us.” He spat.

“And I draw closer to doing something drastic with each moment that continues.” The younger one replied. “While you continue to speak as if you have not already been extended more liberties than most men could earn in a lifetime.”

Collin did not really have much to do, which he imagined was an experience common to many weeks-long prisoners. For the most recent stretch of his life, days had been divided into time spent exercising, time spent eating, and time spent throwing punches into the cell’s outer wall in hope of eventually breaking through. The latter had so far achieved a dent only fingers deep and less than a foot wide.

Outside, he found the air almost driven from his lungs. The hall outside Collin’s cell was something he’d seen only once before, ever. He was kept clean, and sanitary. Sterile might have been the best word for it, really. Exercise had never been a priority for his jailors, and so he had only a weeks old memory to compare the sight of carnage he was met with.

Bodies were broken apart, both skeletal and fleshy. Rotting brown blood stained floor, walls and ceiling in seemingly equal volumes, while broken and bent weapons were littered around the place. The devastation was such that Collin couldn’t even hope to count the number of enemies left strewn across the corridor. He recognised some of the types, though. Basic reanimates, stronger Dullahan... And a Fomori.

Instantly, his eyes were back on the duo, heart racing.

“Who are you both?” Collin demanded. These two men were strangers to him, but not the world. One could not walk the earth with even half their power and not leave a legend behind.

The slender man seemed as irritated by the question as all other things, the broader one only amused. Neither slowed their stride as the second of them answered.

“You will not know my…Companion.” He replied, referring to the other man as if even referencing him tasted foul. “But you may have heard my name. I am Galukar, King of Arbite and-”

“-Wielder of the Godblade!” Collin gasped, realising then where he’d seen him before. King Galukar was a foreign monarch, a distant one at that, but his name was one to transcend any border on the continent. Collin had seen a painting of him once, at a party. He barely seemed exaggerated by the paint.

“The very same.” King Galukar nodded, smiling now. “And, of course, we already know who you are, Sir Baird.”

Something strained in the King’s eyes as he spoke Collin’s name, and it wasn’t hard to guess what. His father was not a popular man among the world’s royals and aristocrats. Such things were hard to even consider, however, when measured against the weight of reputation now standing before him.

No bloody wonder the fortress’s garrison had been scythed away so effortlessly, if even half of what Collin had heard of King Galukar was true, and the slender man was so much as one third his equal, then he was following perhaps the deadliest pair currently walking the world. They might have flattened the entire building itself within a few minutes, if they’d really tried, let alone killing all the monsters inside.

His pondering was interrupted as the smaller man halted, raising an open hand in silence. Despite the obvious friction between them, the larger one caught his meaning before even Collin, freezing himself, then holding Collin still with one giant arm.

“New enemies.” The slender man whispered. “They are few, but powerful. Dullahans numbering one or two dozen, a handful of those Fomori creatures…Yes, a lich is with them. There are maybe two hundred well armed orcs to boot.”

King Galukar nodded, gravely, speaking quietly, but somehow still rattling Collin’s bones as he did.

“We can take them together.” He grunted.

“It is not worth the risk, Baird is too fragile, and this may well be an assassination squad designed to cut losses in the event of his escape. Their timing is conveniently inconvenient.”

There came the slightest pause, then, impressively quick, the giant nodded again.

“Very well, one of us must divert them.”

“I can.” The smaller one said, instantly, “Take the boy, it is best if he is not…Present.”

Another pause, then a great tightening of the giant’s face. He finally sighed, as if conceding to something, and took Collin by the arm. His grip did not feel in any way exertive or strained, but it still sent a dull throb through his musculature and into the bone. How easily could this man have crushed the limb entirely, had he wished? Collin was whipped along behind him before he could ponder the thought.

Their strides came fast and rhythmic, but not so much so that he was kept from glancing behind him. Just before they turned a corner, he caught one last sight of the smaller man.

Collin couldn’t begin to guess why, but for some strange reason there seemed to be thin tendrils of some curious substance shooting out of him, stabbing into the fleshen bodies of fallen enemies. They were gone before he could glimpse what came next.