Stepping out onto the roof, I paused behind Merit to take in the scene.

Off to our left, a young girl. Sobbing as she held a lifeless bundle of clothes. In front of us, near one of the large garden planters, was Vim. He was standing still, and had his back to us… because he was facing down a tall and lanky man.

A man who had just swung a sword at Vim. A sword Vim had caught, bare-handed, and broken with ease with his grip.

Another man was hurrying up behind the lanky one, and he also had a sword… but he looked unwilling to use it. He was staring at the sobbing girl to our left, with wide and concerned eyes.

“Fly!” the man shouted as he hurried up next to the lanky man.

Fly…

Looking to my left, I flinched as the sobbing girl tried to lift the bundle of clothes. She looked completely traumatized. Her face was a wreck, and the pretty feathers all over her head were ruffled and sticking upward.

“This isn’t good…” Merit whispered.

I stepped forward, out of instinct, to head to the sobbing girl.

When I was about to round Merit, I had to come to a stop. Merit’s small arm was blocking me. She held her arm out, to stop me. She didn’t say anything but she did shake her head.

“But…” I whispered.

“Fly! Go help her get away, now!” the man with the sword shouted loudly, desperately, at the lanky man. The lanky man startled, and with a quick look around he nodded as he understood.

The lanky man rounded Vim cautiously… and surprisingly Vim didn’t stop him. Vim kept still, watching the man as he hurried over to Fly and the collapsed girl who had been stalking me.

“Get up! Come on!” the man’s shout sounded strained. As if in pain… yet he had run up right as I exited out onto the roof. Surely Vim hadn’t hurt him yet?

“Shoot…” Merit mumbled, and I turned to see what was wrong.

The man who had ran up, with the sword, was now attacking Vim.

Vim sidestepped a swing, and for a few moments I held my breath as I watched Vim dodge the sword swings. Although the man was attacking Vim with what appeared to be his full strength and attention, Vim was effortlessly stepping out of the way of each attack. The man’s sword swooshed and he grunted each time he missed.

“Damn!” the man cursed as he stepped closer to Vim, to try and stab Vim in the chest.

Vim didn’t side-step, but he did not let the blade pierce his chest. He sent out a foot. A heavy, hard thud resounded throughout the air as Vim kicked the man. His foot landed directly on the man’s hands, right where he held the sword.

A weird crunch filled the air, and then the man’s sword flew off into the sky. Before the sword even landed, clanging harmlessly against the roof's tile, the man had glanced down at his now mangled hands and took a deep breath.

Then he released that breath, with a scream of pain and shock.

“Go! Grab him!” the young girl screamed, and I pulled my eyes away from the man as he wordlessly screamed while staring at his hands. They were already bruising and bleeding. Vim had crushed them with his kick.

The young girl was nearly impossible to see. She and the man had put my stalker, and the bundle of jackets she wore, onto the young girls back and shoulders. She carried her effortlessly, telling me she had our strength. The strength of those not human.

She turned and hurried away, running away. As she did the man ran over to the one Vim had kicked. He grabbed his friend by the shirt, and dragged him away.

They all ran away, hurrying as fast as they could to the farthest edge of the roof. Heading towards the direction of the port and sea. Although they ran away with inhuman urgency… they hadn’t ran so fast that Vim couldn’t have stopped them.

While I watched them run off, I waited for the shock. The impact. The surprise… from Vim.

Yet none came.

Vim didn’t stop them as I watched the young girl jump off the roof, jumping high into the sky… I watched as she and the woman she carried disappeared, falling to the street below. It was only a few seconds later that the two men followed. The man with the broken hands had snapped out of his shock enough to escape.

Once they were all out of sight… I finally looked back at Vim.

He was standing there, staring into the distance… seemingly…

Was he hurt? Surely not… he looked fine… and he had dodged those blows effortlessly. He had crushed that sword with ease, just as easily as he had crushed that man’s hands.

Gulping at the suddenly quiet rooftop, I heard my heartbeat thumping in my ears. It reminded me I was still wearing my hat. I reached up to take it off, as to hear better.

Looking around, I focused to make sure no one else was around. My nose wasn’t trustworthy right now… there was a bunch of weird smells. And not just the scents of those people, but there was now also blood… and rust… and dirt. Wet dirt.

Taken from Royal Road, this narrative should be reported if found on Amazon.

A planter was broke not far from where Vim stood. How had that broken? One of the tall thin trees that had been in it was also broken, it and its leaves were scattered around it… It looked as if someone had torn it apart on purpose.

Merit sighed and stepped forward, away from me. I went to follow her, but did so slowly… since I could now hear the sounds of footsteps behind me. Someone was coming up the stairs.

Thanks to the sound of footsteps, I was able to remind myself to put my hat back on. Just in case a human came to see what the commotion had been.

Vim had made a lot of noise, breaking that door…

Pausing a moment, as Merit walked up to Vim, I stared at the broken door nearby. It had completely broken off the hinges, and the metal bar that was used to lock it was nowhere to be found. Had it flown off somewhere? The metal door was also dented, and bent oddly.

Had that been Vim or them? Something told me it had been Vim. Could I even do that? That hadn’t been one of the steel doors, but it was still a metal one. And thick. The door was thicker than my forearm.

“Thank you, Vim.”

My head darted to Merit and Vim. My eyes went wide as I watched Merit reach out and grab Vim’s hand. He seemed to ignore her as she smiled gently up at him.

She looked small enough, young enough, to be his daughter… yet such a thought was ridiculous.

“I should have stopped them…” Vim said softly.

Merit shook her head, and her gentle smile became even softer somehow. She squeezed his hand, and I watched as his own hand started to curl a little. As if to accept her hand and her emotions. Her hand looked tiny in his.

“Thank you. For pitying them. For holding back your wrath, even if it was justified,” Merit said to him.

I stepped forward, to join their conversation. To ask questions, and to support Merit. I wasn’t entirely sure what had happened, or was happening… but I had a feeling it was something I could support.

He had spared them. He hadn’t killed them, even though that should have been his job.

Before I could gather enough courage to open my mouth and speak, two people exited the stairwell.

Brom and Reatti stepped out onto the roof, their spears pointed and ready. They looked around hurriedly, scanning the rooftop together. I noticed how flawlessly they each took positions near the door, supporting one another.

They’ve done this before.

“Vim?” Reatti’s voice was hard. Somehow it sounded scared, even though she didn’t look it.

“They’re gone. They ran away. Two of them were wounded,” Merit said as she walked past me. She smiled up at me with that same gentle look as she went to Brom and Reatti, to tell them what had transpired.

As Merit went to tell them what happened, I went to Vim.

“Vim…?” I addressed him as I got closer. He looked tired. Exhausted. Yet he looked fine… even his hand, that he had used to grab the sword, looked unhurt.

“They had only wanted to save her. From me.”

Blinking at his words… I realized he was staring at something. Intensely.

Looking to where he had was focused upon, I noticed the spot.

The place where my stalker had been, where the young girl had been sobbing as she tried to lift her up.

I hadn’t seen what had happened before that. The girl had already been sobbing, and Vim had already been getting attacked, when I arrived. Merit had wanted to tell Gerald and the rest what was happening first, before letting us follow after Vim.

Now I wished I hadn’t obeyed Merit, and had followed Vim from the beginning.

While staring at the spot, I noticed something.

Hurrying over to it, I bent down to grab the thing before the wind blew it away.

Grabbing the feather, I hesitated as I noticed the blotches of blood all around where it had been… and in fact, upon it.

The only reason the feather hadn’t blown off the roof from the wind already, was because it had gotten stuck in a small pool of thick blood.

I gulped as I stared at the little red feather. It was dull in color… but yet I could see the beauty within it. It was about as long as my hand, and felt impossibly light.

Vim sighed, and I looked up to find him standing next to me.

For a small moment I stared into the sad eyes of the protector. Then, with great care, I handed him the bloodstained feather.

He took it carefully, holding it between his thumb and finger.

“She had been a child, I think,” Vim said as he stared at it.

My eyes blurred as I realized what he meant.

He didn’t just mean the one who had been sobbing. The girl with feathers. He meant the one he had hurt. My stalker.

I burnt the image of the Societies Protector’s face into my mind. Into my heart.

It was a face wrought with grief and shame. Pure shame.

He had been protecting us. Protecting me… yet…

Yet why did he look as if he had just made one of the biggest mistakes of his life?

Likely because we hadn’t actually needed protection.

Not in that way.

They had ran. In fear. In terror. I had seen it myself. Merit had seen it. Vim had seen it.

It had been why he hadn’t pursued them. It was why Merit hadn’t done anything either… why she had said what she had…

“Did you…” I whispered, but wasn’t able to finish my question. Out of fear of seeing him cry.

After all, I knew he could. I had seen it before. Back in Ruvindale.

Vim gulped quietly, and then nodded.

He did. He might have killed her.

“I might have killed her,” Vim admitted softly, quietly, almost so quietly it had just been to himself.

His words made my watery eyes drip, and then he handed me back the feather.

I accepted it as if it was as precious as his heart. I held it gingerly, with both hands… so I’d not disturb or break it.

Vim turned, slowly, and then headed for the stairs. While he did so Brandy arrived, with Herra.

As he walked away… I noticed no one tried to stop him. He walked past Merit and the siblings. He passed Brandy and Herra, who were hurrying to the others to find out what had happened.

Vim was strangely ignored as he headed back into the building. As he stepped into the stairwell… I noticed his shoulders slouch a little. As if he was about to sigh.

With his head hung low, the Societies Protector had done his job… yet at the same time, failed it entirely.