“Please help!” The chambermaid’s cries for aid were curtailed when the Night Fang swooped from a shadowed corner and hurled a charged fist into the Inferno assassin’s mask. With the demon assassin floored, the Night Fang rained thunder upon him, hitting him repeatedly, sparks flying each time. When the Night Fang relented and stood, he saw that the chambermaid had long since fled.

He had snuck and fought his way towards the King’s quarters, a near detached spiral tower at the top of the Jade Palace. He kicked down an iron door and ascended the winding marble stairway. Sigismund would be hidden away at the top. A king, father, and mad arsonist.

Another kick, another thud of a crashing door that landed on the exquisitely tiled floor. The quarters were a marvel, far superior to even the Empress’ illustrious chambers. The bed was large, the purple canopy above looming with velvet curtains dangling from all sides. Empty suits of gilded knight armour occupied both sides of the bed and were reflected in the large wide mirror framed opposite. The Night Fang saw himself in the reflection. The crystallised side of his armour shimmered off the mirror’s bouncing light, the shadowed side submerged in the dark corner of the quarters. His lightning blue eyes were angry. His scarred fingers clenched around the ledger. He intended for Sigismund to answer for every name written. It boded the question: Where was the brave and fearless King hiding?

He could hear the faintest of breaths whisper around the dimly lit room. The Night Fang lifted the drooping drapes of the purple bedsheets, dragging Sigismund out from under them. The King yelled and cried out as the Night Fang threw him into the mirror. He pinned Sigismund into the newly made cracks with his gauntleted arm.

“How dare you!” the King bellowed. “What a pox you have made of everything!” He did not sound mighty. Tears were streaming from his pale eyes. There was a hopelessness in his anger. “You were supposed to protect my family! Now you come storming into my home when I specifically prohibited such interaction!”

The Night Fang’s eyes narrowed on Sigismund. With his free hand, he raised the ledger above him. He could see the King’s face pale at the sight of the familiar markings. The lines around his withered face crinkled as he hanged his head low. “Is it true?” the Night Fang asked with a cold echo.

“So many were dying,” the King croaked remorsefully, staring at the tiled floor. He could not look the Ninja in the eye. “No vaccines were working. No ailments assisted. What else was I to do but to turn to faith? The High-Scholar believed we were cursed, and these executions were the only way out of it.” His eyes averted upwards, and he snarled at the Night Fang. “The occult, black magic,” he hissed the words like they were poison. “The things responsible for your monstrous creation. They all originated from these self-proclaimed witches. We believed that they brought about the plague with their heresy and acts against the spirits. The only way to stop fools such as yourself from practicing such wicked things was a strong deterrent.”

The Night Fang slammed the ledger into the mirror’s surface, inches from Sigismund’s head. Shards fell and splashed into pieces. The ledger hanged open from his grip. “Hayley Moore, Ruby Medford, Jaimie Fernsby…” He echoed every name on the page until the King struggled and cried out.

“Stop! I beg you! I took no joy in it!”

The Night Fang went on to echo more. He let another page drop horizontally and read the list aloud. All the while the King whimpered and voiced his helpless protests, pathetically hitting at the Night Fang’s crystallised armour to no avail. Another page fell and when Night Fang’s eyes lay on the next list of names, his grip loosened and the ledger fell into the reflecting shards. He fell to his knees beside it, staring deeply at one particular name on the page that made his world turn grey.

Hiroko Horio……….X

The dry ink that morphed the name was cracked and faded, but Hideo knew his sister’s name when he saw it. The city had forgotten about Hiroko, but not her brother. Someone must have seen her use her charge when she wasn’t meant to use it and…. oh spirits…

Grief took him like a crossbow bolt to the chest. All this time, he still had the smallest lingering of hope that she was alive. He knew the world to be cold, like Arkovia’s harshest winters, yet he hoped that Hiroko might be the one light that wouldn’t be extinguished. His sorrow morphed into something darker.

His scarred fingers dug into the King’s shoulders. The Night Fang lifted Sigismund and slammed him into the mirror again. Harder this time. More shards fell and crashed to their feet. “Hiroko Horio,” the Night Fang echoed monstrously. “Did you have her burned too?”

Sigismund’s weeping look of horror subsided, the lines on his forehead scrunching in disbelief. “Hideo?” the King asked in a concoction of disbelief and fear.

“What did you do to my sister?” There was no Hideo anymore. No honourable Ninja. What spoke was something hideously familiar. He could feel rage take hold of him, the lightning brewing within his chest, snapping, and clawing from the inside, wanting to break free. He remembered Star Snow, the power, the bloodlust, the creature that was not him. One fist charged and punched at the mirror. The entire reflected surface fell asunder around them, crashing and whistling with the wind from the open window.

Sigismund’s face was pale as Arkovian snow. His mouth was agape, and he was shaking his head frantically. “I… not everyone on the list was burned... Just apprehended! She might have been spared or escaped!”

“You don’t even remember all their faces!” the Night Fang echoed, desperately trying to supress the lightning snapping within him. “I should end you where you stand!” He raised a fist, the charge burning around his scarred fingers. Blue sparks started to dance around his fingertips. He heard a scream and the lightning in his eyes faded.

Rosamund Greenfire stood in the doorway, blood and tears covering her face. She looked at the Night Fang in horror. “Don’t hurt him!” she pleaded.

The lightning around his fist dissipated. He let go of Sigismund. What am I supposed to be? He questioned as he averted his gaze from the King’s horrified daughter. An assassin? But blood tastes so bitter. A monster? But the guilty weights of carnage are too much for me to bear…

Their collective despair was impeded as stampeding footsteps whispered from the spiral stairway below. Two of Dorian’s killers spawned from the doorway like emerging shadows. One of them grabbed Rosamund by her hair. The Night Fang pounced, kicking one away with a zaffre boot, punching the other in the oni mask with a charged fist. The Inferno assassin staggered back, releasing his grip of the Princess.

The Night Fang felt a metal wall crash into him. He flew back, hitting into the tiles and mirror shards. His upper arm stung as small shards faintly pierced into his skin. The giant ghostly Samurai towered over him, his silver and spiked face gazing down coldly. He picked up Rosamund with just one metallic arm. She cried out and kicked, the sounds of clanging metal pinging around the quarters. The Samurai paid her attacks no mind, as if she were but a meowing cat. The Night Fang leapt back on his boots and charged into him. Jannik swept him away with the other arm dismissively. The Night Fang collided against the marble wall.

His vision was hazy. The assassins, the Samurai, Rosamund, and the King were all gold and black blurs. When he tried to stand, he felt a sharp sting through his arm. His vision finally focused, but when he moved an arm, it only inched like a bird freezing into ice mid-flight. His neck stiffened as he looked down to see the bronze syringe protruding.

“Be still, kitten,” he heard the red-eyed woman whispering soothingly beside him. She knelt in front of him and smiled, scarlet hair around her shoulders giving out a fluorescent glimmer. Behind her, the Night Fang could see Sigismund being taken by two of her minions. Jannik was still holding the Princess up in his metallic grip. The Night Fang could hear Rosamund pleading to him directly for help over the red-eyed woman’s shoulder.

“Greyheart,” the Night Fang echoed whilst he still had the ability to speak. “Greyheart, listen to me. I know what Sigismund did. It was vile and he should face justice for it, but not like this. At least allow Rosamund to live. For the spirit’s sake, she’s only a child!” He could feel his throat tighten and his lips freeze as if he were out in the Tandra Forest.

Greyheart tilted her head. Whether the sympathetic gaze was feigned or not, he could not say for certain. She caressed her hand around the crystallised side of his mask, admiring his otherworldly armour. “I’m sorry, Night Fang,” she said with playful remorse. “Our master was most adamant that the Greenfire bloodline become erased. It is in the Thane’s and my own best interest not to vex him.” She leaned in close and whispered. “Don’t worry. You shan’t see my nasty side this time. The Thane wants everyone to witness what happens next with sober eyes.”

She stood and clicked her fingers.

*

Hideo’s own body was a prison from which he could not move. They did not beat him, nor did they unmask him despite having ample opportunity to do so. They carried him away along with the Princess and the fallen King.

They dragged him down the spiral stairs, down the many hallways of the palace, passing slain Palace Guards, and hapless watchmen. Hideo could only look upwards, staring at the ceiling, his body and limbs iced, his neck locked into place, his jaw welded. The ceiling turned into stars dwindling under a clear night as he was dragged across the grass. He could feel the edge of his index finger mildly twitch. It gave him the faintest flash of hope.

The rest of his body might break free soon enough to act. He also knew that Greyheart was not foolish enough to give him a light dose of whatever dark substance she had administered.

They dragged them to where the Duke, Duchess, and Anastasia had burnt away not long ago. The leaves on the trees of the Palace Gardens glowed jade from the green lanterns that hanged from the high branches. The zigzagging walls of hedges that constituted the garden maze stretched out into the dark horizon beyond. In front of it, was an audience.

Not than rich nobles. The attendees were from poorer boroughs. Men in stained tunics and tattered leather coifs, women with dirt-ridden faces and unkempt hair. Urchins were huddled around their tired and struggling parents. Others were cold and ragged. They must have come from the Shards, or the city orphanages. Some of them were not even moneyed enough to be wearing shoes out in the cold night. Behind them, a row of Inferno assassins stood guard. They were armed with spears, katanas, and crossbows. Hideo thought of Arkovia and the wall of Sano’s soldiers that would close in around the innocents like a red wall of oppression.

A large platform had been erected in front of them. Behind it was a giant pyre of towering logs and embers, a stake crowned at the top. It was clear to the Night Fang who it was meant for. King Sigismund was dragged ahead of him and the Princess, who were held back to watch from afar. As the King was pulled onto the platform, Dorian Ambrose took to the centre as if the platform were a stage and he, the main event. He wore his Velociraptor costume, the white raptor skull under his crimson hood glowing under the hanging lanterns above. The Night Fang wanted to echo out Dorian’s name to the civilians. To tell the whole city who the monster under the mask truly was. Alas, Greyheart’s toxins were still taking their hold. He tried to focus and clear his mind in the hopes it would summon his charge like he did back at the Wailing Siren. The damn dosage was still too strong. He was a statue that could only be moved by others. A cage of flesh.

When Dorian spoke, it was an inhuman and hoarse voice. The Knight was not speaking. The Velociraptor was. He flailed around a katana with his clawed hand. “Greetings, New Jade citizens! I apologise for the rather…forceful invitation.” He cast a gloved hand over the dozens of scared New Jaders. Some were quivering, some tearful. Families were huddled together helplessly, constantly glancing back in terror at the demon-masked men that stood behind them. “Do not fear!” the Velociraptor reassured. “You are not the ones on trial tonight. No, you are the jury!” He pointed his katana down at one of the hostages; a tall man in a torn jacket who looked up at the masked monster with wide eyes. “You there!” the Velociraptor addressed the hostage jovially. “What does a jury need to be for a trial to be fair?”

The man gulped and stepped further back into the huddle of hostages, as if they would be able to save him. “A… A… Afraid?” he asked shakily.

“No, you fool!” the Velociraptor hissed, his demeanour fierce and angry once again. He cleared his throat, coughing through his skull helm, swiftly composing himself. “A jury must be impartial.” He waved his katana over to one side of the involuntary jurors. “The Shards,” he pointed the tip of the blade further to the left. “Dorfchester,” then his blade swooped to the far-left side of the crowd. “Drakelyn. All of you were abducted from your homes at night, at random, in random boroughs of the city. None of you know each other.” He flicked the katana up at the stars. “You do all share one common trait, however. None of you were fortunate enough to be born into wealth and nobility. Therefor you will have no hidden interest or personal acquaintance with the defendant. Shall we bring him on?”

Greyheart stepped onto the other side of the platform, unfolding a scroll in her hands. A gleeful smile was wrapped around her round, luminous face. “The court summons Sigismund Greenfire.”

Two assassins dragged the King across the platform. They slumped him against the stake, bounding him against the chipped wood with thick knots. He did not yell, nor did he protest. The man appeared a forlorn shell who finally realised the harm he had caused.

The Night Fang could hear Rosamund whimpering nearby. “Are they going to burn him?” she asked through streaming sobs. The Night Fang could not answer. His jaw was still locked stiff from Greyheart’s toxin. All he could do was watch helplessly. It angered him.

The Velociraptor sauntered across the platform, his clawed hand and katana comfortably tucked behind his dark crimson jacket. “Sigismund Greenfire, you stand accused of arson, multiple counts of murder, conspiracy to commit murder, and a splash of embezzlement. How do you plead?”

Sigismund lifted his head up, gazing at the dozens of New Jade citizens that were staring up from below at him in uncertain trepidation. His eyes clenched shut, and he turned away, unable to look at his public in the eyes. “Guilty,” he said. The crowd below him collectively gasped. A dozen whispered and frantic murmurers blew through the leaves, along with the night’s wind.

“No, no, no!” The Night Fang heard Rosamund crying out. He tried to move his muscles. His limbs and neck remained frozen, but he felt two of his fingers twitching faintly. The toxin was beginning to fade. Hurry, damn it! Hurry!

The Velociraptor strode up to the stake and slapped Sigismund hard around the face with his non-clawed hand. “That’s not how this is supposed to work!” he petulantly screamed. “You protest your innocence like the deceiving snake you are, then we lay out your vile deeds in front of your people, for New Jade to bear witness.” The white raptor skull twitched back to the right side of the platform and called out. “Bring forth the first witnesses.”

Greyheart stretched out the scroll, her face both enchanting, smug, and haunting all at once. “The court calls Deputy Athena Marion and Sheriff Victor Redtower to the stand.”

No... They had Athena too. No one had been fortunate enough to escape the siege. Both Athena's and Victor’s hands were bound as they were hauled onto the high platform and thrown into the centre. The Sheriff had visibly been caught unawares. He was out of his armour, wearing just a torn and blood-stained tunic and ripped breeches.

The ledger was tossed beside Athena’s knees. One of her eyes was purpled, her lip swollen. Hideo could feel the lightning within him howl like a blood lusted wolf. He wasn’t sure what he feared more; What the Velociraptor was about to do, or himself, when he was finally released from his toxin-laced prison.

The Velociraptor stood over them and snatched the ledger from the under Athena. “Deputy Marion,” he addressed with feigned formality, “you retrieved this ledger from the now-deceased High-Scholar, Eustice Morrigan, correct?”

Athena spat blood at him in response. The Velociraptor clicked his clawed finger and two assassins grabbed onto Victor. One held up his chin with an iron-gloved hand and pressed a curved blade to his throat. “Now Deputy, I remind you that you are under oath to uphold the truth. I should also remind you that your Sheriff isn’t required for the proceedings and is thus, dispensable.” He grabbed Redtower around the jaw with his clawed hand, the tip of the poison blade inches from the Sheriff’s eye.

This tale has been unlawfully obtained from Royal Road. If you discover it on Amazon, kindly report it.

“Yes!” she yelled harshly. “Yes, you are correct.”

The raptor skull turned to her, the bottomless sockets of darkness staring her down. He released his clawed grip from the Sheriff. “What did you find in this ledger?”

“A list of names,” she uttered begrudgingly.

The Velociraptor sauntered across the platform again, playing the lawyer in this farce of a makeshift court-hearing. “And what, pray tell, did this list of names pertain to?”

“They were victims of Violet Light.”

The skull nodded. “I see. Care to elucidate to the jury as to what Violet Light was?”

“A cult of puritans,” she answered shortly.

The Velociraptor stepped in front of her. “A cult of witchfinders,” he corrected contemptuously to the audience.

“Witchfinders that Sigismund and the High-Scholar funded to burn alive anyone they considered to be a heretic!” The white raptor skull turned back towards Athena. “Do you have further evidence to support this?”

“I-”

“Not to worry!” he cut in. “We visited Greenville Valley ourselves after you left. You took my assassins on quite the cross-country journey.” He turned back to the crowd of scared hostages and raised his clawed hand. “Ladies and gentlemen of the jury, may I present exhibit B!”

Two more assassins stepped onto the platform and upended a burlap sack. Dusty and decrepit bones scattered across the platform and tipped over the edge and into the grass near the front row. A broken skull rolled towards one of the urchins and the jury collectively started to scream. One woman tried to flee, but the wall of Inferno demons forcefully pushed her back into the crowd.

“This is but a small portion of Sigismund and Violet Light’s victims,” the Velociraptor shouted over the cries and shrieks. “The Deputy can verify their authenticity.” The bottomless sockets of darkness turned towards her. “Won’t you?” he hissed.

Athena nodded, inconsolably. Her eyes were staring at nothingness, her head hanging low. Redtower began to yell defiant insults at the assassins that stood around him. One of them kicked him in the stomach with a sharp boot and he hunched over, rolling to his side, and coughing violently. The Deputy yelled out, begging for him to stop resisting.

When the crowd’s screams and cries began to melt into sombre whimpering, the Velociraptor continued with the proceedings. “Sonya, be a dear, would you? Kindly bring forth the next witness!”

Greyheart dragged the scroll down lower. Within his flesh-cage, Hideo wondered if there was even anything written on the parchment. “The court calls upon Lord Julian Reeve Woodard.”

Julian was ushered onto the platform on unsteady footsteps. Iron chains were wrapped around his arms and torso. His once pristine and sharply cut goatee had grown into a bedraggled beard. Cuts and bruises were strewn about his face. His black and gold doublet was torn asunder and there were rips around his once-immaculate breeches. He was lightly prodded forward across the platform by the edge of an Inferno assassin’s spear before being shoved down onto his knees. He grunted at the pain. “Lord Julian!” the Velociraptor exclaimed excitedly. “You’re a little late for the hearing? How unprofessional!”

The Lord sneered at him. “Elizabeth did not deserve such a cruel fate.”

“Neither did Cynthia,” the hooded raptor rasped. The skull turned towards the quivering jury. “Lord Julian, what became of the Duke’s former Duchess? I, of course, refer to Cynthia Barlet and not Ada. That old crone supported Violet Light just like her ogre of a husband.”

Julian’s eyes darted around the Palace Garden, to the jury, to the Velociraptor, to Athena and Victor, who were bound, broken, and beaten. “Cynthia Barlet tragically passed away due to the plague outbreak in 1255.” The words trembled out, as if strictly rehearsed.

“Tell them the truth, Julian!” The shout came from Sigismund. His face was pale and grave as he rested his head against the wooden stake that he was tied to. “Tell them what we did.” The King was filled with contrition. If only he had been a decade sooner, Hideo thought bitterly.

Julian’s beaten face flared at the King. “What we did?” he snapped. “I watched Cynthia be tied to the stake in horror. Eustice told me that I would join her there if I interfered. I wanted no part in it, you bastard!”

“You son of a bitch!” Athena yelled out from the other side of the platform. “I asked you what happened to her, and you lied to my face!”

The Velociraptor walked a crooked walk over to the Lord. He grabbed Julian by his neck with the clawed hand and lifted him. “The full account, if you please, My Lord.”

“The plague was ravaging New Jade,” Julian croaked. The tip of the raptor claw was lightly gliding down the side of his sweating head. “Paranoia in the palace was growing. One-night Duke Hugo walked in on her beloved wife, sacrificing a rabbit to Snowbinder, the Arkovian Goddess. She claimed her pleas to all other gods fell on deaf ears. The Duke was not satisfied with her reasons for heresy. He told Sigismund and the High-Scholar that she was helping to contribute to the rising disease in the city.”

“And then what did they do?” The Velociraptor prodded, an unsettling mixture of anger and glee in his voice.

Julian looked away from the crowd in visible shame. “They executed her.”

The jurors gasped and watched on in horror as the bloody-faced Lord went into further detail of other victims of Violet Light. Who they were, when they were caught, the families they left behind, and what their last words were as they burned. Soon, members of the jury began to shout and hurl insults and threats to Sigismund and Julian. Rocks were pelted and crashed into the tumbling twigs around the pyre’s foundations. When Julian’s testimony was finished, the Velociraptor mockingly tapped his claw against his skull in contemplation. “A most harrowing tale, Lord Julian.”

“I wanted no part of it!” the Lord pleaded. “I’ve told you what I know, so now I ask that you show me mercy!”

“Of course,” the Velociraptor agreed with a wave of his katana. “Because of the transparency of your testimony, you shall not be burned.”

Julian exhaled and chuckled in respite. He allowed himself to fall to his side, chains rattling. The Thane’s bottomless sockets gazed at the grovelling Lord, the raptor skull tilting. The Night Fang knew what Dorian’s interpretation of mercy would be. Jannik stomped onto the platform with the sound of steel boots crunching against wood. The Samurai raised a spear. Julian’s eyes widened, and his cry of protest was cut short as the triangular blade was planted down his throat. Sigismund shouted out in anger from the stake that he was tied to. The crowds screamed. The urchins shrieked. The Night Fang could hear Rosamund weeping next to him. He could feel the muscles of his arms move downwards, only by a mere inch. It was as if he were deep underwater. Every movement was a losing battle. Excruciatingly slow.

As pandemonium erupted around the Palace Gardens, one of the Velociraptor’s underlings passed him a flaming torch. The trial was reaching a crescendo. The Velociraptor held the flame high above him; the orange hues glazing everything and everyone around him in a bright blanket of heat. “Shut it!” the Velociraptor roared at his audience, his hoarse voice sounding more hellish than ever. “You all should be grateful that I am opening your eyes! Especially you lot!” With his clawed hand, he pointed at the side of the crowd previously identified as residents of the Shards. “You all struggle and starve, dying of diseases easily prevented with readily available cures. You submissively allow your overlords like Woodard, Barlet, and Reeve to deny you survival whilst you hand them your taxes, give them your unyielding labour, and spend your days in pigsties!”

With his other hand, he pointed the blazing torch towards Sigismund. “And what does your gracious King do with all your taxes? With all the Denarii saved by taking away your medical supplies that your class cannot afford?” He flicked the katana down at the pile of bones that sprawled from the edge of the platform and into the mossy ground that his hostages stood in. “He and his pompous cabal use it to whore, indulge in all their vices and cover up the blood on their hands.” The white raptor skull creaked towards Sigismund. He walked crookedly to the condemned King. The Thane of the Inferno waved the flirting flames of the torch under his golden beard.

Sigismund winced, beads of sweat running down his bruised forehead. “Tonight, you’ll get to feel what they all felt. You’ll plead for mercy, just like they did. Your charred remains will be buried away in a forsaken tomb and be forgotten, just like they were. Tonight, you’ll get to fucking burn!”

He dropped the torch into the pyre.

Rosamund howled into the night with streams running down her cheeks. The Night Fang was regaining movement in his neck. His legs were frozen in the mud. He could feel his arm twitch more. Maybe I can charge it-

The assassin holding him down noticed the slight twitch of the Night Fang’s wrist and butted him in the shadowed side of his mask with the hilt of a spear. “Rosamund,” he echoed. His throat was free. She met his eyes, still howling and weeping. “Look away,” he urged.

Flames wrapped around the embers and cradled the twigs and sticks below. They twirled upwards like snakes ascending themselves around thick trees. As the fire elevated upwards to the stake, orange flickering fingers brushed against the King’s ankles. Sigismund began to scream.

“I’m going to kill him for this, Rosamund,” the Night Fang struggled to echo. “I promise you that I will make him pay for tonight.”

Her responses were sobs and whimpers.

Orange flames crawled up Sigismund’s green breeches. He howled and banged the back of his head against the stake, unable to kick or bite into anything to tame his pain. The audience below was a discordant blend of cries and shouts. Some shouted their approval for the King’s fate, others were falling to their knees and pleading for mercy upon him. Athena was gazing down at her battered knees, unable to watch. Victor Redtower was voicing his hate towards the Velociraptor.

The Thane of the Inferno Clan was too busy savouring the myriad of terrified and angered reactions from the commoners below to take notice of the Sheriff’s empty threats. Lady Greyheart watched on approvingly from the far side of the platform, her red lips curled into a disturbing smirk at the King’s anguish. A pungent smell of burning flesh wafted from the pyre and across the Palace Gardens. The flames were consuming Sigismund, reaching his restrained arms, and blazing through the threads of his green doublet. Specks of flaming dust floated up from the bottom of the pyre and into the King’s braided beard and before long, his face was aflame. The screams were haunting, anguished and became more inhuman the more the fire took hold.

An arrow gleamed in the night as it flew into the side of Sigismund’s head and the screams were curtailed. The Thane’s raptor skull twisted around in search of the arrow’s source. Another flew through the night and embedded into one of the Inferno assassins. The demon-masked man took it in the chest, the impact pushing him from the platform and landing him in the boggy mud in front of the hostages. One hostage pried the katana away from the dead assassin’s iron-clad hand and charged into the assassins surrounded them. Other former jurors became inspired and charged into the Inferno without weapons.

“No!” the Velociraptor shouted petulantly over the bedlam. “He was supposed to suffer like they did!”

Hostages and assassins alike began to scatter. The Night Fang found feeling in his left arm and flared his charge. Lightning struck around his entire arm and he flung a punch into the assassin, holding him down. The Night Fang got on top of him, repeatedly hitting him with flared hands, sparks flashing. He restrained the monster within him when he overheard Rosamund screaming. He saw the assassin that was previously holding her in place fall into the mud, another steel arrow sticking out of the mask’s eye socket.

The Princess scrambled in the mud and ran towards the maze. The Night Fang ran after her. He lost her at the first turning. The green labyrinth was designed to trap guests. He took another turning. Only darkness and hedges lay ahead. Shit…

*

Once she had been afraid of becoming lost within the maze’s dark green walls. Of freezing to death in the night, never to be found again or found by something she did not wish to be found by. Now, becoming lost in this labyrinth was her only hope of evading the demons. She could still see his face covered in flames. There was no face left, just fire and charred shadow…

She forced the image of her father’s burning body out of her mind. She wiped the tears and gunk from her eyes as she turned another corner and gazed upwards. Orange lights from the pyre were all that illuminated her way. It was too dark to see where she stepped and, inevitably; she tripped and fell into the wet grass. She whimpered and wondered if it was worth getting up at all. All her family was gone. Rosamund pushed herself up and stared into the darkness ahead of her. Before she could take another pained step, she felt a cold hand wrap around her mouth. She was dragged backwards, into the wall of hedge. She was pulled through the twigs and thorns and into another pathway between the hedge maze’s infinite walls. The cold hand felt strong, bumpy and coarse. When the hand released, she saw that it was covered in thick red scars.

“Speak and we’re both dead.” The female voice was jarringly sophisticated in tone. Rosamund was twisted around to face her captor. She struggled to see much of the figure’s face under her dark blue hood. What she could see of the face were scars and disfigurement. A glint flashed from behind the hooded figure, the ends of a steel arrow with blue plumes.

Rosamund slapped the hooded figure. She jumped at her and started hitting. The Archer overpowered her, grasping Rosamund’s wrists with her scarred hands and wrested her away. Rosamund had managed to pull the hood back to get a better look.

An Arkovian woman with striking scars that lashed from the left corner of her chin to the top right corner of her forehead. “You killed him!” Rosamund wailed.

The scars around the Archer’s face contorted as she scowled at the Princess. “I stopped his suffering. The flames had already taken him. Why does no-one appreciate me when I end someone’s suffering?” She pulled Rosamund back into the hedge and her scarred hand clasped around the Princess’ mouth again.

Rosamund could hear footsteps and saw shadowy figures pass by through the leaves. Bronze demon masks gleamed before they faded into the darkness, along with the sounds of marching boots. When all that could be heard was the burning pyre in the distance and shouts from the hostages, the Archer pushed Rosamund out into the path again and grasped her shoulders. “Now listen, you spoiled little orphan. Do exactly as I say and there is a chance that you won’t burn like your father did. Am I understood?”

Rosamund meekly nodded with the Archer’s scarred palm still wrapped around her mouth. The scars on the figure’s face stretched and sprawled as she smiled. “Good girl. Now follow.”

*

What was left of Sigismund was still burning into the night, smoke morphing into a looming thick opaque cloud of pure grey. The smell of burning flesh and metal was suffocating and made Athena’s eyes water. Her eyelid and cheeks throbbed with aches after the beating. Her hands stung from her restraints that were beginning to cut into her skin.

The jurors were revolting. Some were fighting the masked assassins and getting sticked for it. Others were throwing rocks at the platform. Others, especially the urchins, mothers, and fathers, remained huddled together in the mud below, watching the chaos unfold around them in horror. The assassins were beginning to control the crowds, much of the contribution coming from the hulking Samurai in black and bronze armour. The metal brute shoved the protesting commoners back into the centre of the mud with visibly little effort. Spears were lowered and pointed from every direction around the hostages, and they were all ushered together again. Mothers clung to their children, dirty peasants stared down at their captures from the other side of the spear, and many others were screaming and shouting in fear and anger.

“Bloody Night Fangs,” the Velociraptor hissed. At first, Athena had been sceptical of Hideo’s theory of Sir Dorian Ambrose, being the masked leader of the Inferno. Now, though, she could hear it. The gravelly voice was a shroud and sometimes a familiar inflection seeped in from the hoarse shouts. Sometimes his posh and noble voice would break through the hard façade. “Very well. We’ll play my ace if we must. Darling, the vials if you please.”

The woman with the ruby red hair and the scarlet eyepatch placed a small object into Dorian’s clawed hand. Athena struggled to get a decent look at it as the smoke from the pyre behind obscured her vision and stung at her eyes. He stepped to the front of the platform and held the vial high for every restrained hostage to see. The liquid inside was a dark maroon that omitted an orange glow from the glass. “Listen now if you value yours and your children’s lives! What I hold in my hand is a concentrated sample of the Red Plague. If the vial were to shatter, you would all be dead by dawn.” Dozens of eyes from the crowd bulged and the screams and shouts returned. “If the Princess is not delivered to me by tomorrow’s nightfall, then a few of these nasty liquids will be set free into the Shards and the other boroughs won’t be so easy to escape this stronger strand.” The commoners whimpered and wailed. Others yelled fruitless insults at the Thane whilst others looked up at him gormlessly.

The Velociraptor leaned forward when the screams finally subsided, and the silence fell. “Well? What are you waiting for? Go out! Spread the news to the streets and bring me Rosamund Greenfire!”

*

The Night Fang felt as if he were descending deeper into the underworld with each erroneous turn he made within the labyrinth. The hedges narrowed further, and darkness reclaimed the grassy floor ahead. He encountered a few assassins that he had to beat into the ground, yet Rosamund was nowhere to be found. He had become fatigued. He had been fighting for so long during this one night and had failed the Empress just as Sigismund had failed his people. Rosamund Greenfire’s life was all that stood between the city and total chaos, unrest, and martial law.

He took another turning, only to be faced with half a dozen Inferno assassins staring back at him. They bolted in his direction, drawing their katanas. The collective screeches of the blades unsheathing sounded like a nest of serpents hissing in the night. Behind his black and sapphire mask, Hideo sighed. Perhaps Evalina was right. Perhaps this was the honourable death he had been searching for.

An arrow hissed over the Night Fang’s shoulder and struck one of the assassins in the neck. He fell into the hedge. The Night Fang turned and jumped back. Another arrow swooped past and stuck into the eye socket of another assassin’s mask. The assassin fell to the ground and writhed around in the grass. The Night Fang glanced back over his shoulder to see Rosamund Greenfire trembling. Amaya loomed over her with the zaffre hood donned. “Take the girl off my hands, will you?” she panted as she dashed past him and towards the gang of Inferno ahead.

He grabbed her by her zaffre shrouded shoulder, pulling at her cloak. “We need to stay together.”

Amaya’s scarred face frowned at him. She swiped his scarred fingers away. “Be pragmatic and allow me to hold them off. You get the welp as far away from the Velociraptor as possible.”

The Night Fang did as he was bid and ran to Rosamund. He knelt down beside her. The Princess was bedraggled, blood and dirt streaked across her face, her hair drenched in mud. “Follow me,” he echoed softly. Behind, he could hear the clangs of Amaya’s sapphire bow clashing against the Inferno’s multiple katanas.

As he ushered the Princess around another corner in the maze, he could smell the looming smoke from the pyre infiltrating his mask. He could hear shouts in Arkovian in the distance and the continuous clangs and scrapes of Amaya fending off the attackers. Rosamund began to run off ahead of him. “Stay close,” he echoed.

“I know a way out,” she said. She sounded empty, as if she had lost part of her soul. I should have stopped this, he scolded to himself. If Greyheart hadn’t ambushed me, her father might still be alive. In chains, but alive…

He followed her around another corner. Something shined in the distance, glowing the night’s darkness away. As they treaded closer, the Night Fang could see a wall of hedge behind the statue. It was either a dead end, or more likely, the maze’s centre. A large golden bear stood high above a green-glowing fountain. Sparkling water trickled from the gleaming fangs and green water rippled beneath the golden paws. The jade stones under the fountain shimmered and illuminated the hedges that arced around them. Rosamund approached the gilded bear from behind the leg and pressed something. The Night Fang heard a strong clank. The Princess pried away part of the earth behind the fountain. A wooden door swung upwards. Yet another secret entrance that Dorian would have known about. No wonder the palace became surrounded so easily. The Princess did not descend. She stood in the cold, watching the clouds of smoke crawling through the night sky.

The Night Fang knelt down to her. “Rosamund,” he echoed. “We need to leave.” She remained mute. Eventually, she obliged and stepped down the ladder below the trapdoor. The Night Fang followed. The wood felt rickety and chipped, the world around him becoming darker. He closed the door above him and felt his way down. He could hear Rosamund sobbing in the dark. The new Queen of New Jade City, Hideo thought sombrely, and the only one left to protect her is me….