“A little closer,” Stroke whispered. He enticed Billid in with a warm, waving hand. “Come on, quicker. Don’t you want to find her and help us face whoever is attacking us?”

  The squire noticed the blood dripping from the prince’s sickle. He initially thought it was the red shine of godsteel, but even with his slowness, he wasn’t that incompetent. He narrowed his eyes, taking a step back. “Are you hurt, mister Stroke?” he asked. “You have a lot of blood on you… but no wounds.”

  Stroke feigned a friendly laugh, twirling his sickle and showing the silver-haired squire the golden runes travelling from arm to arm. “I healed myself,” he said. “The God Arm is a treasure.”

  “Oh.” Billid took a step closer, still confused. “But… mister Stroke, why do you have one? I thought only King Godwin and your brother Harren had one.”

  Stroke sighed in disappointment, then shrugged with only his freckled shoulders. “He gifted it to me,” he lied sarcastically. “And then I gave him a helm of black steel.”

  The Dragonhammer swirled in the sky behind the prince. Bianca summoned herself to her weapon, gripping the purple-steel handle with both hands. Upon seeing her squire, she threw her hammer to the ground below, using her gifts to follow its trail. “Billid!” she screamed. “Get the fuck down!”

  The prince lunged for Billid’s throat with the sickle. He felt a whip of air against his chin from Stroke’s near miss. He stumbled onto his back, kicking himself away from the prince with confused groans of panic and desperation. He stuck the sickle in Billid’s thigh then dragged it out, raising it above the squire’s head with a quick determination to take another life.

  The Dragonhammer slammed into Stroke’s back and forced him to collide with the bottom of a nearby Sentinel. It turned from blue to red, screeching out from the attack and shooting a beam of fire from the magical vortex to repel a dragon dipping beneath the dark, shadowy clouds.

  Bianca scurried to her squire. She ripped the bottom of her thick red vest into a lengthy piece and grabbed a strong piece of wooden debris, tying a tourniquet above the wound so tight that his leg began to go purple only seconds later.

  “Miss Bianca, it hurts!” he yelled. “Why is Stroke attacking me? What did I do to him? Is it because I ate that chicken and told my little sister it had run away? Is this punishment?”

  “What are you an about?” She said quickly. “Didn’t you hear the prince’s speech? He’s mad.”

  “Everyone heard that? Oh, thank the gods, I thought I had gone mad too, hearing voices like my mother does sometimes.”

  Stroke patted the dust off his shoulders, pointing his sickle at the Sentinel flame above. Bianca and Billid had no eyes on him, and Death had not found the new field of battle; no one was watching from the windows or rooftops, no hidden commonfolk cowered in the alleys to watch. There was only one explanation. “You watch my fighting, dear brother?” he said to the Sentinel. “Godwin. I will kill Bianca and the boy if you don’t come out from your hiding. I’ll make you a deal. Reveal yourself, surrender the God Arm, and I will give you a swift execution once I have cleansed this city. I’ll spare Bianca, maybe the boy, and one other person of your choosing. Come out, King Godwin, or there will be no people to call you that.”

  The prince waited for the Sentinels to turn green, laughing at his brother’s cowardice when they didn’t. “You will fall easier than Harren did. I will have your God Arm,” the prince continued. “The gift must be symmetrical. It must be joined to one.”

  “Strike him!” Bianca ordered, grabbing Billard by his leather cuirass. “While you have the chance, do it!”

  “But that’s the prince—”

  She repeated her order, this time louder, and angrier. The squire swung his neck back, looking at the prince upside-down. He awkwardly pointed his hand him, the green veins shifting through many pretty colours before landing on white, then a bolt of lightning came from Billid’s fingertips. It missed, of course, bending around Stroke like a curved blade and striking the Sentinel instead. The young Valan snapped to them with a cruel smile, laughing.

  “You missed!” he yelled. “Ah, Billid Ransomell. A shame it shall be when I must put down your brother Arrid and instil a new commander of the Vaelirian Bloods.”

  Billid rejected any further help from Bianca. He shot a second bolt, missing again. “Don’t go near my brother!” he ordered. “He’s a good knight, just like you, mister Stroke. Has an evil witch taken over your mind?”

  “Can you run?” Bianca whispered. “This fight is mine.”

  Billid rotated the scabbard on his back. He tried to seem cool, but the sword slid, the hilt hitting gravel. When he finally had it one hand, the prince couldn’t contain his laughter.

  “I won’t leave you fight mister Stroke and the evil witch, miss Bianca! I am your squire! I will do as your squire, that is the oath I swore to you when I pledged my sword to you! You are a hero, and I want to be a hero too.”

  She was honoured by his words, but she wouldn’t allow her own squire to face the prince. She leaned into Billid’s beliefs, lying that the evil witch is loose in the city. “The witch is searching for other hosts… protect your family. I order you to find your mother and your siblings, use your sword to protect them.”

  Billid awkwardly sheathed his sword with horror in his eyes. He took off running with a limp, distraught by the thought that his little sister could be taken by the evil witch he’d made up in his mind.

  As he ran, a pair of red eyes watched him from an alley. What a na?ve squire, Death thought. Gullible, but brave. I thought he may have been playing us fools up on that mountain. Seems I was wrong. And as for Bianca, well, that weapon is interesting… seeing the way she moved with it was strange. She can either drag the hammer to herself, or drag herself to the hammer, or summon it to her grip. If she was my enemy, I’d gladly kill her for that interesting weapon.

  Bianca brought the Dragonhammer back to her grip. She ran for the prince, swinging for his head, which he ducked under. He countered by swinging his sickle, powered by God Arm—she met the curve of his weapon with the hammer’s long handle, a deafening twang from godsteel against the otherworld metal. Still, the prince hadn’t used a giftless attack. The force of the blow pushed her own weapon into her torso and allowed the tip of the sickle to puncture the soft flesh of where he once stabbed her.

  The prince gave a gifted backhand to her cheek. She smashed into the window of a burning home, coming out the back, rolling in a small, fenced field of grass, littered with the charred carcasses of sheep, cows, and pigs. She shielded her face from splinters of wood and shards of glass as Stroke obliterated everything between them with a simple push from the God Arm’s power.

  “This was wasted on Harren,” Stroke said. He admired the beauty of the golden runes on his skin, tracing them. “That was me trying to be gentle. You don’t stand a chance against me, Bianca, not one. Yield, this is your only chance.”

  Stolen novel; please report.

  She ignored him completely, darting for his legs. Bianca did not get very far—Stroke used the power of the Sentinels against her. Four red vortex flames unleashed a deafening ring that only she could hear. She covered them with her palms, but the squealing still got through. Bianca screamed. The pain made her unable to think, and for some reason, an urge to claw out her own eyes crept up as the only solution to solve her problem. Thankfully, she saw how this was a nonsensical idea likely forced in by the Sentinels themselves. She spread her arms as far as they could go and slammed them flat against both ears. Thick lines of blood came from the canals, and the ringing she now heard was faint and blurry. Everything went silent. She saw the prince’s lips moving, unable to read his words.

  “How silly,” Stroke mocked. “Doesn’t matter. The Sentinels will put you down like a dog.” He stood still, flashing an offended look at the red Sentinels, then scoffed. “Really?” he said. “Godwin? You stop me from using their flames? If only you’d figured that out a few seconds ago, poor Bianca wouldn’t have had to deafen herself just to stand a chance against—”

  It seemed even while she was unable to hear, the prince’s own voice was louder than everything else. Bianca struck him in the chest with his hammer and knocked him down. She straddled him, hammer still in hand, crushing one of his arms flat with many blows as she pinned the other down with a knee. He moved the runes to his leg and kneed Bianca between her legs. She flew so high she went above the storm clouds, seeing the bulbous-eyed dragons guided by thousands of owls. She plummeted back down, her fall unbroken by building or rooftop, but her gift of strength left her with only a sore chest, and of course, very sore between her legs.

  Where is he? Bianca thought. Where is Stroke? Where is Death? I wasn’t looking at anything when I feel. I can’t hear anything. If I could find Death, maybe he could heal me… I could’ve killed Stroke if I just brought that hammer down on his head instead of his arm. He could’ve killed me if he just aimed for my throat with that sickle. He keeps getting closer to killing me… how are we both so reluctant, how is he this reluctant when he already put a knife into my heart. I need to start fighting seriously. He is my friend no longer, and I am a hero, just like Billid said. I will kill him. I must. It must be me.

  Amidst the ringing in her eyes, as if the words were carried by fate itself, she heard a faint voice. “Help us!” she heard. “Gods save us, please! Anyone! Can anyone hear us?”

  She followed her heart, not the voices, and wobbled into a home burning with flames that reached the dark clouds. She searched hard, kicking down a door blocked by a fallen beam of wood, and there she saw it—a family—a father, a mother, three children, huddled close and covering their faces with thick clothes to avoid inhaling the smoke. They cried out in joy, then in horror, as the roof began to cave in on them. Bianca summoned her hammer, throwing it up and destroying the falling rubble, leaving a flaming hole in the roof.

  “Take our children,” Bianca heard. “Please! Save them.”

  “Are you kidding?” Bianca managed to say. Her head spun, and her vision was blurry. “I’m taking all of you.”

  Before she could, the prince fell through the hole in the roof and grabbed Bianca by the throat. He threw her through a burning wall, then kicked her another. The family were confused, but followed the prince like lost ducklings, trying to get through the path he’d made with Bianca’s body.

  “What are you doing?” he asked them. “Get back in that corner. Pray to your gods.”

  “My… my prince?” the mother said.

  “King,” Stroke corrected. “Pray for your gods to save you. This path is for me.” He gripped a flaming beam of wood with his bare hand, protected by the God Arm’s runes. He sealed them in as the mother pleaded on her knees, but the prince cared not. “Dying with your loved ones is not so bad,” he mocked. “Hold hands. Beg to the old gods. If you’re lucky, they’ll save you.”

  Stroke left the home and found Bianca crawling back. He put a knee between her shoulder blades, ragging her orange hair to force her to look at the trapped family. “Watch,” he ordered. “They don’t belong in Runaya’s new world. See them burn.”

  “Let me go!” she begged. “Stroke, they’re innocent!”

  “No one in this city is innocent. Not you. Not them. Not me.”

  The family, once hopeful, crept back into their fear as they saw no one was coming to save them. All the family could do was hold each other closing, shutting their eyes, embracing each other for what comes after death. Bianca fought harder, summoning her hammer, but the prince snapped her hand at the wrist, twisting it with a snap and exposing a bone piercing through the pink flesh.

  “Stop,” Death ordered. “Let them go. They are not part of this battle.” Death summoned Aleion’s chain, gripping the spiked ball in one hand, pointing with the other. “I’ll fight you.”

  “You,” Stroke mocked. “Please… you’re not strong enough to fight me. I was going to help you get strong, but you didn’t take my offer… are you going to take it now, hm?” He released Bianca’s broken arm, stepping on her back to keep her in place. “You would go so far for a single family? From the sounds of it, you slaughtered your way to Vatanil… why care?”

  “A conqueror knows when to be kind,” Death said. “Release them or die.”

  Stroke burst out from laughter, which quickly stopped as the trapped mother ran by him as fast as he could, the youngest child in her arms. Vera helped the father and the other two children, Beion at her side, guiding away the flames.

  “Fuckin god-cocks, it’s the prince again,” Vera snickered. “You look a bit roughed up, mad-boy.”

  Snow leapt through a burning window, wearing Killian’s large helm loosely on her own head. “We got a present for you, Prince Dickhead.” She flaunted Killian’s head with a shake, then tossed it to Stroke’s feet. “What do you think of that, huh?”

  They did it, Death thought. Fate truly is on our side. This is not good. He is closer to them than I am, closer to Snow. If I move too fast, he might react faster and kill her before I can get to her.

  Prince Stroke moved away from Bianca and pressed a boot onto Killian’s severed head. He scoffed at his scars, spitting onto his long, sweaty, auburn hair. “Symmetry,” the prince whispered. “Like a poem, it’s perfect.” He moved the runes of the God Arm to his foot and crushed Killian’s skill flat against the path. “A circle.”

  “That was my trophy!” Snow squealed. “How dare you!”

  “Darlings,” Beion whimpered. “I don’t mean to interrupt your conversation with the frightening prince, but that is Bianca behind him, and Death is over there.”

  Snow waved excitedly, pointing at the helmet of solid blood that she wore. Death smirked at her, smiling.

  “This is boring me,” Stroke scoffed. “I’ve had enough.” He put the golden runes on his strongest arm, swinging a punch in Death’s direction and stopping his fist abruptly. The rampant winds tore up the homes at either side of the street, shredding hiding families to a mist of red and white.

  Death planted his legs, covering his face with crossed arms. It was too much for even him, and the winds hit him like a punch over his entire body. How far did the blow take him? Not even Stroke knew. What he did know was that it would be several minutes before he returned, if he survived, which Stroke wagered he had.

  Snow removed her helmet slowly, horrified, angry. She raised her hand and summoned her sword, running for the prince bravely. He dodged her swings with effortless leans, then grabbed her wrist, breaking her arm at the elbow. He grabbed her by the throat and threw her into Beion.

  Vera wasn’t sure what to do. She summoned her fox daggers and did what Snow did, sliding around his legs and aiming for the prince’s heels just as she had done for every other opponent. He teased her, sliding around the wet floor and laughing each time she missed. “Fuck you!” the fox yelled. “You’re not a god!”

  “Yes, I am,” he said proudly.

  Vera dropped her daggers and rode into Stroke’s legs, wrapping her arms around the thick oaks under his pants and trying to push him over. She cursed his strength with mutters as he remained firm like godsteel. The red shine of Death’s dagger caught her eye, and she grabbed it, pushing it into the prince’s belly button.

  He gasped, striking her away, ripping the dagger out. Vera took his pain as an opening, grabbing her golden fox dagger and going for his neck.

  The prince punched her in the stomach, but something unusual happened as he did so—at the last moment, he uncurled his fist into a flat palm, forcing the runes of the God Arm to his fingertips rather than heal his new wound. His hand entered her gut like a knife, ripping through everything. The fox’s spine snapped in two, and the prince was stunned by the sensation.

  Feels like jelly, he thought. And it’s warm, so very warm.

  Her legs fell limp and cold as she slid down Stroke’s arm, a bloody hand sticking out from a giant hole in her lower back.

  “No Death to heal you,” Stroke mocked. “You’re dead.”