Downtown Druid

Zak stood at the only entrance to the gambling den, a wide stairway that had been blocked off with debris light enough that they could push it out of the way from the inside, but heavy enough to block the entrance from view just in case. He checked the balance of the new sword Hema had given him. It felt good in the hand, right, and he could feel the heat from it when he sent his will through it as Jayk had taught him years ago when they’d started making real money before getting thrown into the Pit.

He grunted to no one in particular, sheathing the sword at his waist and starting a long walk around the perimeter. He didn’t want to be there. He wanted to be on the surface, fighting with everyone else. He knew himself, knew what he was good at, and that was brawling. When Jayk or Dantes used him as muscle, he never minded it, knew his place, and was just grateful to have it. He knew that they’d given him the job to watch over everyone because they were certain that he was up to it, they knew he could handle any threat that came his way. That made him feel proud, but also uncomfortable. He wanted to fight, he wanted Vampa and Dantes to see what he could really do.

He completed a lap around the gambling den, and paused again at the stairs, scratching Dantes’s hound behind the ears for a moment. He listened for a few moments, but heard nothing, and started walking another lap. He could see Vera and the girls chatting, cutting bandages for Hema to keep busy. Alessa was nursing Jacque, and smiled at him as he passed. Felix was writing in a book, scribbling down sigils and other symbols almost frantically. Zak didn’t blame him for not wanting to be on the front, just like him, Felix knew what he was, knew his place. Zak looked at the other guards, smacking one on the side of the head that had been dozing as he passed. He’d picked men that hadn’t asked for the job, because he knew those that volunteered were cowards, but that left him with men who were bored easily.

He moved to the edge of the pit, looking at the sand still stained with blood from the last Drake fight. He and Vampa had trained in that Pit, or the one near Vampa’s home, for nearly a full year. He’d thought he was a good fighter before, but Vampa was on a level beyond anything he’d ever seen. After a few months of training with bare hands, he’d started giving him lessons in swordsmanship. While the hand to hand fighting had been brutal, and violent, the sword training had been formal, very different from the guard training he’d received before. Vampa’s entire stance had changed when he lifted a sword, though he’d seemed very reluctant to do so at first, as if the grip of it actually burned his hand. Zak had liked learning it, he’d had some background with the guard, but Vampa made him feel like a knight rather than a soldier. Like someone with something to protect. It was just a feeling, but he enjoyed it.

Zak placed his hand on the hilt of his sword and looked around. Something felt off. He exchanged a glance with the other men, and Vera, who all seemed to realize something was wrong.

“Ladies, let’s move back over to the cigar bar and grab some food to eat,” said Vera, trying to move them deeper into the den without frightening them.

Zak and his men moved back toward the sealed entrance. While he hadn’t heard anything before, now he could hear movement at the door, and the sounds of the debris being moved. He gestured for the men to stand back, and drew his new sword, sending some of his will through it to have it light with a dim flame.

One man with a rifle, and another with a bow stepped back and took a knee to aim their weapons, while the others prepared what they had. There were about ten of them altogether. There was a burst of noise, and then silence as a bit of daylight peeked through the cellar doors they were looking up at. A single god coin was slipped through the small gap between the doors, and it bounced down several steps.

Zak was swinging his sword even as the coin neared him.

A man with a golden mask appeared, carrying the same momentum that the coin had and striking forward with a spear.

Zak’s new shortsword batted the spear away and sent forth a wave of flame that blasted the man back, incinerating him.

A half dozen more coins all started rolling down the stairway, one of them bouncing off the charred corpse of the man with the golden mask. Six more men and women appeared suddenly and attacked.

Zak didn’t hesitate, the months of training he’d been doing taking over. He smacked the barrel of a pistol away with his sword just as it was fired, and moved in close. The goldmask attempted to punch him with her free hand, but he ducked his head, forcing her to break her knuckes against his forehead. He ran his sword through her stomach, and kicked her off of it.

He risked a look back to see if the women had fled back to the Vixen, but saw only Vera and Felix struggling with the door. He could hear Jacque crying.

To his left, one of his men was having his skull cracked open by a massive goldmask wielding a metal club. He jumped at the man, slicing off his hand with a downward stroke, before bringing it back up with a burst of flames, lighting the man on fire and forcing him to stumble back. He didn’t scream, but he fell down dead shortly after.

Another goldmask leapt at him, but was knocked off course when a bullet smashed into his face and twisted his head around. He stood back up, his goldmask cracked, showing raw red flesh beneath, but before he could stand back up, Zak smashed his boot into his skull, killing him.

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He watched another of his men go down, but before he could avenge him, his killer took an arrow to gut, shoulder, then ankle in quick succession. Zak had lost count, but it seemed that they’d killed far more than the six goldmasks that had initially appeared. He looked as another of them fell, and noticed several coins falling from his pockets as he did so. Looking across the floor, there were more than a hundred coins scattered around.

He didn’t slow down, or wail in despair, or even curse under his breath. The amount of enemies didn’t matter, the only thing that did matter was keeping them from getting past him.

He squared his stance, and launched himself toward another goldmask, sending out a flurry of fiery strikes. He killed that one, then another one, but even as he struck them down, his own men started to fall. n/ô/vel/b//jn dot c//om

The woman with the bow fell as a goldmask stabbed her in the gut, but she took him with her, driving an arrow through his eyes as she fell. The rifleman’s back was sliced open while swinging the butt of his gun like a club at a goldmasks knees. Another of them was run through by two separate goldmasks wearing rapiers. One tried to run, thinking the fight was hopeless, but was stabbed through the back by a spear before he could get close to the door.

Before long, Zak stood alone, and was being pushed back by them. He sent all of his will through his hands and into his sword, feeling his hands and arms start to burn just from their proximity to the blade. He roared as he made a wide swing sending out an arc of flame that channeled all of the magic left in the sword. The goldmasks that had been moving toward him were incinerated by white hot flame, and even the coins that had been scattered by them melted, leaving pools of molten gold across the floor in front of the stairs.

Zak fell to his knees, breathing heavily, keeping from falling down by holding himself up with the sword. His rest didn’t last long.

From the pool of molten gold in front of, rose a figure of a tall handsome man wearing a full suit of black armor edged in gold. His face and hair were golden, but he wore no mask. The flesh of his face itself was gold. He looked around a bit, appraising the situation.

Zak pulled himself to his feet, raising his sword and sending his will through it. There were a few sparks, but nothing else, it was completely depleted.

Dantes’s hound loped forward to stand at his side, its muzzle covered in blood from the earlier fight, though it was limping on its hind leg. Zak could still hear Jacque crying behind him.

Godfrey smiled at him. “You know, I really wasn’t expecting to have to come here myself. The job should’ve been as easy as sending a few men to cut you down, kill you, bring me the baby so I can put a beautiful bow on everything. You are an impressive man.”

Zak nodded, still holding his sword. “Yeah.”

“Listen. I’m short on time to make sure everything goes just right. So, how about a deal? You walk away. Go up those stairs, and leave. I’m only here for the baby, and I won’t be killing it here, so you won’t even have to hear any pained cries that might haunt your dreams.”

“No,” replied Zak simply, not moving.

Godfrey chuckled. “You’re not going to be able to beat me. The men I sent you were just fodder. Fools that gave themselves to Greed for too little. I’m sure your master told you about me. About what I can do. I will beat you. It’s inevitable.”

Zak felt a tremendous wave of despair hit him like a wall, knocking him to his knees. He felt utter and complete misery and hopelessness suffuse him. The dog next to him fell down as well, whimpering, and Jacques' cries were joined by everyone else's behind them, as if the world was ending.

Godfrey began walking forward, drawing a massive longsword from his hip as he approached. “Mercy always wastes time. Not that I really planned on letting you go, I was going to run you through just before you thought you’d escaped, so you’d have that last flicker of hope taken from you.”

He raised the sword. “Oh well, I shouldn’t be distracted by little tastes right now when a full meal is on the horizon.”

Zak stood up quickly, slamming his sword into the small gap between Godfrey’s right pauldron, feeling it sink in two inches before it stopped. It felt as if he was driving it into stone.

Godfrey didn’t make a sound, but his face contorted into one of rage as he slammed a gauntleted fist into the side of Zak’s head, launching him back toward the rest of the wailing group. He stood up and raised his sword again, spitting out a tooth.

“Has he really done so much to earn your loyalty? Or are you just a dog that listens to orders without thinking?”

“I’m not letting you take that baby. I’ve done some bad shit, sure, but that’s not happening. Simple as that.”

“Gods,” said Godfrey as he closed in. “Simple disgusts me.”

A bolt of purple light slammed into Godfrey’s chest, knocking him back a bit. He turned to see Felix, ripping another page out of the book he’d been scribbling in. He threw the page, and it turned into another purple missile, slamming into Godfrey. He threw another, and another, and another, pushing Godfrey back just inches with each strike.

Dantes’s hound started to growl, its body seeming to grow larger and its eyes glowing gold. It launched itself at Godfrey with the force of a cannonball, its teeth sinking deeply into his gorget and tearing the metal of it.

He was only pushed back by a foot. He grabbed the hound by the scruff of the neck, held him aloft, and beheaded him with a clean stroke of his golden blade. He held up a hand and a cone of gold light shot forward from it and slammed into Felix, throwing him into the fighting pit where he landed in a puff of sand.

Zak charged him, roaring as he held his sword aloft, bringing it down with all the strength he had left in an overhead strike.

Godfrey caught the blade in his empty hand, and drove his sword through Zak’s stomach, twisting it casually as he did so, and lifting him.

Zak spat blood onto Godfrey’s face, smiling through white teeth stained red as he did so.

Godfrey threw him off his sword, and started moving toward Jacque again.

Zak laughed, even as he was bleeding out, a bloody smile on his face.

Godfrey stopped, and turned toward him, his eyes shifting from gold to black as he did so.

“Are you amused by something?”

Zak kept laughing. “You’re already fucking dead.”

“Oh?” Godfrey looked over himself. “I feel quite alive.”

“No. You were dead the second that you made an enemy of Dantes, and when he sends you to the hells to be melted into a golden coin by your god,” he cackled a bit, “I’ll be there waiting for you, to show you how bad of a beating I would’ve given you if you hadn’t had his help.”

Godfrey’s eternal smirk fell, and he walked toward Zak, raising his blade as he did so.