XXIV — Blaze

The port harbor of Melusina.

It was once a thriving harbor, sometimes even called it a Hertina for the new generation. Merchants would sprawl around here to barter and trade without having to abide by the decree of exorbitant price increases and unjust conditions as well as taxations.

It was essentially a pirate harbor, however it was incredibly merry and bustling enough with children, merchants, and vendors alike either going by ship or by land, for merchants to freely do their tradecraft businesses.

Ellen and the Lantern Children had been periodically going to Melusina, as Sam had remembered her mentioning and even going there himself, selling different kinds of lanterns.

He had remembered her saying she wanted to light up as many lives as she can, Sam thinking the Lantern Children could even light up the world, if they so desired.

What Sam and the rest of them didn’t realize, as they stood around looking over yonder at the port harbor, was that someone else had tried to light up the world, not to inspire hope and joy and peace as Ellen had intended, but sow despair and hatred and war, stabbing violence against the ideals the Lantern Children had.

Ellen herself couldn’t be more mortified.

Roger and Kat were speechless.

The carriage driver looked in pity.

And Sam could only remember the first time he had been in a situation like this.

It was during his final battle alongside the heroes the empress had gathered, bursts of fire and ash, brimstone flame burning through the streets, bodies dropping faster than he could have recovered them.

The sky over Melusina had been the color of azure, deep blue.

The sky over the razed village had been the same.

But this time as it flared in crimson and ash, he had people he could trust to weather this blaze, or die trying.

Ellen had seen the sight before. She wondered if Sam would remember what the burning sight of crimson and ash felt like, or perhaps the confusion of his inaction at the time had made his flame burn out and wither. Either way, she was not going to let everything happen the same again.

She gestured to Roger, and held Sam close.

“Listen,” Ellen had said, her tone filled with concern despite the order supposedly rendered as commanding. Roger had realized it, but she had calmed down from last time. “There might be people in there, save them, please.”

She turned to Roger. “Just like last time.”

Roger nodded and the two raced down the hill hoping and believing that they would see more people alive and holding on than corpses. However, both Roger and Sam knew that hope would be a far cry to wish for as the flames had spread and were slowly dissipating, perhaps since there was nothing left to burn and the harbor itself was crumbling down to the sea line.

“Holy shit.”

The stalls themselves had been devastated, blood lined the wooden floors, the one that remained anyway, and crimson splattered and stained through to the broken walls, the debris of which made Sam hesitate—he’d been under such conditions before. Roger saw him hesitate and pulled him forward.

“Oi,” he started. “I know ye might’ve thought of somethin’, but we gotta get through this, now dammit.”

Sam nodded, breaking from his slight trance.

The two glossed around, silently pitying the fallen merchants… or vendors… none of them could tell. From up above, Kat was summoning the help of the Great Mother to blow a gentle wind to assist Roger and Sam in their investigation, wishing they wouldn’t be blown away from harm, as she had resolved to do and intensified by Ellen’s own instruction.

As Roger and Sam slalomed through the torn harbor, Sam noticed a merchant lying sprawled against a debris of wood and glass, his side had been impaled with debris that came from a destroyed stall, the wood stabbing him through the side and crimson still dripping down—he was barely alive.

“Hey, Roger,” Sam said, making Roger pause and look at the carnage that Sam had attended to. The merchant groaned weakly as he slowly tried to weakly stretch his hand out towards Sam, who had knelt down and taken it, gently placing himself on the arm to give him support. What Roger wanted, and what Sam wanted to know was who had done this to the harbor.

“Please,” Sam had said, his voice gentler than what he could have been. “We mean no harm, sir. Who did this?”

It didn’t come verbatim like he was interrogating. Sam was genuinely concerned and alarmed at the cost of the damage inside this harbor; it couldn’t have just been done by one man. Roger stood by the side, shocked yet still wanting answers, his eyes wide with rage.

“G… General… Ger… wyn…”

Sam couldn’t believe it. His eyes widened with the mention of the name and the title, that even he, an archer who had been stoic before then, had started to reel back from the mention. His hand softened, but he quickly returned to supporting the merchant, who had more to say apart from the name of someone.

“The… the empress’s… hound… he…”

Blood came out from the merchant and he gripped Sam’s sleeve with the other hand.

“He knows… you’re… here… archer boy…”

He went limp. The light fading from his eyes as he said the final thing he had to say to Sam.

“Oi, oi,” Roger’s eyes widened with shock and confusion, his fists clenched. “What was all that, huh…?”

Sam couldn’t reply. Not because he was in shock that the empress’s top general and leader of the entourage of heroes he had been involved with was coming to face him, he couldn’t reply because of something more ominous and ruinous. His heart beat with roaring flames so strong that it nearly made the heart pop out of his chest.

Fast, yet not frantic.

He closed his eyes as he closed the dying merchant’s eyes, pausing upon himself as he did when he respected those whom The One Who Delivers would arrive to retrieve. He stood up, slowly, seemingly spooking Roger who was still in shock, staring at him with confusion. And then he turned to him, eyes open and blazing with anger, something he hadn’t felt since he pointed an arrow at Vexia.

“Who the hell is General Gerwyn?”

Sam closed his eyes again.

“Someone who had been dead to me for so long.”

—————————————

Sam remembered it like it was yesterday.

He had been in several missions with the heroes, themselves slightly bragging about their own abilities, but now they’re cornered as they were on a subjugation mission to eliminate a wild monster that had been rampaging across the capital. Gerwyn was deployed alongside some other soldiers, and Sam, who handled the vantage area.

Sam had traced the wind direction upon where the monster would land, but the soldiers following Gerwyn’s orders have defied his own senses and the common sense it seems, charging at the monster and while it seemed to take damage, the monster had tumbled down into the way of evacuating civilians.

Two civilians, of whom Sam had seen up top, were a mother and her daughter, who had come to the imperial capital to stroll. Their stroll had turned from a waking dream to a vivid nightmare as the monster approached them, intending to use them as rampaging bypasses to get to the heroes.

Sam didn’t wait. He stretched his bow, channeling the breeze that blew past him, commanding it to go directly at the foot of the monster, to make it tumble back and destroy just a tree and no other civilians.

A perfect strategy.

A plan that would have worked.

Would’ve, if not for Gerwyn’s great idea.

Without warning, he threw a spear to the direction of the fleeing mother and daughter, hoping to catch the monster by the face as it passed by. Gerwyn didn’t seem to care for civilians and he was willing to write it off as unfortunate casualties unavoidable due to circumstances. Sam knew the truth, and he wasn’t going to accept it, especially as the mother braced and wrapped her daughter for impact, willing to be the only casualty that would arise once the spear landed on her.

If the spear landed on her.

Gerwyn’s surprise and the monster’s attention turned to Sam, who had rerouted his arrow to mark the spear from above, pushing it down and managing to make the monster trip in pain, falling only an inch towards the heroes. The soldiers then stabbed it with all their might, short and long broadswords alike, as the monster died in consecutive blood losses.

Just like that, the mother and daughter who thought they would be skewered alive by the incoming spear, was saved by a random archer.

In fact, the little girl paused to look at the archer up top, before he jumped and vanished. The mother pulled her child towards her as they ran to safety, towards the imperial guards, who helped them evacuate.

Sam sighed as he descended down, himself nearly forgetting to breathe despite what he had trained and practiced for. He had been pondering whether that was a good idea, knowing Gerwyn could have been livid, but seeing the young girl’s awestruck face as she had seen him, he thought it was worth it, saving people just as he had intended to do.

Just as he, once again, stopped Gerwyn from his tracks who, livid as Sam had predicted him to be, stormed towards where Sam was and grabbed him by the throat. The choking was never a problem for Sam, especially since it had come from a brute by Gerwyn, but this was especially a lot more painful, his voice unreaching as he clamped down Gerwyn’s hand, popping veins out as he lifted him up to his level.

“Fucking gutter rat,” he said, commanding. “Know your goddamn place.”

He threw him across the street, himself having enough seconds to fall, and using that split-second he shot through before he stumbled backwards, Gerwyn’s face being grazed before he even knew it.

A gush of red traced down a line through his cheek, slowly trickling blood down through gravity: itself a vivid reminder of how efficient Sam was, that Gerwyn had forgotten for even that fraction of a split-second. Sam picked himself up, coughing from the encounter, and Gerwyn, now fully enraged, decided he would actually kill him. His soldiers had tried to stop him but out of fear of his deadly wrath, they didn’t say anything.

No one dared to stop him.

No one.

Except Sam.

Acting on survival instincts and his training, he held his bow up towards Gerwyn and with another arrow, stretched it as he got closer. His focus was unwavered, his body that had trembled from the choke and the fall had now quickly stabilized, and wind mana from around him concentrated on the arrow he had intended to shoot.

Steady.

Breathe.

Just like that Gerwyn paused. He knew he was stronger. He could have just pushed the arrow and snapped it. He knew he could have just pushed the bow down and taken him down. He knew he was a bigger force of nature than Sam was…

…but he also knew Sam was efficient.

Not just brilliant. 

Efficient. 

He was a class act marksman. 

His shots hit the mark nearly all the time, and this time the arrow was pointed square towards his forehead.

If he moved an inch, Sam would have shot the arrow at an incredibly high speed that would kill him. He knew he had the brawn, but Sam, this gutter rat he should have discarded from day one, but never did because of imperial orders, was smarter.

“The next one won’t miss. Surely you know,” Sam said. 

Cold. Ruthless. 

Something Gerwyn had always wanted from him.

If not for his so-called kind-hearted nature and meek personality, he could have been a cold-blooded killer, but he chose to be kind because he wanted to. There was no malice, only survival.

“Know yours.”

Gerwyn paused in his tracks. Sam lowered the bow and dusted himself off, running up to the rooftops of the capital and perhaps proceeding somewhere to recuperate from the injury he had received from Gerwyn. Meanwhile, the soldiers that had been under Gerwyn at the time, slowly asked their leader.

“Um, sir?”

Gerwyn slowly turned to them, the soldiers freaking out whether they would be turned into tomorrow’s mincemeat for the dire wolves and other scavengers, but today Gerwyn decided to move out. The soldiers followed him, themselves not talking about what had just happened.

Sam had recalled that memory from a time long past, he didn’t think he would even remember it.

But one of the most ruthless generals of the empire was coming for him, and he won’t be alone. He knew the town had to be ready post-haste, except from the look that Roger had given him, he didn’t think they would be ready if someone were to attack them with the power of the imperial army, or at least a part of the imperial army.

They’ll bring their mages. They’ll bring their warriors. They’ll even bring the foot soldiers.

And of course, Gerwyn himself.

Sam knew he had to do so much to prepare them for what will soon come towards them.

For now, though, he needed to be calm.

Steady, just like he had been.

Breathe, just like he had reclaimed.

For the arrow, as his sister constantly reminded him, through countless hours of training and even in quiet moments…

The arrow will always follow a calm heart.