THE LANDS FORSAKEN | ??? | FOREST EDGE

  600

  By the time the mercenary leader left their sight, they realized the Eunuch had vanished as well.

  The man who spoke up to their leader sucked a stream of air through his teeth. “Can’t even be surprised at this point," he said, sighing deeply. "Decided to follow some genius bastard when he stormed out into the great unknown. This life ain’t made no sense since.”

  “But I ain’t gonna lie to ya, little Fang,” He said while gently, almost reminiscently, caressing the patch over his missing eye. “Something’s telling me that if we keep doing things your way, we’ll be watching you drink all ten from above the clouds.”

  A horrible feeling went through Solvanel like a bolt of frigid lightning.

  “Kill them.”

  A woman’s scream disappeared before it had the chance to be heard. Instead, there was a sickening snap, followed by a dull thud onto the grass.

  Wilhelm's voice, wet with lust, erupted with squelching glee. “Aaah! I've been waiting to do that for days! Pussy don’t feel the same, less I can look a bitch in the eyes while fucking her from behind.”

  The sound of flesh against flesh molested Solvanel's ears as he watched her life’s embers turn to nothing.

  Subtle clinks of terrified retreat from within the crowd. “I-I thought- y- your leader said-”

  A heavy thud interrupted their reasoning. The blow was like a gust of wind to his inner flame. The Black Hand, Goodhall, spat. “Sheep ain’t got the right to reason. Just do as the butcher says.”

  Flames scattered in every direction,forgetting they were bound to the same metal chains.

  They weaved past the falling bodies of their fellow captives, pushing others into the sharpness of the swinging blade. They stomped on the heads of those who shared their pain. But in the end, the chains that bound were destined to go taut.

  Solvanel freed himself from the shoulders of the lesser giant, sword aimed at the nearest mercenary before his feet touched the ground.

  The flame belonged to the smaller giant. The brother of the one who picked him up.

  His arms were the length of his entire body, hands eclipsing my head in multiples. Facing this one first was akin to suicide. Though he was planning to kill them all, it should have been after they were whittled by the horrors inside the Forsaken Land of Genesis.

  But if there were a heaven above the earth.

  Or even a devil that roamed in silence.

  If his name was Solvanel, the light that fell from the heavens, then none of these men would live to see another day. “I’ll kill you!”

  His right foot dug into the ground, propelling him across the earth...

  It should have.

  "Brother, wait!" An overwhelming force grabbed him by the collar, scraping off skin with its uncut nails. “No, brother! They not kill! The people just putting to sleep. See? Oh, not see. I mean-”

  Solvanel reversed his grip and severed the fabric of his priestly robes.

  But by that time, he'd lost the element of surprise. The bigger giant easily reacted to his approach. His fist went past the furthest reach of his sword when it was still far from cutting his neck.

  The collision sent him flying back into the arms of the lesser giant.

  “And this one,” Solvanel barely heard him over the screams and the ringing in his ears. “I don’t know why Jonah let you live. I wanted to snap your neck since the second I first saw you!”

  “Shut your mouth!” He screamed. “Disgusting things that can’t even be compared to wild dogs! You dare to keep the name of my grandfather’s huntsmen when committing such atrocities? You think this senseless manner of slaughter makes you strong? You think it brings you any closer to grace? These people have walked across the earth for months, facing torture after endless torture! If it is fear that they will somehow turn their blades against you, you need only have shown them compassion; if it is their sorry appearance that turns your stomach, you need only turn your head! And if it is their weakness that disgusts you, knowing they serve no purpose in the forsaken lands, then you need only leave them here! What have they done to deserve your blade?” A dehydrated gasp scraped as it climbed up my throat. “The darkness is real, you fools! Even if the light is but a story to put you to bed… the darkness…”

  A guttural roar went up from his chest like a ball of hungry flame. Almost loud enough to match that of the creature from before. “What did I expect? There is no loyalty among dogs... and no honesty from the devil.”

  Solvanel dropped his sword and kicked it across the earth. "This world was lost long before I came into it. Kill me."

  Most of the people were already dead. The shepherd's screams were no more effective than his flock's at grabbing the wolves' attention.

  Just like this, a six-month-long journey comes to an end.

  This was fine, too.

  The greater giant scoffed. “No complaints from me.”

  “No!” The greater giant pulled his newest brother back and stood between them. “Brothers don’t fight.”

  His brother paused.

  For a fleeting moment, it seemed he’d weighed the consequences and given up on taking his life. But then his eyes shifted, drawn toward the Forsaken Lands and the faint line a certain leader had carved into the sand. Without a word, he placed a hand on his younger brother’s shoulder. It was an almost tender gesture, one that might have meant mercy, if not for the cold, unrelenting will burning behind his gaze.

  Then, Wilhelm's shadow appeared beside him with an axe in his right hand.

  A childlike howl of pain came from before Solvanel as the little brother’s flame fell to the ground. The fatass retreated on his ass while blubbering some kind of incoherent nonsense. A small part of him almost felt pity for the mercenary. He was clearly impaired in some way. But who knew how many lives this man had taken in a nonsensical stupor like before? Compassion for him was nothing less than disrespect for them, as well as the other captives.

  “Waaaa! Brother! Brother, no!”

  The lesser giant closed the distance, his inner flame fueled by deep resentment.

  Solvanel didn’t care enough for the sibling farce to keep watching, but he heard every fist’s rejoice followed by impact to his brother’s face. “Why?”

  Eventually, those cries were little more than whimpers.

  This book's true home is on another platform. Check it out there for the real experience.

  Even then, the older brother went on.

  To think that brothers are meant to be keepers. Funny, that.

  In the end, it was The Backbreaker, Wilhelm, who picked up the sword.

  He spat on the ground as he approached. “You know, those partners of mine'll be calling me the Spineless till the end of it."

  The old man laughed in Solvanel's memory.

  "So, I'd say it's only fitting I borrow yours."

  The wolf stood over the shepherd, baring its teeth. "With blood like yours, it’d be right for you to put up a fight at least.”

  Something in the way he lingered made it clear he wanted just that. A fighting spirit for him to sever in two. “I won’t.”

  Solvanel looked his soon-to-be killer in the eye as he rested the flat of the blade upon his shoulder. “Then of all the fuckery your grandparents did, you're their greatest failure.”

  “I am.”

  “You weren’t worth the lie you were born in.”

  “I know.”

  “Good.”

  He lifted the blade high up. “I wish I could say it was the last of you.”

  Wait… what?

  His sword came down before Solvanel could ask the question. But just then, a streak of light caught his eye. No. He felt its presence above him.

  Solvanel expected to look up and see the creature from before, but instead, there was a single line of light racing through an otherwise empty expanse.

  It was the star. The comet from that night in the forest.

  The sword reflected a glint that went off like a sudden sun, blinding anything and everything inside the forest, including him.

  And then, the forest ignited.

  “What the f-”

  A violent rush of heat. Screams swallowed by the roar of orange flames.

  The forest was alive with chaos, trees splitting as air thick with cinders clawed at the lungs. Light scattered in wild, uneven bursts across the wreckage. Yet amid it all, the darkness of his cursed sight, something impossible drew Solvanel’s attention.

  Through the smoke, a bush burned. Ordinary fire curled from its leaves, yet it stood whole and untouched, visible to his cursed sight. And not only to that, but to the deeper sense within him, that faint and restless awareness which had followed him ever since the night of the comet.

  He stopped moving. The world around him blurred into noise. Then the bush spoke. Its voice did not travel through the air. It entered his mind with the clarity of thought, calm and unwavering amid the storm.

  [Follow.]

  The command was neither plea nor threat. It simply was.

  Solvanel’s hands trembled. In one, he clutched the shepherd’s crook; in the other, his grandmother’s finger, wrapped in old black thread.

  He whispered an apology and pressed his keepsake to the ground, knowing this was the last she'd ever hold his hand.

  The air cracked like glass beneath frost. A stillness spread outward from him. The mercenaries stopped mid-strike, their bodies rigid, faces twisted in fear and disbelief. Breath froze in their chests, eyes wide, the flames reflected in their pupils.

  The captives’ chains were melting, turning red, softening, and dripping to the ground in molten streaks. The smell of scorched iron filled the clearing. One by one, they raised their wrists, free for the first time since capture, unsure whether to run or weep from the pain of salvation.

  Solvanel lifted his gaze toward the comet’s fading trail, a line of pale fire cutting through the clouds.

  Unsteadily, he rose to his feet.

  The others looked toward him for a cue.

  But as he opened his mouth to speak, something slammed into him with the force of a raging bull. The air in his lungs was punched out in a single, pitiful wheeze. "Don't worry, brother. I have you. I have you in my arms!"

  The greater giant bounded across the sand, each step shaking the ground and kicking up clouds of dust in his wake. The few remaining captives followed behind, stumbling and uncertain, their faces streaked with soot and confusion as they trailed the only figures who seemed to know where to go—a pair of younger brothers who'd become each other's keeper.