"Stupid roads!"The curse echoed through the forest, startling a flock of crows into flight. Their wings beat wildly as they disappeared into the overcast sky.
Lucan trudged down the winding trail, his boots sinking into the muddy earth. Every step was a slog, his heavy armor creaking with each motion. He looked like a moving statue, iron clad, blood streaked, and absolutely fuming.
"This is the third time I've gotten turned around!" he growled, raking a gloved hand through his damp, sweat matted hair. "How the hell does a road disappear?!"
He slammed his boot against a gnarled tree root in frustration.
"Three days in this gods forsaken forest! Bandits, wolves, an orc patrol, and now now I've lost my godsdamned helmet!"
Lucan spun around, eyes scanning the trees as if it might just be hanging from a branch like fruit.
"I liked that helmet…"
His voice dropped into a bitter mutter. "...fit good, didn't chafe. Bastards…"
He reached over his shoulder and adjusted the worn leather strap that kept his massive greatsword fastened to his back. The weapon was nearly as long as he was tall, iron forged, brutal, the kind of blade meant more for cleaving men in half than fencing.
Lucan sighed, pulling a worn map from his waistband. It was creased, stained, and fraying at the edges. The charcoal marks denoting his route were barely legible anymore, smeared by sweat and blood.
"Right, let's see here…" he murmured aloud. "Passed the Godspine... crossed into the Evermarch... If this damned parchment's not lying to me, Dunmire should be close."
Just then, a scream shattered the quiet.
Lucan froze.
High. Sharp. Human. Female.
"Too close," he muttered. "Less than a hundred paces."
His hand went to the hilt strapped over his shoulder. With a grunt, he unslung the greatsword, the sheer weight of it forcing him to twist slightly to balance it. The blade shimmered in the half-light, dark and stained with old blood.
He moved quickly, surprisingly quiet for a man in half-plate. His steps were practiced, honed from years of marching through woods where silence meant survival. Soon, the forest began to open up, shadows shifting into the edge of a clearing.
Lucan dropped low behind a thick cluster of shrubs and peered through.
Four travelers were surrounded. Two women, one man still standing, and one... no, not standing. Lying in a pool of blood, his skull smashed open like a rotten gourd. Three armed bandits loomed over the others, grinning, armed, and far too confident.
One of the thugs, big, ugly, carrying a notched iron mace, gestured with a jerk of his head."C'mon now. Hand over your coin, your gear, your boots too, why not? Unless y'want to end up like that one." He jabbed the mace toward the corpse, smearing blood across the ground.
"You killed Brent!" the older woman shouted, voice cracking from grief and fury. "You bastards! You'll burn for this!"
"Briane, please, stop!" the younger woman whimpered, clutching her satchel. "Just give them the pack!"
Mark, the remaining man, stood frozen, pale as a ghost, his hand limp at his sword's hilt.
"Do something!" Briane barked at him. "You're supposed to protect us!"
The lead bandit chuckled. "Look at 'im. Bastard's shakin'. Probably pissed 'is pants. Ain't no help comin'."
"Shut it," the spearman snapped, stepping forward. "Give us your packs now, or we start peeling off ears."
Lucan stepped back behind the bush, his grip tightening on the greatsword.
He grumbled to himself. "Not my fight. Not today."
He turned to leave, and then he heard it.
"I—I'm an alchemist!" the younger woman shouted. "I've got no coin! Just herbs and salves, please!"
Lucan stopped cold.
He blinked.
An alchemist?
He slowly turned his head back toward the clearing, a dangerous little grin creeping across his face.
"Well, that changes everything."
He unslung the rest of his gear, adjusted his grip on the massive blade, and whispered, "Time to collect."
The bandits barely had time to register the sound of approaching steel before the first one died.
Lucan burst from the brush like a charging bull, both hands gripping the greatsword. He swung from the shoulder, and the blade came down like the wrath of the gods.
CRACK-CHUNK.
The flat of the sword connected with the mace wielder's shoulder, no, not just his shoulder. The blade sank through it, biting deep, severing collarbone, ribs, and spine. The bandit was split from shoulder to gut, his scream cut off in a spray of arterial mist.
Lucan yanked the sword free with a wet shhhlick, blood painting his chest and jaw.
The others screamed.
"WHERE THE FUCK DID HE—?!"
The spearman rushed him, jabbing forward, but Lucan pivoted, caught the shaft against his vambrace, and twisted. With a snarl, he ripped the spear from the bandit's hands, stepped in, and swung his greatsword sideways.
THWACK.
The blade struck mid ribs and carved through armor like wet parchment. The impact launched the spearman backward, torso nearly severed in two, crashing into the dirt with a wet thud.
The third tried to run. He turned, stumbling, but Lucan was already moving.
He raised the greatsword overhead, two hundred pounds of armored rage behind it, and brought it down.
CRACK.
The sword met the man's skull, and kept going. It split through helm, head, and halfway down the bandit's neck before stopping with a grunt of resistance. Lucan stood there a moment, breathing hard, boots in the dirt, hands on the hilt, half a corpse still clinging to his blade.
He twisted and wrenched the weapon free with a grunt. The body slumped to the side in two pieces.
The clearing was silent. Just the wind in the trees. Just the dripping of blood from the blade.
The travelers stood stunned.
Lucan turned slowly, expression unreadable beneath the blood. The greatsword rested casually across his shoulder, as if it weighed nothing at all.
The younger woman blinked at him, wide-eyed.
"You, who are you?"
He spat into the dirt, breathing hard. "Lucan."
Briane narrowed her eyes. "Why'd you help us?"
He turned to the younger woman, her belt clinking softly with the sound of tiny vials.
"You said you were an alchemist."
She nodded. "Yes. I'm Sera. I was apprenticing under Master Halden in Dunmire."
"Well, Sera," Lucan grunted, sheathing the sword with a clang, "You owe me your life. That makes us even. But if you've got salves... we might talk terms."
"I can pay you in tonics. Or... I know the forest paths to Dunmire. The safe ones."
Lucan's eyes flicked to her. He nodded once. "Good. Lead the way."
Mark found his voice finally. "You killed them like they were nothing…"
Lucan glanced at the three ruined corpses behind him. "They were."
"Now pick up your friends body and lead me outa here."
As the group gathered their things and began to move, Sera fell into step beside him.
"You're not... a knight, are you?"
Lucan didn't look at her. "I'm not anything anymore."
But behind them, the bandits bled into the earth. And in Lucan's wake, the road to Dunmire began to feel a little less hopeless.