ferocity from the boy, but until you had seen someone in genuine combat you didn't know what to expect.
A bandit had been moving toward Bolrick, who was standing on the far side of the fire with his giant sword in both hands, but the man seemed to suddenly realize he was now alone in his attack and abruptly turned to run out of the camp and up the slope into the forest. Palry took off in pursuit, daggers still dripping with blood.
"Palry! No! Let him go. We'll find him when the sun comes up." Amund didn't want anyone led off into the woods, woods which the bandit knew much more intimately than any of the pursuers.
The boy didn't listen, letting the heat of combat control him, and vanished into the dark forest.
"Damn you, Palry." Amund started after him. Bolrick and Hansen were tending to Fidrick, but Amund would have to wait until he got back with Palry to offer them any help.
A dozen steps into the forest and Amund stumbled in the dark. He looked down and saw he had tripped over Dran's leg. The hunter lay back against a tree, his throat slit. Had he been caught sleeping here? That did not seem likely, but it would have to wait. Amund ran on up the mountainside after Palry and the man he was chasing.
Once away from the campfire the forest was very dark. Amund could not see more than a few feet in front of him. The fog was gone, but clouds still covered the sky and the moon and stars provided no light. Frost covered the ground and with every crunching step Amund knew he was giving away his location. But he had no choice other than to keep moving.
Amund was no longer sure he was following Palry and the other man. He couldn't see them, of course, and there was no sound other than his own footsteps and a cold breeze high in the limbs of the bare trees.
He stopped to listen. Nothing. Damn that boy. He let the excitement of the battle get to him. Amund had been too focused on counseling Fidrick to contain his emotions and hadn't talked to Palry at all. He'd left the boy who had never been tested to his own devices. A terrible mistake, Amund realized now.
Then he heard sounds behind and to his left. He spun around and walked toward the noises. They sounded like a man choking. He started to run.
"Stop where you are. Stop!"
Amund peered toward the voice but saw nothing. He continued forward.
He heard Palry gasp, "Help me."
"I said stop. Right. Where. You. Are. I'll kill him now if you don't."
Then he saw it, in dim outline. Palry with his back against a tree, a noose around his neck pulling him upwards. A man was next to him, holding a knife at boy's abdomen between the joint of the his jerkin, ready to strike.
Amund looked at the man. Or rather at the man's eyes. They were a bright violet and seemed to shine in the dark. He couldn't make out the man's face, but his glowing eyes stared right at Amund.
"Throw your sword down. I won't hurt the boy if you do as I say."
Amund took another step. The bandit slid his dagger down Palry's side. A fast smooth cut. The boy grunted but did not scream. Brave as his imagination. Blood dripped from his side.
"Do it. Throw your sword to your right. As far as you can. I must bind you, for my own protection, but I'll leave you here unharmed. I want to escape, not call down the entire territory on me head."
Amund knew better. This man was a killer and would wound both Amund and Palry and leave them to die before they were found. The sheriff also knew he had no choice.
He flung his sword away with his full strength. It crashed through branches and struck a tree, clattered to the ground.
Maybe the boy could escape while the man with the glowing eyes was distracted. It was a small hope, but it was now all that was left.
"Kneel. Do it. Now. Clasp your hands behind your back."
Amund knelt and did as he was commanded.
The man walked toward him, his eyes glowing stronger as he got closer. Amund could not look away from them, captivated by them. The violet light seemed to come from inside the man's skull.
As the man passed him Amund saw the dagger in his hand was one of Palry's. In that moment he was certain the man planned to kill them both with their own weapons.
"Raise your hands behind you."
Amund did so, the man standing close behind him.
Then he blindly grabbed the man's right wrist, the one holding the dagger, and lunged forward from his knees. He spun his right shoulder into the ground, bringing the bandit forward and over his shoulder and back. He flipped the surprised man over him, knocking the air out of the bandit and rolling on top of him.
Amund hadn't spent years being beaten by bigger boys without learning how to fight unarmed.
He slammed the man's wrist into the ground repeatedly until the dagger dropped loose. He immediately scooped it up and stabbed it into the man's chest. The man looked at him, stunned, his violet eyes unfocused. Amund stabbed again and again until the man stopped moving. As Amund watched, the glow faded and the man's eyes turned from violet to whatever their natural color had been. He could not tell in the dark, and he did not care.
Amund sat back on the dead man's legs, breathing hard and watching the crystallized air from his lips drift away.
They left the man there, Amund refused to give him a burial. "Let the wild dogs have him."
When they got back to camp they found Hansen and Bolrick mourning over Fidrick's body. He had succumbed to the axe wounds on his back. His father and his brother moved in a state of shock.
Amund felt a deep, inconsolable sadness at the entire situation. Dran was dead. Fidrick was dead. Everyone at Tumblebrook was dead. Killing the men responsible was merely justice; the act did nothing to restore balance or bring joy back to the world.
He set everyone to work building memorials for their dead. Dran and Fidrick's bodies would be taken back to town for full burial, but it was important to mark where they died with ceremonial graves. This was said to ease their conduct through the next world, to give the departure points of their spirits a marker so that they could find their way. Amund did not know if this was true, but he knew he needed to do it for himself, to remember these two men and where they died.
The bandits he left where they were. They carried nothing of value other than their weapons, and Amund broke those with Hansen's hammer and threw the pieces into the pool by the campsite. He hoped they would corrode into rust and be forgotten.
While they were digging the sun came up. They could see the side Frostveil Mountain from their clearing. It was covered in trees, and the fog of last night had frozen on their branches. The bright morning sun was dazzling as it reflected off the icy trees, slowly moving in the wind. A million points of white shimmering light rolling across the mountainside. The beauty of the sight crashed down onto Amund, and finally, at last, he leaned on his shovel and tears streamed down his cheeks.
He spoke words as they filled in the ceremonial sites with the earth they had just removed. "I do not know why the world is as it is. I wish it were otherwise. I do know we have to fight. We have to fight to keep this world from being worse than it is. We have to fight in the hope that we may someday make it better. We have to fight in memory of those who we have lost. And we have to fight in defense of those who are yet to come. We cannot stop. We can barely rest. But we must keep fighting. We must. For them."
He looked around at the others, and they were looking at him with a quiet affirmation. They were not sure where his words had come from, and in truth he did not know himself. But they all knew that he had spoken the truth, and for all those they had lost, they knew the truth was what they deserved.
The memorial ceremony complete and the spirits of their two companions released, they mounted their horses to return to town. They were silent, each absorbing the world around them and spending time deep in their own thoughts. Their night on Frostveil had changed them, not entirely for the better, but also not entirely for the worse.
There was much to do.
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