A couple minutes later, we arrived at a pair of doors with a guard on either side. Seeing as how they wore chainmail, I could tell that they were just ordinary guards and not Iron Knights. They bowed towards Princess Leonora before opening the doors for us. The inside of the room was quite vast, but aside from the size, was rather plain. It had a single, long rectangular table with at least a dozen chairs on either side. The stone walls lacked any furnishings and the only sources of lighting were a set of chandeliers hanging from the ceiling and a fireplace in the middle of the wall opposite the door we came in from. Already seated at the far end of the table was the king, dressed in fine linen with a fur mantle draped over his shoulders, and a gold crown atop his head. It was not a particularly special kind of look, but given my first impression of him when we fought, it was a striking contrast.

  “Ah, you’ve finally arrived! Welcome, welcome! Come now, take up your seats over here!” he called out to us in a booming voice.

  “Tasha, Flora, follow me. Sir Braith, please seat yourself to my father’s left side.” We did as Leonora said and walked towards the far end of the table, with the three girls going along the other side of the table. As I drew nearer, the king got up from his seat and came over to greet me. It was not something I had really expected, and further contributed to differentiating this encounter from my last run-in with a monarch.

  “Thank you once again for saving my daughter. It is not terribly elaborate, but I hope you will enjoy yourselves while dining with us.”

  “The pleasure is ours, Your Majesty.”

  “Excellent…hmmm, oh dear, in all my haste, it appears I had forgotten to ask for your name! To re-introduce myself, I am Henrik von Brennan, king of this humble nation.”

  “My name is Braith. The girl with the bow is Flora, and the other one is Tasha, my daughter.”

  “I see. It is a pleasure to have your acquaintances.”

  “Y- yes, it is a pleasure to meet with you as well, Your Majesty!”

  “Same here,” Tasha said simply. As with Leonora, the king also did not seem to mind this curtness. We sat down and before we could go on to a new line of conversation, the second set of doors in this room opened. These ones were essentially diagonally opposite the first set, and were near this end of the table, but over to the king’s right. A middle-aged man servant came through with a serving trolley.

  “Mikhael? Emil is not coming to bring out his dishes?”

  “My apologies, Your Majesty, but there was a slight issue in the kitchen. He needs more time to finish up and told me to come and bring out the soup first.”

  “Oh, I see, then. Tell Emil not to worry, his cooking is worth waiting a bit longer for.”

  “I will tell him so.” He kept his words professional, but he seemed rather nervous. Judging by the way his eyes kept glancing over towards Flora and Tasha even when setting the bowls down for everyone else, I could guess that he didn’t know what kind of guests the king would be having. Well, I would probably be surprised too at this sudden arrangement. The servant set down my bowl last and then started to make his leave when Flora asked a question.

  “Um, excuse me, but what is in this soup?”

  “Oh, you’re curious about that?” King Henrik replied with a hearty laugh. “Mikhael, please!”

  “M- me, Your Majesty? Right, of course. Well, it is a bread soup with ham, chives, cheese, and cream.”

  “Ham?” I should have expected this issue to come up.

  “Yes.” Flora shifted a bit uncomfortably at the answer.

  “Is something the matter?” the king asked.

  “Well,” I spoke up, “Flora does not eat any meat.”

  “Really? Does she have a rare allergy to it?”

  “No, she doesn’t eat meat because…she doesn’t like hunting…I mean…it’s just her values. I’m not sure how to describe it well, but it is something she has chosen for herself.” The king nodded slowly to himself, but said nothing. Flora’s face noticeably reddened.

  “Oh, now that I think about it…I think I might have heard that some from the Na- there are some who do have that sort of dietary practice.” I knew what the king was about to say, but given his whole performance earlier about not delving more into our personal circumstances from our earlier talk, he clearly knew to avoid saying anything more.

  “If the young miss does not wish to eat meat, then there will be no issue,” the servant spoke up unexpectedly, “I will just bring it back in and I’m sure we can bring her something else.” He sounded strangely excited for someone who just agreed to do extra work. “How about the other young miss, does she also require a different dish?”

  “No, this sounds good,” Tasha answered, picking up her spoon and swirling it around the soup for a bit.

  “A- are you sure?” That was a rather strange question to ask, but more than that, I noticed that Flora’s cheeks were no longer flushed. In fact, they seemed rather pale.

  “So, can we eat now?” Tasha asked.

  “Wait!” Everyone except for Flora looked at me with a bit of alarm. “Flora, what’s going on?”

  “I- I think something dangerous is coming.” Remembering the run-in with the True-Blood cavaliers, I knew that this could be serious. I immediately began glancing around the room.

  “Flora, can you tell from which side?”

  “What is this about danger?” the king asked. “We are in the middle of the royal palace.” The king had a point. Aside from literal fortresses, this should be the most well-guarded place in the kingdom. Guards and knights are on patrol everywhere as Leonora said. They should be on patrol everywhere! We didn’t pass by anyone else up until we got here! I stood up from my seat and reached for my sword. At that exact same time, the servant got behind the king and pulled a knife out from his pocket. He stabbed at the king’s throat and I knew I would be just a bit too late. However, the king grabbed at Mikhael’s wrist just as the knife began to draw blood. Using his other hand, he grabbed at Mikhael’s collar and pulled him down onto the oak table. The impact caused the servant to drop the knife and the king rose up from his seat, his hands still gripped tightly onto the man’s wrist and collar.

  “Father, you're bleeding!” It seemed like just a nick, but the blood flow began staining the entire right side of his neck. Instead of interrogating his assailant, the king let go of his collar and pounded him once on the forehead, knocking him out. Then, the king slumped back in his seat and clamped down on his wound. Flora quickly went over to assist, hurriedly chanting. As I was thinking about how to assess the situation and calm everyone down, we heard shouting form outside the room. A few seconds later, the double doors on the other side flew open and eight men wearing black cloaks over chainmail armour came barging in. I drew my sword and charged two bolts through my whole body.

  “Tasha, watch the back in case more come from the other door!” As I shouted out my command, one more man walked in behind the first eight. He towered over the rest of them and appeared to be the leader.

  “What’s going on? Is the king already dead?” he asked in a deep voice.

  “No, he’s still alive,” one of them answered.

  “Then go kill him,” he ordered. At his command, the eight of them came rushing in, and strangely, all of them came down my side of the table. The space from the table to the wall was about as narrow as the alley I fought in earlier, so the attackers came in almost one by one. I delivered a powerful horizontal slash at the first one, slicing through the links of his armour and knocking him into a chair. However, this was less than I expected. I needed to take these guys down as quickly possible so I charged up to a total of six bolts as the second one came in. He swung at me with a battle-axe and I nimbly stepped out of the way and followed through with quick, deep cuts through both his legs, causing him to crash down to the ground. The third came at me with a mace, which I quickly relieved him of by attacking his hands. I then ran my sword through the left side of his abdomen. I was trying to avoid outright killing him, but I was going to make damn sure they would be out of the fight.

  The fourth and fifth paused for a bit. After seeing how I dispatched their comrades, it seemed they were thinking of making a more coordinated attack. I pulled my sword out of the man and shoved him to the side, taunting them. It looked like it was going to work in causing them to make another reckless attempt at me, but their leader shouted.

  “Stop! You guys don’t stand a chance against that one!” The remaining five began falling back as their leader began making his way over. Unlike the rest, he wore a breastplate over his chainmail and he wore a gauntlet on only his left hand. He had a leather glove on his right hand like the rest of them. He deftly reached behind his waist and I heard something click. In one fluid motion, he took out what appeared to be a hybrid of a cleaver and an axe. The blade was something fit for an oversized cleaver, but the long, ebony shaft looked more like that of a lumberjack’s axe. Something else I took note of was how despite being clearly meant as a two-handed weapon, he wielded it with only his right hand. Well, it’s not something to be too surprised about. By now, I had already concluded that all these attackers were probably Battle-Hardened, unlike the first set of assailants.

  The first person I knocked aside earlier suddenly tried to attack me from behind, but I evaded it and sliced at both of his legs, causing him to fall like the second. I took a brief look at the three downed men around me as the leader with the cleaver continued to stand there, a good twenty feet away. I didn’t know how fast or strong this one was so I wasn’t sure what kind of risk I was willing to take. Going up to my current maximum of eight bolts would exhaust me quickly, which means I would have to go on the offensive right away. However, is that what this one is expecting? He was massive, almost a foot taller than me, and it might just be the armour, but the shape of his body suggested hulking muscles underneath. Given that, what was his most likely fighting style?

  “What are you doing?” he suddenly shouted at the five behind him. “Go around the other side!” They nodded and began circling around the table.

  “Tasha, hold them off!” Alright, forget waiting around. Let’s just deal with this. Right as I thought that though, the leader was right in front of me, his cleaver already high up, ready to swing down on my head. Instinctively, I dodged, and the weapon came down on the stone floor, crushing the area into pieces. Before I had much time to analyze how much strength that would take, he twisted his wrist and followed through with a swing over to where I dodged. Once again, I got out of the way just in time and the blade tore into the stone wall, kicking up dust and loose debris as it screeched across the wall. One direct hit from that, and I knew I’d be dead.

  I quickly shot up to my maximum number of bolts and tried to make a counter attack on his left side as he ripped his weapon out of the wall. I immediately made the decision that this was not someone I could risk taking out alive so I aimed for his neck. With far greater speed than someone of his size should have, though, he blocked my attack with his left gauntlet before my attack could reach optimal speed, and then swung his weapon at me again. I pulled back, but he pressed on without a moment’s hesitation. Instead of swinging at me again, he kicked off the ground and charged straight at me. I was too close to the table by now so the chairs on either side could have impeded my escape. Therefore, I took a gamble and stepped in, preparing a fatal thrust once more. Yet again, he blocked my attack by batting my blade away with his gauntlet just after I initiated the attack. Even more amazing was how just his deflection almost had enough power to disarm me. As I stumbled a bit, trying to maintain my grip on my sword, he swung horizontally at me. I dodged by jumping backwards, and although I evaded the attack, I ended up right up against the table. He followed up by swinging down on me from overhead but I managed to dodge it this time by rolling along the table. The weapon sliced right through the table and I heard the stone ground crack yet again. At around the same time, though, I also heard a man yelp out from the other side of the table. It’s good to know that Tasha, at least, was having a better time than me.

  The story has been illicitly taken; should you find it on Amazon, report the infringement.

  I quickly got off the table just as my opponent prised his weapon out of the floor. My body was starting to burn up, the back of my neck was already damp with sweat, and it was getting harder to catch my breath. From here on out, things were likely to just get even worse for I knew better than anyone that my stamina was soon to be on a rapid decline. However, despite the desperation of the situation, I found myself smiling. It almost hurt to breathe, yet I had the will to maintain my composure despite my body growing ever more feverish. He was strong enough to cleave me in two with a single slash, and he was frighteningly fast on top of that. But, I am still alive. He caught me off guard, and bullied me around while I was just trying to get into proper form or position, but I survived. That means I actually have an advantage, don’t I?

  As my thoughts searched for the next course of action, he suddenly appeared right in front of me again, his weapon already coming in from a full swing. I still hadn’t figured out how he could cover so much distance without me noticing, but it didn’t matter. I wasn’t going to get caught up in the same routine this time. I was in range of him? Well, then he’s in range of me. Instead of trying to dodge, I immediately stepped in and thrust at his throat. He used his gauntlet to grab at my sword, but I knew my attack would be too fast to simply stop. Instead of restraining the attack, though, he pushed the trajectory of my attack as far to his right as he could. My attack ended up just grazing his neck, but this would only delay the inevitable. Using both hands, I used all my strength to follow through with a slash to decapitate him. Or, I was about to do that. Instead of completing his slash, he pulled his weapon in to bash me on the top of my head. There was far less momentum in this strike, but it was still enough to make me lose my focus. In that instant, he tightly gripped my sword and pulled it away from his neck. I found myself stumbling in the process as I still had both hands on it. He reared his weapon back and then jabbed me in the chest with the head of it, which was thankfully blunt. As the attack came in, I tried jumping back to soften the impact, which it probably did. In addition, my armour cushioned against the thrust, but I was still left winded. Right before the impact, he let go of my sword, perhaps to avoid it cutting his hand because the blow knocked me several feet back. I barely managed to land back on my feet as my body sailed through the air.

  The attack didn’t go as I planned, but here I am, still standing. He came charging at me again, his weapon already wound up and ready to swing once more. His strength was so great that I didn’t want to try this earlier, but if my step-in wasn’t good enough, this was one of my only options left. I thrust out my sword just in time to meet the blade of his weapon. Metal grinded against metal and putting forth all my remaining concentration, I flicked my blade at just the right moment as the blades began sliding past another. I did. In a do-or-die situation, I got the right timing against a stronger opponent using a much larger weapon that I have never experienced before. This movement knocked his weapon out of the way, but failed to disarm as it should have if I did it perfectly. I’m still a long ways away from reaching Lars’ skill with the sword.

  Still, it was much better than the worst-case scenario where I completely miss the timing and the force of his attack simply overpowers my own and slashes straight into my body. After knocking his weapon away, I followed through with a swift slash at his neck. Yet again, he stopped it with left gauntlet. This time, though, I felt the blade finally cut through metal and into his palm. Drops of blood splattered out from his hand and blood started trickling down his arm. Unfortunately, that was the extent of my small victory. As stated earlier, I failed to disarm him, and during the second my movements were halted, he thrust the head of his weapon hard into my ribs. I simply lacked the stamina and focus to try and dodge it and took on the brunt of the impact. The armour did whatever it could, but I was knocked hard into the wall. My right shoulder smashed against the wall, the shock finally causing me to drop my sword, but it did not end there. The momentum continued and my body practically bounced off the wall and did a complete 360 degree turn before I finally crashed onto the floor on my back, just where my optimism lay.

  I let out a loud series of coughs and reflexively grabbed at my ribs. I couldn’t feel anything underneath the armour, but at the very least, I didn’t feel like anything broke, but that might have just been the adrenaline numbing my senses, which is not to say I felt nothing at all. My heart rate continued to soar and my muscles started screaming. It was through sheer force of will that I could maintain the circulation of bolts throughout my body. But even that could not help me forget the fact that I was on my back and unarmed. Alright, one step at a time. As quickly as I could, I got my ass off the floor and stood back up. Right as I did, though, I fell to one knee. Partly because of the difficulty in forcing my body to move, but mostly because that man was right in front of me. I let out something of a mix of a cough and a gasp, but said nothing. My brain was just about ready to give up, just what every other part of my body wanted. He picked up my sword off the floor with his free hand and my already grounded optimism fell even lower. From the other end of the room, Tasha hurried over to get behind my opponent, having just finished knocking out her own. Would she make it? Just as I finished that thought, he tossed my sword over to me, and I reflexively caught it, which was only the second most surprising thing about this. Being as surprised as I was, Tasha stopped in her tracks about fifteen feet away from him.

  “One minute is over,” he told me. One minute? Did that much time really pass? Shouldn’t it be more? Or less? No, wait, wait! What does that have to do with anything?! My mind raced, but my mouth remained closed. He took a couple steps back from me, and I ended up stepping away as well. It felt like we were a pair of fighters preparing for a second round.

  “What?” was the only thing I could finally muster asking.

  “You are not Battle-Hardened…right?” And he ignores it anyways.

  “I’m not…” I answered slowly. I wouldn’t normally consider this a grueling and serious interrogation, but given my body felt like it was being roasted over an open fire, I might as well treat it as such.

  “What is your name?”

  “Are you sure you have time…for something like that?” Despite the fact that I wanted to just keel over any moment now, I couldn’t help myself.

  “What is your name?” I’d sigh in response, if I could.

  “My name is Braith.”

  “…Okay,” he finally said when he figured I had nothing more to add to that. Well, that kind of response I have heard before, but probably for a different reason. “Moon Clan?”

  “What? No.”

  “...Okay.” During this conversation, I finally got a decent look at his face. He had black bangs that went down to his eyebrows and his hair was relatively long for a man as I saw a fair amount peeking out from his cowl. He had bloodshot eyes, wore a relatively passive expression, and numerous tiny scars adorned the left side of his face and seemed to continue even down his neck.

  “Why have you come here?” I figured now was the time for me to get one of my own questions in. The answer would have been obvious earlier, but this development made me a little doubtful.

  “To kill the King of Brennan.” Okay, so I did hear him correctly earlier.

  “But why?” Did I really care about that? Not really. My body was not in the condition to care about a lot of things right now. So, did I ask just to buy time, then? Time for what?

  “They want him dead.”

  “Who is they?”

  “Ragnarok.”

  “…I’ve never heard of them before. Who are they?”

  “No more questions. We will fight again now.” I guess my time-buying strategy is a bust. He turned around for a second to look at Tasha. “Little girl, do not interfere.” As if she would take orders from him.

  “Why would I listen to you?!” she shouted back at him. Right, just as I figured. I may be weak and tired, but with Tasha…

  “We are finishing our duel here. The first part was a draw because I ran out of time.” Hearing him spout out these arbitrary rules was irritating me a lot for some reason. “I will win this time.” He turned to face me again. “Ready?” His tone had not changed much throughout this entire conversation, but this time, it seemed to explode with condescension. My pride, my hubris. Something which I thought I had cast aside, grown out, matured away from…it all came surging back. What, you feel confident going on about this because you actually won earlier? I grinded my teeth. Did I come this far to just lose to some muscle-bound simpleton like him? I felt my body temperature rise again.

  “I don’t care about your rules!” Tasha shouted. “Come on, dad, we’ll take him on together!”

  “Tasha!” as the name left my mouth, another bolt surged throughout my whole body. As it did, my entire field of vision flashed bright white for a fraction of a second. “Stay out of this!” I shouted even louder this time as another bolt surged forth. My heart felt like it was beating out of my chest and my entire mouth had gone dry and numb. Finally, I felt like smiling again. “Hey, you didn’t happen to mention your name to me yet,” I spoke calmly.

  “I am Tarras.” I tossed my head from side to side as I sent a third bolt throughout my body, making it eleven. I sometimes felt like each sequential bolt added a bit more power than the previous one, but the eleventh was definitely on another level. My legs were wading through a sea of fire as needles drilled their way into all of my joints, but I also felt like I was invincible.

  “Tarras…I’m ready.” At that instant, he surged forth towards and with my enhanced concentration I could finally see it. Without any extra exertion, he made impossibly long strides, as if he were skipping with ostrich legs. I don’t know if this is some kind of Battle-Hardened movement technique or not, but it was rather boring to just watch. I stepped in with enough force to crack the ground beneath my foot and slashed at him. He barely defended just in time with his weapon. As we clashed, just barely, I could feel his body get pushed just slightly back. My smile widened. I navigated to his left side and slashed at him again, making sure to avoid his vitals. He tried to defend with his armoured left arm before my blade could pick up momentum. My sword noisily cut against his armour, slicing through it and drawing blood. Tarras grunted. I applied more force to press my blade deeper, but he backed off just in time. I gave myself a second to appreciate his new look. His normally passive face was showing signs of being flustered and streaks of red ran across his left forearm.

  For the first time, Tarras held his weapon with both hands. I laughed internally. Throughout most of my fights, this one included, I wielded my sword with only one hand. It was the main way Lars had taught me how to fight, and using two limited my mobility a bit and was generally unnecessary since most opponents were much weaker ever since gaining the power of the Thousand Bolts. This time did not need to be any different.

  Limitations of power? Different in experience and skill? I have already proven to myself that those things hardly mattered. I just needed to will it. He charged at me and prepared to swing his weapon at me. I moved in as well and decided to thrust my sword into his right arm as well. Just then, though, he changed into a full-on tackle and bashed against my body. It was…a solid blow, but that was it. I hardly even felt it. He tried to press my body into the wall, but with my newfound dexterity, I kicked off the wall and literally jumped over his body, even doing a flip in mid-air before landing behind him. Unamused by my show, he quickly turned around and swung at me again. Well, I was no longer amused either. I had intended to make him suffer a bit more, but I had to remember there were others watching this. I thrust my sword at his incoming swing and attempted to disarm him successfully this time. I knocked his weapon out of the way once more, but he still held on. That annoyed me, but I couldn’t let it distract me from finishing this. I thrust my blade straight into his chest piece as the ultimate sign of superiority in penetrating his greatest defense. My sword penetrated the armour, but before I could run him through, he suddenly disappeared. In the time it took to blink, he was already on the other side of the room. But how? I didn't even see him move! It’s true I wasn’t looking at his legs this time, but the only way he could have done this was if he moved even faster this time. I grinded my teeth in frustration. So, he was still just playing around?! That’s just fine! He can’t run forever! I got ready to pursue right as two women armed with bows came into the room.

  “Tarras, we have to retreat now! The Iron Knights will be here any second!”

  “But…”

  “Wait, the King is still alive?” She swiftly nocked an arrow and shot it. As I thought of intercepting it, the other woman also fired an arrow right after her, this one aimed at my head. I tilted my head out of the way and glared at her as I heard the arrow get knocked out of the air. In the corner of my eye, I spotted Tasha running down the table.

  “No time for this, we’ll just have to leave.” Without another word the two women climbed onto his shoulders.

  “We will finish this next time,” Tarras said to me just before bolting out of the room with lightning speed. No, there will be no next time! I kicked off hard from the ground to begin my pursuit, and even tried to focus to charge another bolt through my legs for extra speed. The instant my foot hit the ground again, though, my entire body broke down. It felt as if I had just been caught in a series of vises with boulders pummeling every inch of me, while also being submerged in boiling water. I went blind and my legs became paralyzed. I fell over and I could not even brace myself. My face smashed into the stone floor, but this extra bit of pain was irrelevant. No, even more than that, my brain still refused to quit. I could not let it end like this! Even with my legs failing me, I pushed myself back up with my arms, but entered an insanely dizzying state. It felt like being struck with an extreme case of vertigo, ironic for someone who was still blind. I vomited, and although I could not see it, a tearing sensation in my throat made me feel that there was blood mixed in it all. I wiped my mouth and tried once more to pick myself up, but to no avail. The dizziness got even worse with a cacophony of illusory sounds in my ears and I screamed out in pain. Or at least I started to before I ended up vomiting again. My arms gave way and I fell back onto the floor, finally losing consciousness immediately after my head smashed into the ground again.

  ******************************************************************************************************************

  In the outskirts of the capital, in a deserted alleyway, Tarras finally stopped to rest. The two women got off his shoulders and started scanning around. As they did, Tarras pressed up against a wall and tried to catch his breath. One of the women went to check up on him.

  “Tarras…”

  “It is nothing. Just…more tired than expected.” The woman put on an inquisitive expression. The other woman came back as well, and under moonlight, one can see that they had identical faces. The second one looked him up and down and then prodded him on the left side of his torso. Tarras’s expression showed the ever-slightest bit of change.

  “Leyka, we’re taking off his chest piece,” the second one said. Tarras did not resist and after removing that piece of armour, they saw that beneath his chainmail, the cloth of his shirt was soaked with blood. Tarras maintained an expressionless face.

  “Ah, you’ve been overexerting yourself! And after it looked like we could finally heal up those old scars of yours,” Leyka said.

  “Was it really such a tough situation for you?” the second woman asked.

  “It was an unexpected one.” The two women looked at each other.

  “How so?” the second woman asked.

  “My opponent reminded me of someone. Someone I fought long ago.”

  “From during the War of the Nines?”

  “No…even before that.” Leyka went over to the edge of the alley and peered outside.

  “Leyla, it looks like it really has been a complete failure. I don’t see any of our troops coming to meet up with us.” Leyla sighed.

  “Regrettable. That makes it…forty-eight casualties then?” Leyla reached for a small pouch tied to her waist and pulled out something that looked like a white marble.

  “Does that include the ones that went rogue earlier today?”

  “Oh, those ones? They were all just recruits that I hadn’t bothered remembering yet.” Leyla plopped the marble into Tarras’ mouth. “This is our last one, Tarras. You have to make sure to control yourself until we get more.” Leyka came back to the two of them.

  “Yes, Tarras, you’ll probably…die, I guess, if you don’t.” Her expression suddenly shifted from nonchalant to shocked. “That would be terrible!” Anyone spectating the scene may have found it difficult to discern whether that was sarcasm or bluntness.

  “Take a minute to digest that medicine for a bit and then we’ll finish escaping the capital. We need to make sure to get far away from here before they call for the Harbingers.”

  “Are those Harbingers really that scary, Leyla?” she asked as she went to put the chest piece back on Tarras.

  “Would you want to fight an Iron Knight one-on-one?” Leyka thought on that for a moment.

  “Maybe if there was a lot of distance between us. It would be really hard in close-quarters.”

  “Well, that’s exactly how the Iron Knights would think about them, except double it.”

  “Um…what does that mean?” Leyla sighed.

  “Sorry, it’s my fault for trying to make it too complicated. Yes, they are that scary.”

  “So…do we run away from them? Or do we close in on them?” Leyla’s eyebrow raised in mild annoyance.

  “What would you do if you got in close to them? Smack them with your bow?” Leyka blinked a couple times.

  “So…I’m like an Iron Knight?”

  “What? How did you get that?”

  “I mean…I said I want distance from an Iron Knight…you said Iron Knights think like that about Harbingers...so…I’m like an Iron Knight, right?” Leyla quickly brought her hand to Leyka’s face, as if ready to smack her, but then, she just caressed her cheek instead.

  “If you weren’t my little sister…” she muttered.

  “What did you say?”

  “Nothing! Nothing…alright, one minute is up. Let’s go.”