12 Hugo
Hugo
A Soulless Knight was the last thing Hugo needed right now. The slightly modified Iron Empire sigil on their leather chest
piece was the giveaway that he was facing the Iron Empire’s newest type of soldier. They’d just been an idea when he’d left
the keep, but an idea nearing completion nonetheless. Dr. Balet, who Hugo liked to think was just a monster with a high opinion
of himself, had insisted that they were nearly there when he’d decided to flee the capital.
The sword gleamed slightly in the dim light of the alley. Viscountess Westcotte—Eira—stood behind him. He had been so unbelievably
blind. Frustrated all day at the fact that she had been pretending not to know him, completely forgetting that memory magic
existed. It wasn’t common, and it was certainly outlawed, but that didn’t mean some witch hadn’t cast something on Eira to
have her forget who she was. Whoever had done this to her was going to feel the cold steel of his blade; that he knew for
certain. But first, he needed to handle whatever this thing in front of him was.
“Venton, you know I have to kill you,” the voice said, vaguely familiar to him in the hollowest of ways. Disrespectful of them to only use his last name—the Iron Retinue really did hate him now, didn’t they?
“I’m not sure I know you,” he said, slowly stepping forward and willing Eira to stay where she was. “How do you know my name?”
The creature, or person—Hugo wasn’t certain what they were at this point—threw off their hood. He looked into the changed
eyes of one of his fellow Iron Retinue knights, Saoirse.
He instantly felt ill. Her once-deep-brown eyes were a hollowed-out white. No pupils, no irises, just a milky white void as
she stared blankly at him. Her pale skin was somehow even paler than it had been before, as if it was made of bone now, and
her hair was gone. The copper bob she’d had was shorn off, cropped to her scalp.
“What did they do to you?” Hugo swallowed, his throat suddenly dry as he took another step forward, his eyes flicking down
to her feet to get a sense of her positioning.
“I was made anew,” she said. The rich substance he’d known her voice to always have was all but gone now. “The Iron Empire
rewards those who push forward our future, and I am the future of our army.” She swung, her greatsword barreling toward Hugo
in the blink of an eye.
There was no world where Saoirse could have swung a sword that heavy with as much ease as she just had. He’d served alongside
Saoirse for years after the Iron Empire usurped the De Clares, watched her fight countless times. She’d been strong before,
but not like that. Hugo felt sick to his stomach. Whatever she’d become . . . it wasn’t a person anymore. He parried, jumping
out of the way and knocking her greatsword to the side with his own blade. Saoirse was knocked off balance slightly, but corrected
faster than she ever had before, turning to him.
“We’re friends,” Hugo said, blocking her swings, which were coming faster and harder as she swung over and over again. “We
don’t need to do this.”
“Betrayers are not friends,” her voice dragged out inhumanly, swinging again and only nearly missing him.
He needed to surprise her and catch her off guard. Saoirse was dominating him in this fight, and he couldn’t put Eira in harm’s
way. The next time she swung he dived again, but not out of the way. He rolled toward her, standing up again behind her and
quickly lashing out, swiping her back with his blade and aiming to knock her down so he could finish this fight. He slashed
down, his sword cutting through Saoirse’s leathers in a swift motion. Hugo repositioned, the point of the sword ready to swing
once she dropped to her knees. Except . . . she didn’t.
She turned slowly, her hollow voice chuckling. “You are a fool for fighting me, Venton.”
Shit.
She swung, and Hugo dodged her—barely. He turned to try to swing back but she was already there, swinging again, but this
time it connected. The greatsword slammed into Hugo’s shoulder, the blade slicing through his leathers and into his flesh.
Pain flared and heat flushed through his body as he felt blood trickle down his shirt.
Eira gasped in the distance.
Shit, shit, shit.
“Allow me to execute you, and this can be done,” Saoirse spoke, voice hollow and unemotional.
“You chased me all the way here just to execute me for deserting?” he scoffed. “I thought the punishment for desertion was
worse than death.”
Hugo needed to goad her, get her thinking that he was going to talk—anything that could give him a leg up in this fight. Saoirse’s
sword had connected with the arm Hugo wielded a dagger with, but his sword arm was still capable. He could still fight—for
now.
“You are not just a deserter, you are seeking the return of the De Clares,” she answered, lumbering toward him. “And for that, you must die.”
How did they know that? She probably just heard you convincing Eira that you needed to find the princess, he thought, realizing the mistake immediately. They should have never had this conversation where someone could overhear them.
He moved, feigning to the right and swinging upward with enough force that he hoped he’d cut her sword-wielding arm off.
Eira gasped again from behind him and he knew as he turned around he’d managed it. The sword and Saiorse’s arm lay on the
ground, but there was a distinct lack of blood. He looked to his opponent, who was still watching him dispassionately, her
armless shoulder a mound of darkened, decaying flesh.
What had they turned her into? Dread filled him as he realized the implications. A soldier that didn’t fall when losing a
limb and was inhumanly strong.
No, he thought, mind racing. This is a nightmare.
“It doesn’t have to be like this,” he said, stepping on her discarded sword and pointing his blade at her chest.
She moved quicker than he could react, slamming her remaining hand into his jaw and sending him spinning. Hugo stumbled back,
his shoulder throbbing alongside his jaw, which he was fleetingly concerned might be broken.
He looked up and watched Saoirse pick up her greatsword and turn toward him, her once-graceful frame moving with a stiffness
he had never seen in her before. As she lifted the greatsword with her remaining arm, seemingly unfazed at the loss of her
other limb, he watched her suddenly slump to the ground, revealing Eira standing behind her.
Eira’s hand moved slowly toward her own chest as Hugo glanced down at Saoirse, who now had a dagger Hugo had never seen before
embedded in the back of her neck.
He stood slowly, grunting through the pain, and watched as Eira stepped over the soldier’s body before pulling her knife out and dropping it on the ground.
Hugo stumbled over to Saoirse’s body to check for a pulse and found cold skin under his hand, colder than any of the people he’d killed on battlefields.
Something was very, very wrong with whatever they had done to her.
“I could have handled it,” he grunted, scooping up the blade that Eira had dropped with his good arm. “You didn’t need to
do that.”
She put her hands on her hips, cocking her eyebrow. “You could have handled it? You were about to be sliced in half!”
“I could have—” Hugo started before standing and then stumbling, his vision tunnelling from losing so much blood as the adrenaline
waned.
“We need to get you inside and bandaged,” Eira gasped, and she headed over to support him, looping her arm around his waist
and draping his uninjured arm over her shoulder as they stumbled back toward the tavern.
“We need to leave this town,” he said, shaking his head. “We needed to leave hours ago.”
“You’re in no condition to ride,” Eira retorted, pushing the door to the tavern open and skirting them to a set of stairs
without stepping into the main area where everyone was still gathered, drinking.
Hugo had never been so grateful that taverns allowed their guests to discreetly avoid crowds if they wished. “You can ride,”
Hugo said, gritting his teeth through every step they took. “You’re an incredibly proficient rider. Arthur is a good horse,
he’ll run for you.”
“This is why I don’t think I am who you say I am, because I don’t ride horses,” she answered, breathing heavily as she heaved
him up the stairs.
“You do,” Hugo answered breathily as his vision darkened, and they stepped into their shared room.