Cowardice is your way

Screams tore through the air from every direction, and the weight pressing down on the atmosphere itself pushed Piccaron closer to something past reason. This coalition of mercenaries attacking Baum Goldenir should have been contained — should have, at the very least, been forced into retreat. A flicker of wrongness crossed Piccaron’s vision. But there was no time to chase it. He drew his sword and screamed his way into the chaos.

In the middle of the carnage, he found someone he knew. Chester, run through, already dead.

Whatever restraint he’d been holding onto broke entirely after that. He killed blind, killed anything that moved wrong.

Something in the air began to sap the strength from his limbs. He recognized the pressure instantly — the same aura he’d felt in Merrie.

“Bastards!!! Cowards!! Using ancient poisoned magic to choke Baum’s movements!!”

No one on either side had cast a single spell — this was something else entirely, something that had simply cut off the flow of mana itself, like a hand closing around every throat in the field at once.

The battle turned brutal beyond anything Piccaron had known. His breath was nearly gone. When one of the attacking mercenaries lunged for the killing blow, Marauder stepped between them and took it instead. Another wave of enemy mercenaries closed in, and Siege moved to cover him. Piccaron’s thoughts blurred at the edges. He fumbled a healing potion from his pocket and drank it down.

It did nothing. Even the potion’s effect was choked off before it could take hold. Every kind of exhaustion hit him at once — his hands shaking violently, his flesh burning where wound after wound had opened. He caught sight of Siege in the corner of his eye, just in time to watch him go down under an enemy blade.

Everyone’s mind unraveled into chaos after that. It took two hours before the fighting finally broke — every last attacking mercenary cut down. What remained of Baum Goldenir numbered only in the dozens.

Almost every mercenary belonging to Baum had been present that day, unassigned to any contract but Piccaron and Siege. No one could say for certain whether the guild’s entire membership had truly gathered here — but if they had, this was a wound that could cripple the guild past recovery. And the disaster had no intention of stopping there. Hoofbeats. The clatter of armor. A banner rising against the smoke.

The Kingdom of Elmar.

“Well. You’ve made quite a mess of yourselves.” General Hennesy’s voice carried across the wreckage.

“You cowardly bastard!! Ancient magic and poison—!!” Piccaron’s scream tore raw from his throat.

“Little bird. Isn’t cowardice supposed to be your way of life?” Hennesy’s smile didn’t waver. “It’s cowardice that made you people so gifted at intrigue, at every filthy trick in the book. Call this karma.”

Piccaron felt the pressure of the ancient magic and poison begin, finally, to thin. He gathered whatever was left in his body and forced himself upright. Fury burning through him, he closed his hand around the hilt of his old, worn sword, ready to draw it.

“Piccaron, don’t!!”

Marauder’s scream tore his focus away for one fatal instant — and in that instant, a gust of wind magic slammed into him, hurling him off the cliff’s edge and down into the river below. The last thing he saw before the dark took him was Marauder, standing there, cut down where he stood by General Hennesy’s own hand.

Everything went out after that. Every leaf had fallen from Baum Goldenir. The bird that had guarded the golden tree had finally been brought down.