Chapter 7: A Crash, A Stab, And a Name

  Moments before the collision—

  Krann’s strikes accelerated.

  Faster than before.

  Sharper. More desperate.

  Steel shrieked through the air as his blades carved at Raian, gouging both flesh and stone. The wall behind Raian splintered under repeated impacts, dust and grit bursting outward with every near miss.

  Raian’s eyes moved rapidly.

  Left. Right. Down. Shoulder. Wrist.

  Pain flared with every shallow cut. His breathing grew heavier.

  Krann saw it.

  This is it.

  He stepped in.

  As before, the right-hand blade stabbed toward Raian’s flank—forcing him left.

  The sword embedded into the wall with a harsh metallic crack.

  Exactly as planned.

  Krann’s lips curled. Seeing Raian shift, he prepared the familiar horizontal slash from his left—

  —but changed it.

  “You’re still far from defeating me,” Krann mocked.

  Instead of slashing, he drove the left blade straight forward—

  A thrust aimed at Raian’s abdomen.

  Behind him—Muzz thundered closer.

  The chamber trembled under the giant tom’s charge.

  A coordinated kill. Two predators. One trapped cub.

  But—

  Raian smiled. At the last possible instant, he twisted.

  The blade tore across his side—flesh parting, blood spilling—but it did not sink deep.

  Krann’s swords lodged into the stone wall behind Raian. Both.

  Locked.

  Raian moved instantly. A low kick snapped into Krann’s left leg. The veteran’s stance buckled. He fell sideways—directly into Muzz’s path.

  Muzz’s eyes widened. “Shit!”

  Too late.

  He tried to leap—but his massive foot came down hard on Krann’s tail. A sharp cry ripped from the old tom as pain shot through him. Then—

  BANG!

  Muzz slammed shoulder-first into the far wall of the vault room. The stone trembled. Dust cascaded from the ceiling.

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  When the echoes faded—Two toms lay sprawled across the floor.

  And the third—stood against the wall.

  Pinned.

  A blade driven clean through his abdomen. Blood ran down the stone in a dark, deliberate line.

  Raian’s vision blurred. The world narrowed—sound dulling, light dimming—his gaze locked on the blade embedded in the right side of his abdomen.

  Too close. Too close to something fatal.

  His breath left him in a low, strained exhale.

  Both hands wrapped around the hilt. His teeth clenched.

  Every remaining fragment of strength gathered into his core.

  A low hiss slipped between his fangs—

  Then—He pulled.

  Flesh tore around steel. Warm blood spilled freely.

  Clank! The blade struck the floor.

  Raian staggered. His right hand pressed hard against the wound, crimson seeping between his fingers.

  But he did not fall. Not yet.

  He stepped forward. Reached. Yanked Krann’s other sword free from the stone wall—then crouched just enough to snatch the fallen blade from the floor.

  Two swords now in his grasp.

  He advanced, limping, toward Krann. The old tom writhed, clutching his tail, eyes wide with pain and disbelief.

  “Wait… wait—WAIT!”

  Stab. Raian drove one blade down through Krann’s right thigh. Steel pierced flesh and hammered into the stone beneath—pinning him to the floor.

  “AAARRRGGGHHH!”

  The scream shattered the chamber. Pain surged through Krann’s aging body, draining strength from his limbs.

  He collapsed flat, helpless.

  Behind them—Muzz groaned beneath fallen debris, stone fragments scattered across his back.

  Shriiink—The second blade dragged across the floor as Raian approached.

  Slow. Measured.

  Muzz lifted his head just in time—Slash!

  Two precise cuts. Both Achilles tendons severed. Muscles parted.

  The massive tom convulsed as his legs failed beneath him. He rolled violently, dislodging the rubble from his back, howling in raw agony.

  Now—Both Thorn-Tail enforcers lay broken on the stone.

  Breathing. Bleeding. Unable to stand.

  And Raian—still upright.

  Howls, hissing, and broken roars echoed through the chamber like an orchestra of agony.

  At last, he dropped to one knee, clutching his abdomen.

  “That was close…” he muttered under his breath, voice thin between shallow inhales.

  “I shouldn’t have faced them both at once. I should have hunted them one by one.”

  Blood dripped steadily to the stone.

  He looked at the two members of the Thorn-Tail Three sprawled before him.

  If Nesk had been here…

  Raian blinked, refusing to finish the thought.

  A low groan cut through the chamber. Muzz lifted his head, eyes burning with pain and confusion.

  “What the fuck is going on?!” he snarled.

  His breathing came ragged, limbs trembling as he struggled against useless legs.

  “Who the fuck are you?!” Panic cracked beneath the rage.

  Krann—aged, broken, pinned by steel and his own failing strength—let out a harsh wheeze. Then, barely audible—

  “Why…?”

  Not a demand. Not defiance. Just disbelief.

  A question that had arrived too late.

  Raian did not answer. He stared at them.

  His gaze held no flame.

  No fury. Only weight.

  Judgment without spectacle.

  “So…” his voice came low and steady, “you do not remember what you did?”

  He pushed himself upright despite the tremor in his body.

  Slowly. Without haste. He turned and walked toward the center of the chamber.

  An old chair stood there—dust-coated, forgotten.

  He grasped it. Dragged it forward.

  The legs scraped across stone. The sound was ordinary—

  but here—

  in a room thick with blood and fear—it carved through the air like a blade across bone. It scraped across what little resolve remained in Muzz and Krann’s chests.

  Raian placed the chair directly before them.

  He sat. Back straight.

  Wound bleeding. Eyes unwavering.

  And in a voice like steel left too long in cold silence—he spoke a single word.

  “Name.”