The sleet came down in thin, sharp needles, turning Hollow Hearth into a world of grey mist and sucking mud.
Calder stood near the broken door frame, Dog's Hunger slung heavy across his back.
Behind him, the warband kept watch.
No talking.
Just breathing, slow and heavy, like men waiting for an axe to fall.
Movement flickered at the edge of the village.
Figures moving fast between the broken houses.
Calder's hand dropped to the hilt of Dog's Hunger. The others shifted too, steel rasping quietly from sheaths.
They poured into Hollow Hearth without warning —Twenty-five, maybe thirty hard-looking men.
Scarred armor. Broken weapons. Blood-stained tabards.
Thornhollow's enforcers.
Not soldiers.
Collectors.
Killers.
Men paid to take more than they were worth.
They moved fast.
A fist smashed a woman to the ground.
A boot drove into a child's ribs.
Spears jabbed into empty air, herding the villagers into the open.
Demands followed — for food, for taxes, for obedience.
Volner, the leader, strode into the center of Hollow Hearth like he owned it.
Broad-shouldered, ugly as a split log, nose flattened from too many fights.
A heavy mace hung from his belt, worn smooth from use.
He barked orders and his men moved like a pack of hungry dogs.
No posturing.
No show.
Just violence.
The crack of bone and the hiss of cold laughter filled the square.
Father Bryn came to Calder at a half-run, robes soaked through, eyes wild.
"Please," he rasped, voice low but urgent.
"They'll tear the village apart."
Calder said nothing. Weighing the odds in silence.
Fight — and draw more blood. Stay silent — and watch the village burn around them.
Neither was good.
Father Bryn saw the hesitation in his eyes and faltered, mouth opening, closing.
The plea died on his tongue.
It was Branwen who moved.
Sword bare in his hand, shoulders squared.
No speeches.
No hesitation.
Just a boy who still thought the world could be fixed by standing tall.
Calder watched.
Cold.
The boy would learn soon enough.
Branwen's blade flashed once in the weak light.
A warning.
Volner turned slowly, taking in the warband behind him.
The battered armor.
The hollow faces.
The ready blades.
His gaze settled on Calder.
Recognition flickered.
No arrogance.
No smirks.
Just the grim understanding of one killer spotting another.
"Stonewolf," Volner said, voice rough as gravel.
The fighting started like a knife slipped into ribs — fast, ugly, sudden.
Branwen cut down a man who lunged too fast — a clean thrust through the gut.
The square erupted into chaos.
Eddric moved to flank Volner, sword raised.
Quick. Desperate.
Volner turned without warning.
The mace flashed once —A heavy, brutal arc.
It caught Eddric across the ribs. Bone shattered like wet driftwood.
Eddric collapsed, blood pouring from his mouth, twitching once before going still.
Calder registered it.
One glance.
One more corpse in the mud.
Then he drove forward.
The warband followed Calder's lead, slamming into the enforcers.
Vryce moved like a shadow, spear flashing low, cutting tendons and throats.
Jast broke a man's shield with a sword blow, driving steel into the soft gap between collar and throat.
Mud churned underfoot. Sleet hissed against blood-soaked cloaks.
The world narrowed to kill or die.
Volner fought through it all, a force of pure violence.
He hurled a half-dead peasant into Calder's path to slow him, swung his mace low and fast at anyone dumb enough to close.
One enforcer tried to break and run —Volner smashed his skull without blinking, clearing space.
No loyalty. Only survival.
Calder met him head-on.
Dog's Hunger clashed against the mace with a sound like a church bell breaking.
Volner pushed hard, heavy strikes hammering at Calder's guard, trying to break through by brute weight.
Calder slipped aside from a wide arc, grabbed a handful of mud, and flung it into Volner's face.
Volner snarled, stumbled, wiping at his eyes.
Calder pressed forward —Boot in the ribs. Pommel across the jaw. Steel flashing low.
Volner recovered fast — too fast — catching Dog's Hunger on the haft of his mace, shoving Calder back.
They circled now.
Neither playing for time.
Neither looking for mercy.
Just two beasts weighing who would fall first.
Around them, the battle raged.
Screams.
Steel on steel.
The wet sound of men dying.
A woman shrieked as an enforcer drove a knife into her belly —
Vryce caught him from behind, splitting his skull with an axe stolen from another corpse.
Jast fell — a spear thrust up under his arm —but not before gutting his killer with a final, brutal thrust.
Calder and Volner clashed again —a brutal crash of bodies, shoulders, fists.
Volner slammed Calder into the broken stone of the well, drove a knee into his gut.
Calder grunted, shifted his weight low, and drove Dog's Hunger up under Volner's guard.
The edge glanced off mail, but the force staggered the bigger man.
Mud and blood sprayed.
Volner came in hard, swinging the mace low and fast.
Calder caught it on Dog's Hunger, the impact jarring up his arms.
He twisted, shoving the blade forward — Volner knocked it aside with the haft of his weapon, stepping inside.
An elbow smashed into Calder's jaw.
Lights popped behind his eyes.
Calder answered with a headbutt, feeling Volner's nose crunch under the blow.
They broke apart, blood dripping from both.
Breathing heavy.
Eyes locked.
No words.
No space for them.
Volner lunged again, trying to hook Calder's ankle with the head of his mace.
Calder sidestepped, barely clearing it, and drove a heavy kick into Volner's ribs.
The bigger man grunted but didn't fall.
Instead, Volner swung again — wide, savage — forcing Calder to duck low, boots slipping in the muck.
Dog's Hunger lashed out, carving a deep line across Volner's thigh.
Blood sprayed, steaming in the cold.
Volner staggered, cursing low.
Still standing.
Still dangerous.
They circled each other, slower now.
Both bleeding.
Both breathing like forge bellows.
Calder shifted his grip.
No finesse now.
No clever tricks.
Just the simple, ugly math of survival.
Volner came at him one last time.
Calder let him.
Stepped inside the swing —Boot slammed into Volner's knee.
Dog's Hunger came up in a brutal arc.
The blade split Volner's skull from crown to jaw.
The enforcer collapsed without a sound, twitching once in the mud.
Calder stood over the corpse, blood steaming on his blade.
The fight was over.
The Marches didn't care.
Neither did Calder.
Silence fell over Hollow Hearth.
The few surviving enforcers threw down their weapons. Those too slow were dragged down and gutted where they stood.
The villagers crept out of their hovels.
Bloodied. Hollow-eyed.
They stared at Branwen, not Calder.
Not the Stonewolf who broke the enemy.
But the boy who had stepped forward first.
The boy who had dared.
Father Bryn moved among them, whispering.
Gesturing.
Planting seeds.
Calder watched from the edge of it all.
Eyes cold.
Mouth grim.
He saw the shift happening —
small now, but inevitable.
Loyalty was a currency.
And Father Bryn was already buying hearts with it.
Not with truth.
But with hope.
The most dangerous lie of all.
Lies dressed up as hope.
The kind of lies men died for.
The kind that burned kingdoms to ash.
And Branwen — he was already wearing the first stones of a crown he didn't even know he was building.
Calder wiped his blade clean and turned away.
There was no saving the boy from it now.