The next morning at breakfast, Grayson and Cenred approach Xander before he is able to eat.

“Come on boy we are ending this,” Grayson orders, not giving Xander an option.

Xander doesn’t argue, he just stands up silently following them out of the cafeteria. They lead him down the halls to the very same room where Xander sparred Grayson before.

Back in the cafeteria, Gwendolyn rushes over to Drakthar and Kayde just as they get their food,

“Quickly follow me”. “We haven’t had a bite to eat yet,” Kayde holds up his plate.

“You can eat while we watch,” Gwendolyn tells them as she rushes out of the cafeteria. Drakthar and Kayde follow her to the surveillance room, which is currently displaying Grayson, Cenred, and Xander in the training room.

“What is this? How can we see them? Are they trapped in this little box?” Drakthar puts his hand up against the screen.

Kayde chuckles a bit, “No dude, they aren’t in the box. A camera is recording them. It captures picture and displays it somewhere else”.

“Sounds unnecessary,” Drakthar folds his arms and leans back in his chair.

They watch as Grayson stands before both Xander and Cenred, “I must say I did not expect a situation like this to occur. I had expected Cenred to marry my daughter for a long time now. So you understand my surprise at this situation”.

Xander speaks up, trying to avoid this conflict, “I assume Gwendolyn has told you everything, and therefore I will assume you know what I know. If you do, you also know I could have stayed away and let events take their course, but she asked me to be here and so I am”.

“By that logic, you are asking me to condemn a man for something he is yet to do,” Grayson points out, still not completely convinced by Gwendolyn’s words.

“No, I am not asking you to do that. All I am asking you is to consider the feelings of your daughter,” Xander turns it back on him assertively.

“Damn Xander seems way more confident than usual,” Kayde observes as he forks down some potatoes.

“It’s because he is serious. He already knows he has won where it matters and that is giving him confidence,” Drakthar points out wisely as he sips some tea. Gwendolyn nods along to Drakthar’s statement, her eyes glued to the screen the entire time, anxious about what will happen.

Back in the room Cenred chimes in on the back and forth between Grayson and Xander, “What do you even know about how Gwen feels boy? You have only known her for a week, I’ve known her for twenty-two years”.

“It would seem you messed up your math somewhere in there,” Xander informs Cenred subtly referring to the other timeline.

“What?” Cenred comments having no clue what Xander is talking about.

Xander shrugs his shoulders, a smirk is plastered on his face.

This angers Cenred even more, “I don’t even know why I’m worried about you. I mean look at you, no muscle definition to speak of. You are scrawny and weak, where I am big and strong. I do admit you have a pretty face, but last time I checked Gwen was into men not women. I’m sure she will wake up and choose the more appealing option”.

Grayson interrupts the two of them giving them each a wooden sword, “Enough with the personal insults”.

Cenred accepts the sword and bows towards Grayson, “I will be victorious, how could I not be when you were the one to train me”. Something clicks in Xander’s head causing him to suppress a smile.

“It’s a fight he’s screwed,” Kayde starts to cover his eyes back in the viewing room. Drakthar and Gwendolyn don’t acknowledge his comment they keep their eyes on the screen waiting to see what happens.

Cenred starts to attack in a familiar technique, which Xander confirms as Grayson’s. Having studied this technique in preparation to land a hit on Grayson, Xander knows exactly how to exploit it.

Cenred finds himself confused as he is the one that is being hit over and over, not to any fault of his own, but just because Xander knows all the openings and flaws in his sword style.

“I have to say I’m a little impressed, but still you don’t have the strength to actually hurt me with any of these weak hits you are landing,” Cenred half complements Xander as he gets hit in the leg.

Xander, in fact, has been focusing on attacking only Cenred’s legs the entire fight.

After so many hits to them, Cenred finally notices the pattern, “I don’t know what game you are playing, but it’s not going to work against me”.

“Holy shit he is actually winning,” Kayde watches in shock as Xander is slowly overwhelming Cenred.

“I’m not surprised. Remember what Xander said about preparing to spar Grayson? If Cenred is indeed Grayson’s apprentice then Xander is fighting against that technique, but it’s being executed at a lower level making it even easier to exploit,” Drakthar easily picks up on what is really going on, his battle sense as sharp as ever.

Back in the room, Cenred is starting to get wobbly, his stance is weak from all of the punishment his legs have taken. He is unable to dodge Xander’s sweep at his legs. There is an audible thud in the room as Cenred falls to the floor.

Xander points the wooden sword at Cenred’s neck, “You lost because you underestimated your opponent”.

Cenred starts to try and pull himself up off the ground, “You think you have won? I will stand back up and crush that scrawny body of yours”.

As Cenred fails to get up his insults intensify, “Look at you, I mean who could have given birth to a weak failure like you? They probably took one look at you and threw you out”.

Xander’s calm is lost immediately as Cenred brings up his parents, kind of a touchy subject given he never knew them. He tightens his hold on his wooden sword for a second before deciding to throw it aside altogether.

Xander is done giving Cenred an opportunity to get up, he gets on top of him and starts to punch him across the face over and over, blood slowly starting to seep out from Cenred’s nose after each collision of fist and head.

Cenred can only look up at Xander between each bolt of pain. He doesn’t see the boy he assumed Xander was, but a rabid animal that has been backing into a corner and is fighting for its life.

The pain is seemingly endless until suddenly they both hear, “Xander stop!”

Xander holds his fist back, complying with Gwendolyn’s plea. He slowly stands up and looks at her in confusion, why would she want him to stop?

Xander doesn’t have enough time to figure it out, he feels himself falling backward, tripped by Cenred who has finally found his opportunity. He pins Xander to the ground exactly how Xander did to him before.

“You were foolish to think she could ever like you over me. She will always belong to me,” Cenred starts to punch Xander exactly as Xander did to him. His joy in this moment completely drowns out Gwendolyn’s protests to his claims.

Gwendolyn’s eyes start to fill with tears as she slowly realizes she caused Xander to be in this position.

“Cenred, stop! Please!” She pleads desperately wanting this to end.

This time Cenred hears her but doesn’t care to listen. In his mind, this is her punishment for defying him and forcing him to go through all of this.

Xander can’t endure the pain any longer; he seemingly passes out, his head pushed from side to side without any resistance anymore after he does so.

Grayson notices this and grabs a hold of Cenred’s arm stopping him, “It is over son, back off of him”.

Cenred gets up and straightens his shirt; “Good now that I have won can we get this fool and his friends off the airship?”

Grayson looks at his crying daughter, then back at Cenred, “Here, today, you have lost. You are no longer engaged to my daughter. I will now ask you to accept my decision and continue as a part of the Silent Brotherhood or leave this airship immediately”.

Cenred’s face drops, how could he have lost? He won the fight. He voices his confusion, “How I won the fight?”

“It is because in the critical moment he listened and you did not,” Grayson informs him, Cenred’s lack of understanding reassuring him of his decision.

“I was saving this for him, but now you give me no choice,” Cenred pulls a knife tucked away in his boot.

He quickly grabs the sobbing Gwendolyn and holds the knife at her throat, “I’m sorry old man, but now I’m going to have to take your daughter”.

Grayson watches in horror as the edges of the knife that Cenred is holding flat to Gwendolyn’s neck slowly starts to cut into her, leaving shallow marks on either side of it.

Cenred has now made it to the edge of the room, and with his free hand, he opens the door behind him.

“Say goodbye to your father Gwen,” Cenred taunts her as he is slowly getting what he wants.

Gwendolyn doesn’t say anything; instead, suddenly she no longer feels the knife against her throat. She looks down to confirm it is in fact gone, and so is Cenred. She looks up and sees him lying on the floor where Xander was.

Grayson quickly springs into action, knocking the knife out of Cenred’s hand and holding him down.

“Fuck you old man!” Cenred screams knowing it is over.

“Give me one reason not to kill you right here,” Grayson glares angrily down at the filth that tried to just kidnap his daughter. Cenred just smirks back up at him. Grayson grabs a nearby wooden sword and knocks him out with a single blow to the head.

After everything is resolved, Gwendolyn turns around to help the bloodied Xander on the ground behind her. She finds that he isn’t conscious anymore either. Just as she realizes this Drakthar and Kayde show up.

“We need to get him to the infirmary,” Gwendolyn tells them. Drakthar picks up Xander and throws him over his shoulder. They follow a rushed Gwendolyn as they jog down the long halls of the airship.

They arrive and Drakthar puts Xander down in a bed. The ship’s doctor starts to examine his injuries.

“Not to be rude, but why did you stop Xander? He was winning,” Kayde asks Gwendolyn as they wait.

Gwendolyn who had stopped crying starts to again, knowing that Xander wouldn’t be like this if she didn’t intervene.

Drakthar puts a hand on her shoulder, “It’s okay, I understand you didn’t want to see him like that”.

“Shit, I’m sorry I said anything,” Kayde apologizes for making her cry again.

An hour later Xander wakes up and sees Gwendolyn, Drakthar, and Kayde at his bedside, “It looked good for a second there”. He coughs, ruining the delivery of his quip.

He looks directly into Gwendolyn’s eyes, “I am sorry. You were right to stop me; I lost my cool out there. If you did not stop me I would have regretted it”.

“You fought well, you have nothing to be ashamed of,” Drakthar praises his friend’s efforts.

Kayde adds enthusiastically, “For sure man, to be honest, I thought you had no chance”.

“Thanks, guys,” Xander attempts to smile but ends up wincing due to the pain the action causes from the bruising on his face.

“We’ll get out of your hair now, you two should have some alone time,” Kayde tells Xander as he and Drakthar leave.

Gwendolyn leans towards Xander in her chair, resting her head on his chest.

“Thank you,” she whispers softly.

“I did promise that I would always be there to help you out didn’t I?” He reminds her of their previous conversation on this very same airship.

Gwendolyn scans the damage to his face, and tears start to silently fall from her eyes once again, “I should have listened to you. I should have come here alone”.

“Nah, I think everything worked out okay,” Xander brushes off that statement.

“What do you mean everything worked out okay! You are all beat up and Cenred tried to kill me!” Gwendolyn stops crying and starts to scold him.

Xander puts an arm around her and explains calmly, “You are here next to me, that is what makes it okay”.

Gwendolyn punches him in the arm, “Stop saying all these smooth things. It’s embarrassing”.

“I’m sorry I can’t help saying what I feel,” Xander apologizes, surprised by her reaction.

“It’s fine, just don’t come back to me this beat up again,” Gwendolyn passionately implores him.

“I’ll try not to…” he begins to respond before seeing her eyes start to turn angry.

“I meant yes, I won’t ever get this hurt again,” he immediately changes course causing both of them to laugh.