“Tell me again why I agreed to do this?” asked Mumford. They stood in the center of the docks. Around them customs buildings and warehouses burned merrily. The heat of the flames caused both men to sweat profusely despite the chill winter weather, and its noxious smoke burned their throat and lungs despite the damp cloths they’d wrapped over their faces.

Frank coughed, then lifted his cloth for a moment to spit on the wood of the docks. “I don’t know,” he said. “Desire for honor and glory? Compassion for your fellow man?”

Mumford eyes lit up as he laughed. “Oh yes, other than drinking, debauchery, and running a few good men through, I’m a regular saint, I am.”

“I’ve heard that ladies adore demon-slayers. I couldn’t help but notice you had your eye on a certain Lady-Knight. Astile, I believe you called her? I’ve yet to hear anyone else call her by her first name.”

Frank had intended the comment to be friendly. While Mumford seemed a bit wild, he looked at Lady Ravenwood in a way that reminded Frank of himself when he’d met Clara. Instead, the light in Mumford’s eyes faded, and he looked down.

“Astile, yes. We were engaged to be married not long ago. Not too long ago. It’s been a few years now.”

“Oh, sorry to hear that.” It was obvious the boy still carried a torch for her. Frank doubted the split had been his idea.

Mumford scratched at his mop of curly hair. “My fault. Her brother was one of those ‘good men’ I ran through.” He cleared his throat. “I doubt even killing a demon or two would return me to her graces after that.”

A harsh wind blew from the sea, bringing with it a burst of relief in the form of fresh and cold air. Both men instinctively sucked in the bounty before it was lost to the smoke. The ring of a fire bell carried over the wharf and the groan of the burning buildings. They jogged down the dock toward the source of the sound.

“You know, if this works, we’ll have to make you an honorary member of the witch-hunters,” Mumford said as they ran.

“At this point, I’d settle for a nice pair of boots.” Frank’s feet were killing him. The thin sandals he’d been given did nothing to cushion them and his heel had started bleeding earlier.

Following the demon through the flaming ruins of buildings had proved impossible. It had switched from spreading the fire to keeping the existing conflagration active and letting the crowded conditions of the city do the rest. Given its aggression, drawing it out wouldn’t be hard, but as it now had most of the waterfront as its playground, simply finding it had been difficult.

They’d borrow more ships’ bells and handed them among Lady Ravenwood’s men with strict orders to ring if the demon was spotted. Now the clanging began and the group converged on the spot it issued from.

Three knights fought the demon on foot. They were heavily armored, like metal-clad crabs that bore tall shields and full covered helmets. They had taken up a line with spears but did not advance. Instead, they kept a defensive position, using their shield to fend off heavy blows and the balls of burning pitch the demon threw in infinite supply. As the other appeared, the demon decided to charge at the new targets, but despite the bulk and size of their armor, the footmen intercepted it. One took a charging blow that slammed him back several feet, yet he somehow remained upright.

“Form a shield front,” Lady Ravenwood barked, and three more footmen took up a guard position. Behind them, the other, lightly armored fighters began to toss short spears at the demon. Quill after quill lodged into the flaming figure, sticking in the oily mass of its center only to slowly ooze out and drop to the dock, its tip covered in burning pitch.

“Steady, back up, back up.”

The spearmen were not harming the demon, not that Frank could tell, but they succeeded in keeping it attention. Whenever it would charge forward, a footman would take the blow, and the other work to push the demon back off him.

Frank and Bringle had agreed that the demon’s unfocused aggression meant it lacked the intelligence of the man who’d sacrificed himself to bring it forth. It had abandoned the prisoners and witch-hunters to attack the crowd and then moved on to the warehouses when there were no people to kill in easy reach. Slowly, they made their way along the docks. The spearmen, footmen, and witch-hunters lured the creature along towards a waiting boat.

It was less fighting a man and more trying to bait a bull for the matador. They had to weaken it first and then Lady Ravenwood could get close enough to finish it with her sword. Only, it didn’t seem to be weakening at all.

Frank shuffled up the wide gangplank that connected the ship to the docks. The demon hesitated. Though its ‘face’ was nothing more than a gooy mass where a head would be, Frank could read reluctance here. For a moment, he feared that it had caught on. That it would return to the safety of the burning buildings. They would have difficulty luring it again as the spearmen were almost out of their throwing javelins.

It made one hesitant step forward and then another, up and up the gangplank. The group spread out around it. Now on a wooden ship with the burning demon. Already the deck warped and blistered where hot, black pitch dropped onto it.

“Shove off,” Ravenwood called. The sailors they’d hired pulled up anchor and moved the sails so the wind blew them away from the harbor. Frank had thought his plan sounds and Lady Ravenwood had agreed to it, but now that he was on a small ship with the demon, he had second thoughts.

Again, the pitch demon rushed forward, eagerly swinging its clublike arms. The footmen had little room to maneuver here, and the demon pinned one to mast. It then slammed its head against the soldiers. Its black ooze flowed into the slits of the man’s full helm. The man wasn’t long for the world after that. The sounds of his screams were muffled as the ooze filled the helm, but he continued to twitch and spasm in pain. His weapon clattered to the ground.

The other footmen pierced the demon’s sides with their heavy spears. Frank grabbed the dropped spear and joined them. He slammed the spear point into its lower back and pushed. Its body was a thick, tarlike substance. Frank grunted as he braced himself and forced the point through the center and out the opposite shoulder.

His hands and face burned so close to the demon, and he staggered backwards. “I thought you said we could weaken it!” Frank said through gritted teeth.

“I thought you could,” responded Ravenwood, calmly, “most demons are not this resilient to damage. Let us hope your idea bears fruit.”

The demon dropped the suffocated soldier and spun around, ripping spears from the grasps of the footmen. A few, like Frank, had been able to pierce all the way through. It seemed emboldened now that it realized they were trapped with it. It swung about wildly, knocking one footman to the ground, and following it up with an overhead blow. Under its blows the boards of the deck shuttered and cracked. The demon wildly pounded on the prone solider, beating him down until boards snapped and the man crashed through to whatever was below.

“Abandon ship!” cried Bringle. They had reached the other vessels waiting for them in the middle of the harbor. The largest was a whaling ship; it dwarfed all the others in length and size. Its sailors drew alongside the knight’s craft with rowboats. Frank wasted no time climbing down the side of the ship on a rope ladder and into the waiting craft.

As the soldiers scrambled to safety, the demon flew after them. It caught two before they made the safety of the waiting crafts. Even then, it strode the deck, lobbing flaming balls of pitch into the waters after the rowboats.

It seemed either unaware or unconcerned as the ship it stood on caught fire. Frank kept an eye out for the foot soldier who’d fallen below, but never spotted him. Soon the ship shone like a bonfire on the waters and sunk below the surface.

Peering at the water, Frank spotted a slowly spreading pool of blackness. The oil demon floated, its fires extinguished, its form leaking out into the salty waters. They tossed out the thick netting used to secure whales. As it twisted and bobbed, tangling itself up in the heavy cord, even as chunks of it loosened and floated free.

“There was a man inside there,” Bringle said. “I think he may still be within.”

Lady Ravenwood nodded as the rower brought the closer to the struggling form. One of the sailors handed Frank one of the long hooks dockworkers used for cargo. He snagged part of the net and pulled it closer to Lady Ravenwood’s boat.

The figure within was smaller than he recalled, but still malformed. It pulled against him and he and sailors struggled to keep it still with their hooks.

Within Lady Ravenwood’s grip, her sword began to glow. The polished steel turned golden as she readied it, and then she thrust downwards to where the heart should be. As the blade slid in, the demon’s flesh smoked and hissed. It thrashed, causing the boats to rock violently.

Finally, it quieted. It’s blackened form solidifying into a rocky substance.

“It’s over,” said Mumford.

“Not until we get all the fires out. I hate to think how many will have lost their homes today,” Lady Ravenwood responded without taking her eyes off the demon. She attempted to pull the sword out, but it had stuck fast within the demon’s hard corpse. “Of all the…”

Frank hauled the demon’s calcified corpse partially onto the boat. “Now try it.”

She did so, planting one boot on its chest and leaning back as she pilled. “It’s caught something,” she said with a grunt.

“Let me try,” said Frank.

She stepped back, waving a hand as if to say it was all his. He gripped the crossguard in one hand and the unsharpened beginning of the blade with the other, and then pulled with all his might. The sword was caught on something. As he strained he heard the hard shell of the crust crack, and a sudden flood of energy filled his body.

In his hand, the longsword glowed. Not the strong golden light it had with Lady Ravenwood, but a brilliant crimson. At last, the chest burst outwards as Frank yanked out blade. Impaled on its end was what looked like a massive stone heart.

The blade’s glow diminished as Frank held it up. He realized the other occupants of the rowboat were all staring at him – Ravenwood, Master Bringle, Mumford, and the sailors.

“What did I just do?” Frank asked.

Lady Ravenwood’s eyes flicked from the sword in his hand – its light dimming – to his face, and back again. “You’ve told why the cult decided to kidnap you and your daughter,” she replied.