Eventually, finally, as the sun began to dip back into the horizon again, after a whole day of walking and eating only waybread and apples from their packs as they went, they reached Kirts.

They had rejoined the road more by accident than design about an hour or so beforehand, so in the end they had only to follow it to reach the tumbledown town of log-built buildings. The architecture seemed to be getting more and more ramshackle as they got further North, which fitted what Horatio had heard.

Primus did not even bother splitting the party this time, but at once demanded that they all head for the pub at the centre of the town to enquire as to whether anyone had seen Olivia.

The rest of them followed him into the large wooden building which proclaimed itself as ‘The Broken Staff’.

Horatio was only too glad to set down his burden–the unconscious Braxian assassin–outside the pub before going in. He would attract less attention here, while they decided what to do with him.

Inside the pub was busy, nearly full mainly of muscled men drinking mugs of mead, no doubt after hard days’ work out farming the fields.

‘Wait for me here,’ Primus instructed them, making a beeline straight for the bar where he could talk to the owner about anyone he had seen or any news.

Horatio yawned and looked round the room, remembering again that he hadn’t slept in two days—none of them had. He was beyond exhausted. The Sage has gone mad in his determination to find his granddaughter and pushed them all too hard.

As he scanned the customers, a jolt of surprise shook him when his gaze landed on someone he recognised.

Over in the corner of the pub, sitting hugging her knees on the floor, was a woman with pale pink hair with a green feather in it, wearing a fur-lined, red-hooded cloak.

He searched in his memory for her name.

Helen.

Helen the Huntress.

Helen the Huntress, who had attacked them when they had reached the last room of the tetrachamber back in Balamb.

Horatio stared. It was definitely her, but something was very wrong with her.

For a start, as well as the fact that she was sat on the floor and not on a chair, she had a collar of metal links around her neck, attached to a long chain made of the same. Whereas back in the tetrachamber her eyes and skin had shone with a kind of wild vitality as she thrilled at her hunt, now she looked pale and wan, and her eyes were sallow and sunken in her face.

Something was very wrong indeed.

Horatio followed the chain with his gaze.

At its other end, with it wrapped around his hand, seated at a table not far away, holding forth in conversation with a couple of black-robed men, was a hulking figure wearing a painted-blue suit of armour, a long, purple cape and a white mask with a raised crest.

A sudden shiver shot down Horatio’s spine.

Maybe it was the exhaustion, maybe it was the desire to impress Ceres, maybe it was because he had gotten a taste for liberating women from abusive captors after they had rescued Wyvera from her pimp, or maybe it was all of those things mixed together, but some impulse made Horatio walk over to where Helen sat.

He crouched to speak to her.

‘Hello, Helen,’ he said gently, speaking as he might to someone who was very ill, or unaware of what was going on.

She didn’t do it immediately, but slowly she raised her head from staring down at the floor to regard Horatio. Her turquoise eyes were pleading and weak.

‘Are you…alright?’ he said.

Helen only lowered her gaze to the floor again.

‘Hey, you!’ the man in the mask said all of a sudden in an irritated tone from where he sat nearby. ‘Don’t talk to my dog without my permission! That one’s for rutting and beating, not talking! I caught her fair and square! If you want a bitch to play with, go find your own!’

Horatio stood up. He heard enough already. He strode over to the man, who had gotten out of his seat.

The man was even taller and heavily-built than Horatio–a colossus. The mask betrayed no feeling, only a narrow horizontal slit for the man to look out from, concealing even his eyes, but from behind it the man said, ‘Hild on. You match the description of one of the people there’s a Kill Order out for. A young, thick-set Stanlander with white hair in the garb of a merc. What luck–you’ve come right to me! Are the rest of your little ‘band’ with you?’

Before he could say anything else, Horatio punched the man hard in his stupid mask.

The man staggered backwards, knocking into the table with his hip.

He put a gauntleted hand to his mask as if it was his face. Horatio hadn’t shattered it, but a single, thin crack had appeared, snaking from the chin to just below the eye-slit, like a fracture in a cliff-face.

‘You piece of shit!’ roared the man through the crack. ‘Nobody sucker-punches Samspon, Captain in the Cult of Brax!’

He drew his sword. It was so big that this took quite some time, sliding out of its sheath at his side with a long scraping of steel. At the same time, Horatio noticed that he had let go of Helen’s chain.

‘Horatio, what’s going on here?’

The sellsword turned.

‘Wyvera….’ he said. He hadn’t been expecting her to be the first to appear at his side. The dancer spotted Helen and ran to her, kneeling down and beginning to murmur words of comfort.

The others were making their way over too, Primus included. He was red-faced and looked furious at this diversion, but Horatio didn’t care. Some furious instinct of his own had taken him over, making him do what he was doing.

‘Ah,’ said “Sampson”, the masked Braxian, ‘so you are with the rest of your band!’ The robed people he had been speaking with had gotten up from the table and were backing away slowly. The other customers were scrambling around in a mad panic, running for the door as fast as they could. ‘Even better!’ Sampson exalted shrilly. ‘I shall slay you all, and claim my reward! I’ve dealt with far bigger and worthier ‘bands’ single-handed in my time!’

‘Please, no!’

It was the Wolf-Clan barman who had called out.

‘Please don’t fight in here!’ he pleaded with them all. ‘I just finally managed to repair everything since the last brawl!’

Horatio returned his stare to Sampson’s impassive, cracked visage. He was about to do some serious damage here, and there would no doubt be some collateral. He supposed it was only fair that they avoid trashing this pub.

‘Fine,’ he said. ‘We fight outside.’

Sampson laughed; a manic, mocking sound. ‘Wherever you like! It’s all the same to me where you fall!’

‘You first,’ Horatio said, gesturing to the door with his thumb.

‘As you wish,’ said Sampson.

He marched for the door, not even looking over his shoulder in fear of another cheap shot, and Horatio and the others followed.

‘Boy,’ Primus hissed as he joined him in the procession, ‘what in all hot Hell do you think you are doing?’

‘Shut up, Primus,’ Horatio said. ‘I need to do this.’ At this moment, he didn’t even care if the old man dismissed him from his service for this.

When they got outside, Sampson held out a hand.

‘Here?’ he enquired.

‘Still too close to the inn,’ said Horatio.

They walked further, until they were properly out of the town.

Sampson stopped again.

‘Here?’ he asked again impatiently.

‘This will do,’ said Horatio, his companions all about him.

He gripped the hilt of his sword, and battle was joined.

Boss battle: Sampson, Commander in the Cult of Brax