For an awful half-second, Len wondered if they’d moved on. As terrible as dealing with this now would be, the thought of having to deal with it if and when they randomly showed up at the Hovel was infinitely worse. Her nerves were frayed, her stomach was on the verge of revolt, and every fiber of her being called for violence. But moving carelessly now would have serious repercussions down the road, and she needed to handle it correctly. Before the doubt could really start to set in, the door opened and a smirking Venar stood in front of her.

“Oh, hey there, ‘boss’. What brings you out to our little corner of banishment?”

“Be very careful, Venar,” she said slowly. “Your next words could be your last.”

“Scary,” he said with a grin, then stepped back into the cabin to allow her entry.

“Where’s Tess?”

“Oh, she’s out and about somewhere, I’m sure. Keeping an eye on things, you understand.”

“Get her here, now.”

“Can’t do that. I have the sneaking suspicion that you mean us harm, and I can’t be putting my partner at risk, now can I? Especially when she might have a good vantage point to take your friends out right this instant if I were to, just as a random thought, give her some sort of signal.”

“Fine then. Did you murder that girl’s parents and send her after me?”

“Answer her, Venar,” barked Valkar, who’d closed the distance to get to the entrance.

“So what if I did? Who’s gonna miss a couple of banished humans? So long as they’ve got that brand, they’re fair game. We’d let these three go a little longer than we usually do before harvesting them. They set things up pretty nice for us. Figure Tess and I can just stay put here while you all die back at that shithole.”

“Why send the kid after me?”

“Figured that’d be as good a resignation letter as any. Maybe she killed you, maybe she didn’t. You’d eventually get the hint that we weren’t coming back. Besides, it was funny.”

“You orphaned this girl, tried to get her to assassinate me, and all you’ve got to say for yourself is that you thought it was funny?”

“Absolutely,” his voice dropped all signs of joviality. “You’re just the latest in a long parade of fools who thought they could do something here. At first I assumed you were just as useless as the rest, but you’re actually worse. You think you’re better than us. That you have a right to tell us how to live. Making peace with the humans? Forging an alliance? They are all our prey, to be devoured and cast aside as we deem fit. Someday the Demon Lord will send a proper force to subjugate this filth, and when that happens, Tess and I will be right there ready to serve again. Until then, we’re done with this. Now, be a good little girl, and run away. Tess is ready to take the head off of one of your little goblin pets as soon as she gets the slightest hint that I’m in danger.”

“Buddy, you were in danger the moment you let me get close to you.”

Her hand lashed out, catching his left wrist in an iron grip. He yelped in surprise and tried to pull back, but she stepped inside his reach and slipped behind him, wrenching the arm violently as she pinned it to his back. Pushing him out the door, she dropped him to his knees with a kick at the back of his legs. He struggled against her, but her grip held, and his resistance stopped when she held her blade against his neck.

“Move so much as an inch and you’re dead,” she whispered into his year before yelling out to Tess. “One chance, huntress. Surrender now and you both get to live.”

Keseryn’s mouth opened to cry out at the betrayal of even giving them that one chance, but Moe grabbed her and pulled her back, away from the covered corpses of her parents and conveniently out of line of sight from the treeline. She struggles against him, but couldn’t overpower him. Larry looked around nervously, and Valkar looked to be bordering on a fit of rage.

“You’re really going to let her do this, Valkar? Kill two of your own?”

“Shut your mouth, Venar. She’s the commander, she makes the calls, we follow them.”

“That’s bullshit. You know as well as I do that when one of these fools gets too out of line, we put them down. Hell, you’ve helped us do it.”

Len glanced at him warily.

“When they were a true threat to us, were going to get us killed, sure. But this? And don’t you dare get high and mighty with me, you already said you’d be abandoning us.”

“You could stay with us. Let the others die off and head back once there’s something useful to make of the place again.”

“I serve the commander and I serve the Hovel,” Valkar said stiffly. “You seem to have forgotten who you are supposed to be serving.”

“Wake up, you damned fool! There’s no one to serve but ourselves!”

Len was only allowing this to play out because she needed Valkar’s answer. She was hopeful that he’d make the right call, but she couldn’t make it for him. She saw Larry ready to make a move if necessary, frantically scanning the treeline for Tess’ location. Wherever she was, she was well hidden.

“Time’s running out, Tess!” Len yelled at the top of her lungs. “Show yourself or I’ll end him and hunt you down next.”

“You want me, here I am,” hissed the female Orc from behind her.

Sensing the incoming strike, Len dove into the snowbank beside the house. A hatchet sliced through the air where she had been, narrowly missing her. Her dagger nicked Venar’s neck, but didn’t cut deep enough to be fatal. Blood oozed from the wound as he rose to his feet.

“Shoulda just left us in peace,” he said, taking an offered hatchet from his comrade. “Now you die. Then your friends die, then the we have some fun cutting the girl to pieces before she dies. Valkar, this is your last chance. Join us or die alongside this fool.”

Len swore under her breath, rose to her feet, and waited for Valkar’s decision.

“I think…” he said slowly. “I think you can go to hell, you goddamn traitors.”

If it would have been appropriate, Len would’ve cried with relief at that. One problem solved, now just for the two very large, very fierce problems in front of her.

“Moe,” she said to her minion. “Keep her out of this, we’ll deal with it.”

Moe nodded and continued to hold Keseryn firmly, though he removed his hand from her mouth now that she couldn’t say anything to jeopardize things. The girl looked pissed, but didn’t seem to be struggling anymore. Len spared a small smile at her before turning her full attention to the threat at hand.

Two of them, three on her side. Well, two and a half, depending on how one wanted to count Larry. She’d caught Venar off guard with that hold, it had been a lucky gamble that had paid off but was ultimately wasted. She wouldn’t get that chance again. She and Larry each had a dagger with them, while Valkar at least had his sword. The hunters each had a roughly two-foot hatchet that gave them better reach, but not so much that the daggers were totally outmatched. But that wasn’t the only advantage Len had to press. It’d suck, but she supposed she didn’t have any better options at the moment.

Rushing through the hand gestures and calling up the power that Pitch had called Flagellation, Len linked up with Larry and Valkar, bestowing the speed and strength enhancements that came with it. The moment she finished, her nerves burst into agonizing flame. She almost cried out, but managed to keep herself in check as the miserable sensation washed over her.

Larry grinned wickedly and dashed forward with almost impossible quickness. Valkar took a second to realize what had happened before lunging forward himself. Len just sank to her knees to bear the pain, expending every ounce of will that she had to keep from passing out. She’d hoped that she’d have a better handle on it by now, but getting away with not using it for a while seemed to have destroyed any tolerance she might have built up to it. Or she was just kidding herself to think that she’d ever get better at handling it.

For all their enhanced speed and strength, Larry and Valkar didn’t outclass the hunters. To be sure, they were startled by the sudden fury of their attackers, but after adjusting to the new reality, they began to parry strikes that came faster than any normal foe would be able to make. They were clearly better combatants than the rest of the Hovel, and a small, cynical, part of Len cursed that they were losing these two. She quickly crushed that regret to deal with the task at hand, but it was a wasted opportunity in a land where her opportunities were scarce.

Larry was a sight to behold, striking at Tess from all angles, slipping under strikes that should’ve ended him and coming back again twice as strong. Against most any opponent he’d encountered since teaming up with Len, this would’ve been more than enough. Tess, though, had clearly seen more than her share of violence. These two were no mere hunters. Len was missing something.

Valkar, meanwhile, was having trouble adjusting to his enhanced state. He knew how to fight, obviously, but he was older, slower, and had gotten used to that fact. He relied on putting overwhelming power into his strikes and crushing their guards. Being able to move faster than usual actually seemed to throw him off balance. It was a fact that Venar took full advantage of to avoid killing blows and land several shallow strikes that would cause the Orc trouble if left untreated.

Len tried her best to get back to her feet, but quickly aborted that action as it brought a wave of pain so acute that she nearly passed out from it, and that wasn’t something could afford right now. Something was nagging at her. The way these two moved. She knew it from somewhere. Not her, the other Lenore. It was something she’d seen. Something she’d trained for. What was it, dammit? As she wracked her brain for the answer, she could only watch in horror as, even enhanced as they were, her comrades started being pushed back. Then, almost too late, realization struck.

“Ah crap,” she blurted as it sank in.