Chapter 20

Her mother and sister’s screams filled her ears.

Colt’s eyes watching her with betrayal burned her eyelids.

The feel of his warm blood running down her cold arm.

Izzie’s eyes fluttered open to gaze back upon Colt’s decapitated head; the title of ‘leader’ coursed through her veins but the thing that made her smile was the knowledge that she had completed her task.

She had killed the man responsible for her family’s death; for the destruction of her village and hundreds of others like it.

Gazing at Colt’s head; the skin was turning a dark ashen; the hair simply dangled and his eyelids were half-closed.

His neck was torn in two with flies buzzing in and around his orifices; the tip of the spear piercing through his skull; mouth open.

But she could not stay there forever as betrayal was lapping at her heels in the form of Prince Asher; he was lobbying for the control of the Kingdom to slip back into his grasp after his father’s death but Izzie was damned if she was going to let thousands of innocents fall into evil grasp once more.

“Was that absolutely necessary?” The familiar voice asked softly; his footsteps of uncertainty for the past ten minutes behind the door had alerted her to his presence.

“The men need to know who is in charge and what will happen should anyone step out of line,” Izzie tilted her head and gazed up at the head which accompanied many others aboard the city wall, “And besides,” she turned to face Drystan, “It brings me to heights knowing he is enduring as much hell in the afterlife as he should have endured here. His death was too quick for my likening,”

Drystan seemed upset by her answer; “He caused you much pain,” His brows furrowed as he seemed to search her being for something.

He could never understand how much.

Izzie didn’t crack under his gaze; she needed to be the strong leader her men were looking towards; they needed familiarity and guidance through the transition.

A transition which would see them put towards better use.

“I must go and speak with my men,” Izzie turned and headed towards the door.

“Your men?” Drystan asked with shock behind her and Izzie stopped where she stood, “This was all just some power-play to get control of the army!?”

Izzie gritted her teeth and looked out into the distance where new adventures awaited her. Adventures she would wish to discover with Drystan but, alas, it was a place she could not go.

Or a place she did not deserve to go.

“What did you think was going to happen?” Izzie whipped around to face him with fictional anger, “That we could all go running off into the forest again?”

Drystan said nothing but she could see him harden against her onslaught.

“I joined this quest with the promise of a pardon from the King himself so I could go about freely,” Izzie recalled the deal every one of them had made with Brandon, “But now the King is dead; his son is no worse than his treacherous deluded father and my crimes are worse than ever.”

“I thought-” Drystan started when he stepped forward, his arm outstretched towards her.

Izzie flinched away from his grasp when he simply cupped her freshly washed face with his rough palm and it seemed to sear into her.

He was warm; warmer than she thought possible, and she fought to keep her heart from beating out of her chest.

This feeling of lightness; of not knowing, scared her.

“I thought you could move on after this; you have killed your tormentor. The one thing that stopped you moving on before but now-”

“-But now,” Izzie closed her eyes, savouring the feel of his skin against hers, knowing with sorrow that she would never feel it again, “But now,” she sighed, opening her eyes and stepping back, “it is too late.”

Turning on her heel she walked slowly away; her breath catching her throat as she appeared unmoved by her declaration but as soon as she was out of Drystan’s sight she ran.

Her eyes prickled with the distant memory that tears would follow but she would not show them in public; the screams of her victims were starting to descend upon her.

The memory of their blood on her hands and their unfulfilled lives threatening to choke the life out of her by determination alone.

Once she regained her composure, she got her breath back and pushed the constant memories to the back of her mind as she set herself back upon the path she had been taking.

“I was summoned,” Izzie announced her arrival into the private chambers of the deceased King as castle guards opened the door for her to enter.

Prince Asher straightened up as she arrived, smirking at her with the knowledge that under her bravado she still feared him slightly for the magic he possessed.

He could stab her one second with a dagger swirled in darkness and then she could awake the next second with no scar present of such an act.

Looking away from him she saw Theo; a stocky man with a head for strategy and brutality alike, stood beside him.

He had worked under Izzie’s control when she had been in second command; she thought he would make the best general.

“You were,” A new voice spoke up from the shadows across the room and she turned to see Richter step out of them; his hand resting upon the hilt of his sword strapped to his waist.

His hair was dark and he was missing teeth from the ugly fights he got into.

“We have a proposition to put to you,” Another voice sounded behind her, by the doors, and Izzie looked over her shoulder to see Dawn; bruises littering her face, her hair unbrushed and her skin dirty, smiling at her.

Izzie turned in a circle and found herself trapped.

* * *

“Leave him alone!” Jarred hissed when Thomas was thrown across the floor injuring him further as they were expelled from the city by the south entrance; lucky to be alive by the way they were hustled together.

The mercenaries grunted that they were to leave and never return as they stood and guarded the door until they left.

Jarred and Dermot helped Thomas to his feet; their faces to the guards at all times as they slowly back away.

But Drystan couldn’t leave Izzie inside on her own; she isn’t herself after killing Colt. He feared she would do something she could never forgive herself for.

“Drystan!” Iagan growled at him in annoyance, storming up to him and gripping his shoulder, “It is no use now; we shall come back for her,” he added in rough undertones so the guards could not hear.

“You’re no good to her dead,” He added a few seconds later when Drystan was still determined not to move, “Let’s go and regroup and we’ll launch an attack later. I want to sink my axe into their thick skulls as much as you do,”

Reluctantly, Drystan found himself being willingly moved away from the castle and out into the cold.

“We need to launch an assault as soon as possible!” Drystan stood and told the others as they huddled around the small fire with their weapons close.

They did not know who was lurking about.

“To save your lover? We have all made sacrifices in this world.” Dermot shook his head, gazing into the flames.

“To save the woman that saved your life!” Drystan snapped, reminding Dermot of the plenty of times she had kept him from being skinned alive and rightfully, he shrunk into himself.

“I agree with Drystan,” Iagan spoke around his mouthful of bread; tugging at the hard loaf with his teeth, “Izzie is one of us and we don’t leave a brother behind,” They all looked at him, “You know what I mean,” he sighed as he took another bite.

“Isadora’s probably the one that chucked us out on our hides! If that’s not a sign she doesn’t want us there then I don’t know what is,” Jarred muttered as he hugged his cloak around him, hat pulled low over his face as he attempted to sleep, leaning against the tree trunk as the others took watch.

“For our protection!” Drystan growled with frustration.

“And you want us to dishonour her wishes?” Dermot raised an eyebrow, nervous laughter leaving his lips, “She’d kill us herself as soon as she got the chance for such a thing!”

Izzie smiled as she heard them talking a few hundred yards across from her in the forest.

They did not know she was there; nor did they know that she had the choice to either kick them out or watch them die in front of her.

It was either their lives or the kingdoms.

And if one life no longer held any importance than what did a thousand?

Sat on a fallen trunk, dagger clenched in her fist with a fur-lined cloak tied around her neck she listened to them bicker about launching an assault on the castle and wrestled with whether she should tell them the truth.

That it would be useless launching an assault for she would already be dead by the time they reached her?

She was going to-?

“Isadora!?” A voice whispered in shock and she snapped to her feet, reaching out for the hooded figure and throwing them against the trunk.

“Utter a word and it shall be your last,” she whispered, pressing the dagger against his throat, “Now,” she sighed when she was positive that the others hadn’t heard their little tuffle, “Who are you?”

“Izzie, it’s me!” The voice trembled and they shook their hood off their head.

“Thomas,” Izzie stepped back, looking over his shoulder to where the fire still raged in the camp, “What are you doing out here on your own?”

“I’m never alone,” Thomas murmured and she remembered that he meant the Lord, “The question is what are you doing out here on your own?”