WitchHunter ✔️

The Assassin

Ace

My cloak parts at the front, revealing my black leather-clad legs crossed on the thick wooden beams . The hem of my cloak dangles down toward the stone floor far below me as I sit in the rafters of the great hall, close enough to hear everything but far enough away to ensure that not a single person knows I'm present, including the one I'm meant to protect. Two stories below me, Velius Dag, my owner and operator, sits at the head of a long rectangular table, lined on each side with wooden chairs. Only the three around him are occupied; a meeting with his most trusted Hunters.

This meeting has been dreadfully long, the stick of moonwood I had gathered just before now whittled down into the form of a child. My hands crave constant movement, a trait that doesn't exactly mesh well with the sneaking lifestyle of my line of work.

The light filtering in through the nearly 30 foot high stained glass window casts mottled colors over the room, and my master's gruff face. He isn't a young man anymore, his years in the field carving trenches through his face that mingle with the old scars there. His hair has greyed and begun receding from his hairline, migrating instead downward to this mustache and beard. He wears the clothing of a noble, as all WitchMasters do, with long, draping sleeves and gold around the hem.

The 3 around him are dressed in the casual clothes of WitchHunters: tanned leather trousers, long cotton shirts, and a black vest with Fortress's emblem emblazoned on the right lapel. Graham, Cruor, and Liam sit at ease, but attentive in their respective places. Their arms are thick with muscle, even relaxed as they are, built for battle. If they were in the field, they'd be wielding heavy weapons: greatswords, battle axes, clubs lined with spikes.

As for me, I prefer smaller, more precise strikes, indicated by the double pistols strapped to my thighs. The shadows in these rafters cling delicately to me, obscuring any sign of my presence. It's my specialty, making myself disappear. I learned in Menagerie when I was but four years old. Now, the shadows know me, and accept me as their own. I'm an assassin of the best sort: the type only rumored to exist. Kindleridge's WitchHunter's guild is guarded by a raven demon with black eyes who can vanish from right in front of you.

I'm mythic, but all myths are born from truth. My black eyes and close relationship with shadows allowed my persona to form into something less human, and more... dangerous.

"And one last announcement before I let you all go." Velius Dag says, sitting back in his chair and extending his arms outward. "Hale will be returning to us soon. As we speak, he and his men are returning on a ship from Vetton."

My stomach drops, and my knife slides sideways, pricking my finger. I watch as crimson blooms on the white skin of my finger tip. Hale Arsen is coming back. After six long years, that loathsome man is returning. I pop my finger in my mouth, the coppery taste of blood not unfamiliar to me.

Hale Arsen. Six years. I struggle to pull his face forward from my memory. 2nd in command, even all those years ago, when he himself was just a teenager. There isn't much I know about him, other than his cruelty. He tormented me for years growing up here. His departure was a relief for not only me, but for many others in Fortress as well. Now he's returning, after being the WitchMaster of his own town for the last 6 years. How much more ruthless will he be? Or will he have tired of ridiculing me and everyone else?

Maybe we will be too small for him to notice.

A moment of speaking later, Velius stands. "Well, thank you all for taking the time to meet with me. We'll meet again in two days time with Hale joining us. You're all dismissed."

The 3 men stand and take their leave as Velius watches from his spot at the head. I take the moment to drop down onto a beam running along the entire stone wall and slither quickly down from there, my hands and feet finding the tiny crevices in the rock like they've done a thousand times before.