The Hand that cut the Stone

The darkness between the lights

The rider held the chain-reins of its furious steed with vigour, its thick leather gloves crushing the reins in a forceful grip. Steam bellowed forth from hot breath, forcing itself through the vents of the rider's full-face helmet, with goggles fitted snuggly in place. A large empty satchel blew loosely in its gust. Two swords were affixed across the back of the golden lamellar armoured rider, clashing together with each rise and fall in the gait of the beastly steed.

Upon a fixture that arched upwards from the saddle behind the rider, was affixed a lantern, which cast a bright glow around them, banishing the darkness through which they penetrated.

The beast's focus remained solely forward, its leather helmet and blinders blocking the light from its vision. The beast's skin was parched and cracked, its eyes encrusted with sand and its mouth frothed, with row upon row of jagged razor-sharp teeth that gnashed together with fury on its bridle bit.

Far behind them, on the distant horizon, an orange light illuminated the misty darkness as a winding vortex of smoke rose into the air. The rider sped towards another illumination in the distance, its source obscured by the silhouette of hillocks.

The steed traversed the ridge of the thicket covered hillock, as a tower revealed itself on the horizon, standing strong within a dome of light, illuminating the foreboding blackness. The rider looked behind and quickly turned its focus to the front. In the far distance, a multitude of small lights bore down in its direction.

The tower began to show its form; a metal circular tower, tapering towards the top, with rows of burning gas torches circumscribing it, each row rising towards its summit with glowing steam. At the sight of the tower, the creature sped up, pushing itself harder and faster. When they approached the tower, the rider let go of the reins with one hand and drew a dagger from its belt. With force, the rider brought the blade down where the head and neck of the creature met, with a slush and a crack. The creature let out a snarl and began to thrash wildly, its head whipping from side to side. The rider dived from the side of the saddle, landed on its feet, tucked into a roll and drew the swords from its back as it stood to its feet.

The creature turned to face the rider as it tried to kick the blade out of its neck with its back leg, groaning in pain. The rider focused its attention on the wounded beast, as the rider began to edge its way towards the steel doors of the metal fortress.

The creature kicked out the blade and moaned, stumbling side to side before locking its four eyes onto the rider. The creature's fury overcame its desire to avoid the light of the flames and charged at the rider blindly. The rider sidestepped as the creature swiped it with its extended talons, as the rider slashed at the exposed and soft flesh of the joint. The rider made a pirouette, parrying another slash from talons, and brought two accurate and powerful slashes from consecutive blades to the back of the beast's neck, causing it to drop to the ground with a thud and a stifled gurgle.

The rider knelt alongside the beast, taking its last autonomous and futile breaths. "I'm sorry," said the rider, its deep voice reverberating within its helmet.

The rider cleaned the blood from its blades in the sand and placed them back in their scabbards. From its belt, the rider withdrew one of three spheres, with chain and lever mechanisms affixed to them. It raised the arm of the creature and tucked the sphere under its arm, before releasing the lever mechanism and resting the arm atop it.

The rider picked up the lantern lying on the ground and extinguished it, affixing it a latch on its belt. The rider stood and approached the door and unlocked the door with a key from a key chain. It pulled the door open and went inside, closing the door behind itself. With haste, it lowered two heavy metal arms into place barring the door shut. Within the spacious entry alcove, a guard sat hunched over, asleep in his chair. The rider locked the door and snapped the key off inside the keyhole. The rider detached another sphere from its belt.