The sudden, brutal reality of the Eclipse Elite's presence galvanized the Thornleigh Palace.
A soldier, breathless and deferential, relayed the grave intelligence to the Duke.
"Your Grace, the Eclipse Elite has attacked the Blackwood Manor!"
Duke Alexandrino rose from his seat on the dais, his surprise quickly hardening into resolute purpose. The audacity of the attack was a calculated affront.
He issued the command swiftly: "Send the men. Go and check. Catch them."
The soldiers bowed low, accepting the imperative of his will. The Duke settled back, his gaze fixed on some distant, unseen horizon.
"You can't get away like this again," he murmured, his voice a low, cold promise.
The Montrose Chamber
In the hallway of the Thornleigh Palace, the soldiers moved with disciplined urgency, the shuffling of their formations filling the usually quiet corridors.
Cedric heard the muffled roar of activity from within his chamber. Stellan, slowly sitting up, his gaze drawn to the door, spoke with a soft bewilderment.
"What is going on outside?"
"You rest," Cedric said, his tone firm. "I'll go check."
Stellan merely blinked, an obedient stillness settling over him.
Cedric stepped out. A soldier immediately bowed, his posture rigid.
"What's going on? Does Anything happen?" Cedric asked.
"The Eclipse Elite has attacked Blackwood Manor, Sir," the soldier reported, his voice tight with seriousness. "They are still there, so His Grace ordered us to go and catch them alive."
Cedric's eyes widened. A potent mix of shock and fierce determination seized him. He, too, wanted to ride out, to confront the enemy. Though injured, the will to fight was an unyielding, burning thing within him.
"I am coming too," he announced.
The soldier bowed again, acknowledging the command of the injured, yet formidable, Montrose.
Cedric returned to the chamber, gathering his gear. Stellan looked up, a shadow of concern clouding his eyes.
"Where are you going, Montrose?"
"His Grace has summoned me," Cedric replied, avoiding the fuller truth.
Stellan opened his mouth, but the unstated prohibition in Cedric's gaze stopped him.
"You stay here. I will return soon."
Stellan pouted, a flicker of petulance in his expression. "Okay."
Cedric smirked, his heart giving a small, protective twist. He stepped closer and pressed a quick, affectionate kiss to Stellan's cheek.
He left the chamber. Stellan watched the closed door, the lingering sense of unease coalescing into a sure knowledge: something was deeply wrong.
Cedric, meanwhile, moved with newfound alacrity. Last time, the Elite had maimed him. This time, he would not squander the chance for retribution.
In the Blackwood study, Kelian had found his
rhythm, fighting with a deadly grace fueled by his superior, inhuman stamina. The fight was no longer a dance; it was an execution.
Elias labored, his breaths coming in painful, shallow gasps. He parried Kelian's whiplash attacks, his every movement a struggle against exhaustion and injury. His resolve, however, was anchored by a single, sacred duty: protect August at all costs.
Kelian's blade found its mark, a sharp, searing slash across Elias's arm. Elias hissed, but instantly locked down the pain, refusing the indulgence of feeling.
Kelian, a predator savoring the hunt, wiped the blood from the corner of his lips and sucked it clean.
"So, what were you calling, huh?" Kelian taunted, dodging Elias's desperate counter-attack with unnerving speed. He laughed, a high, mocking sound. "What happened? You look pathetic now."
Elias snarled, his eyes burning with helpless fury as he lunged forward again, his attack clumsy and devastated.
"First of all, I can still be merciful," Kelian offered, a lie wrapped in sadism.
Elias did not listen, launching yet another futile strike.
"You!" August barked, the sight of Elias's humiliation breaking his restraint. He wasn't calling to Elias; he was addressing the assassin. "Stop it already!"
Kelian paused, his head cocked.
"Now your target is me," August declared, forcing his voice to be steady. "So why are you wasting your time?"
Kelian spun, his body coiled, then advanced with a deceptive leisure. "I know, I know. But first, let me get rid of him."
August's heart strangled in his chest. A desperate gamble was all he had left.
"Have you forgotten that my father slaughtered your father?"
Kelian's face froze, every vestige of humor instantly gone. His mouth twitched, the sudden, raw mention of his dead father a visible, crippling wound.
Elias, stunned, looked at August. His father?
August pressed the attack.
"I was your target! Now let go of Elias!"
Kelian's teeth clamped down with a bone-jarring force. The ancient, agonizing pain of loss flared. "I'll kill you!" he roared, his speed exploding beyond its previous boundaries.
"You fucking brat!".
He slashed, and Elias, his guard momentarily dropped by the shock, clutched his ribcage, a deep gasp tearing from his lips.
August went pale, but he moved forward, accepting the inevitability.
Kelian reached him first, his movement an obscene blurring of grace and violence. He grabbed August's chin, forcing his head back.
"You were talking what?" Kelian's voice was a barely contained shriek of rage.
August wrenched his hand free to grab Kelian's wrist. "I said my father killed your father, and that makes me your target, not Elias!"
The true, white-hot fury took hold of Kelian. He snarled, his breath hot and toxic. "Was being whipped wasn't enough to make you understand what that bastard did?"
"You bastard! If you dare to humiliate my father, I will kill you!" August retorted, his own rage a flaring, desperate counterpoint.
Kelian threw back his head and laughed, a hollow, terrifying sound. "You kill me? But it's totally opposite—you are in my grip, you can't do anything!"
August clenched his teeth, his entire being alight with helpless fury.
Elias staggered onto his legs, his blade raised. "Let go of him!"
Kelian lifted an eyebrow in mock surprise. "Ohh, still has energy, huh?" He addressed Elias: "Next time, I promise, it will be your turn."
Then, he turned his full, terrible attention back to August.
Kelian drew his blade back. In the sudden, brutal stillness, the noon light caught the steel, glinting off the streaks of dried blood. August did not flinch. Elias's eyes widened to impossible saucers.
Kelian did not hesitate. He drove the blade deep into August's stomach, the tip emerging wet and glistening from the other side.
August's eyes went wide with paralyzing shock. Blood surged from his mouth.
Kelian finally laughed, a sound of triumphant, demented release.
"Finally!"
Elias watched in horror, clutching his own wounded body. "You bastard!"
"What you gonna do about it, huh?" Kelian challenged, then brutally shoved August away.
August collapsed to the floor, the immense, burning pain of his severed organs stealing his breath.
Blood gushed from the mortal wound.
"I told you to not—" Elias began, the words choked by guilt and horror.
Kelian moved toward Elias, closing the distance, his hunting amusement returning. "Quite the hero, now.
Now, now, get up and finish what you were having!"
Elias hissed, his gaze locked on August, who was struggling desperately for air.
Something dark and painful twisted in Elias's heart. He seized his blade, his willpower overriding his mortal wounds, and surged to his feet.
Kelian looked genuinely surprised. "That's kind of new."
Elias attacked, a hurricane of desperate, renewed violence. Kelian dodged easily. "What a monster! Bleeding and yet have guts to fight back!"
Elias slashed, but Kelian evaded again. Elias's mind flickered. He saw Kelian's face, that same mocking laugh, in his memory.
He didn't know when, but the image was a sudden, violent intrusion. He lost focus for a fatal moment.
Kelian seized the chance and struck a crushing punch into Elias's injured torso.
Elias's eyes flew wide.
"Rule number one: Do not get carried away!" Kelian mocked.
Elias staggered back, his mind reeling. He spit out a mouthful of blood. Then, he looked at August—still gripping the wound, still struggling to rise. Still defiant.
August, coughing up blood, managed to push himself onto his knees, his heavy breathing a wet, rattling sound.
"You..." August rasped, a sliver of his usual mockery in his voice.
Kelian looked at him, surprised once more. "Wow, that's something I've never seen before."
August actually smirked. "You are a coward! I told you that I am your target, but you..." he trailed off, letting the scorn hang in the air, "...but you wouldn't fight the one who hasn't settled their accounts with you!"
Kelian's jaw clenched, his eyes blazing with incandescent fury. He surged forward, roaring, "You indeed have nerve to humiliate me!"
Elias, grabbing his head, felt his mind fracture. The sudden, intrusive memories of that mocking face intensified. The pain, the confusion, the memory of an unknown bastard—it all mixed with the agony of his wounds.
Elias had nothing left. His strength was not merely depleted; it was annihilated.
His mind was a tempest, reeling from the loss of blood and the violent, unbidden memories that assaulted his consciousness.
The masked man, August's tear-streaked face—it all swam in a sickening, chaotic loop.
August, despite the blade through his torso, still fought the ultimate battle: the battle for his feet. He forced himself to stand, his posture impossibly straight, supported only by the mahogany shelf.
Kelian's eyes widened, a flicker of genuine shock at the sheer, defiant will of the boy.
"What are you looking for?" August rasped, his voice rough with blood.
Kelian moved toward him, a slow, predatory advance. Elias watched, his gaze sweeping across the gruesome scene, unable to reconcile the present with the ghostly memories that plagued him.
He saw August's bloody clothes, felt the memory of August soothing his own pain—it was all a terrible, confusing blur.
Kelian grabbed August's hand, dragging him roughly off the shelf and towards himself.
Elias's emerald eyes were wide, filled now with a desolate, unfamiliar emotion.
He saw the vivid crimson staining August's lacy shirt, and a primal, protective instinct surged through the wreckage of his body.
"I thought you were fragile," Kelian sneered. "So, I only stabbed once. If you are insisting..."
August spat blood onto the floor. His shirt, once ivory, was now a sodden, sickening mess, yet the defiant smirk remained on his face—the look of August Everhart D, Rosaye, refusing to yield.
Kelian was momentarily surprised by that implacable nerve.
"Stop it!" Elias barked, the sound raw and desperate, the words already too late.
Kelian moved his blade, twisting it slightly within the wound. August spilled a fresh gush of blood, his body spasming in a violent, unwilling tremor.
"Those who humiliate will be serve like this," Kelian pronounced, a cold, final judgment.
Elias felt a crippling wave of dizziness. He realized the wound was not just physical; the blade carried a paralytic agent, a subtle poison used by the Eclipse Elite's second rank.
He dropped to his knees, spitting blood.
"Elias!" August cried out, wrenching himself free from Kelian's grip. He staggered, listing heavily, toward the fallen knight.
He crumpled next to Elias, pushing his hand against the bodyguard's face. "Don't! Don't close your eyes!"
Elias's heavy eyelids were sinking. He could see August's face in his memories again—crying, worried, there—but the weight was too great.
As Elias finally succumbed, his consciousness dissolving into a deep, black void, August's own strength failed.
He stretched out a hand, a gesture of desperate, futile reach.
"No, not again, Elias..."
Tears, hot and sudden, spilled from August's eyes, a strange, overwhelming sorrow mixing with the intense physical agony.
He was unable to close the last few inches to touch Elias.
His own heartbeat slowed, stuttering, losing its rhythm.
Kelian watched the simultaneous collapse of his two enemies. He shook his head, a gesture devoid of true satisfaction.
"What a shame," he remarked. "Didn't fight for that long."
He looked at the scene of carnage, a final, approving glance.
Finally our, mission is done.
With that chilling, ephemeral declaration, the second-ranked assassin of the Eclipse Elite vanished, leaving behind only the deep silence and the desperate, bloody mess.
But little did Kelian know that, even as august consciousness was dimming, August held a final, fleeting moment of triumph.
As the second-ranked assassin vanished, August's bloodied face contorted into a faint, utterly derisive smirk.
It was a silent acknowledgment of Kelian's arrogance, a sliver of the old, defiant August Everhart D, Rosaye persisting even at the threshold of death.
His gaze, though heavy and clouded, remained fixed on the space where Kelian had been.
August's fingers, slick with his own lifeblood, gave one last, minute twitch, a final, unspent defiance against the encroaching darkness. He had played his part. Now, the rest was up to fate—or perhaps, to others.