Then...
A sharp whistle of steel tore the air.
The rchant snarled as a dagger buried itself in his wrist, the sword jerking from Damian’s neck as blood welled hot and fast.
Damian’s head turned, hazel eyes wide. And there, striding out of the shadows with all the cold certainty of execution was... Leroy.
The "rchant" howled, clutching his wrist. His sword clattered against the ground, useless in his bleeding hand.
Damian didn’t waste his second chance. He rolled, snatching his fan back from the dirt, snapping it open in one fluid motion. His chest burned, his hair hung loose and damp across his brow, but his grin that was sharp and reckless, was back in place.
"Well," he panted, "that was close. You took your ti."
Leroy stepped into the ring of n with no flourish at all, his movents stripped of every ounce of wasted energy. He didn’t even glance at Damian. His dagger was already sliding from his belt, and in his other hand, a short sword glead dully in the early morning light.
The n hesitated only a breath before regrouping, circling tighter. The hooded "rchant" barked an order through clenched teeth, and they surged.
The fight began anew.
Damian moved like a dancer, fan flashing, darting in with poisoned rose-bolts whenever he saw an opening. He taunted his enemies, laughing breathlessly even as blood slicked his sleeve. He fought to distract, to divide attention, to make the mob falter.
Leroy fought like a storm—silent, rciless, every stroke of his blade ant to kill. Where Damian bled drama, Leroy bled efficiency. His dagger buried into a throat, his sword cleaved an arm, his boot shattered a kneecap. He wasted no breath, no words, only the brutal economy of survival.
Back to back, they stood for an instant. Damian’s fan deflected a strike that would have cut into Leroy’s ribs, and Leroy’s blade skewered the man who would have gutted Damian from behind. The clash of their styles should have been chaos, yet together it worked; an unspoken rhythm born not of friendship, but necessity.
The ground grew slick with blood. Bodies dropped one by one. The remaining n, still fierce, now showed uncertainty in their eyes. This was no brawl; this was execution.
Damian laughed low, chest heaving. "Look at them, Prince. They thought they were wolves." His fan snapped shut with a tallic click. "But wolves don’t bleed this easily."
Leroy said nothing. He only raised his sword again, his silence heavier than Damian’s mocking words.
And then the circle of n broke into one last desperate charge.
The last of the n surged forward, teeth bared, swords raised.
But Damian, spotting a familiar figure at the far edge of the carnage, lit up like a lantern. "Ah, there you are, My Dawn!" he called, voice warm as though they weren’t surrounded by corpses.
Without hesitation, he abandoned the circle, skipping nimbly over the fallen, fanning blood off his sleeve as if it were no more than water.
Lorraine, wrapped in a plain linen dress and hood, stood at the edge of the shadows. Her eyes widened at the sight of him bounding toward her, ridiculous and bloody but grinning ear to ear.
"Did you see ?" Damian chid, lowering his voice in mock secrecy as he bowed before her. "I was brilliant, wasn’t I? You ca just in ti to admire ."
Behind them, steel rang again.
Leroy cut down another man with a ruthless twist of his blade, his golden mask flashing under the early sunlight. He didn’t call Damian back. He didn’t need him. In fact, he welcod the solitude. Alone, he could fight with the full breadth of his training, with precision, speed, and the terrifying force of his body honed into a weapon.
He knew she was watching. And he wanted her to see.
His sword work beca more rciless, his dagger strikes more exact, as if every step and cut were an unspoken declaration: Look at . Look at the man you married. Look at the strength that is yours to command.
Yet every ti he glanced toward her, heart stuttering in his chest, he saw her standing with Damian, listening, smiling faintly, her attention caught by his nonsense.
A flare of irritation rushed through him. He broke a man’s wrist with unnecessary force, shoved a blade deep into another’s gut, blood spraying across his black sleeve. His movents grew sharper, hungrier.
By the ti the last man fell, gasping into the dirt, Leroy’s chest was heaving; not from exhaustion, but from the effort of restraint.
He sheathed his weapons and strode across the field, boots heavy in the bloodied soil.
Lorraine, however, wasn’t looking at him. She was leaning closer to Damian, who proudly displayed his rose-bolt contraption like a child with a prized toy.
"It’s ingenious," she murmured, her fingers grazing the polished wood. "Compact, elegant..." And then her eyes sharpened and her lips curled. "How much do you want for it?"
This would be a perfect weapon for her. Damian explained how he could fill the dart with poison and how it would inject it into the enemy. It was like a little bee she could control, except this could kill a person. And... she didn’t even have to get closer to get the poison on them.
She wanted it. Badly.
"Ah, a woman with taste!" Damian bead. "For you, I might part with it. Perhaps... a kiss as down paynt?"
Leroy’s shadow fell over them.
He didn’t speak at once, only stood there, arms folded, mask gleaming, his silence colder than any blade. When he finally did, his voice was dangerously even.
"You’d sell her junk, Damian?" His gaze dipped to the contraption, then to Lorraine’s face. "You don’t need that toy. You have ."
Lorraine’s lips curved, just slightly. "Oh? Are you for sale, too, husband?"
Leroy stiffened. He caught her faint amusent, Damian’s wolfish grin, and felt sothing coil tight in his chest. His hand twitched at his side, wanting to snatch the foolish thing from Damian’s grip and toss it into the river.
Instead, he leaned down, lowering his voice just for her, sothing sharp and possessive threading through it.
"If you want a weapon, Lorraine," he murmured, "I’ll put a real one in your hand. Not... that."
His jealousy was unmistakable, adorably ill-disguised beneath his usual coldness... the kind of stormy jealousy that only made her eyes soften, because beneath it was nothing but love.
Lorraine looked at him, a faint smile on her lips.
Is he jealous by any chance?
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