The Winds of the Past [Rune Factory 4]

Chapter 66

I stumbled with the realization, blinded for a moment with shock as I leaned against the cool rock face next to me for support. Then wordlessly, I turned and ran up the steps, not wasting even half a moment to see if the others followed or kept up with me. As I raced up the long stone stairway, my shock began to subside, transmuting into white-hot rage inside me. In less time than I would have thought possible when I first looked up to the top of the towering rock, I reached the last of the stairs.

The top of the rock was more or less flat, and a few scrubby trees and rubble and the ruins of walls and columns crisscrossed the grassy plateau that stretched out before me. As I scanned the field for any sign of them,  Sano and Uno materialized at my side.

“Your mate is deeply distressed,” Sano commented. I gritted my teeth and didn’t reply as I continued my search.

“We do not understand why one of your kind would force another to copulate,” Uno helpfully added. “If the primary objective of mating in your species is pleasure, is that not then contrary to the purpose?”

“Some people are worse than monsters,” I snapped, glancing briefly at the pair before returning to my search.

“We do not comprehend your meaning as no monsters of our acquaintance behave in this manner,” Sano said after a slight pause, “but your mate is over there, in the middle of what was once a walled garden.” Both foxes looked towards the southeast, then they disappeared again.

I looked where they indicated, and I saw a flutter of white between the broken fragments of walls. Narrowing my eyes to better focus, I saw them more clearly. He had removed his coat, and his pants were dropped down. He had her bent over a section of ruined wall and was thrusting his hips violently into her, and as I looked, he gave a final powerful thrust, then backed away. He had her hair wrapped around one hand, using it like a leash, and he still gripped her shoulder with the other. He released his hold on her, and she stumbled and slumped down over the wall. I could see then that her hands were bound behind her back, and that she was blindfolded and gagged as well. As he pulled his trousers up and fastened them, I could hear low, deep, vicious laughter even from that distance, but I heard nothing from her.

All this surely took no more than two or three seconds at the most, yet it felt like hours as I watched, aghast and numb with shock. Then my limbs unfroze, and I felt a surge of power flowing through me. Grabbing my glaive and casting my pack aside, I leaped over the wall before me. I sprang over the obstacles in my path, or leaped atop them and catapulted from them. For all my speed, I moved almost soundlessly, his first hint of my approach being the howl of rage I loosed as I leaped down from the crumbling garden wall behind him, prepared to plunge the blade of my glaive through his skull.

His reflexes were swift—nearly as swift as Avani’s—and in one fluid motion, he turned, grabbed his sword from where it rested next to his coat, and swung it around, blocking my blow just as it fell. Then he pushed me back and away from him, and I fell to the ground in a crouch, facing him.

He pressed forward, his teeth bared in a mirthless grin, and snarled, “So the dog has followed its mistress, has it? Beware, cur—I am not known for my kindness to animals.” He swung his heavy blade around, striking the shaft of my glaive with a powerful blow calculated to shatter my weapon.

However, my weapon had been carefully crafted by Avani. It had not been something she’d made for practice, and then given to me afterwards just to avoid waste—she had crafted it especially for me, to fit me perfectly, and of the finest materials she could lay her hands on. It was the pinnacle of her smithing skills to this date, and it was well-made indeed. The finest smiths in the land could have done no better. The shaft held.