Arcanum

Chapter 19: Lucas

I pounded angrily at the punching bag in front of me, and it went flying. I dodged it from hitting me when it came back, and kicked it hard and watched it fly back again.

Stupid princess.

Stupid me.

Stupid catori people.

Stupid war.

I gritted my teeth as I punched harder with my bare hands. They began to ache, but my anger drowned out the pain.

"Um Lucas?" Trisha asked nervously from behind.

I whirled on her, and glared.

"What?" I snapped, and she flinched slightly.

"Uh, are you okay?"

My eye twitched slightly, and I returned to punching the sand bag.

"Look I know you don't want to talk about it. But please stop. You're going to break your fingers." Trisha said, and I finally stopped when she rested her hand on my shoulder.

I grunted, and turned away and sat us down.

"I can tell that the king doesn't trust me that much anymore." I tried to keep the sadness from my voice, but Trisha detected it.

"Hey, c'mon what's the worst that could happen?" She asked hopefully.

"The king will kill me and hunt down my family and kill them too." I

deadpanned to her, and she shrugged.

"Yeah.. I guess." She muttered.

"General!" A distressed call came from the hall. Scott came racing in.

"Renegades! They're angry that we were hunting them for sport, and now they've come to kill us all!" He cried dramatically, waving his arms around.

I walked over, and frowned.

"Are you serious?" I asked, and Scott nodded so quickly I thought his head might fly off.

"Well let's go then." I grumbled, and raced to my room to grab my sword.

But when I walked through the doors, a man stood there, holding my sword.

My room was completely trashed! My father's sword laid on my bed, which was all messed up.

The man looked at me, and then my sword.

I noticed that he already had a sword, so he smacked my sword into the wall so hard, the sword broke, and the wall was damaged badly.

I watched in horror as the blade crashed to the ground, and it almost felt like my heart was too. That blade was very dear and good to me!

I glared hard, and charged at the man, and dodged his stab from the blade, and made a run for my bed.

I grabbed my father's blade, and instantly felt a painful tingle from it. But my rage overshadowed it.

"Die!" I hissed as I unwrapped the old bandages, and quickly unsheathed the sword.

It instantly begun to glow a low color from all the magic the crystals infused in the blade.

The catori man froze, and stared at me.

"Y-You're his son?!" He exclaimed, but I launched myself at the man, ramming the sword right into the man.

The man convulsed, before he crashed to the ground, the magic melting him slowly.

I quickly sheathed the blade, and dropped it, shouting in pain as my hands burned and the pain traveled up my arms.

"Dammit!" I growled, but stood up.

I can't leave the battle as it was without my help. I'm the general!

I grabbed the sword from the corpse, as much as I wanted to lay down, I raced out of my room to be face to face with another renegade. A woman.

She had a rapier, and was quick with her attacks, but I parried every hit and swiped quicker. I got her on her side, and continued on, not even watching her fall.

"Lucas!" I heard Rebecca shout, and I turned to see her running towards me. She stopped short though when she saw my arms.

"Dear god Lucas! What did you do?!" She exclaimed, and I shook my head.

"Not the time. I have to find the commander of this fight and drive them off." I explained.

She nodded, and ran back into the battle.

I fought my way through, and growled as I fought harder, but my arms hurt more and more.

I broke outside, and blocked an attack, before I finally noticed a tall figure that was surrounded by renegades. This tall figure had a cloak over their head.

There

I raced at the tall renegade, and swiped my sword down at them. They narrowly dodged, but was so quick I barely saw them hit me with their fist.

I quickly regained my balance, and dodged a swipe from their sword.

They're strong and quick. But I can be quicker.

I dodged under a horizontal slice, and stabbed up at the figure's head.

They backed up, and chuckled deeply. It sounded.. familiar.

"I'll be honest boy. You've taken me by surprise. Especially with arms like those." The figure spoke, and I recognized it was a male. But not only that..

"What is your name?" I demanded, trying to keep my voice low because I knew it was close to becoming squeaky with my excitement, but at the same time, shock.

"You're far too young to be asking your superiors these things, kid." He growled, and his sword hit my arm hard.

I gritted my teeth, and a second later, the man hit my head with his fist.

"So you're the general of this army eh?" He asked as I fell to my back. He rose his sword over me, and was about to plunge it into me, but then he stopped...

I stared up at him as I held my bleeding arm, and the man lost his composure.

"You.."

I would be confused if I didn't already have my assumption on who it was.

"Yeah. Hey dad."

He staggered backwards, and I finally got to see his face under the cloak. He had a short beard, and red eyes like mine. He still had a rough face like the one I remembered, but could be soft when he wanted it to.

"L-Lucas?" He asked, loudly.

It was almost like the battle paused around us. I gripped my arm harder as blood began to leak through my fingers, and I nodded shakily.

"I.. You.." He seemed just as shocked as me, and then he crouched down in front of me, and rested his hands on my cheeks and stared at me carefully.

"Can you call off your army?" I asked gently, and he looked around, as if he just came out of a daze, and didn't even realize he was leading an army to attack his original home.

"Troops fall back." He shouted in the same strong voice that he used so much for commanding the human army.

Some began to notice too, because they began to come closer, recognition in their eyes.

"Lucas.. These burns... Never mind. We'll talk later." He said and stood up but first said to me;

"I will be on the border at midnight tonight. Come alone and make sure no one follows." He whispered in my ear, and I couldn't help but agree.

When he left, I sat there, blankly staring at the sky as knights around me tried to get me to the medic.