Man in Black

Chapter two

Chapter II

Lance and Pace sat on opposite sides of a campfire, Lance lighting a cigar and looking at Pace, who was looking back in curiosity and disbelief. Black straightened his back and began to tell Pace his story:

When Lance was a boy of no more than thirteen years of age, a never-ending feeling of pain...of suffering...of hate had been planted into him. Lance's father was a drifter who owed a lot of money to a lot of people. He left before Lance was born, who had never met his father. He had to help his mother provide for his twin sister Rosalee from a young age.

One day, a man in a suit came to the door. The rather pale man asked who Lance's mother who she and her husband were. Lance's mother said her husband was dead.

"The countess sends her regards."

The man quickly drew a small pistol and shot Lance's mother through the heart. Rosalee heard the shot and came rushing into the room. She barely had time to scream before the man grabbed her and bit her neck.

Rosalee fell to the ground and Lance grabbed the old sword that hung over the fireplace, leaping towards the attacker with a scream of fury. The man grabbed him by the throat in midair forcing Lance to drop the sword. The man took a knife out of his jacket and slashed from Lance's right eyebrow down to his cheek. Lance was thrown across the room with inhuman strength, hitting the wall and blacking out.

Lance woke up in his bed in the dark, he ached all over, he noticed a tall figure in the corner of the room.

"Who are you?" he groaned.

"Lance, it's me," The figure stepped into a beam of moonlight coming in through the window, "I'm your father." The man had solemn expression on his face.

"I thought you were dead."

His father looked down for a moment, "I thought I could protect you. I thought I could fix my mistakes."

"Why did you leave?" A tear had formed in Lance's eye.

"I made a deal. A bad deal with a woman named Countess Nadine Portier. I sold my soul to protect you, but I should have known she would never hold her half of the deal. I protected you from afar, but I failed. Abigail is dead and Rosalee is gone."

"The man that killed them, we have to get him!" Lance was suddenly overcome with anger at the thought of his dead mother and sister. The fiend had gotten away with this crime.

"We will, but I must teach you first," Lance's father replied.

"Teach me what?" Lance was confused.

"I must teach you about the monsters. That man was no man at all, he was a vampire, an immortal without any soul," Lance's father explained.

"So, vampires are real?" Lance didn't believe any of it at first but after remembering the sheer strength and brutality of the man

"Aye, they're real; and more powerful than any of the stories say."

In the following years, Lance trained to fight the dead with his father. The old sword he had once used in his attempt to avenge his family was now coated in silver. His father taught him how to use it with precise speed and force.

When Lance reached the age of seventeen, his father decided he was ready. They were going to hunt down the monster who killed Abigail and Rosalee. The vampire they were hunting was named Salem. He was one of Nadine's most trusted soldiers. He was a cold-blooded killer, as all vampires tend to be.

Lance and his father managed to track Salem to an abandoned church deep in the swamp. Lance and Garrett entered the dark, empty church.

"He's here," Garrett said.

"I don't see him."

"The eyes only convey one sense, my son."

Suddenly out of thin air, Salem appeared, soaring towards Lance and Garrett, broadsword drawn. Salem and Garrett's blades clashed in a storm of sparks. Lance tried to intervene to help his father in the duel, but he could not do anything.

The light-speed duel seemed to slow for a moment as Salem spun around and stabbed Garrett in the stomach. Lance let out a scream of fury and sprinted at Salem, who effortlessly moved out of Lance's path. Salem swung his sword at Lance who blocked the strike with his blade.

"Remember me?" Salem said in an arrogant and even joking manner.

"This is for my family, you wretched monster" Lance growled before quickly breaking the lock of swords and swinging his rapier with speed that Salem never saw coming. Lance decapitated Salem with a single swing. Salem's headless body turned to ash as it fell to the ground.

"May hell have mercy on your soul," Lance muttered. He then rushed to his dying father and held him in his arms.

"I'm sorry Lance," Garrett whispered.

"I'll find all of them father, I'll kill them all for you... for Rosalee..." Lance promised as Garrett died in his arms. Lance wept as he held his father. Lance would never weep again.