Gorvain.

  So that was his name.

  He was the man I'd seen during the burning of Millbrook, standing in the square as flames devoured everything Jorik and Emil called home. The man who'd smiled while children screamed.

  And now here I am facing him.

  Threatening to destroy this town.

  He was dangerous. Deadly. I could feel it radiating from him. Virel pulsed beneath my skin, warning me of his strength, the symbiote's instincts recognizing a true predator.

  But I wasn't scared.

  Deep inside, a certainty settled over me that I was stronger than him now. With Virel bonded to me, power flowed through every fiber of my being. The familiar weight of weakness, of helplessness, had vanished. In its place was something new. Something hungry.

  The courtyard around us bore the scars of his earlier battle. Broken stone. Scorch marks from magic. Blood pooling in the cracks between flagstones. Bodies of townspeople scattered like broken dolls.

  Gorvain stood in the center of it all, sword gleaming in the firelight, that same deranged smile playing across his scarred features. His armor was pristine despite the carnage. Not a single dent or scratch marred the black steel.

  Then he vanished.

  One moment he was standing twenty feet away, the next he materialized behind me, his blade singing through the air toward the base of my neck. The edge of his sword carried the whistling promise of death, aimed precisely at the gap between skull and spine.

  If it was before, I might have been defeated at this point. Cut down before I even knew what hit me.

  But I wasn't the same person who'd fled Millbrook in terror. Not with Virel.

  While he was fast. Way faster than me, I knew I was stronger.

  Virel reacted by pure instinct, the symbiote's alien intelligence processing threats faster than human thought. The dark matter across my back thickened, forming overlapping plates that turned his killing blow into a shower of sparks.

  I spun, tendrils lashing out, but Gorvain was already gone. Moving again. Dancing away from my counterattack with predatory grace.

  "Interesting," I heard him murmuring, appearing to my left. His sword came in low, seeking the gap between armor plates at my ribs.

  Again, Virel adapted. The symbiote flowed like liquid, sealing vulnerabilities before the blade could find them. Steel met organic armor with a screech that set my teeth on edge.

  The impact sent vibrations through my body, but no pain. The sword had pierced maybe an inch before Virel's defenses stopped it cold.

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  Gorvain's eyes widened behind his helmet. Not with fear. With confusion.

  "What—"

  I backhanded him with enough force to shatter stone. He flew backward, crashing into a pile of rubble with a sound like thunder. Dust and debris exploded around the impact site.

  For a moment, the courtyard was silent.

  Then laughter echoed from the dust cloud. Wild, delighted laughter that made my skin crawl.

  "Wonderful!" Gorvain's voice called out. "Simply wonderful!"

  He emerged from the rubble, blood trickling from a cut on his forehead, his smile wider than before. The blow that should have caved in his skull had barely staggered him.

  "Twenty years," he said, rolling his shoulders as if working out a kink. "Twenty years since someone landed a hit like that."

  He vanished again.

  This time I was ready. Virel's enhanced senses tracked the displacement of air, the minute vibrations through the stone. When Gorvain materialized behind me, sword already descending, I caught his wrist in an iron grip.

  The blade stopped inches from my neck.

  For a heartbeat, we were frozen like that. His strength against mine, testing limits.

  Then I squeezed.

  The gauntlet crumpled. Bone cracked. Gorvain's sword clattered to the ground as his hand went limp.

  But still, he smiled.

  "Yes," he hissed through gritted teeth. "This is what I've been waiting for."

  His other hand came up, a dagger appearing from nowhere. The blade punched through Virel's armor, sliding between my ribs easily..

  I felt it. Cold steel penetrating flesh, scraping against bone. Blood flowed hot down my side.

  But the pain faded almost immediately.

  Virel's healing factor kicked in, dark matter flowing into the wound like living thread. Muscle knitted back together. Skin sealed. Within seconds, there was nothing left but a faint scar that quickly disappeared.

  Gorvain's smile faltered.

  I pulled the dagger free and tossed it aside. The wound it left behind was already gone, not even a mark on my armor to show where it had been.

  "Impossible," he breathed.

  I could see it in his eyes now.

  Fear.

  "My turn," I said.

  I didn't give him time to recover.

  My tendrils struck like vipers. The first one punched through his chest plate, the organic spear bursting out the other side in a spray of blood and twisted metal. The second took him through the shoulder, pinning him in place. The third and fourth wrapped around his legs, crushing armor and bone with equal ease.

  Gorvain made a wet, choking sound. Blood frothed at his lips, but somehow, impossibly, that deranged smile remained.

  "Magnificent," he whispered, his voice a barely audible rasp. "You're... magnificent."

  I stepped closer, my feet splashing through the growing pool of his blood. The tendrils held him suspended like a broken marionette, his body pierced and shattered beyond any hope of survival.

  "This is for Millbrook," I said quietly.

  "And this is for Oakenford."

  The final tendril erupted from my back, moving with deliberate slowness. Gorvain's eyes tracked its approach, and for the first time since we'd started fighting, his smile finally faded.

  The spear-tip hovered inches from his forehead.

  "Any last words?" I asked.

  Blood bubbled from his mouth. When he spoke, his voice was barely a whisper. "Tell me... what are you really?"

  I tilted my head, considering the question. What was I?

  “A monster.”

  The tendril punched through his skull with a wet crunch.

  Gorvain's body went limp, his eyes staring sightlessly at the burning sky above. I held him there for a moment longer, making sure he was truly dead, then let the tendrils retract.

  His corpse hit the ground with a metallic clang.

  The courtyard fell silent except for the crackling of flames and the distant sounds of battle elsewhere in the town. I stood over Gorvain's body, feeling Virel's satisfaction pulse through our bond. The symbiote had tasted victory, tasted the blood of our enemy, and found it good.

  I felt nothing. No satisfaction. No relief. No horror at what I'd become.

  Just the cold fact that this was what I was now. What I needed to be.

  The Butcher was dead. But the war he'd started was far from over.

  I turned away from his corpse and began walking toward the sounds of continued fighting. There were more knights to kill, more innocent people to protect.

  And I had work to do.