Page 1 of Into the West

Royal fist met commoner jaw with an impact that jolted Kordas’s right arm all the way up to the shoulder. He was vaguely aware that his hand was going to hurt like bloody hells—but that would be later. Right now, he had a good excuse to let his rage take over, and a good target to vent it on. He had the surge of adrenaline powering him, now. A little thing like pain was not going to stop him.

Not now.

Not when pure rage misted his vision.

Not when all emotion from the pure shit he had gone through the last year was piled up behind him like a tempest, and here was a righteous target to unleash it upon.

His target staggered back. Kordas turned his footing and followed the right cross with a left to the man’s unprotected gut, driving all the breath out of him in an explosive, guttural grunt. The man bent over, gasping, and Kordas followed with a knuckle-splitting right-handed uppercut that knocked his opponent right off his feet. The force of the blow sent the man flying backward. Pocketknife, kerchief, one shoe, and a spray of blood parted company with him before he even landed. Kordas would not have minded if the offender had cracked his skull on one of the tree trunks behind him, but luck was with the wretch, and he landed instead on his back, not his head. Crumpling onto the “soft” uneven ground padded by decades of fallen leaves was akin to falling on a pile of bricks covered by a few pillows.

Uppercuts always work. They’re so satisfying, too.

Kordas knew better than to fight bare-knuckled, but when he saw the man’s expression, drawing his sword just didn’t come to mind. He could instantly read the guilt on the offender’s very punchable face, and didn’t even break stride throwing the first punch. I love this rage. I want to stay inside this fury as long as I can, and just keep punching. I can kick him, I can throw him, I can snap his joints. I can punch down. And why not? I’m in power. What’s anyone going to do about it? Tell me “no”? The Empire taught me early on, obedience comes from threat of harm. Anyone’ll think twice about crossing me once they see me pound some criminals to paste. I have the authority. I can beat down whoever I want to.

Kordas sucked in air between his clenched teeth.

I want that so much.

Kordas stood over the offender, instinctively stepping into a well-trained boxing stance. Kordas’s vision was still fogged with rage. His hands clenched at the ready, dripping blood and starting to throb. Kordas pulled in his forearms to cover his vitals, and flexed his shoulders, just daring the fool to stand up.

They have no idea of the kinds of rage I keep hidden from them.

The fool was in no shape to stand up. He rolled partly over on his side, doubling into a semi-fetal position, wheezing. There was no other sound but that, and the tense breathing of the crowd that the fight had drawn.

They don’t know how lucky they are, with me. They haven’t seen what I’ve seen.

The downed man’s face was covered in quickly purpling bruises, smears of blood, and a lacerated cheekbone. His body probably looked the same. The way he winced with each intake of breath suggested that there might be a broken rib or two, and he certainly was going to be painfully aware of his sins every time he inhaled or exhaled for at least a week.

Every single bruise and broken bone is deserved.

If his people had been harboring the notion that there was anything “soft” about Baron Valdemar—well, they’d just been disabused of that notion. Word would get around quickly. He hadn’t exactly been looking for an excuse to burn off some of the pent-up emotions from his experiences at Court and the destruction of the Capital, but here it was.

He wanted the blackguard to get up and come at him—while at the same time, he didn’t. The intensity of his fury just moments ago subsided slightly. His rage slammed into the full force of his conscience, and rage broke against it.

But I damned well won’t be a tyrant. I want to be better than that. I want us all to be better than that.

His momentary loss of control made him just a little ashamed of himself.

But just a little.

When the fool on the ground did nothing but wheeze and moan, Kordas stepped back and motioned to the two men of his Guard—that’s what they were calling the loose policing/military group he’d put together, “Valdemar’s Guard”—to come and pick the man up.

“Should we take him to a Healer, Baron?” asked the one who had once been one of his gamekeepers, a tall and weather-beaten man who frankly looked as if he’d be more than willing to add his own beating to the one Kordas had doled out if Kordas asked him to.

“Just long enough to make sure he’s not dying today,” Kordas said, his words coming out sounding harsh and angry. Well, he was still angry, and he roared the words so all present could hear him. “Splints and bandages are all he gets. No herbs. No Healing. And if he wants something to dull the pain, he’ll have to forage it himself. No help allowed.”

While the two of them secured the creep—and it did not escape Kordas that the gamekeeper ran his hands expertly over the fellow’s ribs, before forcing his hands behind him and trussing his wrists together—Kordas turned away from the miscreant and his keepers, to address the little crowd that had gathered while he had been occupied with meting out rough justice.

And got angry all over again, because the first thing his eyes lit on was the broken Doll that the fool had been abusing and torturing for his own amusement. The torture hadn’t gone on long before Kordas and his men had come racing up to the little secluded spot among the thickets of barberry bushes the bastard had chosen to conceal what he was doing. But it had been enough time that the Doll’s arms and legs were broken in four places, and there was no telling what other damage had been done that was covered up by the padding and cloth. The sledgehammer the fool had been using lay beside the Doll where he’d dropped it after Kordas tackled him.

The Dolls looked like oversized children’s playthings. But they had been the backbone of the Imperial Palace servant-structure, and had replaced most humans in those functions years ago. Kordas wasn’t sure how long ago that had been; long after his days as a hostage, at any rate, because they hadn’t been visibly performing those functions when he’d been held in the Palace.

Maybe Dolls were only for the elite, then. The hostages were not exactly elite. Oh, of course—an important part of having prisoners is enjoying their suffering, so there’d be humans for that suffering, not Dolls that don’t display suffering. Cruelty was the Imperial Way, and I was raised Imperial. It’s in me. I resent that it is, but I resent keeping it pushed down all the time, too. I can’t let it out long. I can’t let the Empire rule me.

I won’t. I won’t be like them. I can do this and not be like them.

As he lost the blinding clarity of rage, he felt his stomach churning, heard the murmurs of the crowd he had gathered, and took a moment to glance up into the tree branches overhead. His knuckles ached dully, but all the physical labor he’d done the past few moons had certainly had an effect—he wasn’t in the least winded, nor did he feel as if he’d just pounded someone to within an inch of his life. He just felt bruised in soul and fists.

He lost his focus on everything for a moment. It may have been the sizzling pain from his hands that incited it, or the shivers—part of the comedown from adrenaline—but Kordas’s mind was racing. His heart beat rapidly. His skin felt as if it was wet, and stretched thin. Pain was still just information thanks to adrenaline, but that wasn’t going to last. His mind switched from subject to subject, desperate for something self-saving.