*** Trigger Warning: In this part, there is an attempted sexual assault that doesn't get very far, but I understand it can be hard to read. In addition to that, there is some graphic violence depicted in this scene, and there will be more in following chapters. Just to clarify, this is the only scene in the novel that contains any attempt at sexual abuse. If you'd like a specific spot to skip to, I'd recommend the paragraph that begins with "However," in which a third party enters the scene and changes its direction. With all that out of the way, I hope you enjoy the beginning of an epic journey!***

A man staggered out of the tavern, pulling back the thin white cloth that covered the arced, stony entrance. The pebbles shifted and crunched beneath his clumsy path, nearly falling flat on his rosy face as he stumbled forward onto one knee. A woman walked out after him with a long sigh, untying her apron and wiping the sweat off her brow with the back of her hand. She looked down at the mumbling mess before her with reluctance. In his state, she had an idea of what was on his mind, and a part of her wanted to work more hours amongst the horde of drunkards just to avoid him. Despite that, she hoped his inebriation would not get the best of him that night, so she chose to grasp his shoulder and elbow to help him back to his feet. She forced a smirk as she looked into a countenance that appeared about as lifeless as the beige dirt he stared at. "Dear," she whispered, her eyes darting towards the empty, dark street to her left, "we should get going. It's not safe out—"

He shrugged her hands off of his arm and turned his pinkish gaze towards hers, a grin spreading across his face. There was a new desire in his lightened expression, one that she knew all too well. "C'mon, darling," he said, grabbing her wrist. "Let's have a little fun first."

Her breathing became heavier as she looked down, jerking her arm to pull away from him. "It's late," she insisted, her voice hoarse. "Please, I just want some rest tonight. I'm not in the mood."

His grip tightened. "Ah, quit being like that, will you?" he barked. "It'll be fun for the both of us anyway!" The dirt became noisy, smearing underneath her heels as the man dragged her towards an alleyway on the opposite side of the street, formed by a couple of run down, adjacent shops built with brick and mortar.

"Just...let go of me," she pleaded, raising her voice only slightly. "Can't we at least wait until we get home?"

"Why, so you can just fall asleep on me again?" he asked with a chuckling, yet biting tone. "There's no fun in that, let's go over here!" He yanked her arm harder.

As they neared the alleyway, the woman's face went pale with fright. "Stop it, please!" she shouted. In one last attempt to prevent the inevitable, she stamped her foot and added, "This isn't you!" Without even sparing her a glance back, he merely yanked her arm again. The man continued their course down the street and into the alley by force, though the woman could feel her will to resist drift away.

The night was dark, loud with the hum of drunken chatter. Not many people were in the street, though. It seemed like the man knew what he was doing by picking this time and place for his assault. Perhaps his timing could have been perfect, if it were not for the one lurking around the corner behind them. This one watched the man force the woman into the alleyway, and soon started to follow.

A bad drinking habit. Long, brown hair past his jawline. He is lanky and loud. The woman seems fatigued. Lengthy blonde hair, a petite figure. Not very strong, not physically nor mentally. Yes, that is certainly them.

The man pushed the front of her body against a wall in the alley, his head pressed down on the back of her shoulder. She tried pushing against the wall in a feeble effort to get him off of her, but he pushed back. He started kissing her neck, to which she flinched away.

"Joseph," she started, her voice cracked and shaky, "can we just go home?" Tears began to form in her eyes.

"No!" Joseph refused, too loud against her ear. "For the last time, just relax!"

Her skin went cold once she felt him remove the shoulder strap of her dress working his way towards her upper back. She knew that no matter how much she struggled against him, it would not be enough to break out of his grasp. If she screamed, it might not be heard over the ruckus the men were making in the tavern. Even if somebody did come for her, it would likely make Joseph even more aggressive at home, blaming her for embarrassing him. Knowing there was no way she could escape, her cheeks became wet as she closed her eyes with a gulp, preparing for the shame that would soon follow afterwards.

However, before the assailant could go any further, there was a rhythmic, wooden clicking coming from around the corner of the alleyway. With that, the woman's eyes fluttered open, wondering what it could be. That was when she spotted with wide eyes the one who had been lurking, seeing that the source of the clicking came from a pair of rectangular, brown wooden sandals that he wore. Spoken with more sternness than that of the king's royal guard, the stranger called, "Excuse me."

The man jumped away with a gasp, not realizing that they had a visitor until his voice cut through the air like an axe through a tree trunk. In spite of his surprise, a harsh frown shaped his face and he yelled, "Beat it, will you? This is none of your business!"

The woman looked the stranger up and down, unable to make out his face or many other features in the darkness. All she could really tell from the silhouette at the moment was that the man was tall and strong, unlike most men she had ever come across.

"Your name is Joseph, yes?" the lurker responded.

"Yeah, so what?"

The woman shot a look at her drunken captor, knowing that this was not a fight he should pick.

"Then it seems this is precisely my business." The lurker began to walk forward, each step faster than the last.

The man stepped back, nearly tripping over himself in the process. Then he braced himself and rose his fists. "Oh, you wanna fight? Fine, let's—" The man stopped himself as he noticed the sword strapped to the stranger's side, the hilt comprised of black and blue threading and sheathed in an obsidian scabbard. With a sharp gasp, his fists quickly changed into outspread hands. His frown transformed into a crooked smile. "Hey, hey, wait a second! I know what it looks like, but you've got it all wrong, alright?" As the lurker kept coming towards them, Joseph frantically turned his attention back to his victim. "W-we're together, aren't we, Amy?"

The stranger stopped near the moonlight, revealing a pair of narrow, chestnut eyes that shifted towards the woman for confirmation of the man's claim.

The woman still stood against the wall, stunned with confusion. Her eyes darted back and forth between Joseph and the stranger. What struck her as odd was the fact that the stranger knew Joseph's name, and it seemed that he was after him.

"Darling, look at me!" the man ordered.

Joseph's command snapped her out of her confusion for a moment. When she looked at him, a smile formed on his face that reminded her of the man she had fallen for. The way he called her "darling" always felt strange to her in an amusing way. Its formality never seemed to match his casual tone, but she always liked when he put forth the attempt at sounding like a gentleman. Even though his behavior continued to get worse by the day, that moment gave her faith that the man she loved would return to her someday. With that, she furrowed her brow and looked at the stranger, whose eyes still smoldered with unwavering intent. Amy took a deep breath, nodded, and answered, "Yes, we're together. This doesn't concern you."

Joseph sighed. "Thank you, Amy." Then, he turned his attention back to the stranger with a puckered lip. "You see now? We're just trying to have a good time, now beat it!"

The eyes slowly returned back to Joseph's, to which he flinched with a step backward. "Joseph Maury," the stranger responded a solemn dryness.

Joseph jerked his head back. "Wait, how do you...?"

"And Amy Reiss." His chestnut browns went back in Amy's direction, their input appearing to be of little consequence to him.

Amy's eyebrows raised. She stared at the stranger with a new understanding. "The sword..." she noted.

"W-what about it?" Joseph demanded with faltering confidence.

The stranger drew his sword, to which Joseph shrieked a little. The curved edge of the thirty-inch silver blade glistened in the moonlight. The stranger raised the weapon so that the tip of it was just above his chin. The lurker stepped into the pale light before him, making himself known to the couple he followed.

He was like a tower, looming over the two of them. The stranger wore black robes with dark blue stripes, his robust arms bare to the shoulders. His skin was dark, his hair short with tight curls close to his scalp. A scowl defined his face, with scruffy facial hair lining the sides of his head and his jaw. There was a reddish-brown scar at the top of his neck, which stretched diagonally all the way down under his clothing. A symbol was stitched into the fabric of his robe with gold yarn over his heart: a snake with its fangs bared, the symbol of the Swordsmen's Guild.

Once it was clear to them what kind of man their stalker was, the conviction in Joseph's face from earlier had completely drained. "You're..."

"A swordsman," Amy finished. Although she was aware of his profession, there was still something else about him that seemed familiar. Perhaps she heard it in rumors, but he had an air about him that reminded her of the stories she heard about the Swordsmen's Guild years ago. It was like he had an aura that most other swordsmen lacked, something that inspired awe, something that evoked fear. Whichever the case, she was sure that he was not new to the business.

Joseph took a step backwards, but then shook his head for a moment and regained his drunken glare. "Well...who sent you then? Or are ya just tryin' to be a hero?"

The lurker lowered his eyelids with a dull impatience. "If you do not know who sent me, and you would believe I am a hero, then you are about as dim as the night."

Joseph clenched his fists and grit his teeth. In his stupor, it was like he forgot the man was armed with a sword and almost twice his size. "Oh, so now you're making fun of me!" the drunkard acknowledged, slurring his words near the end of the statement. "That's it! Swordsman or not, you're goin' down!" With a red face and a jagged course, Joseph ran towards the stalker.

"Don't!" Amy pleaded, stepping away from the side of the building and reaching towards her lover. "He'll kill you!" She would have run to stop him, but seeing how close he had already gotten to the swordsman, she knew it was too late for him.

The swordsman rolled his eyes and shook his head as the dunce approached him. Joseph threw a punch towards the left side of the swordsman's head, but he dodged it easily with a sidestep. The drunk stumbled forward a bit, leaving his left side vulnerable. Before the man could fully lose his balance, the assassin cut through the side of Joseph's torso—all the way to its opposite end—with a single swing of his blade. Both halves of his body fell to the ground with a thud. Joseph clawed at the ground, a feeble attempt at retaining what little life he had left. He gasped for air like a fish out of water about three or four times before his eyes rolled to the back of his head and he fell silent. Crimson fluid spread all over the ground, the pinkish, purplish insides slowly came loose from his upper half.

The swordsman examined his soiled blade and swung it toward the ground, the fluid creating red dots on the earth. He looked down at his work and scrunched his nose. "Grotesque."

Amy's hands clasped over her mouth as she stared at what remained of her significant other. Her whole body shook, her knees buckling. She dropped to her knees, tears streaming her cheeks. She took her hands off her mouth and looked up at the swordsman. "You...you really killed him..."

The man stared in an aimless direction, appearing indifferent towards the life he took. With his heavy breathing, though, it was unclear what he was really thinking. "You know why I had to kill this man, yes?" he finally asked, his cold yet searing eyes returning to the woman's.

Amy took a few moments to collect herself, gazing at what was left of her beloved. With a quivering lip, she directed her attention back to the killer and nodded slowly. As much as she did not want to say it out loud, she knew who sent the swordsman after Joseph. She placed her hands in her lap, blinking slowly. She did not want to believe it, but she knew that she needed to hear the swordsman confirm her suspicions. She looked into the man's eyes and replied, "My sister sent you, didn't she?"

The man glanced down at the dead flesh near his feet and confirmed, "Not as foolish as him, I see." Aside from the grief on her face, he could tell that she was suffering from some long-term exhaustion due to the bags under her eyes—something she appeared too young for. He also noticed the straps that hung loosely from the sides of her shoulders and remembered the position Joseph had her in when he arrived. Then, he finished his analysis claiming, "But you are still a fool, nonetheless."

"Think what you want," she snapped, a glare in her eyes as she wiped her cheeks. Her breathing became shakier when she looked back at her loss. "Drinking changed him over time, but...I loved him. More than anything."

"Certainly, more than your sister, yes?" the swordsman surmised.

Her gaze shot towards the ground. She was unable to confirm it aloud, but with the self-loathing she had felt for years, she nodded. "They didn't love each other," she explained, "they were only staying for the boy. She was cruel to him, and eventually...he fell for me, and I did the same for him. So, we ran off."

"Leaving your sister with the child," the swordsman finished. He looked back down at the corpse with contempt.

"It's not like he wanted to," Amy explained, raising her head up slightly. "That's why he drank so much. He missed his son."

The man winced at the corpse, forming a harsher scowl. There was a despise in his glare that appeared unaffected by Amy's explanation for his actions. With a long, somewhat reluctant sigh, he turned his attention back to Amy with subdued intensity. "Your excuses for him are laughable. Love really has made you a fool."

Amy averted her eyes to the ground, a frown forming on her own face. "Did she send you here to lecture me, too?"

There was silence for a moment, as if the woman was waiting for a response. Once she turned her attention back to him, the swordsman glanced at his weapon and took a couple steps towards her. He looked back into her eyes and drew the blade near her chin. Then, he answered, "Not quite."

Her eyes doubled in size, realizing that his work was not finished. She blinked for a moment and tried to steady her quivering body, placing a firm hand on her wrist. Her head moved up and down as her eyes went back down to the dirt beneath her. With a gulp, she responded, "I understand."

"Does it shock you?" the swordsman wondered, given her wide-eyed reaction.

After taking some time to register her situation, she looked back up at him with a furrowed brow. "No. I knew this day was coming. I just didn't think it would come so soon."

"How would you like to die?" She appeared puzzled by the fact he was giving her a choice, and he explained, "Running off with your sister's husband is the only selfish thing you have ever done, is it not?" Her eyes shifted to the side. The swordsman detected deep shame in her soft expression, something he could not find a fraction of in her abuser. "You have a kind spirit. I can see it." He glanced at the severed half next to them. "I dispatch scum like him however I please. But for the ones like you, I allow a more peaceful death." He noticed a flit in her eyelids, as if she had some sort of epiphany. It was a look that many of his victims had moments before their fate was met. "So then," he continued, "what will it be?"

Seeing how he towered over her and hearing his explanation helped her finally figure out why he seemed so familiar to her. In his foreign garb, wielding a strange sword, speaking with eloquence, and having such dark skin, it was a wonder she did not realize who he was earlier. "The dark swordsman..." she murmured. With his identity clear in her mind, she lowered her head and answered, "Just...get behind me."

"Very well." The swordsman walked slowly and stood behind her.

The woman inched closer to her lover's upper half. Not yet prepared to behold Joseph's face, she turned back to look into the lurker's eyes one last time. With all the poise she could muster, she declared, "Maybe one day, you'll understand what it means to love someone, Daryl the Dauntless."

The swordsman narrowed his eyes—a silent, yet biting response to such a statement.

After boring into his eyes with a harsh gaze of her own, she looked down at Joseph's face. It was like he was caught in a perpetual scream. His eyes completely white and bloodshot, his mouth open and leaking blood. She exhaled with a sob, squeezing her eyes shut. "Make it quick for me," she ordered, "and don't say anything else. I just want to be with him again."

Daryl raised his blade, pointed at the back of her neck. He drove it through quickly, just deep enough to sever her vertebrae. She tumbled over next to her lover.

With another job carried out, the morbid nature of what he had just done began to set in. He closed his eyes and took a deep breath. Then, he tilted his head toward the night sky and examined the stars. Not only did they seem dimmer than what they should have been, but they all had a gradual flash, as if they were struggling to shine. They had been that way his whole life, but there was something about them that always told him they were not supposed to look that way. Along with the oddity of the stars, one could notice a jagged, white line that stretched across the sky if examined carefully. Whenever Daryl noticed the faint, infinite line in the reaches of space, it appeared to him as some sort of tear that had been sealed shut. Like the stars, it occasionally glimmered. That sky told the swordsman the world they were living in was a broken one, trying to hold itself together. There was hardly anything in the world anymore that could restore his hope for it, and the night sky was a grim reminder.

The swordsman pulled out a small towel tucked under his garb and wiped his blade with a grimace, dropping it to the ground once the weapon was clean to his liking. He replaced the sword back in the scabbard on his side, the sound of metal scraping the inside breaking the silence. Before departing, he looked down at the couple with a soft stare. "My dear, I am afraid you and he will not be going to the same place."

***