[WARNING: Contains very strong language, therefore the 18+ rating]
A large troop of scarlet on black marched down the spacious courtyard of the Duke, which housed the infamous Dusk Garden. It was named as it was because of the oddly gloomy color scheme of the assortments; dark purples mixed with dull reds, with rivulets of grey orange running amock, all of them shadowed with dark roses and hanging vines, masterfully planted and tended to draw the gaze and hold it. The men traversed in the shadowy confines of looming hedges, which accentuated the depressing atmosphere.
Legend has it that countless slaves were sacrificied as an offering to the Three Devine as the Garden was near completion, to ensure the richness of the soil. Sacrifices or no sacrifices, Damion shuddered with dread; the Dusk Garden always had that effect on him. He offered a prayer to Rasdha, the Lord of Dusk and Ill Fortune, fingers twitching nervously. If this weren't the only way in and out of the Duke's estate, he would never have set so much as a toe in it. As it was, the Dusk Garden was perhaps even more effective against invading armies than the walls enclosing it.
Damion heard the men around him breathing heavily, gulping in large amounts of oxygen in short spaces of time, eyes flickering around nervously. The creaking of leather filled the quiet at random intervals as hilts of sheated swords were fingered with gloved hands, the touch bringing re-assurance to the disquieted veterans.
He glanced at the man on his right and cocked an eyebrow. The Dregh looked at him sharply as if he were an idiot and turned back to watching the bushes.
”Ryne, you fucki-” Damion whispered in annoyance, just to be cut off by a hand falling on his shoulder.
He reflexively jerked away from the touch, bumping into the man next behind him, who then fell onto the man next to him, and so on, until the whole company was in complete turmoil. Bodies fell over each other, stumbling around wildly to escape the imminent threat of attack. Elite veterans or not, the Garden had them nervous as hell, and human nature fears the unknown; nothing but utter pandemonium ensued.
In the middle of the bewildered frenzy, a grip of iron caught Damion by the scruff of his coat, pulling him along roughly into a tangle of vines. Damion hollered for help, inviting a curse from his abducter and a firm hand was raised to cover the offending aperature. His fighting spirit returning to him, Damion bit down hard on the hand, the bitter taste of leather assaulting the innards of his mouth. The hand never faltered, but he heard a grunt of pain. They had reached the heart of the hanging plants and Damion was whirled around to face his captor.
”You bite like a little bitch, bitch.” Ryne's mocking voice was laced with pain though.
He took his hand away from Damion's mouth and shook it with a grimace. Damion had the courtesy of looking only slightly amused.
”Sorry about that,” Damion said without a hint of remorse, ”and anyhow, your mother's a bitch.”
”That's your bloody mother too, nitwit.”
”I'm very well aware of that, thank you very much. Truth is, she was a bitch,” Damion said with a grin, a brief flash of white in the grayness.
”Very fucking true that,” Ryne chuckled grimly.
A sudden scream broke through his chuckle and both of the men turned to regard the incident they had just escaped. The commander of the company had pulled out his heavy rapier and was laying about with it mercilessly.
”Pull yourselves the fuck together, you limp-dicked sons of fucking bitches! You lot are supposed to be the best we've got and here you are, screaming like a bunch of whores gaining their pay! Gather your balls from wherever the fuck you misplaced them and don't. Fuc-king. Dis-grace. Your-selves. Fur-ther!”
He punctuated each syllable with a cruel slash of the blade; blood flew in glittering arches at the apexes of his swings, the moonlight enhancing the vividness of the carnage in an awe-inducing way. Tortured cries escaped the victims of their commander's vengeful wrath, echoing in the still night; the ones lucky enough to be far away from the cold bite of the blade scampered even further away. Some of them threw up in the bushes, clutching their stomaches. Damion didn't think any less of them.
”Looks like we got out just in the nick of time, my old friend,” he said disgustedly as a man with a half-severed leg tried to force his way up from the seething mass.
”Aye.”
The grieviously wounded soldier was dragged down by his howling comrades, adding his voice to the demented chorus.
The commander breathed heavily and wiped his glistening blade on the corpse of one of his sub-ordinates. The rapier entered its scabbard again and clanked closed with finality.
”Let the fuckers out of their misery,” he ordered, ”and let this be a lesson to the rest of you.”
The survivors looked upon their pitiful friends with haunted faces, but every last one of them raised their crossbows to their shoulders. Damion looked away when the crossbows discharged, but he couldn't block out the horrible thumping sounds as the bolts hit home, or the shrieks of the dying, or the agonized cries of men as they slaughtered their friends.
”Fuck. Bloody fucking hell.”
Ryne looked at his brother and placed a comforting hand on his shoulder, which Damion shrugged off. ”There's nothing we can do about it.”
”I know. I fucking know and that's the worst bit. Fuck...” Damion's clenched fist hit the earth with a thud. ”I feel so damn useless. For fuck's sake, leave me be!”
Ryne let his brother and best friend have a moment of privacy and turned back to observe the aftermath of the scene they had created.
[The Part 3 will continue further from this, but first I've got a question to ask of you. Should I keep it like this (that Damion isn't actually completely heartless) or change it so that he is in fact the damn bastard he seems to be? Which one would fit the scene better? Thanks in advance!]
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