Men were yelling and there were loud thuds, as an ax into wood. I was at the door very quickly and opened it. Argyl looked at me.
“Run, hide if you can!” he cried. The door caved in as an ax broke through it and a man rushed into the room holding the ax. Two more quickly came through to either side, each with a sword.
“Hello Kracht,” Argyl said.
“You'll come with me motherfucker. I will kill you if you give me any reason at all.”
There was a moment when nobody moved, then the man furthest from me took a step towards Argyl.
“What about the girl?” asked the man closer to me. Kracht didn't take his eyes off Argyl.
“Bring her too. If she resists kill her.”
“Sir,” said the man, stepping towards me. Argyl held up his hands and Kracht and the other man cautiously walked towards him. Then the man was in front of me and I took a step backwards into the bedroom.
“Please don't rape me,” I said in my best soft scared voice. I didn't know why I said it, I had perhaps some half realized impulse to elude capture, to do my master's bidding and murder them. He reached out to grab my hair and I let me knees go weak. He yanked me hard and dragged me back into the main room.
“What do you say we have some fun with the whore first capt'n?” said my man. Kracht had eyes only for Argyl.
“Do what you want with her, just don't waste too much time. I can keep this one,” Kracht said. Argyl now had shackles on his wrists. I hadn't seem them come in with shackles. I sobbed my best sob, and it must have worked for the two men laughed and my man dragged me by my hair back into the bedroom. I screamed and left my body limp.
He threw me against the wall and there was a knife against my neck. I froze up. I didn't feel any fear. Adrenalin pumped through me and it was some effort to play at helpless. My heartbeat surged in me and I knew I must kill. My master still thirsted for blood. Any blood. All blood. Mine or his, my master made no distinction. I twisted slightly away from the knife so that my body fell. He used the knife to cut open the front of my robe. I made an act of pathetic struggling while I considered what to do. The other man had not come into the room. Maybe they were the type to take turns rather than both go at me at once. Better for me. He had my robe split down the middle now and was fumbling with his breeches. He was careful, he kept his eyes and his knife at my throat. I squeaked pathetically.
His cock was hard already when he had it out. He leered at me and reached down to grab my breast. By luck he grabbed it. I wondered if he had noticed the other was missing, but put the thought aside. He let it go and put his hand on my throat. He dropped the knife next to us and used his free hand to maneuver his cock into me. I was quite dry and he couldn't get it in. He cursed and then spit on me.
I had too much to do at the moment to worry about it. His eyes stayed on mine, and I kept mine wide and as fearful as possible. I groped for the knife with my hand, careful to keep my eyes away.
“Please, please no,” I whimpered. His eyes glinted, he liked to see me beg. Motherfucker. He thrust at me again, but too late. My fingers touched the knife and I racked it quickly across his throat. My aim was off and I sliced a deep cut into his cheek instead.
“Bitch!” he cried, but my second try was better and he had trouble screaming with his throat cut. Blood spurted out over me and I shoved him off. He was grabbing at his neck and staring at the blood pouring from him in weakening spurts. He looked rather pathetic, like a scared child more than a grown man. I didn't have time for him. I slid to the side of the room so that I could pounce on the other man if he came through the door. He did not. The door was nearly shut, so that the other man couldn't see into the room. The robe was soaked in blood and badly torn so that it dragged about my feet and threatened to trip me. I looked back at my rapist. He had no mind for me, what life he had left was being spent on panic. I quickly pulled the robe off me and crouched naked.
For a long moment nothing happened. Then the man in the other room called out “Hey, save some for me huh?” I wasn't actually good at fighting. I probably would never have killed the first man except he had left himself very vulnerable. Also, though, I wouldn't mind being dead, and didn't mind pain either. I crouched and waited, more because I couldn't think of anything else to do. The thought of rushing him seemed like suicide.
The door kicked open and the other soldier stepped through, sword out. I was on him before he had finished registering the carnage. I stuck the knife into his neck and rushed passed him into the other room. I heard a loud thunk and spun around. I had ended between the stove and the wall, crammed into a corner. The stove, which I had not noticed before, explained the heat difference that I had been confused about before. The man in the door was on the ground with blood spurting everywhere. His sword was embedded in the wall where I had rushed passed him. Good soldier, I had almost been dead. Agryl and the other man, what had his name been? They were not in the room. I moved quickly to the man in the door, who was clutching at his neck. His eyes widened when he saw me approach, and he shook his head and pulled away from me. I shoved the knife through his eye and he stopped moving. His hand was holding his knife, he had been about to stab at me. I had been very lucky again.
I tried to pull the man's sword from the wall, but could not. My hands were bloody and slippery. Instead I took the sword from the first man I had killed. He was actually sort of sputtering still. I pushed his sword through his neck to sever his spine. A man with a cut throat didn't seem like much of a threat, but I wasn't certain.
I went to the window in the main room. I didn't see anybody through it so I climbed out as quietly as I could. It was fairly easy to walk quietly. The ground was mostly pine needles and was quite soft under my bare feet. I made my way around the back of the cabin and peeked carefully around the side.
Argyl was sitting on a horse, his hands shackled to the saddle. He held his head up as if to be defiant. The other man was on his own horse. I could, I thought, go out some distance into the woods before he would investigate what had happened to his men. It was unlikely he would search for me alone, when Argyl was clearly who he wanted. I was just a random woman who had been there. I would be safe. I crept back behind the cabin and then walked, crouched, some ways into the woods. There were many low firs mixed in with the pines, and any one of them would offer a good place to hide. In a moment I was safely in one.
My master would be happy with the blood. After Argyl and his captor were gone I could return to the cabin and desecrate their bodies. Would he forgive my transgression? The thought sat uneasily inside me. A blunted tool, I thought, a worthless tool. More blood. He would want more blood. Should I return to kill the two men? It would be suicide. But it would please my master. And death would not be unwelcome to me. I felt strangely detached. Once I would have been mad with my master's will. Now it all seemed far away from me, a quaint question of ethics. To kill, I suppose, was my purpose. I felt no enthusiasm for it, but also no reason not to.
I was quickly back watching the two men from behind the cabin. They hadn't moved much since I had left them. He was giving his men a lot of time to rape me. I should wait until he went inside to investigate, then kill Argyl and ambush his captor when he came back outside. I waited quietly. Instead, the captor abruptly began to ride away, holding a rope that brought Argyl's horse along.
“Wait!” I called as I stepped out from besides the cabin. The men paused and turned to look at me. The soldier let me get fairly close before he reacted. I must have been a strange sight, naked and bloody, walking towards him with murder in my eyes.
“Stay there,” he said. I ignored him and kept walking. He apparently decided it was better just to leave with his prisoner than stay and deal with me, as he spurred his horse. I leapt to try and cut him from his saddle. I missed horribly, and instead cut into the horse's flank and fell myself. The horse jumped away then toppled over, pinning the man under him. Argyl's horse kept going.
The man swore as the rope leading the other horse slipped from his hand. He was pinned beneath his horse for a moment, but then the horse was rising and running away. My cut had surprised it more than hurt it. The man drew his sword but had trouble standing. Argyl's horse was galloping away. I lumbered to my feet.
“Who the fuck are you?” the man said.
“I don't know,” I said, pulling back from him. His leg bent at an unnatural angle and he clearly couldn't stand on it.
Who was I? My master's slave? Vehicle of his will? The man was shaking his head.
“I don't know what to do,” I told him. He looked disgusted.
I didn't want to be there. I didn't want to do my master's will or disobey my master's will. I wanted to be nothing, to do nothing. I dropped the sword and fled into the forest.