NOVEL NEXT Chapter 63: Lord
Night pressed over the ridge. The watch fire thinned. Drums changed time.
Han listened until the beats settled in his chest. The coach rode on three good wheels. The forest held its breath.
Hanna checked the bell on her wrist. The clapper touched bronze and stayed still. Her gaze walked the ditches.
A wrong scent slid in. Old blood. Wet iron. Smoke without flame.
Han opened the door and set a boot on the step. He raised a hand. "Hold the line. Save your breath."
Wood popped beyond the ditch and then on the other side. Something rolled.
Two boulders burst from brush and stayed true. They broke the crown and bit the far bank.
The second hit came like the first but meaner: horses first, wheels second, then men—teak smashed flat, bone coach trampled, bells knocked dumb.
Hanna rang her bell once. Maids moved like hinges and cut traces to free the lead.
Han cracked a jar on a stump. Gray drift slid over the ditch. Shapes blurred.
An ogre swung for the team bar. Han turned the blow with a short blade. The bar dropped.
"Left holds. Right yields," he said. Denver hooked the hub and kept the coach square.
"Feet under breath," Han called. A hammer kissed his shoulder and missed his throat.
Drums tripped and stopped. The far tree line rose.
The lord of the band stepped onto the crown. Half again the height of the rest and twice the chest. Tusks pushed past his lip.
Muscle rolled in bands. Veins stood like roots. Ash marks showed bloodline layers.
Broken iron hung at his throat. He carried a beam spiked with nails. He chose his order.
He went for the red canopy first. One blow folded the box. The next ended the owner's cry.
He ripped the teak roof. He shoved mirror steel until it skated. He hooked a frame and tore it free.
Han watched and counted. Strike, then two steps to deny space.
Hanna drew bone into a spear. Black shine drank light and gave none back. "Keep him off the team," she said.
The lord roared. The sound hit like a wall. Bloodlust climbed the band.
He came straight. Han planted. Dark mana folded and held.
"Obsidian Cauldron," he said. The pull opened. Heat bent toward his palm.
The beam slowed. Nails sang. The swing lost teeth.
Hanna drove for the hip. The lord turned and took the cut on bone. She slid back and planted.
He broke the pull by brute force. He hit the road and made it jump. He came again without care.
Han filled his other hand with fire. "Dual Breath," he said. Black and red curled and spat across the beam.
Pitch ran and caught. Nails glowed. The beam hit mud.
Hanna split the spear and went low. She cut the tendon above the heel. The lord staggered.
An ogre rushed her flank and fell to a hook at the ankle.
The lord turned for the horses. Three steps brought him to Han.
Wings opened. Air drew like sails. The pull dragged through the lord and past the ditch.
Hanna staked a bone pin at the hub and locked the coach to ground. The team found room to breathe.
The lord tore a strip from a wing. Pain went white. Han narrowed his eyes and held shape.
A guard rushed and died under one fall of the beam. Horses screamed. The line held.
Hanna cut the calf and got sparks on bone. Mud slid under her boots. She kept her feet.
Han burned him again. Ash glazed.
The lord snatched a broken axle and stabbed like a man. The point ran under Han's arm and tore cloth.
Han stepped in, caught the shaft, and turned it with his hips.
Hanna stabbed above the crest of the hip and twisted. The lord swung blind and hit the coach. Wood cried and held.
The maids ran the freed horses in a loop and brought them back. A third bell hung on a spoke and made the wheel sing. The sound rattled ogre ears.
"Dark Dragon," Han said. Air cooled and cracked. A shadow jaw laid its teeth on the road.
The dragon shoved the lord into the ditch and held. Stones flew and passed through smoke.
Hanna nailed his shadow to the wheel song. The pin hummed and fixed the weight. "Now," she said.
Han opened the Cauldron in the lord's chest. Not flesh. Not blood. The flow between both.
Heat went first. The boil left his skin. Breath shrank inside his ribs.
Hanna grew a cage inside the wound and turned it like a key. Sinew snagged. The opening stayed wide.
The lord clawed for her throat. She slapped the hand aside with the blade's flat. The bell spoiled his aim.
Han drew until the dragon sharpened. He drew until the lord's eyes knew what had gone.
The dragon bit the beam and crushed it. Nails rang. The road smelled like a forge.
"End it," Han said.
Hanna stepped to the line of his pull and drove the spear through the chest. The body pinned to its own shadow. Han spat the last of the twin fire and sealed black to red.
The lord sagged. Steam left his mouth and stopped. The band felt the stop and broke.
They ran for trees in a clatter of stone and bone.
The dragon coiled once and faded. The road went quiet.
Hanna wiped her blade on a strip of cloak. Her hands shook only after the bell came off.
Han folded the wings and let cold in. He breathed slow. His hands steadied.
Denver soothed the mare. The hub hook held. The team stood square.
The teak coach lay open. The red canopy was still. The twins looked like boys who learned too late.
Han looked at wheels and faces. "You leave at light," he said. "Take what moves and nothing else."
No one argued. The road had taught enough.
Hanna tallied the maids. Scrapes and bruises. One cracked bell.
Han crouched by the lord. The Cauldron still tasted heat. He shut it and left cold weight.
"We were read," Hanna said.
Han faced the crest on the coach. Light drew a thin bar and did not move. "We keep pace," he said. "We change nothing and we change everything."
He set the order for the night and walked the line.
They salvaged iron from the lord's beam and braced the cracked hub with twine and a wedge. "Hooks, spikes, pins," Han said. "No gifts for a second band."
They logged tusk tallies. Hanna copied the cuts onto the scroll. Bells were hushed with cloth to a dull pitch.
The mirror twins asked for escort. "Ride behind and speak to no one," Han said. "If you bargain, you leave our shadow."
Denver found a reed and wire charm under their rail. Hanna passed it to Han. He pocketed it. "Watch who misses it. Quiet."
They cleared stray cords and salted the leather. Hanna stitched a strap. The bell rang once, clean.
A rival asked to share fire. Han gave them heat and refused their wine.
He traced ridge and menhirs in dust and marked the stream that sank and rose again. "First light we move," he said. "Pace is mine. If drums call, bells answer in threes."
"Name the strike?" Hanna asked.
"Later," he said. "It stays ours."
He listened to what did not move until the chill went still.
He set the order for the night. A single drum sounded and went quiet.
Before dawn the fog pooled low along the ditch. Frost threaded the grass.
Han checked the marks around the coaches. Hoof cuts overlapped in odd pairs. A new set pointed toward the ridge and then stopped as if lifted.
He found a pin shaped from soft wire under the red canopy's rail. It matched nothing on their harness. He kept it.
Hanna walked the circle once more. She found a smear of ash on the toll rope and three fresh knots. Someone had tugged the cords after the fight.
The mirror twins came for orders. One glanced at his coach rail and hid the glance.
Han watched him without comment. "We move on the first bell," he said. "Eat now."
Before first light, Han walked the ditch. He counted stones and marked where feet had slipped. The mud told him they would circle if they smelled weakness.
He set snares of line and bells on low branches. Cloth muffled each tongue to a whisper still cut clean. Denver checked the brace and nodded once.
Hanna placed a chalk mark on every wrist. "If we scatter, we count five and show the mark," she said. The maids repeated it.
Han left a decoy light in the brush and killed the rest. He turned the charm in his pocket and listened for breath was not theirs.
Somewhere beyond the cedars, a drum tested the air. It found nothing and went quiet again.
The road waited in the dark.
So dark that everything ahead seemed to have been born from darkness itself and more.