Free Brave Men Die: Part 2 by Dan Adams Page A

disturb his blonde, Rigel moved quickly into the night air and across the compound. A few of the mercenaries nodded their heads as he passed and he returned the gesture. Once again, Finn had made sure that all his men were on duty tonight.
    The captain was waiting for him at the gate with the same two men as last night. All three were heavily armed, and heavily armoured, and would be too slow if they were actually participating in combat tonight. If the creature attacked the gate, they wouldn’t even draw their blades before its claws tore through the steel plate they all wore.
    ‘It isn’t midnight yet boy.’
    Rigel tilted his head to look at the rising moon. ‘It won’t be long.’ He wanted to be out there waiting when it arrived, not in here where it would slaughter everyone to get to him. And then there was the chance it would track down Finn before it found him.
    ‘Doesn’t feel right, you going out there on your own.’
    ‘You didn’t even see it last night did you?’
    Finn was silent. Both men knew the answer. There wasn’t a man in the camp besides Rigel who had been able to track the beast’s movements as it traversed the woods last night. Rigel put his hand on his uncle’s shoulder and smiled as confidently as he could.
    ‘It will be fine. I’m much better at this kind of thing than I look.’ Even he sort of half believed that. It was enough for Finn to let him walk out of the compound, alone, and that was all he needed.
    Rigel stopped halfway between the camp and the woods. He had two hours to wait until midnight. He didn’t know exactly what it was but the creature was magically enhanced and took the shape of a giant wolf crossed with something from the depths of hell.
    He swallowed and his throat was dry.
    Rigel stood perfectly still, his eyes trained on nothing but the woods. His arms rested by his side, his leather armour stretched as he breathed deeply, meditating. His hands clenched and unclenched, his fingers flexed out of nervous habit. His blade was never far from reach.
    He noticed the movement on his left without having to actually see it, his heightened senses picking the creature up as it stalked him. Without betraying himself, his green eyes shifted to his left slowly until he found the beast.
    It hugged the tree line, perhaps five to ten metres back under the safety of the shadows, darting across his line of sight as if weighing him up. Rigel kept his arms by his sides, nonchalant, as if the creature wasn’t there at all, slathering and scratching the ground with its claws. He resisted the urge to arm himself, the fear of confronting something from hell making his stomach drop.
    Rigel knew Finn and the other mercenaries were watching him, their eyes glued to his back. Instinctively, he knew Carina was still asleep in the tent. Over the last few weeks no one else had even seen the creature and tonight, when it made its move, he doubted they would see it launch itself at him. They would probably just hear his screams and find his corpse in the morning.
    It was directly in front of him now, waiting, its chest rising and falling with heavy breath. Rigel waited, his fingers dancing on the hilt of his blade. The moment dragged. He locked eyes with the beast, those deep red eyes held his stare. Then it charged.
    The mercenaries would have blinked and missed it. His eyes remained focused on the demon, the steel sliding against his sheath scraped at the night air, opposing the growls from the depths of the beast. Rigel moved like a blur himself, charging to meet it, his blade up in front of his torso.
    A claw scraped against his left shoulder as his blade sliced the beast’s chest and Rigel instinctively rolled with the blow to lessen the damage. Blood was already streaming down his arm, but he raised it to take a two-handed grip as they began circling.
    The beast snarled and leapt. Rigel darted to his right and slashed at its side, cutting through its thick fur and grazing it slightly. It