The Coal Knight

The door cut the setting sunlight out at a strong slant, hanging by only the bottom hinge and slapping against the wall in the breeze that had picked up over the fields, the rustling of corn stalks punctuating the brief interludes of silence between the screams. Lady Ruth looked to the man on all fours, his face badly beaten and lacerations covering his forearms where he had tried to protect himself. Lesser military men lined the room, but they didn't step between the Coal Knight and this. It was the only real fun she seemed to have in the service. She pressed the steel of her boot down, a loud cracking sound echoing through the room before it was quickly chased away by the elderly woman's scream of agony. For all Ruth's discipline as a knight and her best efforts to look intimidating to her captors, she couldn't help but grin at the sound.

"Tell us what you can about the half-breed. You took care of him, and now he has taken up arms against Lord Saxton, your regent."

Another crack before the old man, tears and sweat and blood mixing on his face let out a horrible sound. "WE DON'T KNOW. We don't know where our boy has gone we told you we don't know we don't know we don't please please please you have to stop" and several heavy heaves and cries of all the emotions a person might feel when faced with nothing but despair and dread.

Lady Ruth took a deep breath in her nose, and let it out in a peaceful and calm demeanor. "Very well, I believe you." She took her foot off the woman's broken knee, a dark purple and black and yellow bruise coloring through the swelling that had already begun to take hold. She had to be in her later 60s, the man likley close in age. Ruth looked at her, and could see the expression of agony still masking her face. "I shall end this suffering." In a flash she had pulled her sword from its scabbard and in another, her eyes blacking over, put it trough the woman's throat. A sound that no human could hope to produce edged its way out of the old man's mouth before it slowly turned into a recognizable scream. Cries and curses and begging that what he had seen wasn't real. Lady Ruth stepped around him, wiping her boots clean of the blood on them on their entry mat. "Come, men, it is best to let widows grieve for a loved one." The men stepped around her and she turned to follow before stopping. She turned around, a small frown on her face. "Face me."

The man clutched his dead wife, her gray hairs covering her wide open eyes that still showed the pain she had felt in her final moments. He tried desperately to hold her neck together and cradle her head in his arms, the mixture of his blood and tears dropping onto her face. Ruth grew weary of the whole thing. Watching people grieve is tiresome. Her voice boomed, unnaturally, and she exclaimed "Face me, farmer." The room grew dark and the sunlight from outside seemed to grow distant. He slowly turned towards her. Her black eyes cleared and the room grew sunny again. "I am not without mercy, farmer. I do what I must for my Lord, but I come from a noble line of knights. No one should have to see such wretched sites." She dropped to one knee, and lifted up the old man's chin with her hand, her gauntlets taking to his cheeks as she looked deep into his eyes, still filled with all the grief in this world. "I will do what I can." With her thumbs, she wiped away the tears from under his eyes as he slowly inhaled, calmed more than he believed possible by the essence of the nobility before him. Then, Ruth smiled, digging her thumbs deep into his eyes. His screams were wild, like an animal being cooked alive. She stood up over him. "There, now you need not see it anymore. If you remember anything about this 'Galt,' pray tell that information finds me." She turned, the grin still covering her face.