As the beast roared and one of the guards was sent flying, the prisoners quickly realised that their current situation had to change. The second guard managed to ward it off, rushing over to his comrade, the otherworlders he was supposed to watch over becoming merely an afterthought.

  “I don’t know what the fuck that is, but it doesn’t sound cuddly.” Jeremy turned to the other two soldiers, yanking on the chains.

  Each of them had thick cuffs around their wrists, each cuff connected by a chain to the other, far enough apart for them to move their arms, still with significant constraint. The only thing that kept them from leaving the stables was the fact that their chains were also wrapped around a wooden beam, one of several, that held up the roof of the stables, preventing them from getting up and walking more than a couple of feet.

  The horses in the back began to panic once they sensed the beast outside, and the ragabarn wasn’t one to pass up a free meal; tied horses and chained up men seemed like a perfect feast.

  There was more commotion outside, beyond what the otherworlders could see through the entrance of the stables.

  “That thing is gonna tear whoever’s outside apart, and then it's coming for us. The guard has a better chance of not dying if we help him and vice versa.” Continued the soldier, all three men now standing up and tugging on the chains.

  “Alright, you two, duck,” Clyde said, turning to face the beam. Adjusting his body to get as much range of motion as possible, he clenched his fist, joints feeling stiff from the cold.

  “This’ll sting like a motherfucker.”

  With a quick inhale, the Warhound put his entire body into the swing, fist connecting with the beam at shoulder height of the man, followed by a loud crunch. But it wasn’t Clyde’s hand that gave way, but the old wooden beam itself. Splinters showered Jeremy and Marcel as they crouched while the force of the hit broke the wood in half.

  More crunching quickly followed as the portion of the roof, no longer held in place by the support beam and overweight from all the snow that had piled on top of it, began to collapse.

  Clyde grabbed the chains of the other two, pulling them closer and standing over them, back bent forward and arms, now free to move, covering the back of his head as the roof crumbled and fell on top of them.

  The guard stared at the collapsed structure, watching next to his comrade as the prisoners moved the fallen planks and snow aside and crawled outside from the mess. Jeremy immediately rushed over to the guard, while Clyde wasted no time running towards the paladin that was facing off against the beast.

  “Move it, kid!” The behemoth of a man shouted, kicking Filtz out of the ragabarn’s way before the creature’s jaws could clamp around Elisia’s brother.

  Filtz was sent tumbling through the snow, Clyde’s right foot struck him from the left side, breaking his arm right below his shoulder. The Warhound winced in pain as the monster’s teeth sank into his right thigh instead, the beast determined to get at least one victim. He flexed his enhanced muscles, preventing the teeth from sinking further and doing more damage, while trying to grab the monster by the head in hopes that it would release him.

  “Clyde!” Marcel yelled for his comrade, grabbing a large piece of wood from the collapsed roof and throwing with surprising strength for a man of his small stature.

  Clyde caught the chunk that was once the lower part of the beam he had punched through, gaining a foothold with his left leg and slamming the object full force into the ragabarn’s head, sending splinters flying in all directions.

  The creature released Clyde’s leg from its jaws and hissed. It was dazed and confused; the force of the strike was far more painful than it expected. Blood dripped down Clyde’s right leg, painting the snow where he stood, but the man didn’t seem to mind much.

  They stared each other down as the ragabarn shook its head as if trying to shake off the residual pain of the wooden block being broken over its skull. The hunt had taken an unfavourable turn for the juvenile, too many foes knew about its presence in the village and the number was bound to increase quickly. It had to escape, take with it what prey it had already felled and leave.

  This would prove harder to do now that the large human was standing in front of it. He showed no signs of pain or panic, and biting into his flesh felt no different than sinking teeth into thick wood. The needles on the end of the ragabarn’s tail needed more time to grow back, meaning that paralysing the opponent was out of the question. Even worse, the other, shorter man began to approach from the side.

  While Clyde and Marcel were dealing with the ragabarn, Jeremy grabbed the guard by his shoulder.

  “Go get Elisia.”

  “But.” The guard looked to his comrade, who lay on the ground, showing no signs of life.

  “He’s either dead or dying. You can’t help him. Go!” Jeremy practically pulled the guard back to his feet and pushed him in the direction of Tynaris’s house.

  The ragabarn roared, clawed hands digging into the snow and throwing it in the direction of the two Warhounds, hoping to blind them enough so it could grab either Filtz or the incapacitated guards and escape with them. However, such a trick would not work twice.

  As soon as the creature moved, so did Clyde, closing the distance fast while snow was being thrown at him. Arms raised high above his head; fingers interlocked as he brought both hands down on top of the creature’s already wounded head like a sledgehammer. The force of the blow forced the ragabarn’s head into the snowy ground.

  It recovered quickly, but not quickly enough to avoid the thick arms from wrapping around its long neck, just where it met the skull. Clyde made sure to also wrap the chains that connected the cuffs around the beast’s jaws, forcing them shut while he used his entire body weight, essentially lying over the ragabarn’s head and keeping it pinned down. The beast thrashed and hissed, as Clyde hugged it, wrapping his legs around the creature’s jaws too, and his arms around its neck, trying his best to choke it.

  Wings flapped and its entire body jerked in wild, panicked movements, tail flailing around like a whip. With its clawed wings, the ragabarn swiped at Clyde, leaving several shallow cuts across the man’s back and arms, trying to get him to release his iron grip.

  Marcel tried rushing in to help, only for the beast to jerk wildly to the right, striking with its tail and sending him flying back to the pile of wood that was once the roof, several meters away. Still, without its spikes, the hit would not be lethal.

  “Fuck! Jeremy! Marcel! This piece of shit is trying to take off!” Clyde yelled, pressing down on the ragabarn’s head with all his might while the creature began kicking off the ground and flapping its wings in a panic.

  Jeremy took the decommissioned guard’s sword and ran over to help Clyde, running the blade through the monster’s right wing, pinning it to the ground. The beast immediately began to thrash and throw its mass around, hoping to unpin its wing while Jeremy struggled to keep the sword pressed down.

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  “Aaagghhh! How strong is this motherfucker?!”

  Faced with the prospect of its death, the monster’s instincts went wild as it began putting all of its strength into breaking free and shaking the attackers off, giving up on everything, including its previous prey, in an attempt to survive.

  Jeremy, lacking Clyde’s strength, struggled to keep the creature’s wing pinned to the ground, pushing the sword down with all his weight as the ragabarn’s tail whipped close to him in hopes of hitting. His effort was helped by Marcel, who emerged bruised from the pile of wood and ran over to Jeremy, striking the hilt of the blade with a large plank, driving the sword further through the ragabarn’s right wing, until the very handle touched the blood-stained feathers. Both men pressed down, doing their best to hold the sword in place as the animal was going berserk.

  “It’s tryna bite my dick off!” Clyde screamed, feeling the monster try to open its jaws.

  Filtz was watching the fight unfold through the haze of the venom and the heavy snow. He couldn’t move, even speaking felt like an insurmountable task.

  “Ragabarn…. Venom. I need to cleanse myself…”

  Quietly, barely louder than a whisper, he began to chant.

  “Merciful Mother… You who weep for your children, your devoted servants… Bless me. Grant unto me… your holy tears.”

  Every word spoken felt like a final breath. Filtz struggled to focus through the venom coursing through his blood and the lack of sleep he suffered for days. He was warm, he was tired, if only he could rest, even for a minute.

  “A paladin can never truly rest when he’s aware of the presence of evil.” He remembered the words of his instructor from the Holy City. No matter how tired, how afraid, no matter what happened in that dungeon, he took the sacred oath of a paladin.

  “Cleanse me of evil and its vile influence. Let not wickedness take root within me.” His words grew louder, his body glowing with a soft, green light.

  “I let into me your holy light! Purify!”

  The dizziness was gone, the venom purged from his body as the spell took hold, and in its place was overwhelming pain.

  “Ouughh, fuck!” Filtz yelled; the pain of his mangled arm that was being suppressed by the paralysing venom now fully registered in his brain.

  Still, he pushed through it, looking around and reaching for his sword with his good hand and using it to help himself up to his feet. The object of his fury since that day in the dungeon was right before him, wrestling with the ragabarn for life or death. However, seeing the monster, its long serpent-like body thrashing and spasming, he felt a familiar fear climb up his throat. Gungams. Prior to encountering them in the dungeon, Filtz was never afraid of reptiles. But after that day, he couldn’t so much as look at a snake or lizard without wanting to run up a tree and hide.

  The ragabarn was much bigger than a gungam, about the size of a large work horse in height and almost twice as long. Its neck was half the length of its tail, giving it a snake-like appearance. To say that Filtz was terrified of the beast would be an understatement.

  He gripped the hilt of his sword tightly, watching as the animal tried the only move left it could think of; attempting a deathroll in hopes of shaking off Clyde and potentially squishing Jeremy and Marcel beneath its large body. It kicked the ground with its legs and pushed off it with its left wing, but every time it tried, Clyde would forcefully rotate its head and neck in the opposite direction as much as he could, preventing the beast from rolling.

  The paladin’s mind was torn between vengeance and fear. If he attacked the prisoners, no doubt he could take out at least one before collapsing, but it would allow the beast to escape. And a ragabarn always held grudges; if it survived this night, it would come back when it matured. Time was running out, and Filtz had to make a choice: payback for what happened in the dungeon or the guaranteed safety of the village?

  “Damn it all.” He cursed, mustering up all his strength and grabbing the sword so the blade was pointed backwards, before running towards the ragarn from its left side. Filtz leapt into the air, jumping towards the beast and driving his sword through its other wing, pinning it also into the ground before it could attempt to roll over.

  The monster screamed, kicking against the ground with its back legs, but the men held strong, pushing with everything they had to keep the animal pinned until more guards showed up to finish it off. Jeremy hoped the guard alerted Elisia, as the village guards held the gate, which was all the way across from where the beast flew over the wall and attacked. It would take them minutes to arrive, if they even heard the commotion in the first place over the howling snowstorm winds. And they didn’t have minutes.

  Suddenly, something broke in the beast and Clyde fell on his ass.

  ***

  “RAGABARN! RAGABARN!” The guard screamed like a man possessed as he ran through the street on his way to Tynaris’s house. Running was difficult as the snow was dragging him down with each step.

  Elisia could hear the yelling, tossing in half-sleep, before suddenly being jolted awake by frantic banging on the front door of the house.

  “Lady Elisia, Wake up! Your brother, the prisoners, a ragabarn attacked! The stables! It struck your brother!” Screamed the man while pounding on the door so hard that clumps of snow were getting knocked off the roof.

  She grabbed her sword and swung the door to her room open with a band, kicking down the door to her brother’s room, as it was right across from hers. Leaping out the window would save precious seconds instead of running to the front door.

  Elisia leapt across the room, over Filtz’s bed, in one motion. Halfway out the window, she kicked off the windowsill with such force that it cracked the wall around the frame and shattered the window entirely, sending shards of glass all around into the snow, sending her into the snowstorm as just a furious red blur.

  ***

  “I can’t hold it for long!” Clyde yelled, feeling the creature’s tongue lick the blood from his thigh as his grip began to weaken.

  Jeremy, Marcel and Filtz didn’t fare much better, the paladin already feeling his strength begin to abandon him at a rapid pace due to his exhaustion and broken arm.

  Warning bells rang in the distance, as a muffled boom echoed from somewhere in the street, before a red blur appeared and landed next to Clyde. The man fell on his ass, still holding the head in a tight grip, realizing it is no longer connected to the neck once blood began to shower all over him. The creature reared on its back legs, its death throes shaking off Filtz and the other two prisoners.

  Elisia beheaded the beast in a single strike before her feet even touched the ground, but her fury was nowhere near satiated. Her black blade began glowing, turning through all shades of red and orange until it glowed as hot as forge iron. Without hesitation, she ran her blade into the beast’s chest, twisting the sword.

  The knight roared as fire erupted from the blade, scorching the headless ragabarn from the inside out, until it burst into flames from the inside. Elisia pulled her blade out as the burning corpse collapsed into the snow.

  Filtz simply smiled, seeing how easily his sister slew the beast, before his eyes rolled and his world turned to black.

  “Filtz!” His sister screamed, dropping the sword to the ground and rushing to catch him before he fell.

  By now, the entire village was awake and outside their homes, some of the gate guards were also rushing and pushing through the snow to get to the group.

  “Took these assholes long enough.” Clyde sighed, catching her breath and still holding the ragabarn’s head.

  “You two alright? Marcel?”

  “I’ll live. Good thing none of those spikes hit me.” Replied the man.

  “Jeremy?”

  “Who knew KFC would send a hit-chicken to take us out?” Joked the soldier.

  “If there was ever a timeline in which I go vegan, that possibility has died tonight.” Clyde laughed, catching his breath.

  “Oh, fuck man. I think I broke the kid’s arm when I kicked him out of the chickenshit’s way.”

  “I think… we are just gonna blame that one on the monster too,” Marcel suggested and they all agreed in heartbeat.

  The villagers carefully helped the guards take Filtz towards the church so he could be healed by the village priest. Though no one could understand what the prisoners were laughing about, Elisia ordered them to be taken along with Filtz as well, so any wounds they might have could at least be cleaned to avoid infection.