“Hold your ground!” he heard Hornbeck yell from somewhere, his command disobeyed as it was followed shortly by the footsteps of lumberjacks sprinting towards the truck, dropping the wood they had been working on. One lumberjack ran past Florian, his green eyes wide open and regarding the sky above them. The axe he held in his hands shook as he ran past Florian out of the forest and back toward the highway where the truck was waiting.

Florian heard the boy – for he had been too young to grow even the beginnings of a beard – scream. It was a primal thing, one of fear and anger. Racing after the kid as fast as he could, Florian looked into the sky, noting that there was a stream of red smoke rising ahead of him. “Fuck!” he yelled.

Hornbeck yelled after him, but Florian paid the commander no heed as he pushed through shrubbery. What he found made him nearly lose his lunch, despite all he’d seen on the wall and in the medical tent. Three Hellwolves stood around a corpse, its face practically missing, a single green eye remaining the only identifying feature. They regarded him with canine grins, watching as he moved to unhook Bludgeon.

Forcing the bile down, Florian approached, every step measured and heavy. The sight had filled him with fury so great that it threatened to burst. His heart ached for the boy, and he would see those monsters dead, even if his magic was largely unavailable to him. He shouted a challenge, holding Bludgeon at his side and at the ready. The wolves eagerly accepted.

Then they were upon him, clawing at him with reckless abandon, their simultaneous strikes threatening to overwhelm him from the beginning. Florian stumbled backwards, trying to evade their attacks, his armor shredding like paper when he failed. It was when the largest wolf – larger than most of its brethren, but not enough to be a boss – opted to try and bite him that an opportunity finally presented itself. Deciding that Florian’s shin had looked like a good target, the wolf tried to separate Florian from his right leg. Instead, Florian pushed backwards off his leg, gaining the time to bat the monster away with Bludgeon as if he were playing baseball.

The beast didn’t fly far, just barely missing Florian and losing an eye in the process. Those golden plates on the left side of its face were showing cracks, but they didn’t stop it from turning right back to attack him with even greater strength. This time, it didn’t leap at him, learning its lesson. Instead, it waited for the other two wolves to finish encircling Florian. Their trap set, the big one closed in, a feeling of inevitability in its steps.

He had one spell left in him, the same spell he’d been hoping to save for a rainy moment. Well, that moment had come. The overgrown wolf charged at him, its fiery eyes opened wide with excitement. Florian swung Bludgeon, the wolf dodging the heavy weapon, trying to nip at Florian’s leg once more. Swiveling, Florian moved just barely out of reach only for another of the two wolves to take a bite at his right arm. Iron crumbled, but the armor held long enough for him to stab his left thumb at the creature’s eye, forcing it to release him.

Blood dripped down his arm, running down the length of Bludgeon. There, it mixed with the inky ichor of the lead Hellwolf. Florian’s heart beat with the intensity of a war drum as he swung Bludgeon yet again, catching the second of the smaller wolves off-guard as it leapt at his back. The weapon slammed into its ribs with as much force as Florian could muster, breaking a few of the scales there and drawing blood.

Not a moment to rest, Florian fended off another attack by the big wolf, Bludgeon moving as a conductor’s baton might. The constant movements tired him, but his chance hadn’t come yet. He redoubled his efforts, making sure to take a swing at the other two when they returned to his range. It was a flurry of attacks from both the wolves and Florian, but had anyone been there to witness the fight, it was obvious that it was a losing fight for the human.

Then, whether spurred on by impatience or confidence, the lead wolf leapt at Florian’s neck while Bludgeon was colliding with another of its allies. Florian grinned, condensing the moisture in the air into a ball of water and sending it down the wolf’s throat. The Hellwolf continued its flight into Florian, but it was dead on arrival. Its eye was unmoving, no longer blazing a fiery reddish-orange, but rather a black bead.

But the fight was not over. Florian’s latest attack had sent another wolf flying, and so he took Bludgeon and, as if he were swinging a hammer in the forge, sent it straight into the maw of the next wolf. This time, the attack carried with it enough force to break the Hellwolf’s jaw. Faced with two enemies, one incapable of using its strongest attack and the other limping with what Florian hoped were broken ribs, Florian panted in exhaustion. Even injured, the monsters were more than a match for him as he was now.

Fortunately, the Hellwolves didn’t stay around to find out. They took one last look at him and decided that he wasn’t worth the trouble. Instead, they bounded back toward the highway, leaving Florian alone in between the trees with the carcass of his fallen foe and the body of the young lumberjack. Closing his eyes in relief, Florian breathed deeply. The smells assaulted his nose now that he was no longer fighting, and this time, it really did make him lose the contents of his stomach.

For all the fighting he’d done for the past months, he’d never hung around after a fight. This was the first time he was smelling death. He didn’t like it.

Weapons clanged in the distance, people screaming in anger and in pain. It had been but a moment, but Florian had forgotten that the Hellwolves he’d fought weren’t an isolated incident. His common sense urged him to run to the truck, but he didn’t know what he would face on the way, so he summoned his strength and his courage.

He ran back to the field.

It didn’t resemble a logging camp any longer. It was a battlefield, dozens of Warriors facing dozens of Hellwolves, trying desperately to stick their spears in their vulnerable mouths and eyes. Rivers of crimson ran through the grass as men and women lay dead and dying. Wolves died around them, but they were replaced by what seemed to be an inexhaustible reserve. He saw Anna fighting back-to-back with Hornbeck on the opposite end of the clearing, a small pile of golden carcasses surrounding them. Florian ran in their direction, a Hellwolf taking notice of him as he entered the battlefield. It chased him, forcing Florian to run even harder to find safety.

He tripped. Bludgeon fell out of his grip as he braced himself, the weapon landed a couple feet away.

Turning, he watched as the Hellwolf bounded after him, a lizard’s tongue flicking out of its mouth as it neared. Florian reached for his weapon, but as his fingers just barely grazed it, he knew that he had no way of fighting back. The Hellwolf leapt at him, maw open. His mind protested his efforts, pain striking with the intensity of lightning as he tried to move moisture. He couldn’t keep focus. His spell broke, but the Hellwolf’s eyes betrayed fear for a split second.

A spear shot out over his shoulder, taking the Hellwolf in the vulnerable tissue in its mouth. Its eyes dimmed and went out. Breathing a sigh of relief, Florian found his savior to be Anna, who watched him with concern as he finally closed his eyes and rested.