“Report!” Captain Dhiak ordered as the two tired soldiers shed their armor and were given food and water. “Where are Belgran and Sergeant Lekin?!”
“Sir.” Smid said, then paused a moment, as if to order his thoughts. “It was the strangest thing. We were takin’ a shortcut that Belgran knew about, a little two-rut cart path about two miles south of the highway. We came to this burnt out house. It must have burned last night because there was still a bit of smoke from the smoldering, and you could smell it was really recent, an’ bad. It’d been right beside the road, and one of the half-burned main timbers had fallen mostly across the way, and there was this kid sittin’ on the end of the timber with his legs out, blockin’ the rest a’ the road. He’s all covered in ash an’ soot, his head down, his hands on his thighs, ain’t wearin’ nothin’ but his pants. Couldn’t of been more than twelve, maybe thirteen years old. He didn’t move a muscle as we come marchin’ up.
“It was just after noon so we were all hot and sweaty, and you know how Sergeant Lekin was, he hated everything just on general principles anyway, so he was in a pretty snarly mood from marchin’ in the heat in his armor. He kicks the kid’s legs out of the way as he walks past, not hard to hurt ‘em, just to get ‘em out ‘a the way, but not nice about it neither, an’ he says; ‘Outta the way, peasant!”
Smid paused for a drink of water, his eyes unfocused as he remembered, then continued. “The kid stands up an’ says ‘Hey’ as he steps up behind Sergeant Lekin. Not yellin’ or anything, just hey, in a completely normal tone of voice. Lekin spins around like he’s gonna yell somethin’ nasty, but he’s kinda’ surprised to find the kid so close to him that their bellies are almost touchin, and the kid’s looking him up right in the eye with this strange look on his face, or I should say no look on his face, no expression at all, and that was the strange part. And as this is happenin’ the kid takes Lekin’s short sword out of its scabbard enough to get the tip clear, and he lowers the handle end enough to get it pointing up as the tip is restin’ on Lekin’s belt, and he shoves it up under Sergeant Lekin’s breast plate and into his heart. He didn’t do it particularly fast, or slow, he just did it, casual like, like you’d slice a carrot, without lookin’ away from Sergeant Lekin’s eyes. It was all over in a second.
“Sergeant Lekin’ gets this stunned look on his face as he tries to grab the blade or the wound through his armor, then his legs start to give out an’ shake, an’ the kid casually pushes him backward off the blade, and he falls.
“We were so close as this is goin’ on that I could’ve reached out and touched him. The kid turns around and looks at the rest of us. He didn’t threaten us with the sword, he just let it hang by his side, drippin’ blood. But his face… It was like havin’ a dead man lookin’ at you.
“We all just stood there for a second, then Belgran says ‘Crap!’ an’ he reaches for the kid, and the kid cuts off two of Belgran’s fingers with no more hurry or emotion than wavin’ away flies. Then Belgran yells crap again, a lot louder this time as he draws his longsword, and an arrow hits him in the throat. A small arrow, prob’ly elf made, or… Or from a bow for a kid.
“The boy just stands there as Belgran starts thrashin’ his life out on the ground, then me an’ Krin here, we ran the hell outta there. Once we were in the trees an’ had some cover, we look back and the kid’s just sittin’ on the end of the burnt beam again, just like how we found ‘im, ‘cept with the bloody sword.”
“Sir, I figured it was an elven trap and the boy was spelled.” Krin stated. “I thought the best thing to do at that point was to catch up to you here at the camp and report.”
Captain Dhiak looked from one to the other of them for a moment, his jaw clenched. “You’ll take Lieutenant Fastel’s platoon back there in the morning.” he ordered. “They have our best trackers. Tell Fastel that you’re to find the boy and the archer. Kill them.”
“Yes Sir.”