Gregor's Stand: Flashback to the Attack

Gregor - POV

I woke to Lyra's scream from the bedroom.

Not the gentle stirring of a husband responding to his wife's nightmare, but the instant, electric alertness of a soldier hearing the sound of death approaching. My eyes snapped open just as rough hands seized my shoulders, dragging me from the bed and into the main room before I could even process what was happening.

"Got the big one," a voice growled in the darkness. "Watch his hands, looks like he knows how to use them."

Three men hauling me toward the center of the cottage. Maybe four more moving through other rooms. Hard to tell in the chaos, but enough that they'd thought it necessary to overwhelm me while vulnerable. Smart tactics from professionals who understood overwhelming force applied quickly.

The floorboards beneath my bare feet suddenly groaned and buckled, wooden planks shifting like living things. From the bedroom came sounds of struggle and the impossible noise of furniture moving on its own. Lyra was fighting back with everything she had, turning our home into a deathtrap.

Unfortunately for the raiders, they'd never fought someone who'd learned to kill with nothing but bare hands, battlefield instincts, and the fury of molten earth running through his veins.

The first raider made the mistake of getting too close, trying to pin my arms while his companions secured the rest of the cottage. I twisted violently, breaking his grip, and drove my elbow back into his throat. My skin burned hot with rage and desperation, and the satisfying sizzle of flesh as my superheated strike collapsed his windpipe told me he'd be dead in minutes. The wet crunch and smell of burning skin confirmed it.

"He's loose!" someone shouted, but I was already moving.

No weapons. No armor. No time to think, only react. Thirty years of muscle memory took over as I rolled away from grasping hands, came up in a fighting crouch, and assessed the threat. My fists hardened like stone as earth magic flowed through my bones, turning my hands into weapons that could shatter ribs with a single blow.

The house shuddered around us as Lyra's magic spread through every beam and board. Window frames creaked ominously, and I could hear the sound of roots erupting from wooden surfaces. Whatever she was doing in there was making the entire structure unstable.

Two men between me and the bedroom door. A third circling to flank me. All armed with short swords and daggers, all moving with the coordination of experienced fighters. But they were fighting in close quarters while the house itself was coming alive around us, which meant their longer weapons were actually a disadvantage.

The flanking raider lunged first, his blade aimed at my ribs. I sidestepped and caught his wrist with hands hot enough to brand flesh. He screamed as my grip burned through his leather bracers, and I used his own momentum to drive him backward toward the wall that separated the living room from Seraphine's old quarters.

The impact, enhanced by earth magic flowing through my arms, sent him crashing through the weakened timber with a shower of splintered wood. Lyra's plant magic had compromised the structural integrity, and the wall gave way completely under the force of a grown man's body, creating a breach between the rooms.

I followed him through the gap into Seraphine's room, where he lay groaning among the debris.

Before he could recover from his tumble, I had his dagger. Then I had a weapon.

"Son of a bitch knows what he's doing," one of them snarled, nursing burned fingers from trying to grab my heated forearm. "And he's got fire magic!"

"Ice him down!" another shouted.

Frost began spreading across the floor around my feet as one of the raiders extended his hands, trying to trap me in place with slick ice. But I was already moving, my heated steps melting through his magic as I continued the fight in the smaller room.

The room felt strange, walls bulging slightly as Lyra's magic worked through the wooden framework of the cottage. Support beams curved at unnatural angles, and I could hear the sound of growing things spreading through the structure like a slow infection.

They came at me together in the cramped space, which was exactly what I'd been hoping for. In the narrow confines of the room, they got in each other's way while I had room to work. I ducked low under the first swing, my stone-hard fist connecting with the man's thigh and shattering his femur. As he collapsed screaming, I spun to catch the second raider's thrust on my stolen blade.

Steel rang against steel as we grappled, but close-quarters knife work was a skill I'd mastered in muddy trenches and desperate night raids. I twisted his blade aside with my left hand while my right, burning like a forge coal, grabbed his throat. The smell of searing flesh filled the air as I cooked him from the inside out, then opened his carotid with the dagger while he was still trying to scream.

Four men down, but I could hear more moving through the cottage. Lyra's voice, muffled and growing distant. Baby Naelira wailing in terror. The house continued to shift and groan around us as wooden surfaces sprouted impossible growths.

My family was in danger, and I was trapped in this room fighting for my life.

I tried to push toward the main room, but more raiders poured through the broken wall, six this time, crowding the space with bodies and steel. Too many to fight directly, especially when they'd learned to be cautious. They spread out as best they could in the confined space, using their numbers to box me in while staying out of my reach.

"Just keep him busy," one of them ordered, his hands glowing with what looked like wind magic. "The others will finish up with the cargo, then we can deal with him properly."

Cargo. They were talking about my wife and children like merchandise.

The rage that filled me then was cold and calculating, sharpened by years of battlefield experience into precision and deadliness. Fire roared through my veins while earth magic hardened my bones to iron. I stopped trying to reach the door and focused on what I could do: reduce their numbers as quickly as possible.

The wind-mage tried to knock me off balance with a sudden gust, but I planted my feet and let earth magic root me to the floor like bedrock. When his companion rushed me with a spear, I caught the shaft with both hands. The wooden handle burst into flames from my touch while my grip, hard as stone, snapped it in half. I drove the broken end through his chest and used the body as a shield against the crossbow bolt that followed.

The walls around us continued to warp and shift as Lyra's desperate battle reached its climax. I could sense the magic in the wood, angry and protective, fighting to defend what remained of our home. But the sounds from the bedroom were growing quieter, which meant they were winning.

The next few minutes blurred together in a symphony of violence and magic. I fought like a man possessed, using every dirty trick, brutal technique, and elemental ability I'd learned in two decades of warfare. I broke bones with stone-hard fists, cauterized wounds with burning palms, and shattered what remained of Seraphine's sparse furniture with earth-enhanced strikes that sent splinters flying like shrapnel.

But there were too many of them, and I was fighting in my nightclothes with nothing but stolen steel and raw magic. For every man I dropped, another took his place. They didn't need to beat me, they just needed to keep me occupied while their companions finished the real work.

A water-mage caught me off guard, sending a pressurized jet that knocked me backward into the wall. The weakened timber, compromised by Lyra's magic and our earlier fighting, gave way completely. I crashed through into some kind of storage closet in a shower of broken wood and scattered linens.

Before I could recover, a sword pommel caught me across the temple, sending stars exploding across my vision.

My magic was flagging now, the constant use of fire and earth taking its toll on a body already pushed beyond its limits. My heated skin began to cool, my stone-hard fists returning to vulnerable flesh. A boot to the ribs cracked bones. A blade opened a long gash across my back that burned like molten metal.

The house had gone quiet. Whatever Lyra had been doing, however she'd been fighting, it had stopped. The magical energy flowing through the walls faded to nothing, leaving only ordinary wood and the acrid smell of spent power.

Still, I fought, because the alternative was unthinkable. My family was depending on me, and I would not fail them.

But when the club finally connected with the back of my skull, sending me crashing to the floor in a haze of pain and darkness, I heard the sound that told me I'd already failed.

Hoofbeats. Moving away from the cottage. Moving away from my family.

I lay there in the wreckage of Seraphine's room, surrounded by dead raiders, shattered furniture, and the lingering smell of burned flesh and scorched wood, listening to the sound of my world disappearing into the night.

After the Attack

Present Moment: Gregor - POV

The sound of hoofbeats fading into the distance was almost as terrifying as the silence that had preceded the attack.

I dragged myself upright, my head spinning from the blow that had knocked me unconscious. Blood ran down my face from the gash across my scalp, and every breath sent spikes of agony through my ribs. My stolen dagger lay beside me, its blade dark with blood that wasn't entirely mine.

Around me, the cottage that had been our home lay in ruins. The wall between the main room and Seraphine's quarters was completely gone, reduced to scattered timber and splinters. Furniture lay overturned throughout both spaces, walls scorched with strange burn marks, the very air thick with smoke and the acrid smell of magic gone wrong. Bodies lay scattered across the floors, raiders who'd thought they could take a soldier's family without paying the price.

But it hadn't been enough. I'd killed six men with nothing but stolen steel and desperate fury, and it hadn't been enough to save the people I loved most.

"Lyra!" I called, stumbling through the debris toward our bedroom. "Victor! Naelira!"

But I already knew what I would find. The bedroom was empty, the baby's cradle overturned, signs of struggle everywhere. Strange growths protruded from every wooden surface, testimony to Lyra's desperate battle, but they were already withering without her will to sustain them. My family was gone. All of them. My wife, my daughter, my son, taken by raiders who saw them as nothing more than merchandise to be sold.

"Gregor!" Henrik's voice, rough with smoke and pain. I turned to see the guard captain limping toward me through what had been our front door, blood streaming from a cut on his forehead. "Thank God you're alive. They took everyone they could carry. Women, children..."

"My family," I said hollowly. "They're gone. All of them."

Henrik nodded grimly. "Your wife put up a hell of a fight. Strange growths everywhere, walls twisted like they were alive. But there were too many raiders."

Other villagers began arriving. Selene, tears streaming down her face as she confirmed that her husband Marcus had been among those killed. Widow Cora, whose cottage had been spared but who'd seen the raiders dragging away her neighbors. Several wounded villagers leaned on each other for support, their injuries untreated since Master Elena had been taken with the other captives.

But it was Master Jorik who brought the information I needed most.

He was dying, a sword thrust through the chest that had pierced vital organs, but he grabbed my arm with surprising strength as I knelt beside him.

"Gregor," he wheezed, blood flecking his lips. "The boy... heard them talking... the raiders."

"They took him with the others," I said bitterly.

"No... listen..." His grip tightened desperately. "They came for him specifically. The boy with the strange eyes. Someone told them about his abilities." His eyes found mine, filled with regret. "Always suspected there was a difference about him. Never knew for certain, but they knew. Someone witnessed him use magic, told the wrong people."

The words hit me like a physical blow. Someone had discovered Victor's secret. Despite all our precautions, someone had seen him use his abilities and sold that information to these monsters.

"Where did they take my wife and daughter?"

"Blackhaven," he gasped. "Heard the leader talking about Blackhaven. That's where they take the merchandise." His grip tightened one last time. "The boy... heard one of them shouting. Said the boy with the strange eyes was in the tool shed when it came down. They left him, thought he was dead under the rubble."

My heart stopped. "The shed?"

His hand went slack, and Master Jorik's breathing stopped. But his words had given me what I needed: a destination, and hope that Victor might still be alive.

I spun around, seeing the collapsed structure for the first time with new eyes. Not just random destruction from the raid, but a specific location where my son might be trapped.

"Victor!" I shouted, dropping to my knees beside the wreckage. "Victor, can you hear me?"

Nothing. Just the sound of settling debris and my own desperate breathing.

I turned back to the other survivors with renewed determination, calling out to them. "All of you, help me clear this debris. My son is under there, and we're getting him out if we have to move every piece of wood by hand."

The Rescue

It took us six hours.

Six hours of backbreaking labor, removing beam after beam, tool after tool, piece of shattered timber after piece. The sun was high overhead by the time we reached the bottom of the pile, where a small pocket had been created by two intersecting roof beams.

And there, unconscious but breathing, lay Victor.

He was battered and bruised, covered in dust and small cuts, but alive. Miraculously, impossibly alive. The same magical power that had brought the building down had somehow protected him in the collapse, creating just enough space for him to survive.

I gathered my son in my arms, feeling his steady heartbeat against my chest, and for the first time since the attack began, I allowed myself to hope.

Lyra and Naelira were gone, taken by monsters who traded in human suffering. But Victor was alive. My family wasn't completely destroyed.

And now I had a choice to make: stay in Hearthvale and try to rebuild from the ashes, or leave everything behind and venture into the lawless lands to rescue what remained of my family.

As I looked down at Victor's peaceful face, still marked by the innocence of sleep despite everything he'd endured, I knew there was really no choice at all.

We were going to Blackhaven. And we were bringing our family back.