The bandit camp sprawled across the clearing like a disease: ramshackle shelters, cooking fires, and stolen goods piled without order. Twenty men, perhaps thirty, the dregs who haunted the Blighted Forest's edges. They preyed on refugees fleeing the Council's purges, adding mundane cruelty to theological horror.
The Shadow Knight studied them from the tree line, seeing more than mortal eyes could reveal. Their souls flickered like candle flames: some bright with recent atrocity, others dim with old guilt. None pure. None worth preserving.
"They're nothing," Serena observed from beside him. "Common criminals. Hardly worth your attention."
"They're practice." His voice had settled into its new harmonics, each word seeming to come from multiple directions. "And they have information."
She was right about their insignificance. These weren't the architects of his family's destruction. But the stone's power roared through his veins, demanding expression. Better to test his capabilities on expendable targets before facing real enemies.
"The Council will notice if you slaughter everyone in the region."
"Let them notice. Let them wonder. Let them fear."
He stepped from the shadows without attempting stealth. The transformation had rendered such tactics unnecessary; reality itself bent around him, making concealment a matter of will rather than skill.
A sentry spotted him first. The man's scream died stillborn as shadow-stuff filled his throat, crystallizing into obsidian shards that erupted from his neck. Beautiful in its efficiency. The Shadow Knight noted the technique for future use.
The camp erupted into chaos. Bandits scrambled for weapons, shouting contradictory orders. Some fled immediately, the wise ones. Others formed rough battle lines, too stupid or proud to recognize death walking among them.
"Form up!" their leader bellowed. A large man, scarred from countless small victories. "It's just one man! Take him!"
They charged.
The Shadow Knight moved through them like wind through wheat. His blade, an extension of will more than metal, carved reality as easily as flesh. Where it passed, men simply ceased. Not died—ceased. Their existence edited from the world's story.
One bandit, quicker than his fellows, managed to land a blow. His cudgel shattered against armoured skin that had forgotten how to yield. The Shadow Knight caught the man's wrist, squeezed slightly. Bones liquefied. The bandit's screams provided pleasant counterpoint to the symphony of violence.
Some tried to flee. Distance meant nothing now. The Shadow Knight stepped between heartbeats, appearing before runners like a nightmare made manifest. Shadow-tendrils erupted from his form, piercing hearts, crushing windpipes, painting the clearing in patterns of artistic death.
Within minutes, only three remained: the leader and two lieutenants who'd had sense enough to drop weapons rather than use them.
"Please," the leader gasped, all bravado fled. "We don't even know who you are. Why are you doing this?"
The Shadow Knight considered. Why indeed? These men hadn't killed Marcus or tortured his father. Their crimes were petty compared to the Council's organized evil.
But they were here. They were guilty of something. And he needed to understand his new capabilities before facing real opposition.
"You prey on refugees," he said instead of answering directly. "Those fleeing the Inquisition. Tell me what you've learned from them."
The leader's eyes darted between his dead comrades and this impossible figure. "They... they speak of purges. Entire families arrested. The Council's gone mad, they say. Taking anyone who questions, who complains, who looks wrong at a priest."
"Names. I want names."
"Lord Blackmoor's son leads some kind of resistance. They say he gathers forces at Ironhold. The Council's marked him for death but can't find him." The bandit spoke quickly, desperately. "There's talk of other knights defecting. Some woman called the Silver Witch aids them. Please, that's all I know!"
Ironhold. The Shadow Knight filed the information away. A resistance meant potential allies, or at least tools to use against common enemies. But first...
"You've been helpful," he told the leader. "Your death will be quick."
"But I told you—"
The protest ended as shadows coalesced around the man's head, compressing. The skull imploded with a wet crunch. Quick indeed, more mercy than the bandit had shown his own victims.
The two lieutenants tried to run. One made three steps before shadow-spears erupted from the ground, impaling him in a dozen places. The other simply... stopped. His soul, visible to the Shadow Knight's transformed vision, tore free from its flesh housing and dissipated like smoke.
Silence fell over the clearing. Twenty-seven dead in fewer minutes. Not a battle: an execution. An exercise in applied power.
Serena emerged from the tree line, picking her way delicately between corpses. "Efficient if excessive. You could have questioned them longer."
"I learned what I needed." The Shadow Knight studied his work dispassionately. The artist in him (was that new or had it always existed?) appreciated the patterns of death. The knight he'd been would have been horrified. That man was less than memory now.
"And that was?"
"That I need practice with restraint. These new abilities..." He flexed his hand, watching shadows writhe between his fingers. "They demand use. Demand excess. I need better control before facing the Council."
She nodded thoughtfully. "The Soulstone's power can be intoxicating. Many bearers have lost themselves to bloodlust, forgetting their original purpose."
"I won't forget." The toy horse in his pouch seemed to pulse, or perhaps that was imagination. "But I need to understand these capabilities. Map their boundaries."
"Then we should find more bandits?"
"No. We go to Ironhold." He turned from the carnage, dismissing it as irrelevant. "If Lord Blackmoor's son truly leads resistance, he'll have information. Resources. Perhaps even allies worth cultivating."
"And if he proves unhelpful?"
The Shadow Knight smiled, an expression that would have sent hardened warriors fleeing. "Then I'll practice restraint on better subjects."
They left the clearing without burial or ceremony. Scavengers would come: four-legged and otherwise. By dawn, little would remain but stains and stories. Tales of shadow-given-form, of death walking the forest paths.
Let the stories spread. Let them reach the Council's ears. Let those who'd murdered a child for convenience learn that their actions had consequences beyond their imagining.
The toy horse definitely pulsed now, warm against his chest despite the armour between them. Marcus's laughter echoed in memory: faint but persistent, untouched by the stone's transformation. Some things, it seemed, were too fundamental to erase.
Good. He'd need that memory for what came next. Need its purity to contrast against necessary atrocities. The Council had killed an innocent child. Everything that followed stemmed from that singular cruelty.
They moved through the forest with purpose now. No longer wandering, no longer searching. The Shadow Knight had found his power, tested its edges, confirmed its sufficiency. Time to aim it properly.
Behind them, shadows gathered over the bandits' remains. They whispered to each other in languages that predated human speech, discussing this new player in ancient games. The Soulstone had chosen well; this one wouldn't break under power's weight or lose himself to mindless slaughter.
No, this one had purpose. Direction. Hatred refined to surgical precision.
The forest itself seemed to approve, paths opening where none had existed, distances compressing to speed his journey. Even the Blighted Forest recognized a kindred spirit: something that understood how beauty and horror were merely different angles of the same truth.
By nightfall, they'd covered impossible ground. The forest's edge appeared, and beyond it, the normal world (if anything could be called normal after what he'd become). Somewhere past those ordinary trees, ordinary people lived ordinary lives, unaware that their reality now shared space with something altogether other.
"Second thoughts?" Serena asked, noting his pause.
"Never." The Shadow Knight stepped from the forest's embrace into mundane moonlight. "But I do wonder..."
"What?"
"Whether the world I'm about to reshape will be better than what exists. Whether replacing the Council's tyranny with my own serves any purpose beyond personal satisfaction."
Serena studied him with those violet eyes. "Does it matter? You've already chosen your path. The stone accepted you. There's no returning to who you were."
She was right, of course. The transformation was irreversible; he could feel it in every altered cell, every shadow-touched thought. But some remnant of the knight persisted, questioning motivations even as it accepted necessities.
"Perhaps not," he conceded. "But I'll ensure whatever rises from the Council's ashes can't repeat their cruelties."
"Noble words from someone who just slaughtered thirty men for practice."
"They were bandits. Predators. The world loses nothing by their absence."
"And when you kill innocents? When your revenge requires stepping over children's bodies?"
The question struck deep. Would he become what he fought? Would necessity transform him into another Matthias, justifying atrocity with higher purpose?
The toy horse pulsed against his chest: Marcus's memory made tangible. His nephew's laughter echoed across the gulf between human and whatever he'd become.
"I won't kill children," he said finally. "That line remains."
"Even if they stand between you and revenge?"
"I'll find another way. The Council created me by murdering innocence. I won't validate their methods by copying them."
Serena smiled, an expression both knowing and sad. "Hold to that limitation. It may be all that keeps you recognizable as something once human."
They travelled through the night, covering leagues with each shadow-stepped stride. The power flowing through him made physical laws negotiable rather than absolute. Distance bent. Time stretched. The world became fluid, responsive to will backed by the void's authority.
Dawn found them overlooking a valley where smoke rose from dozens of fires. Not destruction: cookfires, forges, the controlled flames of civilization. A keep squatted at the valley's heart, its walls black stone that had never known siege.
Ironhold. Ancient seat of the Blackmoor family, built in the realm's earliest days when threats came from outside rather than within. Now it sheltered those the Council had marked for death: heretics by decree if not nature.
"They'll have sentries," Serena observed. "Probably with blessed weapons. Your appearance might provoke... unfortunate reactions."
The Shadow Knight considered. His transformed state wasn't subtle: armour grown from flesh, eyes that burned cold fire, an aura of wrongness that made reality flinch. Appearing suddenly would likely result in immediate attack.
"Then we announce ourselves properly."
He reached out with senses the stone had granted, feeling for the valley's emotional temperature. Fear dominated: refugees huddled against uncertain future. Anger too: the bitter rage of those wrongly accused. But underneath, hope. Fragile but persistent. The hope that resistance might succeed where submission had failed.
Perfect. Hope could be shaped, directed, weaponized against those who'd destroyed so many.
The Shadow Knight began walking down the valley's slope, making no effort at concealment. Let them see death approaching openly. Let them decide whether it came as enemy or ally.
The first scouts appeared within minutes: mounted men wearing Blackmoor colours beneath improvised armour. They reined up sharply, horses dancing nervously as their riders processed what they were seeing.
"Halt!" one called, voice cracking slightly. "State your name and business!"
"I am the Shadow Knight," he replied, letting power resonate through the words. "I seek Lord Blackmoor's heir. We share common enemies."
The scouts exchanged glances. One wheeled his mount, galloping back toward the keep. The others formed a loose circle, blessed crossbows trained on him but fingers carefully off triggers.
"You're the one from the stories," another scout said. "The knight who fell to darkness. Who slaughtered an entire Inquisition unit at the crossroads."
"Among others." No point denying what would become legend regardless. "Though 'fell' implies accident. I chose darkness when light proved corrupt."
More riders appeared: a full squadron in better armour, led by a young man whose bearing marked him as nobility despite worn clothes. Lord Blackmoor's son, presumably. He studied the Shadow Knight with intelligent eyes that showed caution rather than fear.
"I'm Robert Blackmoor," he confirmed. "Acting Lord since my father's arrest. The stories say you were Kaelen Dawnblade."
"I was. That man died with his nephew. What stands before you is what the Council's cruelty created."
"And you seek what? Alliance? Sanctuary?" Robert's voice held careful neutrality. "Or have you come to add our souls to your collection?"
Interesting. The man had spine despite his youth. The Shadow Knight approved; tools with initiative proved more useful than those requiring constant direction.
"Alliance, for now. I have business with the Council. You have resources and information. Mutual benefit seems possible."
"Even if we agreed, my people won't accept you. You radiate... wrongness. Children cry when your shadow passes. Priests, even those who've rejected the Council, speak of abomination."
"I don't require acceptance. Only cooperation."
Robert considered, clearly weighing options. Around them, more soldiers gathered: the keep's entire garrison, probably. Fear scented the air, but discipline held. These weren't bandits or common levies but trained fighters with cause worth dying for.
"There's a condition," the young lord said finally. "We have wounded. Refugees brutalized by Inquisitors, fighters injured in skirmishes. Our healers are overwhelmed. If you truly have the power stories claim..."
"You want me to heal them?" The Shadow Knight almost laughed. The stone's power was built for destruction, not restoration. "I'm no priest."
"No. But power is power, as someone recently told me. Will backed by sufficient force can accomplish miracles, light or dark." Robert's eyes hardened. "Prove you're more than a weapon. Show us darkness can create rather than merely destroy. Then we'll talk alliance."
A test. Clever. Force him to demonstrate control, utility beyond simple slaughter. The Shadow Knight recognized the manipulation and approved of its subtlety.
"Lead on."
The keep's interior showed signs of hasty conversion from fortress to refugee centre. Great halls meant for feasting now held pallets of wounded. Courtyards built for training served as temporary shelters. The smell of too many people in too little space competed with herbs and poultices.
They led him to what had been the castle's chapel, now converted to infirmary for the worst cases. The irony wasn't lost on him: using a place of worship to test darkness's healing touch.
The wounded lay in neat rows. Some bore obvious trauma: missing limbs, burnt flesh, the signature marks of blessed weapons. Others showed subtler damage: minds broken by interrogation, souls scarred by systematic cruelty.
"The children are separated," Robert explained, gesturing to a curtained area. "Some were... questioned extensively. The Inquisitors believe youth makes extraction easier."
Rage flared: pure, cold, absolute. Children tortured for their parents' supposed crimes. Marcus's fate multiplied across innocents whose only sin was being born to the wrong bloodline.
The Shadow Knight moved to the curtained section. Inside, a dozen small forms lay still as death. One girl, perhaps six years old, whimpered constantly despite healers' efforts. Burns covered half her face: the precise work of someone who'd studied how much pain young flesh could endure.
He knelt beside her pallet. Up close, the damage was worse. Not just physical trauma but spiritual scarring where blessed implements had touched. The Inquisitors hadn't just tortured her; they'd tried to burn out whatever heresy they imagined inherited sin had planted.
"Don't touch her," a healer warned. "The wounds are consecrated. They resist normal treatment."
Consecrated. Blessed. Made holy through child's suffering. The perversion of it sparked something beyond rage: a cold determination to show these faithful what their light had wrought.
The Shadow Knight extended one gauntleted hand over the girl's burns. Shadow flowed from his fingers: not the destructive force he'd used on bandits but something more nuanced. The stone's power responded to will, and his will now focused on undoing rather than doing.
Black fire danced across ruined flesh. Where it touched, burns faded. Skin reformed. The consecrated wounds fought back (light resisting dark) but his power was older, deeper, drawn from voids that existed before stars learned to shine.
The girl's whimpers faded. Her remaining eye focused, seeing him clearly for the first time. She should have screamed; his appearance alone terrorized hardened warriors. Instead, she reached up with one small hand, touching his armoured face.
"Thank you," she whispered.
The Shadow Knight froze. In that child's gaze, he saw Marcus. Not physically (she was older, different colouring). But the trust was the same. The belief that adults could fix broken things, that kindness might balance cruelty.
He'd thought such innocence burned away with his humanity. The stone's transformation should have left no room for sentiment. But something cracked in the armour around his heart: hairline fracture in defences he'd thought absolute.
"You're welcome," he managed, voice rougher than intended.
He moved to the next child. Then the next. Shadow-flame danced through the infirmary, undoing the Inquisition's careful work. Bones straightened. Minds cleared. The consecrated wounds yielded to power that predated their blessing's source.
Hours passed. Or minutes; time meant little when will reshaped reality. The Shadow Knight lost himself in the work, finding unexpected satisfaction in creation after so much destruction. Each healed child was a small victory against those who'd made suffering into sacrament.
When he finished, the infirmary had transformed. Children who'd seemed permanent invalids now sat upright, touching faces made whole. Some cried (but tears of relief rather than pain). Others simply stared, processing the impossibility of sudden wellness.
Robert Blackmoor stood at the chamber's entrance, expression unreadable. Behind him, Serena watched with something like surprise.
"Well?" the Shadow Knight asked, shadows still writhing around his form.
"I've seen priests channel the Light's healing grace," Robert said slowly. "I've never seen it done with such... efficiency. You healed in hours what would have taken them weeks."
"The Light didn't do this. I did."
"Yes." The young lord's eyes held new respect, and wariness. "Which makes me wonder what else you might accomplish. Very well, Shadow Knight. Let's discuss alliance."
They withdrew to Robert's study, leaving healers to marvel at transformed patients. The Shadow Knight noticed how servants pressed against walls as he passed, how guards gripped weapons despite orders to stand down. Fear followed him like a second shadow.
Good. Fear was useful. But he'd proven capability beyond simple terrorizing. Shown that darkness could serve purposes beyond its nature.
"Your terms?" Robert asked once they were alone.
"Simple. Information on the Council's movements. Safe passage through territories you control. In exchange, I'll eliminate specific targets you designate."
"Assassination."
"Execution. The Council declared war on its own people. I'm merely returning the favour."
Robert poured wine, his hands steady despite proximity to something wearing death as flesh. "And your ultimate goal?"
"Grand Inquisitor Matthias. The architect of my family's destruction. His death might not end the Council's corruption, but it will send a message."
"That heretics can strike back?"
"That actions have consequences. That even the Light's servants aren't beyond retribution's reach."
"Justice, then?"
The Shadow Knight considered. Was it justice he sought? The word implied moral authority, righteousness, balance restored. What he wanted felt simpler: pain answered with pain, loss with loss.
"Call it what you like," he said finally. "The result remains the same."
Robert nodded slowly. "I'll need concessions. My people won't ally with darkness without safeguards."
"Name them."
"No killing of innocents. No torture. No methods that mirror the Inquisition's cruelty." The young lord's voice hardened. "We fight to end their tyranny, not replace it with our own."
"Acceptable." The restrictions chafed, but pragmatism outweighed preference. He needed allies more than unlimited freedom.
"Additionally," Robert continued, "you'll share intelligence you gather. Coordinate strikes with our forces when possible. We're building something beyond simple resistance: a new order to replace what the Council corrupted."
Idealism. The Shadow Knight recognized it from his own youth: the belief that systems could be reformed, that power could be wielded justly. Experience had taught him otherwise, but let the boy dream. Perhaps some good might accidentally emerge from necessary destruction.
"Agreed."
They clasped hands: Robert's warm flesh against his gauntleted cold. The young lord didn't flinch, though the Shadow Knight felt his soul recoil from contact with something so fundamentally wrong.
"Welcome to the resistance," Robert said. "May the Light forgive us for the company we keep."
"The Light's forgiveness stopped mattering when it blessed child-killers." The Shadow Knight turned to leave, then paused. "That girl in the infirmary. The burned one. What's her name?"
"Sara. Her parents were executed for harbouring refugees. The Inquisitors... questioned her about their activities."
Sara. He'd remember that. Another name on his growing list: not for vengeance but as reminder of what the Council had become. What they all might become if they weren't careful.
Outside, night had fallen. The Shadow Knight found Serena waiting in the courtyard, studying stars visible through Ironhold's limited sky.
"That was unexpected," she said without turning. "I didn't know the stone's power could heal."
"Neither did I." The admission disturbed him more than he cared to acknowledge. What else might these new abilities accomplish? What other assumptions would prove wrong?
"It changes things. If you can create as well as destroy..."
"It changes nothing." But even as he spoke, he knew that for a lie. The children's faces haunted him: not with guilt but with possibility. If shadow could heal what light had harmed, what other inversions might prove true?
The toy horse pulsed against his chest. Marcus's memory approving, perhaps. His nephew would have liked Sara; they were of an age, would have played together if the world had been otherwise.
But the world was what it was. The Council ruled through fear. Children suffered for their parents' thoughts. Good men died for asking questions.
That had to change. Whether through justice or vengeance, light or shadow, the current order had to fall.
The Shadow Knight walked into darkness, feeling almost human for the first time since the stone's transformation. It wouldn't last (couldn't last given what lay ahead). But for this moment, in this place, the monster felt something almost like peace.
Tomorrow he'd begin hunting specific targets. Tomorrow the killing would resume. But tonight, children slept without pain because darkness had touched them with unaccustomed mercy.
It was a start.