Shadow Slave

Splinters of wood exploded into the air as bullets hit the yacht. Sunny bent low and peeked from behind the cabin, raising his arm to take aim. The figures of Madoc’s henchmen on the tall wall of the castle were barely visible behind the curtain of rain — the distance was substantial, as well, and they were in an elevated position to boot. Still, he was the Lord of Shadows. Someone who could hit a target with a javelin made of pure darkness from dozens of kilometers away.

Surely, a trifling revolver...

Bang!

‘O-oh!’

His bullet did hit someone — however, Sunny failed to make the next shot and dove back behind cover, cursing under his breath. The mechanism of the archaic firearm was exceedingly simple, and the double-action trigger was easy to pull without making the barrel wobble. However, the strange thing kicked like a mule! Sunny had never fired a gun before, let alone one from a distant past, so he did not expect the recoil to be so severe.

Bang, bang, bang!

Effie held her own gun firmly with both hands, crouching low. She seemed to have hit someone, as well, then hurriedly reeled to the side. A moment later, the roof of the cabin near her head exploded into splinters, making her wince.

“Damn... there’s really an army of them out there.”

Sunny smiled crookedly as he wiped the drops of rain from his face.

“We have a secret weapon, though. We just need to get a little closer to deploy it.” He glanced at Saint, who was pressing herself into the wall of the cabin near him with a deceptively indifferent expression on her exquisitely beautiful face. She was plugging her ears, though, seemingly unhappy due to the deafening noise of the firefight.

At that moment, there was a bright flash, and a deafening thunderclap tore apart the sky. A blinding bolt of lightning connected the tallest tower of the castle to the dark veil of storm clouds ahead, and arcs of electricity danced on its spire for a few seconds.

“Cover me!”

Sunny leaned sideways and raised his revolver again. This time, he had learned his lesson and compensated for the recoil, firing the gun four times in rapid succession. The first two bullets hit the parapet of the battlements, but the third and the fourth found their mark, hitting a vague figure of a henchman in the chest and the shoulder. Sunny wanted to capitalize on his success by dashing to the bow of the yacht, but in the next moment, a deluge of bullets descended upon his position, forcing him to dive back into the cover.

“Hey! I told you to cover me!”

Effie wiped a bit of blood from a cut left on her cheek by a stray splitter and shrugged. “What could I do? They started shooting the moment a tip of my ear showed from behind the cabin. And they know how to shoot, too!”

Sunny gritted his teeth.

”Damnation.”

Showered both by the torrential rain and by the splinters flying off the yacht, he crouched, pulled on a special lever, and opened the drum of his revolver. Sunny shook it a little, expecting the spent cartridges to fall out, but only one did. It rolled directly onto his thigh.

“Ah, damn! Hot, hot!”

Sending the scalding cartridge flying with a hurried swipe, he huffed in annoyance and pushed on the ejection rod. The remaining shells — as well as one unused round — scattered on the deck, and Sunny pulled six more out of his pocket.

Sliding them into the drum one after another, he grimaced.

“Seems like we are pinned down here pretty badly.”

Effie was reloading her gun, as well.

”Yeah.”

Sunny flinched when a bullet ricocheted from a mast and zipped past his head.

“And the gate is still closed.”

Effie glanced at him.

”True.”

Sunny frowned.

“And this boat is going to sink from all the holes those bastards are making in it before we make it to the shore.”

Effie made a face.

“Sounds about right.’

He sighed.

“I don’t know about you... but I hate being thrown into water. It happens to me way too often. No, really — I’ve been thrown into water a weird amount of times. And I hated every single one.” 𝘙âNȮ𝐛ĚꞨ

Effie smiled.

”So, partner, what are we going to do about it?”

Sunny grinned.

”Easy. Don’t shoot the henchmen... shoot the spotlights.”

He prepared to follow his own advice.

”I’ll take the ones on the right, you take the ones on the left. Ready? One, two, light them up!”

They dove out of cover at the same time, aiming their guns rapidly. Their shots rang almost simultaneously, and two of the spotlights installed on the wall of the castle exploded into a rain of glass shards and sparks. A moment later, two more were destroyed, plunging the approach to the castle into a dim darkness.

“This should be enough...”

Looking at the bottom of the wall, Sunny smiled darkly.

”I guess he is still alive, after all.”

Out there, under the guise of darkness, a figure in a stylish suit dashed from behind an abandoned construction machine toward the wall. As Sunny and Effie fired a few more shots in the direction of the henchmen, Mordret reached the ancient stones of the castle wall unseen and grabbed onto them, climbing with surprising agility.

It looked both eerie and almost impossible, for a human to scale a wet, vertical wall with such ease. Nevertheless, in less than a minute, completely unnoticed, Mordret reached the battlements and slid over the parapet without making a sound.

”Get ready to move.”

A few seconds later, there was a lull in the rain of bullets pelting the yacht. Sunny dashed forward, followed by Effie and Saint.

They could not see what was happening on the battlements above the gate from the stone steps, but could hear screams and sporadic gunshots. A body fell down, splattering on the stone plates and growing motionless.

The henchmen further down the length of the wall were still aiming at them, though. Just a few seconds after Sunny, Effie, and Saint jumped ashore, the first bullet whistled past them.

”Faster!”

They made a mad dash up the steps, eventually finding cover behind a colossal construction machine just a few dozen meters away from the gate.

By then, the henchmen had concentrated fire on them once again, making it almost impossible to move.

But it did not matter anymore.

Catching his breath, Sunny calmly reloaded his gun and glanced at Saint.

A dark smile appeared on his face.

”Dr. Saint, if you will... it’s time for your entrance.”