The Vampire & Her Witch
Chapter 521: Five Blows From a Knight (Part One)

Chapter 521: Five Blows From a Knight (Part One)

At the water’s edge in the village he had worked so hard to bring to life, Ollie knelt in the soft, sodden soil, facing the least likely priest he’d ever met.

Across from him, Ignatious knelt in the mud, holding a golden emblem of a sun surrounded by waving flames as he prayed over the soon-to-be knight.

"Though his vigil begins in darkness,

And his feet have carried him far from home,

His heart was forged for greatness,

And his virtues are bound to his bones."

Ignatious’s prayer wasn’t propper according to any of the forms of the Church but the fallen Inquisitor didn’t care what the Church considered proper. What mattered was that the words he spoke on Ollie’s behalf were true, and after his conversation with the young man, he firmly believed every word he said.

"Though Faith is not among your virtues, Ollie," Ignatious said, tucking the emblem away and placing a firm hand on the flame-haired youth’s shoulder. "I believe that you embody the heart of our faith more than many Templars I have known. It is godly to meet your struggle, and it is pious to turn first to yourself before you turn to others for help, but in this world, no one is cursed to struggle alone."

"This village is proof of your struggle and of your virtue," the fallen priest said, gesturing at the villagers watching in the distance. "Many of them would have succumbed to their struggle without your help, and many of them must have struggled to accept help from someone who looked like the enemy who drove them from their homes."

"I only did what needed doing," Ollie said, shaking his head at the vampire’s praise. He’d heard several times that he had accomplished something that few people believed was possible, but Ollie struggled to see any great deed in what he had done.

"Others could have done better. I know that Lady Ashlynn wouldn’t have struggled so much," he said, glancing beyond the priest to the witch who was preparing to take him into her coven.

"Seeds fall where the wind takes them, but only the ones who land where they can thrive grow into mighty trees, Ollie," Ashlynn said as she stepped forward to help the young man to his feet. "This was your place to thrive. Mine was somewhere else. Be proud of what you have done because you were in the place where you could help at a time when you were needed."

"Listen to Lady Ashlynn," Thane said with a warm laugh as he inspected the young man before him. Despite the chill night air, Ollie wore only a simple woolen tunic that hung to his shins, belted at his waist with a plain leather cord, with simple leather shoes on his feet. The tunic had been left undyed, kept free of any mark or sigil that would proclaim status or affiliation as the soon-to-be knight took on the appearance of a humble pilgrim.

"Humility is all well and good," Thane said, his voice growing stern as if he were an elder brother dispensing sage advice. "But a knight must know the limits of any virtue lest they turn into a vice."

"I understand," Ollie said, shaking his head as he turned to face the vampire knight. "Is it time for a reminder?"

"Cheeky brat," Thane said, reaching out to ruffle the young man’s hair affectionately. He’d promised Ashlynn and Nyrielle that he would do his best to forge Ollie into a worthy knight during their absence, but he’d never expected that the young man would come so far so quickly, or that he’d come to admire the former kitchen boy in the process.

Ollie was unlike any of the spoiled scions of powerful lords who had come before him to learn the ways of a knight in the years before Nyrielle took him under her dark wing. He had none of their arrogance, nor any of their delusions that he was better or more talented than anyone else simply because of an accident of his birth.

Nor was he like the hardened mercenaries who earned their knighthoods with mountains of trophies taken from the bodies of the Eldritch people they slew. Those men thought that they were already among the strongest, greater than the soft knights who had been offered every opportunity when they had carved their bloody way to the top.

No, Ollie was a young man who dreamed of a future where he could do more for the people who mattered to him, and he put in twice the work that anyone asked of him. He never objected to a lesson, never argued that he didn’t need to learn, and always followed a lesson with at least three useful questions.

The young man was so impressive that Thane had begun to consider taking the young man as one of his own progeny in a few years if he could survive the wars to come. Thane had seen first hand how Marcel suffered for becoming a vampire so young and the moments of life that were forever denied to him haunted the Black Merchant to this day, even if he pretended that they didn’t.

Thane would never wish such a fate on Ollie, but that didn’t mean he wouldn’t take such a promising knight under his own wing if the opportunity was still present when he was old enough to withdraw from the mortal world. Instead, however, Ashlynn had opened an even more suitable path for the flame-haired youth, and though Thane felt a slight pang of sadness that he wouldn’t be able to take in a young apprentice as his first progeny, he couldn’t begrudge the young man for choosing the path that his liege lady offered.

"Yes, you scamp," Thane said, cracking his knuckles and looking at Ollie with a dark, teasing smile. "It’s time for a reminder. But because I’m feeling generous," he added, lowering his hands to his side. "You may strike the first blow."

Standing off to the side, Heila frowned in confusion before she tugged at Ashlynn’s sleeve, standing on the tips of her cloven hooves to whisper a question to her lady.

"What is this about striking a blow?" Heila asked, genuinely confused by the way the two men were acting as Ollie shook his arms loose and cracked his own knuckles before squaring off as if he were about to punch Sir Thane.

"The traditions of knights are the traditions of men," Ashlynn said, shaking her head as she watched Ollie throw a heavy punch that struck Thane solidly in the chest, though the blow didn’t seem to bother the powerful vampire in the slightest. "This isn’t one that I can understand, and every time I asked my father, he told me, ’If you were a man, you wouldn’t have to ask.’"

"That, that makes no sense at all," Heila said, frowning as Ollie shook his hand out, wincing slightly in pain and cradling his injured hand. "Are they just going to stand there hitting each other? Ollie is still just human, for him to fight against Sir Thane..."

"It’s not a fight," Ashlynn said, shaking her head as she watched Ollie settle into a relaxed, defenseless posture before Sir Thane. "It’s the first lesson taught by a senior knight to a junior one on the night of his vigil," Ashlynn said. "And knights believe that important lessons are best learned through pain."

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