The sun shone brightly over Edge Cliff in the morning, searing the uncovered half of Talon's back as he crossed the now dry, cracked mud. He should have boiled under the half-cloak, yet, for all intents and purposes, his right side may as well have been lying under cool shade.

The conditions couldn't have been more perfect.

'Gah!'

Buck Owens almost jumped out of his skin when he opened his door to find Talon waiting patiently outside.

The man's face tightened after he'd fully taken in Talon's garb but he too remained silent as to the reason for this reaction.

'What are ye' doing here, boy?' Buck plucked his pitchfork from the floor. 'I'm about to – look, I'm sorry about yesterday, I was – bah! Never mind.'

'It's what I'm here about,' Talon said, before the man could barge past. How was he supposed to look if he had to give bad news? Scratch his head, kick his feet together? He eventually settled on thrusting his hands inside his pockets and staring down at the dirt path.

'What'd'ye mean, boy?' Buck asked.

Talon put a finger to his lips and indicated that the man should come closer.

'What's going on?' Buck demanded.

'Yer' wife's dresses – some of them went missing yeh'?'

Buck's eyes narrowed into a squint and he planted the pitchfork a foot closer to Talon. 'What would ye' know about that, boy?' he asked.

He'd have to be very careful now. Say one wrong thing and, given Buck's previous comments about his mother, Talon could very well end up skewered on the end of that pitchfork.

'Eli Gill,' Talon said quickly.

That caught Buck's attention.

'The toad?' Buck bared his front teeth and growled like a wolf, 'what about him?'

It took all Talon's concentration to suppress a smile; this could be far easier than he thought. Just a little bit of encouragement there, some embellishment here and his plan would be set in motion.

'Ye' think he's been eyeing up your wife, Buck?' Talon said.

'Think? Think?' Buck said, his eyes almost popping out of his head, 'I bloody well know, boy! My woman crossed eyes with the toad once, just once mind ye'! And now he be stalking her!'

Ah, Eli. Talon felt a little guilty for what he was about to do but he had no other choice. While he wasted time with sentiment, the Viscount planned future acts of cruelty from his little tower. He could not balk now.

Talon's jaw set and he drew himself up in his half-cloak against Buck, not that it meant much against the man's sheer bulk.

'I saw her, yer wife, sneaking out the back of Eli's garden,' Talon said. Knuckles whitening against his pitchfork, Buck edged menacingly towards Talon.

'Ye' little –' Buck made as if to grab Talon by the scruff of his neck. The balance was going against him once more, he would have to speak quickly.

'I have proof,' Talon continued, 'just look at the toad's fence!'

'What?' Buck's face scrunched up, resembling something akin to a bulldog.

'I can show ye',' Talon insisted. He raced back across the path, kicking up dry mud flakes in his wake. Buck Owens stood stock-still, staring blankly at the space Talon had formerly occupied.

'Come on!' Talon waved his arms at the man.

Buck eventually followed, hesitantly at that, and, at Talon's insistence, lowered himself into a hunch as they came around the back of Uncle Jack's house to reach Eli's back garden. Fortunately, the toad was nowhere in sight.

'I swear to ye', boy...' Buck began.

'There,' Talon pointed at the side of Eli's wattle fence.

'Flay me... flay me... flay me...' the man muttered to himself with increasing ferocity as his eyes ran from one tangled scrap of dress to another.

'Flay me!' Buck made Talon jump with his sudden growl and he glanced nervously at Eli's house, hoping he hadn't heard.

'Ye' believe me?' Talon asked quietly.

'I believe...' Buck's eyes did circuits of Eli's fencing as he gripped his tuft of blonde hair so tightly Talon wondered if the man might actually yank it off. '...I'm going to kill the toad today.'

The man marched around the house with Talon close in tow.

Now this was the most important part of his plan. Fail here, and he may as well throw himself off the cliff's edge.

He grabbed the man's arm to pull him back but Buck simply threw him off into the dirt, as if he were merely a fly buzzing round his head.

'TOAD!' Buck cried, slamming his pitchfork against the man's door. 'Come out where I can see ye'!'

Now or never.

'What's to stop another man from sneaking yer' wife?' Talon said.

'Ye' what?' Buck rounded on him.

Talon licked his lips. That pitchfork did look like it would slip awfully painfully between his ribs.

He pulled himself to his feet and dusted off his trousers, unaware that the half-cloak remained completely unblemished.

'If ye' kill him, yer' wife may sneak about with another man,' Talon said, holding up his hands as if trying to appease a bull.

Buck wrung the pitchfork in his hands furiously but listened on.

'Ye' need to make an example.'

'Oh, I'll make one alright,' Buck laughed bitterly. The look he gave back at his house suggested he had switched the focus of his fury.

Talon shook his head. 'Ye' need to make an example of Eli, one everyone – Edge Cliff and yer' wife – can see.'

Buck frowned, doing that bulldog impression again. 'What'd'ye' mean by that?' he demanded with a shake of his pitchfork.

'Remember last year? When Ty tried to set some of the fireworks off in his garden?'

How could anyone not? It was wonder how Ty hadn't blown off one of his legs in the process. Uncle Jack had been kind enough to house the man after what the fireworks did to his home.

'Yeh', what of it?' Buck said suspiciously.

'Make an example,' Talon simply said. He spun around before Buck could notice the grin spreading across his face.

Buck scratched his head for a moment before heading down the dirt path to the farms beyond, muttering dark oaths under his breath.

Talon hoped Buck understood what he'd been suggesting, he certainly couldn't have made it any plainer.

Poor Eli. He debated warning him of Buck's likely intentions but quashed the thought before it could take hold.

No sentimentality. Not while the Viscount still drew breath.

*

Blotches of crimson streaked across the sky as the sun sunk below the pink waters beyond the cliffs with such haste, as if it could sense the coming bloodshed.

The guards, bored as they hung outside the Viscount's Tower, but a few paces away from Talon, had eventually given up with their sidelong glances in his direction. Though, with tight jaws, they made innocuous comments about the boy's half-cloak, which made little sense upon reaching Talon's ears.

'Is that... one of them?' one of the guards whispered to the other. The velvet flow of his voice and his blue eyes marked the man as a soldier of Clovaine.

'...can't be... look how young the child is,' the other shook his head.

Talon cocked his head to the side. Some of the villagers were filing up the dirt path after a hard day of work out in the farms. He spotted Uncle Jack with his bushy beard but Buck hadn't yet come into view. 

What was taking so long?

BANG

Talon jumped to his feet and whirled round to see one of the thatched roofs lining the dirt path catching fire. It looked like it was Eli's roof.

The door had been flung open and sparks fizzled and cracked outside, much to the delight of the small children who crowded outside.

He breathed a sigh of relief when he noticed a small, slightly singed looking man prancing frustratedly among them. At least he was alive.

'Not again!' one of the guards cried.

'Du Puis will lose his damn mind!' said the other.

Their chest plates rattled like tin pots as they scuttled down the hill towards the fire, forgetting all about the half-cloaked boy and the now unguarded door they'd left behind.

And now time for the gamble.

The arched door had been left unlocked apparently, opening outwards towards Talon when he tugged lightly at the round iron knocker. He moved his head towards the gap and peaked inside.

A dozen candles in a chandelier chained to the low ceiling illuminated the lavish scene before him. Considerable expense had gone into making the inside seem a palace rather than a cold stone tower teetering against the cliff edge. Red carpets trimmed in gold covered the floor revealing not an inch of stone.

He pushed the door open a little further, the gap was almost wide enough for him to squeeze through.

Besides the tapestries, bearing the golden hawk of Clovaine, strung either side of the winding staircase directly in front of Talon, painted wooden shields crossed with swords were hung.

Not meeting any resistance, Talon budged the door once more then scraped himself through the gap.

He clapped a hand to his mouth to stifle his startled cry.

Another guard sat inside to the right of the door. His sword laid unsheathed across his lap and the man's chin rested atop his chest plate as he slept, undisturbed.

Fortune really was on Talon's side this day.

Unwilling to test the extent of his luck however, Talon quickly crept up the stone steps, mindful of any other guards at the Viscount's disposal.

He came across a very short corridor halfway up the stairs, leading to an open archway, its door lying ever so slightly ajar.

Satisfied that nobody was watching from the stairs leading higher into the tower, Talon flattened himself against the wall and pulled out the hiding knife from his boot. Dull at its edges, the weapon looked about as threatening as a toothpick. He had been tempted to draw one of the swords from a shield the floor below but thought better of it. Best not to push his luck. He twisted the knife before his eyes and shrugged, it would have to do.

The room connected to the middle of the corridor was even more extravagant than the first.

The four-poster bed instantly caught Talon's eye. Its green curtains had been tied to the posts revealing  a double bed with plump white sheets that could have slept a small family. The wall to Talon's right had been adorned with paintings. The most impressive of which depicted a man atop a mound of bodies wearing golden armour and holding a sword aloft in one hand whilst tweaking a curled moustache in the other.

A fireplace sat cold underneath directly opposite a strange white couch. It was half-backed and curved in such a way that would have made it comfortable only to lie down upon it like a bed or sit up straight right at the end of the couch close to its one velvet arm.

Amidst it all sat the Viscount.

Back curved into a crouch, Talon held back a low snarl as he approached the gilded chair upon which Viscount Du Puis sat overlooking Edge Cliff.

This was it. The moment he'd been waiting for. Months of planning and here he was, alone with a completely unaware Viscount.

The handle of his Uncle's hiding knife seemed to pulse in his hand.

Every step caused his heart to beat with increasing voraciousness and he could feel his hands becoming clammier by the second.

Talon raised the knife above the Viscount's head and placed his free hand on the man's shoulder, ready to strike.

The Viscount toppled from the chair the moment he'd been touched, landing face first against the carpet with his arse arched up against the chair.

Talon stood stunned for a moment then he shook himself, pushed the chair roughly aside so it tumbled against the carpet, and turned the Viscount onto his side.

Blank blue eyes stared dully up at the ceiling and when Talon snapped his hand back from the Viscount's tight ruffled collar, his finger tips were stained red with blood.

The knife slipped from Talon's limp fingers and rolled away.

The Viscount was already dead.

Thanks for reading this far! If you've enjoyed How the Axe Falls and would like to see more, please feel free to vote, comment, and share the piece. I always like interacting with fellow readers and writers in the comments, so don't hesitate to tell me what you think! :)