//------------------------------//
// Chapter 1 - Lullaby of Woe 
// Story: The Hexer 
// by Gvozdi 
//------------------------------//


   "Hexers, they were once as common as birds in the sky. It was said, that this guild of mutated monster slayers lived in a mountaintop keep. They had but one singular purpose, to protect the inhabitants of Equestria from monsters that lurked in our world since the Conjunction of Spheres. These sterile mutants were often hatchlings and fledglings from Gryphonstone. In times of greed and prosperity, there was also intense poverty. Before the time of King Grover's heightened reign, Hexers often could not be paid in gold. The monster slayers invoked the "Law of Surprise", a custom as old as the existence of equine itself. The law went, 'if you do not have coin - then head home, as I have guaranteed your living. Find me the first thing that you did not expect'. On one particular dark evening, a peasant was rescued from a beast that laid beneath a bridge. The peasant returned home to find his wife had laid an egg. 6 years later, the Hexer who saved him returned and took the fledgling as payment back to Kaer Morhen - the School of the Wolf. This was the beginning of the infamous monster slayer: Gilroy of Gryphonstone."

~Anonymous,  "A Brief History of Mutants"

---

The bank of the river reflected the moon above. With such a beautiful sight, it was easy to mistake the stars in the reflection of the water for the actual celestial beings up in the sky. The soft blankets of waves soothingly cast themselves over jagged rocks and debris from small fishing vessels, many relics and a select few seemingly new as of the evening. A wooden fence, asymmetrical in every way, dotted the grass covered slop before it reached the coastal dirt. Between blades of shivering, dying yet still green grass laid plots of snow from the day the prior. The Gryphon, who was on her evening stroll, gently traced herself around the decorated nature that was her modest property. A nearby tree was also illuminated by the full moon tonight. Its bark breathed life like a young colt taking its first breath. It was heavenly in every way, however somber - as the Lady of this land knew soon that she would meet a very peculiar visitor.

Her beak ripened, she chirped out a tune with a beautiful harmony - a lullaby to add solace to the scenery of what may be her grave. The wind gently carried her dark maroon headfeathers with it, but with not enough force to pluck - merely to make them wave as her blue dress did. "Wolves asleepin' midst the trees, Bats all aswayin' in the breeze-" They stood on their hindlegs, something that few Gryphons did. The bipedal stride was something among officers of the Black One's military, primarily. To show their authority and prestige, being worthy of a salute and respect. The Lady of This Night, continued to softly harmonize - her feet and talons crunching against the now frosted leaves, dirt and blades of weeds. "But one soul lies anxious, wide awake~" She bent down, their taloned hand carefully picked up a small doll from the dirt. It was a soft shade of blue, much like her own garb. Left behind just hours ago that evening. Their claw traced the face of the doll, which had been soaked in both tears and melancholy. 

"Fearin' all manner of ghouls, hags and wraiths..." The Lady swayed a bit with the doll, as if it were her partner to dance with devils in the pale moonlight. Across the river as the architectural masterpiece of Toussaint, each window glistening like an enchanted lantern and every spiral, stone and step like a note in a perfected orchestral composition. A principality of living art, where class and civilization was at its peak - while the world just outside of its cobblestone streets, remained hungry and afraid of the beasts who were their neighbors. "For your dolly, polly sleep has flown, Don't dare let her tremble alone~!" The Lady stepped toward the path that lead down to the cold water of the river, as if she wanted to sprint across its surface. She yearned for the festival that was soon to take place that night, a luxury she was long denied. 

The Lady brought the doll up to eye level, her wings fluttering a moment - a brief moment of joy was felt as she held the toy like a mother would her kin. "For the Hexer - Heartless cold! Paid in coin of gold..." A step behind her, a heavy foot - a bipedal such as herself, had stepped cautiously on a patch of crispy, frozen grass. A sound so light that few would be able to hear it besides the Lady, even in this absolute silence of the deep evening. "He'll come, he'll go - Leave naught behind But heartache and woe~" She made a half right and stopped her brief dance, letting the doll slip from her talons into the weeds where it was gathered from originally. Perhaps that was its new home, as it was an orphan, forgotten and abandoned by its owner out of fear. "Deep, deep woe..." Her glistening headfeathers had a streak of silver from the moon above - shining like a Hexer's sword. 

"A beautiful melody, honestly." Gilroy mentioned casually. His voice was gritty, yet balanced. It did not yet match their youthful appearance, but behind their young eyes laid a weariness and caution of a veteraned hunter. The fellow Gryphon approached on their hind legs, feet wrapped in leather and cloth - their thighs in a padded garb while their torso covered with a dark brown jerkin. A thick, probably warm undershirt covered their forearms and a bit of their neck. Yet only a single wing poked out of their back, on the left side. A sleeve even covered their tail. Warm and snug, yet being a mutant - they did not need to be. "Been awhile since I heard it." Their yellow eyes flashed as they blinked in the night, a cat's eyes in a Gryphon's head. Gilroy was white as a dove. Their headfeathers long and pulled back into a pony tail via a single, red knot of fabric. The Hexer's beak a brownish gray. 

The Lady inhaled, her own eyes closed for a moment. Their feet sheepishly gave a soft kick to the doll on the ground. "Most have forgotten it. I remember when it was still a fresh tune, that spilled out from the mouth of colts and fledglings into the air of this very riverside." The Gryphon scratched the back of her neck, just behind her long flow of feathers - her own talons nicked a string that kept them close together. She went from civilized to feral, yet intensely more beautiful. She smirked, turning slowly - the flow of her dress no longer carried her as the winds have died down tremendously so. As if they were not there seconds before. The Hexer approached her carefully from beyond the gate, their body turned - to protect their vitals and draw their sword if they needed to. The Lady's eyes gazed upon the belt across his torso - numerous vials and flasks, three or four in total. A small satchel for gods know what. Two swords, side by side, on his back - where his right wing was before it was clipped. A silver sword adorned with the decoration of a wolf's head and blue wrapping at the hilt, then its brother - a red hilted steel sword. Each of nearly equal length, she estimated from the tip of the sheath that poked out from behind him.

"The world has a lot of things on its mind. Too many things." Gilroy said simply, their stance now more strong - yet more warm than confrontational. His eyes were bright in the dark yet the Lady was unable to tell just what they were looking at. Was he admiring her beauty, her feralness? Or was he scanning her for whatever motion she may make. Suddenly, the Hexer looked more like any other Gryphon. He was strange, surely - but not a monster as told by the other folk. He was different than the last one she saw before that, he looked weaker and scrawnier than the one before that one even. Perhaps, it was the first that encountered her, decades upon decades ago that gave her a scare once - but the Lady now noted that was her youthful, inexperienced self facing a challenge for the first time. Oh, how much she has grown and strengthened since then. 

The Lady ran her petite talons through their wave of headfeathers. The dark maroon colour almost looked pitch black as it faced away from the onlooking stare of the moon. "Things like me?" She teased. Timid one moment, playful the next. Gilroy calculated the distance between them, took in consideration from his research and dabbled over pages upon pages of glossaries they had memorized and stored in their head. Their gloved hands hid any talons - it seemed they had none at all, in fact. On their knuckles were studded, jagged bits of steel - the Lady recognized them now. Little triangles of silver, in fact. Only silver could reflect the moon like that as if it were a mirror. 

"They paid me for you." The Hexer said simply. The Lady shrugged and tried to conceal a laugh by capturing it within a smile. Her cloak that laid upon her shoulders slowly drooped off of her frame and onto the cold, unforgiving ground. Revealing her blue dress in its entirety. She was dressed for the festival, the ball - the feast... All of the events that she would not participate in tonight at the principality. She must have felt like there was a prince waiting for her there, with a glass slipper only a monster could fit in. The Gryphon's talons began to pick and unthread the top of her dress, letting out a tuft of smaller, softer feathers that would have aroused even the most saintly and religious of Gryphons. 

"In the times of old, there would be not amount of bits, gold or orphans that could satisfy pay for which a Hexer would take this contract." Her voice had changed, subtly at first - but soon became deep, bellowing while remaining a tinge bit feminine. Indeed, she now sounded like a ghastly hag that had gotten lost and fallen down a well. A true Baba Yaga. As she raised her hands again to further disembark her body from the dress, Gilroy noticed that her talons had become grotesquely long and ugly. The dark maroon of her feathers were now completely, oil-black. The Lady's shoulders peered out from the river of cloth and further gave form to her naked visage underneath. Fit, strong - far too strong for a lady who could afford such a nice dress of noble makings.

The Hexer's finger twitched, the Lady was unsure if he was going to reach for his sword or cast on of his famed Hexer Signs. "Times have changed." Gilroy muttered, but before he could act further on his contract the Lady literally became invisible to the eye. From the blue dress, a streak of visible wind zoomed out of it and left the fabric to lifelessly fall ontop of the snowy grass like a ghost itself. Gilroy followed the sound of a demonic, teasing giggle that flew past him - making the leaves that dripped from the dying trees of this time of year suddenly whirlwind out of control before crashing into the dirt. Their head and torso moved nearly the same, while their legs remained strong and almost rooted to the ground. Their cat-like eyes watched as the Lady's form pushed open the wooden gate to the nearby barn and knocked its door open - the frame spat out wooddust from the burst of force against its hinges. 

It was so natural, that by the time Gilroy approached the barn he already had his silver sword in hand. It must have taken literally a second or less to pull it out of the sheath for him, without a single awkward movement in his body. The Hexer knew he was being lured in to the hunting grounds of the Lady, their eyes still scanned around while their head panned back and forth on a horizontal plane. Their foot slowed to a ceasing in their step as they remembered to grab a potion from their leather sash before progressing any further. The tip of his break bit off the top plug, which was packed with herbs and spices to preserve the effects of the concoction. Gilroy spit the plug out onto the ground, where it stuck against the sticky, near freezing dew drops of the grass. The wind had returned and blew through his feathers, rustling their wing slightly. The wooden fences of the entire farmland whistled for a moment an eerie tune - like the lullaby they just heard. 

Gilroy quickly took the bottle to their beak and started to quickly gulp down the thick liquid down his throat. At first it burned like a shot of alcohol, then they bent over and grabbed their stomach - letting the potion bottle drop to the ground between his feet. The potion seized their body, pulsated throughout their blood and rewritten nervous system. Their yellow, piercing eyes became bloodshot for a second - as if parasites swam through all of his veins with each pump of the heart. Even beneath the feathers, the gross changing to his body's chemistry could be seen. But just as quickly as they had ingested the serum, they were upright and calm - fully recovered despite still appearing like a corpse. A small drop of blood dripped from the nostril of their beak and burned a hole through the discarded glass bottle. Warping the glass around the entry point, a small streak of smoke rose from the single blood droplet which now buried itself into the soil.

The Hexer opened the barn door for himself, the broken chains that once had it fastened jingled and swayed against the new winds that have found entry as well. Every breath of his was harsher, as he had to take in more oxygen when being intoxicated by his mutant brews. Sword in a single grip on his right side, his left hand outward, they side stepped into the barn and scanned it as they did the area outside. It was strange, the farm was well kept but there was no stench of cows or pigs. It was just straw and an intense aroma of blood. Blood that has stained the wood and could never be washed out. Enough blood that an entire barn full of dead pigs and cows could generate. Gilroy could feel the eyes upon him, one moment they were above - staring down between the boards and then rapidly changing from stall to stall, as if he was hunted and haunted by a hundred ghosts. 

Every step they took, their wolf-head medallion vibrated and danced against their chest. It was more than a symbol of the Hexer trade or the School of said trade they attended, it was a magical device used to detect magic and monsters. In this barn, Gilroy had used it to detect both alongside a sense of dread. The reality of the situation had become more clear, the Hexer reached for a circular vial on their belt that was hidden just behind their waist. Beside it was a butcher hook, used for carrying trophies and also to claim them. In their hand, they gripped a glass bomb of alchemic dust laced with some silver shavings. The Lady's invisible form did not bother the rays of moonlight that seeped in through the cracks of the roof, but Gilroy did hear the sound of taloned foot briefly scratch against the wood framing of one of the hay-holding stocks nearby. 

Gilroy cast the glass ball and let it shatter violently against a wooden post. It shot alchemic glitter everywhere in that vicinity and coated the invisible Gryphon's feathers. She hawked at him as she flapped her wings with tremendous power - it merely cast dirt and hay across the barn and did little to disarrange the dust that now clung to her. Droplets of her monstrous blood briefly fell toward the ground before becoming hardly visible themselves. The silver shavings were more like silver shards, an expensive investment that cost the Hexer a pouchful of coins. Each one stung deeply, they pulsated with a sort of pain that the Lady could not comprehend. It was the taste of her own mortality and it was bitter, ever so bitter and far from sweet. What a strange sight it was to see, an invisible beaked creature roaring like a feral, jungle beast distorted through a wood instrument. The Lady's glittered talons clawed out at the sterile mutant.

They met at the middle, where a streak of moonlight was cast - the Hexer's silver sword stopped the first blow as it was now lodged midway through the Lady's forearm. The pulled back and swiped again and again, a rapid succession of life ending strikes and blows from her vicious claws. Gilroy masterfully evaded each one with a step or two backward, before he, himself would lunge forward and swing their silver sword which sang a tune as it could precisely cut a droplet of water or a snowflake from the sky as it fell. The Hexer's swordplay was both practical and like a heavily choreographed dance. It both surprised and threw off the Lady, who found most of her strikes to be dodged, parried or outright struck down with the sting of silver. Yet, even as unpredictable as the swordstyle was - she was able to dodge even the most skillful of slashes from the monster slayer.

Gilroy raised the blade high and swung it in vertical swipes, it left his vitals open to attack - which would provoke the creature to let her guard down and try to swipe at his guts. This would allow for a precise strike right down the middle of her head, but unlike most braindead beasts the Hexer has faced, she would not allowed to be jested into her own death. She evaded, hopped side to side and forced the Hexer to improvise. She hopped over one stall and was already in the other by the time Gilroy had stabbed his sword through the hay stacks. When the monster slayer was near the entrance again, she quickly crawled her away across the door and onto the support beams above. Gilroy scanned the glitter-covered beast as it sprawled out above him in a lustful manner. "Come on, cat-peepers! Don't you want to play?!" The Lady mocked in her non-feral voice, just before she once again whipped around and with great agility, landed just beside Gilroy.

Mutant vs monster, this was the deciding act. Gilroy flew several blows toward her on the horizontal axis. She managed to lean back and evade a blow that would have otherwise cleaved her head clean off. The Hexer twirled and managed to put a foot between her's, their blade soon to catch up but by the time the sword was visibly in front of him again - she was several steps back. Gilroy arched and twisted their wrists, now gripping the sword with both hands they delivered a series of blows and slashes of great power and speed. The Lady had only one solution for this, to come at him just as hard. Gilroy swiped for her leg but only the tip nicked her, she waved a back hand at him and her talons nearly cut his cheek. The silver sword swung horizontally upward and to the right, allowing him to twirl and jab forward - but she had span with him and ducked as if she had read his moves seconds before he performed them. From a lowered position, Gilroy bought their blade upward to slash at the vitals only for sparks to emit as they clanged against her guarding talons. 

Back to a one handed stance, they delivered a sudden jab to her side - which spiked the ribs with the silver studded knuckles. Blood crept out from her wound as it jabbed in more Silver shavings into her flesh. The Lady leaped forward at him and let herself become visible again - just as she hit the streak of moonlight. They wanted the monster slayer to see the full grizzly sight of her visage, which had a rotten beak and deep, black eyes that matched her darkened feathers. Before she could continue to lather the Hexer's face with spit from a roar, another fist found its way into her stomach - feathers fell from the now bleeding wound. Gilroy grabbed her by the neck now, as she was stunned and hardly able to swipe at him as she bellowed from the pinching pain of silver. They choke slammed her onto the ground, across a thick rope that was laid across the barn. Gilroy stabbed the ground beneath her, as once again she had turned to a puff of smoke - a mere, mystic wind or mist that zoomed out of harms way as a bat would from light. 

Gilroy stood up and felt a pinching at their side. She had managed to swipe him after all during the furious exchange of swords and claws. The Hexer senses and abilities merely suppressed the pain, but now it was hard to ignore as their heated blood even began to burn at their own wound. Their hand held it for a moment as they stared at the dirt beneath them, inhaling more air into their lungs. Gilroy quickly with their free hand, now covered in their own blood from cupping the wound - cast a Hexer Sign. A yellow ball of magic appeared around him - it would shield him from the wooden cart that was cast through the air by the Lady. It hit the magical barrier and crumpled quickly, each piece now tumbled hard to the ground as the yellow bubble disappeared into a series of bright sparks the illuminated an aura of candle-like lights around Gilroy before they disappeared entirely. 

The Hexer was already exhausted, the Lady flew at him again and they could barely flail their sword forward. They swept and swiped, but then the Lady drew the sword out from his hand. The silver weapon slid across the dirt from the momentum and stopped at a wood beam, a large chip near its base from repeated contact with the monstrous claws of the bloodsucker. She struck him in the stomach, just as he did earlier in the fight and slashed his face. The Hexer's blood spilled out like any other mortal's, this pleased the lady and killed her fears, just as she was soon to kill the monster slayer. Gilroy gasped for air as the stinging hit their senses suddenly as the swipe at their stomach did, when they opened their mutant eyes again - his face was being pressed hard into an unlit, glass lantern hung up on the barn wall. 

He felt his balance give in and knew that his only chance was to turn his fall into a roll. This was easier said than done, being a one winged Gryphon with a sword - useless against a monster and an empty sheath on his back. Still, they managed to do so and emerged on their two feet, splinters in his face face and two scratch marks across his cheek and having dug a bit into his beak as well. They lunged for the exit of the barn, feet first as to slide against the dirt that was now slick with Hexer and monster blood. The Lady grabbed him the collar of his jerking and threw him harshly onto the ground in the center of the barn, where this skirmish for life and death began. His wing curled up, as if to protect something it was hiding beneath his feathers. Gilroy stood up again, legs shaking - this was the most deadly hunt he has been on yet. Blood and soil covered their dove-white face, a single straw of hay stuck, broken against one of their lacerations. 

Gilroy stumbled as he took a step but found him suddenly taken into the grasp of the Lady from behind. His beak opened to yelp out, but nothing could come out as the Lady - a Higher Vampire, sank her beak-turned-maw into his shoulder. She bit through the leather and the small layer of chainmail underneath, despite its silver composite. The Lady did not mind one bit, the feathers she tasted as the intoxicating brew of blood entered her mouth. Higher Vampires were worse than any Bruxae or Fledger, they drank blood like fine wine, it was an intoxicating drink, an addicting one. But contrary to folklore, the act of drinking blood did not transfer vampirism to the victim. Vampires were a species of their own, having entered Equestria via the Conjunction of Spheres. 

The bloodsucker pushed Gilroy away after taking more than a few pints of his blood, letting the monster slayer fall onto his back as blood drenched his torso. His face looked even more corpselike than it did before he entered the barn. Every gasp brought sharp pain from the gaping wounds that were inflicted upon him. He could only watch as the Vampire stood triumphant over him. The Lady grinned with her malformed maw and her shoulders raised and lower with intensity over her excited drinking frenzy. Gilroy would not falter, still he managed to force himself to stand - which only brought joy to the face of his target. The monster on the contract.

The Lady nearly chirped out of pleasure when suddenly her throat burned. Her black body started to shiver and seize, large tufts of her feathers fell off of her body and the burning sensation surpassed even that of the silver strikes against her. She was poisoned somehow, she did not know how but there was that sudden fear of mortality again. Perhaps it was true, the lullaby she sang at the beginning of their meeting - a song Higher Vampires humbled their offspring with during a time when Hexers hunted their kind mercilessly - was her own dirge, her final swan song. She flapped her wings in anger, only for them to become featherless as a result - her body now nearly nude and her veins visible, intoxicated. 

Gilroy cast another sign, by forming his fingers in a certain manner and pushing forward. The sign of Aard, which sent a large blast of kinetic energy at the vampire. The rest of her feathers were tossed apart the barn, the force so great that even the clouds in the sky seemed to move for a moment. The Vampire next felt her back against a wooden beam and then her bare, bleeding stomach against the hay. She was knocked back several meters, which gave the Hexer enough time to regenerate and come at her once again. His silver sword in a single hand grip and a hand a free, perhaps for more sign usage if he had any left in him. Now, somehow considerably weaker than the Hexer was, despite Gilroy forcefully sucking air into his lungs - the Lady made a weak swipe out against him. Gilroy side stepped and with a single slice - dismembered her attacking hand. Its elongated, black talons clicked together as the nerves tried to respond and resend messages to a brain it was no longer attached to. The Lady was astonished.

The Hexer had turned slightly from the dismembering strike, they now sluggishly carried the rest of their moment with a twirling blow that slide the tip of his blade across the bare chest of the monster. He felt the sword jump at every couple of centimeters as it tore through tissue, bone and cartilage - rendering the surface of some cardiovascular organs open into a shedding downpour of blood. The Lady crawled across the grains that poured from a sack sliced earlier in their combat, she was now the one desperate to leave the barn - sprinted out of it on threes, her wings spread out to grant her balance. She would not die here, in a barn where so many of her own prey had died at her fangs and claws. As soon as she hit the moonlight of the soon ending night outside of the barn, something struck her that nearly drained all remaining life from her in an instant.

Gilroy reloaded the hand-held crossbow they had concealed under their single remaining wing. A thick bolt stuck out of the spine of the Vampire, its tip coated in silver. Her wounds burned, as her blood was now boiling hot after consuming the intoxicated Hexer's hemoglobin. The Lady crawled, paralyzed from the mid-torso down - her remaining hand pushed away the half melted glass vial that contained the Black Blood Hexer potion Gilroy ingested earlier. The Lady gasped her last breath of air in the living realm as another and final bolt lodged itself between her ribs, through her heart and lung. She could see that across the river, the festivals have begun - as the water now had small, fancy boats with bright, glowing lanterns. Couples were out on a romantic evening, enjoying the beautiful, soft moving waters and the now calmed weather. 

The Hexer let their crossbow drop, as it was now too heavy for their arm to hold and carry. Outside of the barn, they took up the butcherhook that hung off their hip and gripped it tightly. Whether it was a hallucination from blood loss, in combination with the intoxication from the potion and fatigue or a genuine sight - he did not know. The Lady had returned to a normal state, no longer a ghastly creature but looking still divine despite being mostly featherless and bare now. A few long, now bright red headfeathers covered one of her green eyes. As they hit their knees, Gilroy could have swore he heard the vampire lullaby leave the Lady's dying, motionless beak. "Birds are silent for the night, Cows turned in as daylight dies..." Gilroy's medallion had diminished to a low hum and then stopped completely as their chest crushed the glass vial on the ground. "But one soul lies anxious wide awake!" The Hexer rolled onto her side and discarded the butcherhook between the himself and the dying monster. He watched as all signs of life, or rather - whatever an excuse for life the creature may have had - drift away like a reflection of the moon in the river come dawn. 

On his back, the Hexer laid. The bleeding had stopped. There was no an uncomfortable coldness, with only a soft warmth deep within their chest. Their wounds had stopped bleeding and therefor, the pain had succeeded and became nevermore. "Fearin' all manner of ghouls, hags and wraiths." Gilroy sighed and closed his eyes, the birds have become silent and the festivities of the night started to begin in the fantasy-like city across the river. Yet, hardly any sound from them events carried on over to the blood drenched barn and the soft doll, getting frozen into the ground beneath a blue evening gown. "My dear dolly, polly shut your eyes, Lie still, lie silent, utter no cries..." And then, there was blackness. An easing blackness where no pain, no suffering and no hate seemed to exist. Merely a water of nothing, a consciousness fast asleep, unaware of its exist as if it were the beginning of time.

"As the Hexer, brave and bold, paid in coin of gold~" Gilroy's yellow eyes opened as their beak gasped for air. The twisted wood that made the fences now painted a similar shade of yellow by the morning sun. The barn now looked warm and welcoming. All that was homely had died in the night, as the wind carries the scent of grass warm from melted snow. An orange hue was over the Hexer's face, their now healed wounds still hinted to by the thick layers of dark maroon, dried blood - which made him almost resemble the Lady's headfeathers the night before. "He'll chop and slice you, Gut and dice you..." Gilroy glanced over at the corpse of the Lady - which had succumb to the the rays of the sun, which detested vampires. Her beak was shriveled up, eyes dried out and her body, unprotected by feathers - looked like a dried up fruit. The corpse still emitted small twirls of smoke, ashes laid in the empty, soot-black eye sockets. "Eat you up whole."

Gilroy limped out of the gate before they returned their silver sword to its sheath. Their butcher hook fastened back at their hip, empty. There was no way to identify the corpse as a trophy to bring as evidence to the contract owner, it was hardly distinguishable from a burn victim in this state. The Hexer began their trek along the dirt road from the modest farm land back into the neighboring village and from there - the small principality of Toussaint. He hoped the Black One would at least give him two thirds of the gold promised, trusting in the new scars that Hexer held would be more than proof enough. But, it was just as likely as not. 

"Eat you whole...~"