"The wench and the Paladin"

I heard the sound of the curtains and felt the rays of the sun right on my face.

"Are you awake, Isaac?" said a young woman with blonde hair.

"I am now."

"We overslept! I have to go to work!" the young woman said hurriedly like it was all my fault.

"Alright. The door is over there."

"Where is the money you promised me?"

Alright. Maybe it was my fault. I should had paid her services in advance.

What? You thought she was some kind of significant other?

A wife? Or maybe a girlfriend?

Please…

She was the wench of the tavern I was currently staying in. I did not even remember her name. It does not really matter much because I have been calling her Blondie since the first time I met her, which was like a whole two days ago.

The young woman was good looking in a worn out kind of way and also looked like she could use the money. So when Blondie offered me the "warming bed especial" last night, I did not had the face to reject her. I counted it like my good deed for the day.

Who I am kidding? I don't do good deeds. Nor am I a nice guy.

I am a cold blood killer. And that's in the good days. Thus, I have to be very careful when I choose my prey.

But this woman was not a prey. So I let her go in peace.

She did not smile at all when we were having sex but she did smile when I gave her the gold coins. Then she left the room without bothering in saying goodbye to me. I did not care either. We both have work to do.

She has a tavern to attend and I…

I have a prey to hunt.

I dressed myself with my golden robe and grabbed my magic weapons. The cursed staff, the forbidden book and the poisoned dagger. My only permanent companions.

I wanted to take a bath but like the woman said I had overslept. I had dreamed of my family again… Damn nightmares!

I used my magic to clean my body and my clothes. It was the first spell I have learned from my old master, Silver Ray. It was only a cantrip of the water element but it has been the most useful spell alongside the years.

It was important to keep myself clean. Because I don't want to leave any traces for my pursuers. Today it was gonna be the same. A clean murder. A fast runaway. No witness. No complications.

That was the plan.

An hour later I was in the central square of the town. The sun's rays hit me directly in the face. It's annoying but it does not hurt me. Old legends say that monsters appear under the cover of darkness because the sun hurts them.

The old legends are wrong.

In this square there are at least two monsters walking among the people in full sunlight. One of them is me. The other is Aaron Goodwin.

Undoubtedly, it is an appropriate name for a champion of the holy church of the kingdom. The kind of name that inspires confidence in people. Aaron means "the enlightened master of battle" and Goodwin has two meanings: "The friend of God" and "the one who ensures a good victory." With a name like that, even I could be considered a good guy.

Aaron has known how to take advantage of his name. He has become the favorite champion of the people. Good, kind, loyal. The kind of man the church needs. Someone that the people could trust unreservedly.

The parents of this city ask their children to work hard to be like Aaron when they grow up. And if the mothers had to choose a single man from the city to leave their little daughters in their hands, most of them would choose Aaron before his own fathers.

Of course, neither mothers nor fathers of those children have the slightest idea of what Aaron enjoys doing to little girls.

But I do know it. The reason I know is because my new friend told me.

Yes, I'm talking of the wench in the tavern. It happened to her when she was a child.

Aaron trapped her and also caught Annie, her little sister. Blondie managed to survive. Barely. It was only because the paladin had taken a liking to her little sister and spent more time with her.

So when he felt the other paladins approaching, he no longer had time to kill her without leaving traces. So instead he made her faint from a quick punch on the head and then he casted a spell of silence on her so that she could not tell anything about what happened that night.

Then, the so called hero of the people blamed on the father of the children everything what he had done to the two girls. The paladin's companions believed him because this other man was a wanted criminal of the church. An unfortunate thief who had robbed some food from the priest's reserve to feed his hungry daughters. Aaron had killed him a short time before, right in front of the girls.

Nobody was suspicious of the paladin. All blame was cast on the father instead. The poor girl was obviously traumatized by what happened and nobody found it strange that she could not speak.

As far as everyone was concerned, Goodwin was a hero. He rescued a girl from the evil father who just killed his other daughter.

Nothing strange there. Just another good deed to celebrate from a respected paladin of the church. The people applauded him for it and the mayor awarded him a medal.

And now, twenty years later, people were still applauding him.The meeting at the square was to give the paladin another medal. Aaron was the champion of the people and the example to follow for the children of the town.

Meanwhile, Blondie was a tavern wench who prostituted herself so she could pay for a daily dose of "sugar bread dust" and lose herself on the drug effect hoping to forget the face of her dead sister.

The reason why she could not forget her sister was because Aaron visited Blondie at least once a week. Blondie was no longer a child but her sad face still resembled Annie's. So the paladin liked to "reenact" with the wench what happened to them that night. Aaron liked it so much that he kept coming to see her. Again and again.

Life is unfair. But death does not discriminate against anyone.

I could not do anything to help Blondie. The drug had destroyed her a long time ago and she was not far from finally reuniting with her little sister .

But I could help Annie. The ghost had been by our side all night.

Annie had never abandoned her sister. Not even after her death. And she had seen everything the paladin had done to her older sister. What he was still doing to her even now. That's why last night, the ghost had asked me two things as soon as she discovered that I could indeed see her preternatural figure.

The first request was that I would sleep with Blondie. Aaron could not complain if she was busy with another client. The ghost even insisted that I should make love to her sister for real since the damned paladin was capable of detecting lies with his divine powers. Besides , her sister really needed a little tenderness. Someone who would not hit her, for a change.

So I did what she asked. But that was not all.

The second request was that I would make sure that the Paladin could not hurt her sister anymore. And preferably, neither to any other person.

That's why I was now in the square. Hidden in plain view among all those people that applauded this guy.

In order to fulfill the ghost request, I would had to wait for Aaron to go home so I could do my job without problems.

So I waited for him.

Finally, when the celebration was over, I followed him home hidden in the shadows by an invisibility spell.

It was night already and there were not many people on the street. But I did not want to risk killing him right there.

It was better to follow the plan. Just in case something unexpected could happen. Wait for him to be alone. In his house.

Perhaps Aaron sensed something was not right because he hastened his pace and we soon arrived at his house.

Well, it wasn't exactly a house. Damn paladin had bought a nice mansion to himself. I guess that lust was not a big enough sin for him, so he had to add greed to round up the numbers.

At the beginning, I was concerned for all the people present inside. Some of them could be innocents. But then Aaron ordered the guards and servants to leave early. After everyone leaved the premises, he went to the underground basement. I followed.

Something was wrong.

I prayed that it was not because of what I was thinking.

But it was.

And there we were there. On the basement of the mansion. In a dungeon cell. Aaron, the naked little girl chained to the wall and me.

And the ghosts of eleven other girls, whose bodies are inside the walls in the cellar.

Of course, Aaron could not see them. He believed that he and his victim enjoyed privacy. First the paladin teased the little one for a while. Then he took off his armor and unbuttoned his pants. The ghosts of the girls covered their eyes. The one that was still alive fainted from sheer terror and exhaustion.

The paladin frowned. Apparently, it was not so much fun if the victim was not conscious. In my hands trembled my staff and my dagger. I had planned to use them to kill Aaron and then clean them up.

It was important to stay clean. Because I do not want to leave traces for my persecutors. A clean murder. A fast runaway. No witness. No complications.

That was the plan.

But it was not what happened.

What happened was that I got angry and the Ardsheall appeared.

Damn! Here we go again!

I dropped my weapons and used only my hands wrapped in dead mana to throw the paladin against the wall. He fell and stayed on the floor, stunned. I only had a few moments to free the girl before the transformation was over. I broke the chains and used the paladin's cloak like it was a blanket to wrap her in it.

The paladin hit me on the shoulder with his sacred mace. It hurt a lot but the transformation was in progress and my broken bones would heal on their own. I ignored the paladin, who kept hitting me, and keep chanting spells.

First a sleep cantrip on the girl to make sure she did not wake up too quickly and then casted a teleporting spell on her. It would appear directly to my room in the tavern. I was sure Annie would take care of her until I returned.

Because I was going to take my time with this guy. Usually, I tried to kill my victims as quickly as possible so that the Ardsheall would not cause so much destruction in the vicinity.

The monster inside of me did not like it because it was not so much fun if I could not slowly destroy its victims. But this guy deserved the Ardsheall's attention.

So I stopped resisting the transformation.

My hands had already turned into claws and my teeth into fangs. My appearance must be horrifying but, strangely, the ghost girls were not afraid of me. On the contrary, they smiled with joy and in their eyes there was a flash of anticipation.

The club hit once more against my body and this time it broke with a crack. I turned slowly to face Aaron and gave him enough time to cast his most powerful divine spells on me. Holy water, fire, lightning, rays of positive energy.

I let him exhaust his possibilities. I saw hope wither in his eyes. I wanted him to feel as much terror and despair as his victims must have felt. I smiled and jumped on him. I took my time to make him suffer.

It was not clean at all. I leaved a lot of traces. But I did not care anymore.

Because sometimes, only a monster can stop other monsters.