[hr][hr][h1][center]T H E   B R O K E N   B L A D E[/center][/h1][hr][hr]

The evening air was cool and crisp. Dusk had not long fallen, a thin band of baleful crimson still rimmed the western horizon, casting long shadows of a deep bruised purple. It would be night soon.

Sir Brandon hefted the longsword in his hand. It was his own blade, plain but serviceable, it had been given to him by his brother in arms Sir Hyrwine the Gallant, in recompense for the one he had broken against his fellow knight's shield during the great tourney at Meadowview. It was a good blade, nimble in the hand, well balanced, and honed to a razor edge.

His resolve tightened. He knew what he had to do. He twirled the blade once more, hoping the motion would steady his hands. They continued to trembled.

The knight turned away from the fading light and walked towards the pavilion behind him. He was girded in his mail, the armour gently shifted around him, a reassuring cascade of metal clinking against metal, letting him know that he was well protected.

Tonight, it would be tonight. He would put an end to this wretched folly once and for all. He pulled aside the curtain, and stepped into the tent.

The room he found was not what he was expecting. Inquisitor Thomond's personal pavilion was filled with expensive furniture, lined with plush silks. Instead Brandon found himself standing in a very different sort of room. It was made of bare stone, roughly dressed in places, seemingly hewn into natural rock in others. Light came from a single guttering  torch from a metal sconce upon the wall. It was empty save for a kneeling figure.

They were a pitiful sight, whoever they were. Thin and dressed in rags, with long, greasy, tangled, greying hair. A chain snaked its way from the wall they knelt beside to join to a pair of irons affixed upon their wrists and ankles. 

This was some kind of cell. And this was its prisoner.

But where was the Inquisitor? It was Thomond that had to find, had to stop, before... before he could do something unspeakable. Unforgivable. Brandon's head began to spin, he felt dazed, confused. He had been looking for the Inquisitor. Why was he here? How had he ended up here?

"You there, wretch! Where is Inquisitor Thomond?" He tried to steady himself, barked an order at the kneeling prisoner. He would find the Inquisitor. He would put a stop to this.

The man on the floor did not answer. Brandon took a step closer.

As he drew closer, he could not help but think that this man seemed familiar somehow. Like he should know who this was. He had faced many enemies and fell foes over his years of service to the crown. Doubtless many of them were housed in cells such as this. But somehow he didn't think that was where he knew this person from. They felt so much more... intimate...

"Look up." Brandon spoke in a hoarse whisper. 

Slowly the prisoner stirred, uncoiling themselves from the ball they had cowered in. The rats nest of dirty hair and sackcloth unravelled to reveal a pale face staring back up at him, grey eyes wide, trembling with desperate tears. 

Sir Brandon stared in horrified disbelief at his own face.

[color=6ecff6]"Too late."[/color] A voice spoke from behind him, it sounded like glass being shattered. [color=6ecff6]"Too late to save anyone, little knight."[/color]

And then it all came flooding back. The memory of what he had done. Of what he had failed to do. The horror of it all. The rage, the shame, the hatred, the despair. 

Suddenly he wasn't the knight standing over the broken prisoner. He was the kneeling figure, bound by chains, unable to move. Forced to watch as the terrible tableau was played out again once more. The knight before him stepped forward and lifted the guttering torch from out of the the wall sconce. 

They weren't in the cell anymore. Oh gods they were there. The Pyre. The Pyre!

He saw himself. Torch in hand. The Pyre already stacked.

Oh Gods. Oh Gods why didn't anyone stop him? Why couldn't he stop himself? But he could not move, he could not even cry out. The light from the torch grew brighter and brighter. Until it was a blazing inferno. Redder than the setting sun. Hotter than the flames of hell.

The world shifted again and suddenly he was not the Brandon stood frozen at the side lines, watching the horror before him unfold. No, now he was the one holding the torch. 

He lit the pyre.

And the screaming began.

[center]_____________________________________________[/center]

With a stifled scream Sir Brandon awoke from the nightmare, eyes wide with panic. Slowly he managed to get his breathing under control enough to realise that he had not awoken in his cell. He was in a darkened room, surrounded by other individuals, held by some kind of unseen force. 

It did not matter.

Nothing mattered anymore. And anywhere was better than being trapped inside of his own head.