The grey wolf banner snapped furiously in the night wind.
The heavy cavalry of the Wolf Pack surged from the estate's side gates, looking massive and invincible in their plate and mail. Swords clattered against scabbards, and the thundering of iron-shod hooves shook the earth. They rode out with longswords, ash-wood spears, maces, and flails.
Purplebeard watched the slaughtered runaway slaves littering the ground below the walls. They were nothing but crushed ants to him.
"It seems the Wolf Pack earns its reputation," Purplebeard murmured, his eyes cold as frost. "They are a difficult breed to break."
"Captain," the bandit paymaster whispered from behind him, his voice trembling. "Without siege engines, we cannot breach that estate. It is the Magister's most prized asset, and they are heavily guarded..."
"What are you trembling for?" Purplebeard scoffed. "He is only a Magister. And do we not have a Magister's backing of our own?"
Purplebeard turned to a tall, gaunt man standing in the shadows behind him, offering a sickeningly obsequious smile. "Isn't that right, Lord Rust?"
The gaunt man had rust-red hair and a pale face. His eyes were dead and freezing. He rested his hand on the hilt of a curved Dothraki arakh.
"We committed to the assault," the rust-haired man said quietly. "We do not retreat."
CRASH.
The Wolf Pack cavalry slammed into the bandit-knights like a hammer hitting an anvil. Seeing the massacre unfold, the surviving runaway slaves in the rear had already melted away into the darkness. It was a pure mercenary melee now. Purplebeard's veterans wore heavy steel, giving them the courage to meet the charge head-on.
"With me!" Pretty Boy roared, drawing his longsword and driving his horse straight toward Purplebeard in the bloody chaos.
A Wolf Pack rider was skewered by a bandit's lance, tumbling heavily from his saddle. Nearby, Longspear's warhorse reared, its hooves caving in a bandit's spine with a sickening crunch.
The Wolf Pack was outnumbered, but their discipline and armor were vastly superior. Purplebeard's men fought wildly, without formation. A bandit-knight charged recklessly at Gendry. Gendry swung. The warhammer's spike punched through boiled leather, muscle, and lung, killing the man instantly. Gendry ripped the hammer free as the blood cooled, his momentum unbroken, searching for his next target.
A dismounted bandit lunged, thrusting a spear at Gendry's chest. Gendry swatted the wooden shaft aside with the iron head of his hammer. The bandit scrambled backward, only to be trampled beneath the hooves of Morningstar's charger.
A throwing spear whistled in from the right, burying itself deep in Gendry's oak shield with a heavy thud. Gendry spurred his horse, running the thrower down. The bandit frantically raised his own wooden shield. Gendry's warhammer rained down like a squall. Splinters of oak flew into the night. A heavy steel shield might have held, but cheap wood was utterly useless against solid iron.
CRUNCH.
Gendry's warhammer whipped into a cyclone of death, obliterating the right side of the bandit's face. Bone and brain matter scattered across the dirt as the man collapsed limply to the ground.
"Watch your flank!" Gendry roared.
Morningstar was suddenly on foot. His horse had taken a lance to the belly and thrown him. Being dismounted in a cavalry melee was incredibly dangerous, but the veteran fought ferociously, his spiked morningstar crushing skulls in a wide arc around him.
"Keep your eyes open, lad!" Morningstar laughed heartily, swinging his chain. But the laugh died in his throat. A heavy crossbow bolt slammed into his shoulder, staggering him.
Before Morningstar could recover, the tall, gaunt man with rust-red hair materialized from the shadows behind him. Khrazz. The curved arakh flashed, blindingly fast. Morningstar desperately tried to parry, but the bolt wound slowed him. The arakh was a mere distraction. Finding a gap in the guard, the rust-haired killer drew a long dagger in his off-hand. He drove the blade upward, slipping it cleanly through the gap between Morningstar's breastplate and rerebrace, deep into his armpit. Arterial blood pulsed out.
It was the harsh, unforgiving end of a sellsword.
Morningstar offered a grim, apologetic smile to the dark sky. He collapsed into the mud, his eyes slowly sliding shut.
"No!" Gendry roared, bogged down by three spearmen, unable to reach his mentor in time.
Seeing Morningstar fall, the storm ignited in Gendry's blood. His vision tunneled. A terrifying, explosive strength flooded his limbs. He swung his warhammer in a devastating arc, crushing the ribs of two bandits pinning him, and spurred his horse straight toward the rust-haired killer.
"Do you wish to die as well, boy?" the gaunt man asked lazily, pulling his dagger free and wiping the blood on a square of white silk.
Gendry swung his leg over the saddle and dropped to the ground. Cavalry had no advantage against an agile pit fighter who knew how to hamstring a horse. He didn't say a word. He just gripped his hammer. Morningstar had been his brother and his teacher.
"I don't mind opening your heart, too," the rust-haired killer sneered, raising his long, curved arakh. The weapon was beloved by the Dothraki for its slashing power. From horseback or against an unarmored foe, it could lay a man open to the bone.
Steel clashed. It was a dance of death. Gendry wore his black iron scale and his massive horned bull helm, though his throat and face remained exposed beneath the metal. His rust-haired opponent wore no helm at all, moving lightly in a simple chainmail shirt.
"You earn the right to know my name, boy! I am the undefeated gladiator of Meereen. Khrazz the Rust!"
Khrazz was blindingly fast. The arakh hissed through the air, raining down in a flurry of silver arcs aimed entirely at Gendry's exposed throat and the gaps in his helm.
Gendry defended with cold precision, catching every frantic slice with his buckler and the iron haft of his hammer. With every clash of steel, the storm in his blood surged higher. Purplebeard could never have afforded an elite Meereenese pit fighter on a bandit's coin—the rival Magister had undoubtedly bought Khrazz's contract.
"Coward! Iron coward!" Khrazz cursed, his breath growing ragged. The tide of the battle was turning. Pretty Boy's veterans were fighting like demons, and Purplebeard's rabble was breaking. Khrazz was struggling too; the boy's strength behind his parries was freakishly violent, jarring the pit fighter's arms to the bone.
Hah!
The arakh whipped past Gendry's guard, biting hard into his black scale mail. The iron rings held. Gendry felt a jolt of hot pain, but the curved blade failed to pierce the armor. Exploiting the overextension, Gendry retaliated instantly. The hammer snapped upward, the heavy iron flange catching Khrazz flush on the cheekbone.
Blood poured from the ruined cheek as Khrazz shrieked in agony.
"Coward hiding in armor!" Khrazz howled, staggering back. Without a helm, the pit fighter was fully exposed. It was the only opening Gendry needed.
Gendry descended like the Storm God himself, his hammer falling with terrifying, overwhelming force. Khrazz roared, swinging his arakh in a desperate, frenzied blur to escape the crushing blows.
Gendry only bothered to block the strikes aimed at his face and throat. He stepped directly into the flurry of blades, letting the arakh slash across his armored forearm. The cheap steel sparked and skipped off the iron scales. It wasn't Valyrian steel. It couldn't cut plate.
"Die."
The melee ended in an instant. Ignoring the glancing blows to his arms, Gendry drove the spiked beak of his warhammer straight into Khrazz's chest. The iron spike punched cleanly through the chainmail, shattering the sternum and piercing the heart.
Khrazz the Rust crumpled into the bloody mud, his undefeated streak ending forever in the dirt of the Disputed Lands.