At that moment, the two men began to move. They stepped out of the dark shadows near the wall and ran rapidly towards the staircase that led to the rooms upstairs.
A boy, who had been descending the staircase, stopped short and gasped when he saw the men rushing right at him.
"No!" he screamed as he jumped the last six steps and nearly fell on his face.
He managed to catch his balance though and ran toward the door of the inn.
The two "men" intercepted him.
He was trapped.
The boy looked around desperately for a way out.
The man with big fists swung a punch at the boy's head, but the boy ducked and tried to slide between the two men.
The other man grabbed him. With his left hand, he pulled the boy against him and held him still. In his right hand, he held a knife that he raised to slit the boy's throat.
"Hey! Stop that! Leave the boy alone!" the owner of the inn shouted. He began to make his way toward the men and the boy.
The two men paid no attention.
The boy kicked at the man that held him. With his hands he slapped at the man's face and scratched at his bald head. Nothing he did could make this man let go. Desperately, the boy grabbed onto the man's right arm and tried to hold it away from him.
Some of the people in the room charged at the man and tried to make him let the boy go, but the man with the big fists intercepted any attacks toward his comrade. Every man he hit ended up with broken bones.
Two men were hit in the chest and they flew across the left side of the room and crashed through some tables. They both passed out and breathed unsteadily through their cracked ribs. Another man received a blow to the jaw, and a loud "CRACK" resounded through the room. The man's jaw bone had broken and now protruded out of his cheek. That man had landed in front of the bar on top of James, who had been right behind the man when he'd been hit. James had been lucky because the man had jumped in front of him right before the big-fisted man had thrown the punch. Both men were unconscious.
The boy still held the bald man's knife hand, but the knife kept inching ever closer to his throat.
People had stopped being brave at this point and cowered under tables or made runs for the door.
"Elena. We have to do something," Mikaya whispered.
"I know. It'll mean giving up our cover, but we have to help that boy. There is something odd about him," Elena said.
Elena began casting a spell. Sweat trickled down the side of her face, and she grunted slightly as she wove the magic.
"Elena . . ." Mikaya said in a slightly worried voice. She'd never seen Elena so strained from spell casting.
The man that held the boy began to release his grip.
The boy slipped out of the man's grip, and let go of his knife hand.
The man stabbed himself in the chest and froze.
Mikaya jumped out of her chair and ran toward the boy. She had to maneuver through the chairs, tables, and people, but she made it to him pretty fast. The other man swung down at the boy with his fist, but Mikaya pulled the boy out of the way just in time, and his fist punched a hole in the floor.
"Come on," Mikaya said as she helped the boy to stand straight.
Elena still struggled in the corner of the room. She couldn't keep up the restraint on the bald man for much longer.
Mikaya pushed the boy toward Elena.
"Go over there and stay low," she commanded as she unsheathed her sword.
The boy ran towards Elena and almost stopped in shock.
She was using magic.
The woman, who had been talking to Mikaya and Elena earlier, grabbed onto the boy before he made it to Elena.
"What is going on here boy?" she asked in a frantic voice.
"I don't know!" the boy said as he pushed the woman's arms away from him.
She stumbled back and turned to stare at the two monstrous men that Mikaya had drawn her sword to fight.
"I don't know what you are, but you won't get past me," Mikaya said as she swung her sword at the big-fisted man's head. He pulled his fist out of the floor and blocked Mikaya's swing with his left hand. The sword's blade bit into his meaty hand and sliced straight into his wrist.
He didn't make a sound. He simply turned his grinning face up toward Mikaya.
The man's comb-over had fallen forward to cover part of his face, and she could not see his eyes. What she did see made her uneasy. He wore a deformed smile on his face. The whole time he fought with the people in the bar, when he tried to hit the boy, and now. The smile never wavered. It seemed chiseled into his face, as if he was a man of clay.
Suddenly, a black mist began pouring out of his eyes.
Mikaya pulled at her sword, trying to dislodge it from the man's wrist. She didn't want that mist to touch her.
The man took the opportunity to swing at her with his other hand.
Mikaya barely managed to swing her sword and block his fist with the forearm of the hand she'd lodged her sword into. The bone broke and came free from the man's arm, along with Mikaya's sword.
"Elena!" she screamed as she slammed her sword against the floor to get rid of the bone that'd stuck to it.
Elena had finished her spell, but she was still giving up magic energy to keep it going. Usually, she would be able to give up a certain amount, and it would be enough to see the spell all the way through, but the magic she countered now was too strong.
"Mikaya . . ." Elena struggled. "Please . . . kill the bald one first . . . I . . ." She couldn't continue.
Mikaya dodged a punch and ended up backing into a table. The man's punches had a huge amount of force behind them, but he moved much slower than Mikaya did. She turned and grabbed the table and threw it at the man. It didn't connect because the mist repelled it, but Mikaya had only used it as a distraction. She ran around the left side of the man as the table flew at him and she slashed the bald man behind him. The bald man fell to the floor, his body slashed into two pieces: one piece consisting of the right side of his neck down to the left side of his torso and the other consisting of everything else.