Pull The Trigger

Helenia sputtered amidst the ruins of the smouldering cathedral as ashen haze concertinaed closer still - ensnaring, choking and finally forcing her to her knees. The beast that long tormented the light had been slain, however the weight that strained her was yet to be relieved. The pressure only grew as her palms fell flat on the sand, each denticulate grain deepening the grazes that illustrated countless days and restless nights across her hands - however the greatest stories were painted across her lithe, pallid canvas. Lust in her hooded eyes never dared to venture beyond the shadow of her scarlet-plumed tricorne, just as the scars of her late distaff, stretched from navel to breast, cowered beneath her solemn longcoat and delicate blouse and cravat. Her mere visage was fable in itself, pointed chin and soft jaw sobered by dark furrowed brows that threatened to collapse atop a grimace that bared perfectly shaped, blood-flecked teeth.

The heroine gathered what little resolve was intact to stagger towards the blood-starved beast - who now laid supine before the steps of the ancient cobbled altar. Despite the absence of sun, moon or any form of guiding light, the silvered rapier in her grasp hungrily glimmered, eager for the hunt.

She approached, closer now, shadow enveloping before she skewered the creature down. The carnivore writhed, leathery skin and crackled flesh rippling like waves on its surface as it struggled to come undone from its transfixion. For the second time since their visceral bout, Helenia met its eyes.

Between aching gasps, a force flooded her senses.

It ran thicker than blood, heavier than smoke, more pungent than rot.

The corner of her lips defied all conscious thought as she buried the blade deep in its flesh. 

Deeper. Deeper still, until the edge ground itself smooth on the syruped cobbles beneath.

To witness such authority was true horror. But to inherit it?

She reveled in the hunt just as the beast did.

The beast snorted a galling insult. Helenia scoffed.

Irreparably fouled and tainted. Misbegotten beyond ministration. Discordant, guttural and by all aspects pathetic. Her rapier wrenched itself around the flesh of its hind. Its squeals became shrieks that congealed with the countless shrieks and cries of man and beast alike that echoed into the Arukarian sky. For its mettle to distinguish itself as the predator, justice dictates it to be awarded the sentence of being silenced in the same manner as its prey, however the beast fell quiet, whimpering beneath Helenia’s gaze.

Undeserving of any form of mercy - right? Mercy is wasted on those without humanity, is it not?

Her hand gravitated to her hip, in which was her black powder revolver. One bullet. 

The hammer clicked into place. A singular, solitary bullet is all it would take.