The kingdom of Hollander simmered with rage three days after the Tournament of Swords, the air heavy with the stench of rotting corpses and the acrid smoke of pyres burning the fallen. King Henry Hollander, a titan of muscle and fury, stood atop the castle battlements, his burgundy doublet torn at the shoulder from a skirmish, revealing a chest matted with graying hair. His beard bristled as he roared orders, his green eyes blazing with a father’s wrath and a warrior’s thirst for blood. His daughter, Princess Jamie, had returned, ravaged, her emerald gown in tatters, her golden hair matted with dirt—but alive. She stood beside him now, her hazel eyes hollow yet sharp, her pale skin bruised from Robin Hood’s assault and the village women’s cruelty. Her beauty remained, a defiant flame—lips swollen, breasts heaving beneath a borrowed tunic, legs trembling but unbowed.
Henry had declared war. The outlaw who dared defile his blood would hang, his guts fed to crows, but first, the kingdom’s honor demanded a reckoning. A new contest surged in the valley below; a manhunt turned slaughter, knights and mercenaries clashing to track Robin Hood and his band, their swords glinting in the midday sun. Steel rang against steel, a cacophony of death punctuated by screams as blades sank into flesh. A knight in dented plate armor drove his longsword through a brigand’s throat, blood spurting in a crimson arc, soaking his greaves. Another fell to an axe, his skull splitting with a wet crunch, brains oozing onto the grass. The ground grew slick with gore, bodies piling as Henry’s forces carved through Robin’s men, each kill a step closer to the outlaw’s throat.