Tale I: The Tithe of Iron

The autumn rain in Nottinghamshire did not fall; it hung in the air like a wet shroud, turning the dirt roads into a thick, sucking mire.

Sir Thomas pulled his woolen cloak tighter around his armor, his eyes fixed on the small stone priory at the bottom of the hill. He was a man built of hard angles, his face lined by the harsh sun of the Levant where he had bled for King Richard. But Richard was dead, and England was now ruled by his brother John—a king who measured loyalty in coin.

Beside him, hiding in the treeline, stood Father Benedict, the priory’s elderly curate. The old priest’s hands were shaking as he clutched a wooden rosary.

"They have no right, Sir Thomas," Benedict whispered, his voice cracking. "The King’s relief to the French crown is his own burden. Twenty thousand marks! To wrench it from the altars of God is sacrilege."

"John is desperate," Thomas replied softly, his hand resting instinctively on the pommel of his sword. "The Treaty of Le Goulet demands payment, and a crown gives a man a license to steal. But he will not steal from here."

Thomas’s hand tightened on the hilt. The weapon was a bastard sword, passed down through five generations of his bloodline, though no ledger recorded its forging. It was made of an unknown, matte-black metal. It never caught the rust of the English rains, it never notched against iron shields, and its balance was so supernatural that it felt weightless in his grip. It was a masterwork of an age forgotten.

Below, the heavy oak doors of the priory burst open. Three royal men-at-arms stepped out, laughing. Between them, they carried a heavy wooden chest, its iron bands gleaming wetly. Inside were the sacred silver chalices, the gilded cross, and the weekly tithes of the local peasants.

"Stay back, Father," Thomas commanded, his voice turning to ice.

He mounted his horse, drew the black blade—which slid from its scabbard with a low, metallic whisper rather than a ring—and nudged his mount down the muddy slope.

The Interceptions

"Halt in the name of the realm!" Thomas bellowed, cutting off the path of the three soldiers.

The lead man-at-arms, a burly brute bearing King John’s crest on his leather jack, sneered. "Stand aside, knight. This is the King’s tithe. Interfere, and you swing from a gallows."

"The King’s tithe is collected from his own lands, not from the house of God," Thomas said. "Leave the chest."

The brute drew his broadsword. "Take him."

The two other soldiers rushed forward with spears. Thomas did not feel fear; instead, an absolute, unshakeable wave of confidence washed over him. The black sword moved like a thought. With a single, fluid sweep, he sheared the iron heads off both spears. Before the guards could register the shock, Thomas struck them with the flat of his blade, dipping them senseless into the mud.

The leader lunged, swinging wildly. Thomas parried effortlessly. The impact sent a jar up the brute's arm, dropping him to his knees. Thomas held the razor-sharp point of the black blade an inch from the man's throat.

"Run," Thomas whispered. "And tell your master that the Church is guarded."

The brute scrambled backward, dragging his groaning men into the woods.

Father Benedict hurried down the hill, weeping with joy. "A miracle! God has given us a protector!"

Thomas looked down at his sword. Not a single drop of mud or rain clung to the dark metal. It felt alive in his palm, urging his fingers to grip tighter. "I will keep watch, Father. They will return."

And return they did. Over the next two weeks, the King’s agents made three more attempts to secure the wealth of the region's parishes. Each time, Sir Thomas was there.

By the third ambush, he stopped using the flat of his blade. In the dense woods of the valley, two royal tax collectors were left dead in the ferns. By the fourth interception, outside a small convent, Thomas cut down three heavily armored mercenaries without breaking a sweat.

The local monks began to speak his name in their prayers, calling him a holy savior. But they did not see the change in his eyes. Thomas slept less. He no longer cleaned the blade, for it required no cleaning, but he stared at it for hours by the campfire. The confidence it gave him had hardened into an absolute certitude: he was the law. He was the only true justice left in England.

The Fifth Tithe

It was late October when the fifth detachment arrived. This was not a routine patrol; it was a heavily guarded transport dragging a massive iron-bound vault of church valuables toward London.

Thomas waited alone at a narrow bend in the road where the trees grew thick. When the wagon came into view, he did not hesitate. He charged.

The skirmish was a whirlwind of mud and steel. The sword moved with terrifying perfection, guiding his reflexes. He ducked under a halberd, driving his blade through the guard's breastplate as if it were parchment. He wheeled his horse, cutting down another. The sheer speed of his assault threw the royal detachment into absolute panic.

Within minutes, the road was silent, save for the heavy breathing of Thomas and the groans of the dying.

Only one guard remained standing—a young boy, barely eighteen, wearing a rusted iron kettle hat that was too large for his head. He was a local conscript, trembling so violently he dropped his spear into the mire.

The boy fell to his knees, his hands clasped together. "Please, milord! Please, mercy! I have a mother in the village. I only took the King's shilling to buy bread. In God's name, mercy!"

Thomas reined in his horse, looking down at the terrified face. The honorable knight inside him—the man who had fought with chivalry under Richard—stirred. *He is unarmed,* his conscience whispered. *Let him go.*

But his fingers remained wrapped around the perfect hilt of the black sword. A cold, heavy pressure filled his mind. *Mercy is a luxury for the weak,* a silent, dark logic seemed to murmur from the steel. *A job left half-done is a threat left behind. A tyrant's soldier is a tyrant's soldier.*

"You served a thief," Thomas said, his voice flat, drained of all human emotion.

"Please—!" the boy gasped.

The black sword flashed in a swift, merciless arc.

The boy's plea was cut short as his body fell into the mud. Thomas stood over him, the absolute rush of invincibility overriding the sudden, hollow ache in his chest. He convinced himself it was necessary. It was all for the greater good.

The Ambush

Thomas did not see the eyes watching from the ridgeline.

The local noble, Lord De Luce, fiercely loyal to King John and desperate to secure his own standing by delivering the church funds, had grown tired of the rogue knight. He had not sent an ordinary tax patrol this time; he had sent bait.

As Thomas turned his horse toward the wagon, a sharp horn echoed through the trees.

From the dense brush on both sides of the narrow road, dozens of heavily armored men-at-arms emerged, their crossbows leveled. De Luce rode out from the rear, flanked by seasoned knights.

"Sir Thomas!" De Luce called out, his voice dripping with aristocratic disdain. "You were a hero under Richard, but now you are merely a thief and a murderer of the King's peace. Drop your weapon and yield!"

The old Thomas might have looked at the overwhelming numbers, recognized the trap, and sought a tactical retreat. But the black sword in his hand pulsed with an intoxicating, deceptive warmth. It whispered that numbers meant nothing to a master. It whispered that he could not fail.

"I yield to no tyrant!" Thomas roared.

He spurred his horse forward, raising the black blade.

"Fire," De Luce ordered.

A hail of iron-tipped bolts hissed through the autumn air. Thomas’s sword swept up, incredibly deflecting two bolts mid-flight, but the numbers were insurmountable. One bolt buried itself deep into his horse's chest; another pierced Thomas's left shoulder.

The horse reared, screaming, and collapsed, pinning Thomas in the deep, wet mud.

He fought his way out from under the beast, dragging himself to his feet, his left arm dangling uselessly. He adjusted his grip on the bastard sword, wielding it with his right hand alone. Even with one hand, the weapon felt perfectly balanced, perfectly deadly.

The men-at-arms closed in, a wall of spears and heavy shields. Thomas lunged like a desperate wolf. He severed spear shafts, cracked iron helmets, and drove men back by the sheer fury of his assault. But he was bleeding heavily, his breath coming in ragged gasps.

"Finish him," De Luce shouted from the safety of his mount.

A heavy poleaxe caught Thomas across the back of his thigh, bringing him down to one knee. He swung blindly, cutting the attacker down, but three more spears plunged into his chest and side.

Thomas gasped, the cold English mud soaking into his armor as he fell onto his back. The ring of soldiers closed in around him, staring down at the fallen giant with a mixture of awe and fear.

As the grey sky began to darken into blackness, Thomas’s fingers loosened. The ancient bastard sword slipped from his hand, tumbling into the mire beside him.

With his final, fading vision, Thomas looked at the weapon. Two centuries of history, a dozen dead men in the mud around it, and yet the matte-black metal was pristine. There was not a single scratch on the blade. Not a single smudge of blood stuck to its edge. It lay there, ageless and indifferent, completely unbothered by the death of the man who had wielded it.

Lord De Luce dismounted, stepping through the churned earth. He looked down at the weapon, his eyes widening at its flawless craft. "A magnificent piece," the noble murmured, reaching down to claim his trophy.

But before his gauntlet could touch the hilt, an abrupt, freezing mist rolled off the valley floor. It grew so thick within seconds that De Luce could not see his own boots. The horses panicked, whinnying in the dark, and the soldiers stumbled blindly into one another.

"Hold your ground!" De Luce shouted, coughing against the sudden, unnatural chill. "Keep your eyes on the gold!"

A few moments later, a sharp wind blew the fog away as quickly as it had arrived. The autumn sun broke through the gray clouds one last time.

De Luce shook his head, blinking against the light, and looked down at the mud beside the dead knight.

The sword was gone.

There were no footprints leading away into the woods. The heavy iron-bound vault was untouched, but the black blade had vanished from the earth as if it had never been there at all.

Lord De Luce searched the forest for three days, but no trace of the masterwork steel was ever found. It slipped out of the local songs and the royal ledgers, fading into a rumor whispered by the monks of the priory—a tale of a righteous savior who went too far, and the black iron that broke him.