Jacob wasn't a huge believer in fate. In fact, there he was a firm believer in human choice and willpower. Fate came from the idea of predetermination, and a cynical outlook. No matter what you do it won't be enough.
So Jacob chose to believe in something other than fate. He believed in mankind. Even when Jacob entered that tower on that fateful night, he still left believing in the good of mankind. He didn't think he was fated to meet the woman he left with in his arms. He didn't think it was fate that he stumbled upon the tower. It was his own choices that led him there. And it was the choice of his to arrest any remaining cultists instead of kill them.
It was the wrong choice. A mistake. He believed in those too.
Who could have known what rescuing the stranger would lead to? He certainly didn't.
The days seemed to go by slowly. He kept Piper away from the stranger. Didn't want to scare her with the old gal's energy. She was just a young hound, didn't know any better. Got excited when she met strangers but was esecially excited with this one. Maybe she sensed something about the poor girl. Either way, Jacob tried to keep their interaction to a minimum. The stranger still seemed weak and wary, and he figured it would be easier for her to rest if Piper wasn't constantly on her all the time.
Jacob stayed home for weeks tending to the poor girl. He had requested time off from the chief. He was surprised to get time and a half. Didn't know why but apparently the chief wanted him gone anyways. He wasn't gonna argue. He counted his blessings that he could stay home with the girl.
He didn't know what to think of her. Never even got her name. She hardly spoke a single word in those first few days and her beautiful eyes always seemed filled with fear when he approached. He was a giant of a man, after all. He had little to no experience in dealing with victims of crime, even if he felt boundless compassion for them. They were his motivation for being a lawman.
For some reason, it always hurt when she looked at him with fear and he resolved to be as approachable and friendly as possible.
He didn't know when it happened. All he knew was eventually he started to look at her differently, as did she. He found his emerald green eyes trailing to hers almost longingly. He laughed a bit too much around her. He was inexplicably happy.
After the first week he started to see the change in her. It was like the two of them clicked. She seemed to love Piper almost as much as the hound loved her back. Whenever Jacob sat beside the bed and the stranger ran her hands through Piper's shaggy hair, the lawman felt at peace. The sun shone through the windows. He would put his knuckles up to his face, bite down and keep himself from saying anything. If he did say something, too much would spill out.
Week three was when he started talking to the stranger nearly every day. Her voice had become a comforting sound and she had started to help out around the house - despite his direct orders for her to stay in bed and get rest - and often times their conversations ended in laughter and smiles. They were the first genuine smiles Jacob shared with a stranger in a long time. And it would be even longer before he smiled again.
One day he accidentally touched a topic that he shouldn't have. They were hanging up clothes outside after scrubbing them down. Piper was resting comfortably, curled up in a ball and snoring away in the grass. It was a beautiful day out, and it contrasted so much with that dark night, that he was thrust into his memories of the tower. The books he had found. The symbols.
He foolishly brought it up with the stranger. "Those cultists... they had this strange... language in their books. Otherworldly symbols. Writings of old gods, of the end times. What was that about?"
When her smile faded he regretted bringing it up. "These cultists... they worshipped a being from the before times." Her jaw set and her fists clenched. She kept her eyes to the floor. "I... I can't say much, except to tell you... tell you the things they did. They stole us from our homes. They practiced horrible rituals. And they..." She couldn't continue.
Instinctively Jacob wrapped his arms around the stranger, surprising the both of them. But she hugged him back. He couldn't imagine the pain those men had inflicted on the poor woman and bringing it up again was a mistake. A wrong decision. She didn't have any place to go, she likely didn't have any family left (or at least she had never told him about family), and she would be forever changed by her experience.
By then he had shamefully grown a crush on the stranger. He still didn't believe in fate, no matter how much he'd like to say that their encounter was meant to happen. It wasn't. He was just a sad, delusional young man who thought there was something between them, something that neither would say.
It wasn't true.
He knew she couldn't stay. It would be selfish to ask her to. But the idea of her facing the unknown, going out into the world with barely anything, on the run from cultists, it was so unbearable that he couldn't think of any other alternative than for her to stay with him.
He breathed deeply and placed a hesitant kiss to the young woman's hair. He would ask her tomorrow.
Tomorrow would never come for the two of them. The day seemed to drag on until it was dinnertime. She hadn't spoken since the incident earlier and he hadn't pushed her for answers or for conversation. They sat at opposite ends of the dinner table.
"How... how's the soup?" He asked, reaching. She glanced up at him, startled as if she was lost in thought.
"Did you hear that?" She asked suddenly.
Jacob frowned and tilted his head, concerned. He was about to ask if she was ok and apologize again, but he was interrupted by a knock at the door. He blinked in surprise and excused himself to go answer the door. As soon as he got up, the young woman jumped up and grabbed his wrist. She seemed extra jittery.
"Don't go. Don't answer the door." She was looking at him with such desperation and such conviction that he was almost convinced answering the door would be a death sentence. He gently took her hand away from his wrist.
"Hey, don't worry, okay? I'll bet it's just someone come to check up on me. I haven't left the house in weeks. Who knows, it could be one of my fellows from the constabulary. I'll be right back." He smiled gently down at the young woman, though on the inside he was shaken. The first words she had said to him after the incident and they were to warn him not to answer the door. Maybe... maybe he should at least be a little careful.
Jacob moved to answer the door, calling Piper to his side just in case. His hand uncertainly hovered over the doorknob before he finally stopped stalling and opened it.
Standing outside, just as he expected, was a colleague. Sergeant Davidson, in fact. Jacob blinked and gave a small, polite nod to his superior. "Ah, sir. Welcome. What brings you here so late at night?" Jacob asked politely.
Davidson had his hands at his sides in his pockets and a lit cigar in his mouth. He took it out for a moment to speak. This concerned Jacob. Davidson never spoke, he was too busy chomping on cigars. "You did fine work in that raid a few weeks ago." His voice was raspy from rarely ever using it. "The boys in the constabulary are nicknaming you Krieg for the hell you brought down in that tower."
Jacob swallowed, admittedly unsure of how to handle this information. Did he really want to be associated with war and death? He had enough of a hard time getting people to trust him in spite of his stature. He didn't want to be known for his brutality. Before he could continue, movement to his right caught Davidson's eyes. The lawman narrowed his icy blue eyes and reached for his baton. He never had time to brandish it.
The young woman was on the officer in half a second, tackling the officer and ripping into him with what looked like... were those claws? By the time he had recovered from his shock and could pull the woman off of Davidson, it was too late. His colleague was bleeding profusely.
Jacob stared in horror at the stranger. "What have you done?!"
She turned to him, her face now stained with Davidson's blood. She seemed shocked and hurt at Jacob's reaction, as if she expected him to understand her motivations behind attacking an officer and a friend. "The tower." She whispered.
"What about the tower?" He asked, grabbing her shoulders.
"He was there. He... he was one of them."
Her words hit Krieg like a kick to the gut. He didn't believe what he was hearing. "No. You're wrong. You have to be. You have-"
He was cut off by... a growl? "I know I'm right. And more of them are on their way. They came for me. You know too much. You let me in." Krieg stumbled backwards. Something in his gut told him she was right. He swallowed hard. In the distance, he caught movement.
He clenched his fists. He didn't know how to deal with this. "Leave." He said quietly.
"What?" The stranger asked incredulously.
"I said leave. They're not taking you." Not after everything she had been through.
Instead of arguing, Vanya just stood there for a moment before finally deciding to take his advice. She bolted out the door and in the opposite direction of the approaching lawmen. Very few broke off to run after her. The rest were coming to meet Jacob.
He had a bad feeling about this.
This turned out to be the last he ever saw of the stranger, or so he thought. When the policemen approached, they attacked Jacob with such ferocity that he couldn't fight back. Piper got several wounds just from trying to protect him. He was beaten to a pulp, covered in bruises and welts and horrible cuts. They left him when they were sure he was dead. The last thing Jacob remembered was crawling away to safety with Piper and watching as his house went up in flames.
The next weeks were a blur. He nursed himself back to health, miraculously surviving the beating. He didn't feel like he survived. He felt like he had died. Jacob had, anyways.
He was Krieg now. A new man. He stayed in the village for a short while. Just long enough to be there when a creature slaughtered the entire constabulary a few weeks after Jacob died. Krieg hobbled in the creature's footsteps, stalking it as it frantically searched the town for something. It led him to the graveyard finally and settled at his grave.
After the slaughter, both Krieg and the creature left town.
It wasn't until years later that Krieg came to believe in fate. When he realized that fate had been pulling the strings all along. When, in search of an honorable death as a flagellant, he happened upon someone he never thought he'd see again.
She wore a musky cloak around her shoulder, and an extremely familiar red scarf around her neck. She eyed him with those same beautiful eyes, though much more wary. He could sense the pain in her. Neither of them belonged in this Hamlet. When he approached her in the Tavern, she studied him up and down and neither spoke for the longest time. Finally she opened her mouth.
"What the hell do you want?"
Krieg used to think fate was a sham. He knew better now. Fate had been controlling his life all along.