Image by These red days stretch as far back as I can remember.
The sound of iron on iron, the cacophony of timber screeching as shield grinds against shield, and the screams of the dying mingling with the slick squelch of blood and mud.
Rain flays my upturned face as I drink in the scene, a discordant ballad that plays in my warrior’s heart. Each note leaching a part of the soul like a pestilent drug, satisfying while emptying.
The duality of battle lust throbs in my chest. I drink it in.
“Captain Gream.”
A slight soldier barrels through the press, waving a Blackwood stave in my direction. I watch him duck and weave, vaulting sword slashes to the knees only to flatten the enemy’s nose with a knee adorned with spiked greaves, which arc a rain of blood to dilute the morning deluge.
What was his name? Saminson, Saimsan?
Memory filters through like treacle in my battle lust. Sailinson, that was his name.
Willow is the nickname the seventh company gave him though, on account of his quick fighting style and ability to weave with the winds of battle.
The standard flaps madly around the Blackwood stave as he drives the butt end into the top of a Westwold’s spine as an afterthought in his mad flight.
I grin in appreciation.
Westwold’s clan sigil of the sable dagger shatters with Willow’s blow to the prone Orc’s armour.
Specks of ichor flick through the throng of men, staining the armour of friend and foe alike.
“That’s it lad,” I bellow, heartened by the spirit Willow is showing in his first attempt at the great game. He tumbles in a heap, tripped by one of ours, rolling smartly and scooping up the standard as he exits the roll.
“Well Done”… A large Westwold Orc knocks the wind from me, cutting my shout short as I scramble to grapple with this giant warrior.
We tumble for what seems an eternity; I feel a finger snap as I wrench the sword from the large Westwold’s hands. Blood mingles with bile that bites at my throat as the dirk I kept clenched against my wrist enters his neck.
Blood fountains high merging with the general madness of the smoke-sickened battlefield.
As I struggle to my knees, I hear the snap of bone as willow drives home the standard through the dying Orc’s backbone.
“For the seventh company” the lad screams.
A blue vein pulses with battle rage as his eyes glisten in that dead way of the newly initiated.
With that call, the men rally around the banner fighting for what seems an eternity.
A green wave of Westwold Orcish flesh and jagged cutlasses carves meat from the seventh. A copper stench fills the air as the crimson sunset stains the battlefield, illuminating sallow cadavers, eyes missing as the crows start their grizzly endeavours early, wings flapping madly as they caw at the continued fighting.
In the distance, a lone figure steps out from the brow of a hill.
Wrapped in a leather cloak with animal bones dangling from his neck, this small goblin fixes the captain with azure glowing eyes, like the depths of the Calista sea where the whales sing to the sea folk.
Staff upraised, the spindly creature almost coughs a series of guttural croaks that reverberate through the earth, shaking the standard in the still air of the dying day.
Captain Gream stands stock still on a heap of bodies he has kicked into a makeshift platform.
Silence descends, Orc and man stiff as desiccated trees as the incantation takes effect and the shaman walks calmly toward the final enclave of knights frozen like stone statues.
To be continued...
Expect more magic, grizzly battles and unexpected twists in the Provinces of the Seven Wolds.
Part 2, entitled 'Arrows in Flight' can be found on this link.
Part 3, entitled 'The King's Gambit' can be found on this link.
Part 4 (Finale) entitled ‘Deathdrinker’s Bite' can be found on this link.
