The Siege: Part Three

Tweet

This time we did not form one single, impenetrable unit, we merely attacked. I gave the order and my sixteen brave friends sprinted behind me through the moist, bloodstained courtyard and hurdled over the many lifeless lumps that littered the ground. I had my eyes on the large wooden gate that protected the houses and homes of the inhabitants of Hungate Castle; however my hopes dropped even lower as I came closer to see that it had been smashed through and ten red dressed soldiers blocked the entrance to perhaps double the amount of green. I transferred all the rage from on top of the wall into my run and my trusty blade and as I was almost upon the men I leaped into the frosty air. Proceeding forward seemed to take longer than it should have, but this was all the more time to get my attack honed. I pulled my sword back in the air and jabbed a random man inbetween the neck and the shoulder. But if he screamed, I would not have realised because I landed on a not-too-happy enemy soldier.

“What the”- he blurted out as I slammed into his back and forced us both to the cold, dirty floor. I pressed my shield to the back of his head and pushed his screaming face into the ground. I broke his feeble neck. Just then my attack team arrived with a thunderous clatter all around me. Green troops that had been caught by surprise succumbed to the power of my soldiers blades and landed either side of me. I stood up, and ran again. Hacked at my right where I slashed open a back and smashed the persons spine in two, no time to stop. Two men had their backs to me; they were fighting two of the defending red soldiers at the base of the demolished gate. My eyes narrowed and I slowed down, I cut the left mans leg off at the knee to which he toppled, and I beheaded the other. Amazed glares came before thankful nods from the two defending soldiers; one patted me on my shield, a symbolic gesture. I turned around to see the ground covered in green soldiers bleeding and some crying, fourteen of my sixteen soldiers were still standing, a minor victory, I thought.

I pushed forward with my men, who had been joined by the ten defending the broken gate, into the civilian district of the castle. We all lowered our heads briefly as we seen houses burning, and children lying dead in the street, slaughtered. I was sure I seen a tear stroll down the dirty cheek of the comrade next to me. We progressed past the houses towards the screams of battle. Before us was a prestigious set of white stairs that went up to the keep. Exactly one-hundred and one steps ascended a small hill and held up a large marble building that displayed a beautiful array of different columns on the outside. A raging battle was taking place on the stairs, and my men were ready for it. I gave them all a brief look and then jogged up the stairs missing out two every time. As I ran, I studied the battle; these were not mere enemy soldiers. These were skilled warriors that Rulf had sent to attack; they must have been from the deep end of his army. They looked powerful by just studying them, however I did not back down, and neither did my men. One of the enemy knights stepped down three steps and squared up to me as I stopped. My eyes were dragged from his helmet to meet a rusty broadsword hanging from his hands. It was almost the length of my body. He raised it up without warning and let it drop towards me, the large chunk of sharpened metal getting ever faster trying to destroy my body. I only just had time to squeeze my shield in front of it, but even then the blow knocked me down and I fell five steps. Bruised, I slowly stood up to see my attacker advancing towards me.

“Go around him!” I shouted to my troops, to which they obeyed, but they were clever about it, one of them strayed too close so the knight took a large sweep at him to which the man ducked. This was my opportunity. Disregarding my sturdy shield, I moved as quick as lightning and jumped onto his back. Using all of my force and weight, I pulled him down to the stairs where we toppled together for an unknown number of steps. I ended up on top of his steel-armoured body with my sword clutched in my right hand and my left on his face. He had misplaced his death-bringing broadsword, but this did not stop him doing damage, he punched my right arm with the force of ten men so it went numb and I toppled to the left, where he tried to take advantage and grab my throat. However I moved my sword in towards my body and it pierced his think armour and ripped through flesh. I heard a loud grunt through the shiny helmet and I felt warm blood flow down my wrist. Are you dead? I mutely questioned him. No, he physically replied, he lifted me up into the air and threw me onto the stairs where I landed on my back. Pain shot through me from the blow. I noticed, as I landed my gaze back upon him, that my sword was still sticking from the right-side of his stomach, he seemed unaware of it. Ignoring the pain as he lunged at me, I kicked out at the pommel of my blade, forcing it to the left, a crunching sound followed by metal hitting metal came from the persons’ torso. I kicked the blade so it tore diagonally upwards through muscle and ribs and it clanged against the inside of the knights’ armour. He fell on his face and stayed motionless. I too stayed still for a few seconds to catch my breath, they better not all be as tough as this one, I thought. Standing up, I pushed the heavy body over and yanked my sword from the armoured man. It was covered in a deep red blood that contained all the memories of that man that I had just slain. I disregarded the thought and turned around to see three gaunt-looking red soldiers remaining, and many bodies entangled on the red-stained stairs. So many. These two words bounced around my mind continuously and I pondered a question. What is the point in all this death? Step by step I took, towards the three remaining troops of my command. But the battle was not over. Inside the keep was King Rulf, leading his powerful attacking group through the halls of our Kings home, and if there was one main thing that stood out from the rest of the nagging emotions that were rebelling against my own conscience; it was that I was going to stop that devil in disguise, even if it took every ounce of my own depleted life. 

>G

The Siege: Part Two

Tweet

The giant wall I stood upon shook violently as the men ran at our home. Just as I pushed a ladder that rested against the wall, it tumbled away into the sea of humans, sending a man who was halfway up flying. I turn and parry the sword of a green dressed man behind me, follow up by kicking him in the knee so he loses his footing and thrust my blade through his chest. He screams and lands on the ground dead. I get a sour taste in my mouth as I know I’ll hear his screams in my next sleep.

Looking right towards the ballista I see my men engaged in fierce battle. They seem an equal fight for the enemy, which is bad due to the sheer amount of men they have, we needed to get off the wall. I begin to call out to them but I get cut off by a tall archer beside me, “Missile!” he shouted too late. A huge rock the size of ten men flew through the thick air and exploded in the middle of the wall. Shards of stone flew in every direction as I dived backwards to avoid the blast. Even more men screamed when the initial explosion receded, shouting out for aid because their legs were trapped or they needed help to retrieve someone. Standing up and wincing as my torso pained me I looked forwards at the damage. Most of the top of the sturdy wall was still standing but I could already see it cracking away at the pressure point. The boulder must have tore a hole in the lower half of the wall so there is nothing to hold up the top. I raced forward and shouted “Get off the wall!” at the top of my dry voice to which several of my respectful men obeyed. But still just less than half on my entire battalion were on the other side of the damage to the wall. “Run!” I commanded as two men seemingly jogged over to me. Mere seconds after, another six sprinted across. Suddenly the tremor returned as a second rock pelted into the already crippled wall and penetrated it; launching right out the other side and slowly rolling into the courtyard amongst the debris of our home’s first line of defence. A large chunk of the wall in front of me descended into the pit of attackers who were smashing chunks of it the wall away with bettering rams. Upon the wall as it fell were seven of my men, there eyes staring at me as they fell, longing just to be by my side, and feeling cheated by death as it stole their souls in such an easy way. This left a small proportion of my troops trapped on the other side of the now gaping hole in our wall. Roughly twenty; still fighting off enemy troops who seemed to have aimed their attacks to that side.

“Let’s go rescue our men!” I ordered and my twenty strong followed me down the staircase. As I stepped into the courtyard I noticed three things: A metallic taste in the air which I presumed was the thick stench of blood. Villagers fleeing as the enemy dogs poured into the courtyard via the hole in the wall. And more importantly, a large congregation of red and green soldiers mixed together, slashing, stabbing and shouting. “We need to go through them.” I stated as I turned to face my men. Continuing through the shocking looks I received from one or two I said, “We’ll move through as one impenetrable circle. All facing outwards with our shields in front of us. Agreed?” My men exchanged glances of determination, terror and violence.

“Let’s do it” confirmed a ginger-haired soldier, no more than nineteen years of age. War is a cruel act, I thought.

“Excellent” I exclaimed and turned to face the disarray of fighting men. “On me!” I added and trotted towards the bloodshed.

I pressed against a sturdy man on my left as the scared-looking fighter on my right pressed against me. Pushing our shield arms out-front we aggressively drove through the main body of the attacking group. Green garbed men bounced off our shields as we formed one single body. I occasionally stabbed my sword underneath my shield or over it at the men who refused to budge, I wounded one in the thigh, he fell to the floor and got trampled by our leather boots. Shifting my gaze to my right at the man, I noticed his posture was inefficient; he was unable to defend from high attacks. I was about to tell him when what I thought came true and a blood-stained spear rose above his seemingly useless shield and pushed through a gap in his chain mail above his shoulder. One single scream emanated from him, it was a sanity destroying scream that made every bone in every man shudder. He dropped to the ground and I had no choice to fill in the gap in our now flawed group. Another four men fell before we made it through the pack of fighting which seemed never ending, each one having their life torn from them by a soldier who was one of thousands of puppets controlled by the twisted King Rulf.

We continued up a different, yet identical set of stairs back onto the wall to rescue our men but when we got there, my emotions flipped upside down. Bodies. Everywhere. Mostly men dressed in the red tunics of Hungate. Over half of my soldiers had been slain. Rage aggressively pushed aside reason, emotion and any consideration for my being as I push my way backwards through my appalled men. I turned. “These men did not deserve to die.” I stated. “Each soldier fought for this grand castle and its worthy inhabitants, and in my eyes, each is worth a place next to the Great Lords throne. But now it is up to us. We are going to crush these desecrators into the ground that we walk on; we will grind them into the very depths of Hell with our swords and shields. Let us go face the devil.” I concluded. Turning my back on awed stares from my men, I descended the stairs into the fiery pits of Satan’s glorious bloodshed.

 

>G

The Siege: Part One

Tweet

There I was. Waiting. In the first large courtyard of Hungate Castle. This courtyard was the closest one to the Badlands, which is where the enemy loomed. Just outside our castle walls there was an army only distinguishable by the terrorising war-horns and the echoing drums from beyond. Trying to intimidate us. I stood proudly at the top of a column of soldiers; my soldiers; my garrison; I was in charge of roughly fifty men that held a sword in their right hands and a shield in their left. They looked so scared. Dressed in predominantly metal armour, but with flashes of red cloth from underneath they obeyed my every command without hesitation. Looking around I see identical columns of troops standing adjacent to mine, there’s at least twenty, all standing, waiting. Every single soldier had one word rattling through their mind like an unwanted pest scraping on the inside of their worried skull: Defend.

It was tense when the officer rode up on a large brown stallion; the officers’ name was Sir Pasco. Wiping sweat off of his brow with his gauntlet he boomed,

“The King has issued the order, do whatever necessary to defend your homes! Do whatever necessary to defend your family!  And do whatever necessary to defend your King!” to which every swordsman, archer and spearman exclaimed dedicated cheers, including me. “King Rulf has made a mistake by trespassing within our lands with his weak army!” continued Sir Pasco. “They will not be alive to make that mistake again! May the Gods prove this battle, short, easy and casualties a few. Best of luck my brave men!” He ended his speech and rode off back in the direction he came from, wading through loud cheers and war cries.

I turned to my men, gave them a long and trustful stare then shouted, “Onto the walls!” and with a point of my gleaming blade lead my fifty-few up a narrow staircase onto the first defensive barrier between us and the enemy. On the stone wall stood archers, each at their own crenel overlooking the fearsome Badlands. I stopped and shouted, “Take position along the wall and fend off any ladders that you encounter. Any enemy that makes it onto the wall, kill them!” I strode over to the crenel as an archer moved one step to the left and saluted me. Looking out was a sight I would never forget, an uncountable number of men stood about eight hundred metres from our castle walls, each garbed in a dirty green colour with cheap chain mail torso’s, sword in one hand, shield in another. Among the army were various contraptions including catapults, trebuchets, battering rams and ballistae that would tear down the walls we were stood on like it was scissors going through paper. The archer gave me a worried look when I patted him on the shoulder and wished him luck. Further along the wall I spotted one of our own ballista sitting upon a formidable looking square-shaped tower, it was basically a giant crossbow that sat and fired giant bolts over a great distance. Not far until the enemy will be in range for them to impale the dogs. I thought.

Giving my sturdy men a reassuring glance I sat and waited for a mere seventeen minutes before the enemy drums stopped, the war-horns creased and the emanating sound of ugly shrieking exploded from eight hundred meters away and drowned any possible sound from escaping anyone’s lips, every green dressed soldier ran at the feeble walls crying one single word and holding the note until it formed an uniformed scream: Attack.

>G