I was a soldier once...

[MarsCymber]

When I heard that Zhentil Keep was burning I rejoiced. Twas but one of the few times in my life that I ever truly did- my family buying their debt and becoming citizens, having enough coppers to buy a blackberry pie and share it with my brothers, holding my first longsword at the age of 16. Of course by that age I had already been a spear-carrier in the Mulmaster 6th Infantry for two years. I had already tasted battle and saw through the youthful delusions of battlefield glory. But I was still young and some dreams stay with you even through the nightmares. When I held that sword I was Drakshor the Wrymbane, Boers Craelson, King Azoun… I was a knight, not just a soldier in the armies vying for the Moonsea, a piece of kindling set to burn in the great blaze that they had made of it. I believed I would one day own my own sword and shield, my own armor and land. Such are the dreams we dream when youth still burns in our veins. Yet time, that implaccable foe, laid siege to my soul, worrying away at me year after year with countless battles and skirmishes... but for what? My body bears the scars of all the weapons I know and some I cannot name. There came a time when I would not learn the names of the other men for I knew the next day would see different faces about me. Yet still I would trust them, nameless as we were, for in sooth we were all the same: we were soldiers, and duty was our mistress.
Then came the day our captain told us of our victory. "Zhentil Keep burns!" he cried. His words silenced our campfire conversations. We stared at him unblinking in our shock, not comprehending this strange messenger who stood in our captain's skin. This man, grizzled and hardened, who had led us into the gaping maw of death time and again without flinching, fell to his knees and wept. Only then did those words, so sweet in their destructive implications, cut through the armor of our unbelieving minds. The captain was not the only man to weep that night, nor the only one on his knees praying to his god in thankfulness. In that moment we were men again, individuals all who had come through a dark ordeal together. We drank and spoke with laughter and shared our sadness together over those who had been lost upon the path. I dreamed the old dreams that night, unmarred by the nightmare of my waking hours. I was Daerus, and I rejoiced.
Is there no true peace to be found in this world the gods made for us? I ask that question even today as I write this, years and leagues distant from that night upon the shores of the Moonsea. Though much older then than the boy who first picked up a spear, I was still a fool drunk on dreams. No war is ever truly won. Even as the great fleet of Mulmaster sailed across the dark waters to seal Zhentil Keep's dying fate I should have known that I had not found victory that day, nor that year, or the next. "Victory" is but a fleeting thing, the moment of ecstacy when you lay with a woman, a fire burning on a cold night. When that warmth is gone, when day breaks and you awaken naked and alone and there is nothing left of that life-giving heat save for ash, you realize the truth... Battles are what fuel the fire of victory, war is the woman who holds you close at night. And like the fools we are we continue to feed the pyre and return to her embrace because we grasp for that feeling, that moment when we can stand above our bloodied and fallen foes and say to ourselves: "this is it, we have made peace... we have achieved victory." But those we call enemy savor the taste of victory as well. Even when their city is a smoldering rubble and their fleet is a quarter the size of that which is sweeping down upon their harbors, Victory, that fickle lover, opens her arms to any who would take her.
We sat upon the battlements partaking of the stock of mead left by the Zhent noble who had fled that keep some days before our arrival and watched the fires burning on the sea like so many stars in a dark liquid sky. We thought we were watching the most beautiful sight our living eyes would ever see. Hillsfar forces had marched on the city and were digging fortifications even as our great fleet made short work of the few warships left in the defense of the harbor. Howe'er the battle lasted throughout the night, much longer than we fools with our plundered drink. In the morrow the sight that greeted us sobered us quickly enough. Twas not the Zhent fleet that had burned, but our own. Bloated bodies and charred flotsam washed on the shore in great number, with each wave revealing more. Later that day a thunderous and dark storm rolled in from the west. With it came the forces of Darkhold. Beholders, skymages upon their dragons, a horde of goblin kind, rank upon rank of heavy Zhent infantry... and at their front rode Scyllua Darkhope astride her fiery devil steed. The army had marched through the night hidden in darkness and sorcery. They struck the Hillsfar forces without warning, shattering the Red Plume ranks. The battle was over nye under an hour. As quickly as it had begun the siege of Zhentil Keep was broken. Years after it happened there are nights still that I awake in utter terror, visions of fires on dark water before my eyes... fires on dark, blood red water.
In the coming months Yulash fell to General Darkhope and the Hillsfar forces completely retreated to their own city. Worst of all, a small Zhent force with delegates was welcomed into Mulmaster by High Blade Selfaril Uoumdolphin. Our leader, once the fiercest opponent of Zhentil Keep, had made alliance with our most hated of enemies. I soon found myself battling next to the very men I fought against all of my life.
The remainder of my term of service was harrowing. Thousands of Mulmaster citizens were in open protest and hundreds of soldiers joined their cause. They were denounced as deserters and enemies of the people. The punishment for these crimes was death. Perhaps though their fate was preferable to what lay ahead for the rest of us.
I do not recall much from the final months of my soldiering career. Perhaps it was the shock I had seen on the waters of the Moonsea, or perhaps it was the horrors I committed as I followed the orders given to me by my new Zhentarim officers. But one thing remained clear to me throughout and to this day: I had become a slave to duty. That which had sustained me through year after year of dark campaigns had become my gaoler. Duty to my city as soldier meant obeying orders, duty to my gods for vows I made, and duty to my family, for if I deserted too they would be sold into slavery as "sympathizers." And so without question, detached from myself as never before, I was the hand that created nightmares.
As my service ended I took as my home a keep some distance from the city. The nobleman who lived there had housed my company in the past and had shown us great hospitality. He was all too pleased to take me into service as his master-at-arms. Tis true I could have joined my family within the walls of the city. But after so many years in the army I had no skill at crafting as they had, and the scars I bore upon and beneath my skin left me a poor choice as a merchant. I could also not abide living within that city with so many Zhentarim swarming the streets.. Nay, I left my family most of the pay given me upon my retirement and took to the country.
For a year I lived in relative peace. My lord's sons were young and lively and they took to learning the skills of melee with glee and zeal. I had not the heart ot tell them my nightmare, nor the truths of war. Rarely did I offer any war stories though they hounded me for them. Twas my hope to shield them as long as I could from the horrors beyond the confines of their estate. To this end I drilled my lord's men-at-arms constantly. With my scars and harsh voice they instantly feared me, but they also learned to respect me. Within months they were honed and ready to defend the keep and their lord should there be a need. My vigilance and determination further impressed my lord, and in reward he promised something I had not thought of- not dreamed of- since I was that young boy fresh in the army. He promised to knight me for my service and bestow upon me a grant of land near his estates. I was stunned by his words, lost as I was within myself, and I regret that I was never truly able to show my gratitude.
You see, my lord was one of the most outspoken critics of Mulmaster joining the Zhentarim. And though he never raised arms, he fought ferociously at court. For this, but a week after he had made his promise to me, he was taken within the city as a traitor and spy. To me he was one of few truly loyal men remaining. But he was tried and beheaded within a fortnight of his arrest.
Word reached the keep upon the banners of Mulmaster as they marched down the road leading to the keep. The oldest son and charge, a mere 13 years old, had become my lord. We had enough men and supplies to withhold a siege for a few months, perhaps a year if we really stretched the food stuffs. But no allies existed to break a siege even if we could get a messenger past the small army and the warmages that supported it. My young lord was seemingly doomed. Howe'er his father had shown me a secret room hidden deep within the cellars of the keep. This room was hidden by subtle magics and would be remain hidden even to magical detection. Only three people could fit in there with no room for supplies, but my late lord had three magical rings within the room. These rings would sustain a man through thirst and hunger as long as he wore it. I hid the two sons within the room and set my smallest guardsman to protect them. Even then the compartment was cramped, but at least they would be spared.
I then took command of the defense. We held out for three long, bloodied months despite our enemy's superior numbers and the magical support given them by the Mulmaster Cloaks. Lady Strategy was with us. She showed her favor in the design of the keep and its clever defenses. We were also able to take advantage of errs in the enemy commander's tactics. My opponent was a mountain of a man from Darkhold named Gustav the Giant. What he lacked for in wits he made up for as a fierce warrior with the strength of an ogre, and none could doubt his courage. Time and again he himself led advances upon the walls, but each time those advances broke as waves on cliffs. I was much aggrieved that the Zhentarim commander was leading Mulmaster Blades in the attack, but my resolve never faltered. Alas though his tactics were no better than an orc's and he lost ten men for one of mine that fell, I could not replace my losses.
We fell in the third month. As the gates were smashed we met them with boiling oil and pikes, yet still they came on. I was much weary and woudned when I faced the Giant in the courtyard. To my shame and sorrow he broke me as a boy would a toy. Yet his orders were explicit that he should take prisoners and I became his trophy. They tortured me for for only the gods know how long, but I would not tell them where the yound nobles were. I had sworn oaths to both their father and before gods that I would protect them. I would not falter in this task. Once again I lost myself within the pain as I once had in those years of soldiering, and no amount of torture could bring me forth from that citadel. They even threatened to arrest my family as once I had feared, but I knew they were already going to be punished. I could not save them.
Alas where physical means and threats failed magical means were brought to bear. A short man with a simple face and wearing simple clothes entered my cell. He was a man so ordinary he culd no doubt fade easily into a crowd. This man smiled and talked pleasantries to me, but I was locked away within myself. I was resolved to my fate, but I would not allow those boys to share it with me. With a sudden and sinister frown he placed his fingers upon my head. In all of my years in the Blades I had not felt such terrible agony. Not spear, sword, nor axe had ever cut me so deep as that man's mind. He took the knowledge from me. Having no more use for me, I was left to rot in that cell.
I had never had much use for prayer. Or rather, I prayed to my lady patron before battles and observed the rites on holy days, but I had never fervently prayed as I had seen truly zealous worshippers do. In that cell, I prayed every waking moment I had. The Zhentarim had no means with which to reach those boys whilst they remained hidden in their sanctuary. I prayed the Lady give them the strength and clear mind to stay hidden and wait out the Zhentarim. I prayed the Zhents would eventually tire and leave the keep. Yet as I had seen happen to so many before- to survivors of a sacked town we passed, too late to protect; to men lying bleeding on the battlefield, crying for home- my prayers had were not answered. The bastards tricked the boys. For though they could not find the sanctuary within the cellars, the boys could hear all that the Zhentarim said. They promised the boys that if they surrendered they would see their father. That promise was fulfilled, for as they emerged they were beheaded. The young guard I had left with them was drawn and quartered. In that moment I had lost my second home and family to the Zhentarim.
I believed I would never see the light of day again. In my cell I grew weak with fever and hunger. The wounds from the battle and torture did would not heal and the flies stuck to me like amber as my wounds oozed foul fluids over them. In my few moments of clarity I knew I would die a failed servant.
I dreamed constantly of sitting on a high battlement watching fire on dark water. The flagon I held was filled with blood. Around me sat my drinking companions: my family in irons, my former captain and company all skeletons chanting "victory! victory!", and my Lord with his sons. He poured our drink from his head, the blood flowing thick and steady. I turn back to the fires and drink deep... ever so deep of that rich, red drink.
When I awoke I was surprised to find myself hale and healthy. My wounds had been cleansed and certainly magically attended. I wore shackles, plenty of new scars, and bore a strange tattoo upon my wrist. Yet for all this I was alive. Within moments I realized that I was in the back of a large wagon ladden with Mulmaster goods. I could hear horses, the familiar clinking sound of armor and arms, and heavy voices from outside. They spoke a language I did not know and I had no means by which to see outside to identify my captors. I had no choice but to wait and see what new fate Beshaba had laid out for me, for it seemed obvious to me that I had earned Lady Misfortune's disfavor.
In time I did learn who my captors were. In sooth, there was but one captor and his mercenary guards. He was a short man with a wide belly and a bald head. His scalp was decorated with arcane tattoos and his face was bereft of hair save for an oiled fork pointing from his chin. He was a red wizard of Thay named Zulthen, and he had been so impressed with how much torture I had endured that he purchased me to fight in Thayan arenas. Over the weeks that we traveled I learned that my family was indeed sold into slavery. Their business, the one that my father and uncles built and had worked so hard to buy out our grandfather's debt with, had been torn down along with most of my old neighborhood to make room for a new temple to Bane. I also learned much about Zulthen and that the Red Wizards were to be despised as much as the Zhentarim. Zulthen was a petty man who counted every coin. In the villages we passed he would use his magic to charm and then beggar the people who lived there. In one village he took a liking to a young mother. He ensnared her mind and used her for the entire week we stayed there. While he held her she thought not of her young, and the baby starved before her unblinking, uncomprending mind. As I left the village in my cage in the back of the wagon I heard a heart-rending scream. That night there was another drinking companion upon my sea-side battlement.
It seems to me that my new life, my life here in Narfell, began when the bandits descended upon us. The day was like all others: the sound of the mercenaries telling ribald jokes in their strange tongue as they rode beside the wagon, the cursing and muttering of Zulthen as he cracked his whip at the horses drawing the wagon... the fading sound of dark waves in my mind. Weeks into our journey, those sounds had become as a natural ambience. It was shattered with a warcry and the tearing of fabric as arrows sped through the sides of the wagon. The sounds of the battle awoke old memories. My eyes flickered, my fingers twitched, and at once I was a soldier again. I looked about for a way to break my bonds as I listened to the death cries outside. I could not tell who was winning by sound alone, but could tell the fighting was fierce and bloody by the familiar cries of agony and the ringing of steel. Suddenly Zulthen was crawling inside the wagon. He had an arrow embedded in his shoulder and one in his buttocks. As he climbed in he cursed and muttered about "damnable, cheap, cowardly mercenaries". It was then that he saw me, and in his feverish eyes I saw his plea. He hissed "help me! Help me live slave and freedom is yours!" I stared at him without experession until his face quivered in fear, and then I nodded once.
I leapt from the wagon and rolled. My muscles protested at the now unfamiliar movements, but adrenaline flowed freely and I was awash in my old ways. I ducked under a slash from some colorfully clothed rider wielding a saber. As I came up I had already grabbed the blade and shield of a fallen mercenary. The shield was smaller than was standard in the Blades, but it was a sturdy oak reinforced by iron bands and ringed by spikes. The longsword was well forged but older than me. Still it seemed the mercenary cared for his weapon and, as I drove it through the first bandit I saw, apparently it still had bite. As I pulled the blade from the gut of the man his entrails and blood spilled over the colorful tunic he wore. The look on his face told me that he did not understand that he was dead, so I helped him along by cleanly severing his head from his shoulders. I heard the rider returning from behind me. My movements after so many months of captivity were too slow howe'er and this time the blade bit into my back as I dove from the blow. Thankfully I was still quick enough to avoid being sliced in twain, but the wound bled freely. I grimaced and blocked out the pain as I had so many times before. I needed to think clearly, as the Red Knight would. There were two left- the rider and another who was grappling off to the side with a mercenary.
I focused on the rider. I was on open ground with no horse and no pike. There was no chance for me to win this fight in melee. I looked over the battle site for a bow or a spear and saw several, but none were close enough for me to reach before the rider would be upon me again. I was resolved to cut the horse out from under him. Yet as the rider came on, charging thunderously upon that magnificent warhorse, I thought it a too much a shame to lame that beast. As I stood there, the rider screamed his terrible warcry and raised his sabre with both hands, determined to put as much power into the stroke as possible and fell me on this pass. Twas then I decided. I let him nearer, that sheer savagery in his face nearly neerly unnerving me. But too much of me was a soldier still, and I held my ground. Closer now... closer... and I turned my sword into the ground and grabbed the rim of my shield. I threw the shield as he was a mere dozen paces from me, and with the momentum of his charge and both hands raised he was unable to defend himself from the improvised missile. The spinning spiked wheel slammed into his chest and knocked him back in his sadle. Twas not a mortal wound, yet it is a testament to his riding ability that he stayed ahorse. In his surprise how'er his blade fell from his hands. I did not wait. As he fought to control himself in the saddle with a small spiked shield stuck in his chest I ran to the nearest fallen body with a bow. The bow was easy to pick up, but the man's body was covering his quiver. Luckily one of the bandits' colorfully fletched arrows protruded from his back. I ripped the missile from the corpse and notched it in the bow. Yet as I turned to fire at the wounded rider I caught movement in the corner of my eye. I spun away from the rider and fired the arrow just in time to catch the other bandit as he charged at me with a bloody dirk, presumably the one he used to guy the last mercenary. The arrow embedded itself in the base of his throat but he continued to charge me. I dropped the bow and lowered my shoulder, using the man's charge to flip him over me. The fall drove the arrow up through his throat, and somewhere along the way it had snapped, driving the broadtipped arrowhead through his mouth.
I only had time to register that the man was dead before I heard the thunderous hooves nearly on top of me. A great shadow descended on me as the rider, sans shield and blade, dove from his steed to tackle me. I lost my ragged breath in the impact and managed -barely- to roll with the fall. Alas the man had the better of the fall and landed on top of me. He immediately set his callused and powerful hands about my throat, blocking any air from reaching my already painful chest. Most men when they are being strangled will panic and try to pry the hands from his throat. Years of battle will teach you that this is folly. Even a strong man loses his strength when he has no air whilst the strangler remains just as powerful as he was to begin. Nay, the first course of action must be decisive and swift. I immediately punched my thumb up into his eye socket. Jelly and liquid spurted into my face as the man shrieked in agony. As he instincively raised his hands to his face I locked my fists and drove them into his throat. It always seemed to me that strangling someone was a waste of time, and time is crucial on the battlefield. Instead I always like letting a man's broken trachea do the work for me. Blood spurted from the rider's lips as his shrieks turned into a gurgling whisper. I stood up, calmly walked over to where I had driven my longsword in the dirt, and then just as calmly plunged the blade through the man's heart, ending his pain. Then I turned to the wagon.
Zulthen was cowering amongst his ill gotten goods within the wagon. Though those wounds he had suffered were not individually mortal, together they had bled him much. He weakly raised his head to me and whispered "slave! Good and true slave... come and tend your master."
"I am no slave Thayan. By this sword and your word I am free, and freely do I leave you here to rot."
His spells spent in the battle and weak as he was, all that Zulthen could do was curse me with his strange tongue. But those I could endure, twas the bleeding in my shoulder and the burning in my muscles and lungs that I thought would do me in. But old ways die hard, and my mind and body worked mechanically to cleanse the wound and bandage it. Though I found myself in a daze, the motions were so familiar. When I snapped from my daze, the faint crash of waves on rock was in my ears. Yet I found myself miles north from the battle site on the back of that magnificent warhorse the bandit had ridden.
My mind worked... north? Why north? I could think clearly after the rest on the horse (who I named Redshield after his fine coat and the means by which I met him). There was nothing to the north, and somehow in my daze I had realized this. To the west was the Zhentarim, my hated enemies. To the east the Thayans and Tuigan, neither of whom seemed appealing. To the south was Aglarond, but the witch-queen there had no love for Moonsears. And though I knew that the Olarryns had originally come from there, I did not know any of my family in that distant land. There was no promise as to how they would receive me, but I had doubt that it would be with open arms. No, my path lay north. My mind, still returning to clarity, worked out the names of the lands there. The Cold Lands: Damara, Vaasa... and Narfell. I looked down at Redshield and tried to grin, though my face had nye forgot how to. The Nars were reputed to be great horsemen, a match almost for the Tuigan. They would surely give a good price for a fine warhorse...
And with that I, Daerus, rode frayed of soul, broken in body, but clear in my memories as a soldier into the land of the Nars to pursue a new life, and perhaps a new dream.

MarsCymber - Daerus Olarryn

[Celandine]

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