The Shining Armor

A forceful tug of his deep blue capelet yanked him to the ground just as an arrow splintered against the gravestone behind him. Stammering, the bowman who had grabbed him uttered, "M-m-m-y Lord, I-I apologize for touching you... but..." Without a word, Duke Rayneer struck the man across the cheek, sending him sprawling to the floor.

"Your lord thanks you for your service and deplores you for touching nobility," he declared, turning to face the treeline that separated the Parish of Carstag from the fields of Heregar. Along the trees, numerous Larion, Tirabalti, and other rebel skirmishers darted in and out from the woodline, hurling missiles into his own Verellian skirmishers.

The morning sun crested over the horizon behind their enemy, casting blinding rays that disadvantaged his own skirmishers. In this dawnlit duel, the affair became one-sided. The graveyard of the parish, where the Duke and his skirmishers had sought cover after being fired upon by the rebels to the east, now bore witness to the haunting scene of fallen blue-caped bodies. What had once been a retinue of bow and javelin men, adorned in blue capelets, had transformed into a bloodied tapestry of corpses in the sacred grounds of the graveyard.

The Duke turned to his remaining men and shouted, "You dare let these sniveling yeoman beat us! Pig farmers and shepherds are cutting you down like animals. Show me that you are truly men of Verellia and cut them down!" As the Duke finished, the skirmishers leaped from behind their cover and charged towards the tree line. However, several skirmishers dropped dead not ten paces from their cover as arrows flew out from the trees and into the chests of the Duke’s men.

The Duke cried out in fury, "Damnit, must I do it all myself?" Drawing his ornately adorned, sapphire-pommeled sword, he sprinted across the open ground towards the trees, leaping over the bodies of his fallen men. Arrows whipped past his face; one grazed his left cheek, letting a rush of blood drip down the Duke’s face. Behind him, the Duke could hear the bowman he had struck rushing after him.

In an instant, the view of the skirmisher-laden treeline changed to one of crumpled grass and dirt. The Duke felt heavy, as if he could no longer move his limbs. A sharp pain branched out from his right shoulder and across the whole side of his body. His eyes were pinned shut by the ground that gravity now shoved into his face. The hilt of his sword was no longer felt in his palm. Struck by an arrow, he had collapsed to the ground face first.

He could hear the voice of his aid once more, the young bowman stammering, "M-my lord." The Duke grumbled between spitting bits of grass from his lips, "Don't you dare put your filthy hands on me, you swine, or I will have you whipped!" Rolling onto his back, he saw arrows littering the sky above him as the cries of the dying filled his ears, his men falling around him.

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"Sir, you've been wounded, please, you must get back. The enemy is cutting us to pieces."

Using his good arm and growing anger, the Duke propped himself up, turned to his knees, and forced himself to stand. His right arm dropped limply at his side. The arrow had passed through his shoulder, leaving a gaping hole spewing blood across his shining mail armor and once blue, now purple, capelet. The Duke growled in frustration, pulled his sword from the dew-coated grass, and continued forward, stepping angrily through the open ground and towards the tree line.

"I will have each and every one of their treasonous heads, or by God, I will die trying." The Duke turned to his men who were crawling amongst the grass, trying to avoid the onslaught of arrows. "Whosoever brings me the head of the man who shot me shall have his weight in silk!"

As the Verellian skirmishers began to rise to their feet once again, a thunderous roar could be heard coming from their rear. The Duke turned to see the white and blue banner, divided by a blood-red stripe and adorned with a golden bull, rushing down the road along their right. The Count of Brevia, better known as the Bull of Brevigton, had arrived with his cohort of heavy infantry. The tower of a man, wearing his horned helmet, was leading a cohort of plated knights wielding heavy maces, hammers, and other metal bludgeoning weapons. Their armor gleamed in the morning sun, sending blinding rays back at the enemy skirmishers.

“No! I will not let them steal my victory, my glory, from me!” The Duke shouted as the cohort of heavy infantry crashed across the field and rushed into the enemy treeline. The knights were unstoppable as the rebel arrows bounced off the heavy armor of the Brevian cohort or were stopped by their heavy tower shields. The Duke sprinted forward, trying to reach the enemy treeline before the Brevians could, but his head was becoming fuzzy, the blood dripping down his arm showed that he was weakening fast.

The Duke fell to his knees as the Brevians rushed past him, scattering the rebel skirmishers swiftly and taking the treeline. His own skirmishers collapsed around him, exhausted and peppered with wounds from enemy missiles, unable to follow the Brevians as they burst into the fields beyond the treeline, hoping the momentum of the charge would carry them when they met the enemy infantry.

“It seems the Lion of Lorundus is little more than a kitten,” a metal-clad warrior said from beside him. The Duke turned to see the Baron of Narciop, one of the Bull’s vassals and knights, standing beside him. “Do not worry,” the man chuckled, “us honorable men will carry the day where you have failed.” The Duke could do little more than scowl up at the Baron’s bascinet before he continued, “If you fought properly in the melee rather than playing these despicable games you learned in the Aris valley, you’d find war is much easier for you.” The Baron patted the Duke’s shoulder before marching on with his mace at the ready.

“My lord” his bowman started “do not speak to me!” the Duke screeched. “Gather the men and we fight on! Push through the woods to the east along the Brevian’s right, open fire on the enemy before these curs can steal any more glory from us today. Damnit! The day has only just started and yet we have already been shown up by that unwashed upstart!” The Duke then stumbled forward lightheaded before collapsing to the ground.