“A man ponders he should live a life of peace and prosperity or take up the sword and cover himself in glory?”

Michael lay dying at the fork in the road, his clothes in tatters, half-starved, his back sunburnt. He curled up like an infant, too weak to crawl on his belly. He felt tremors in the earth, he felt it was getting closer and closer, he moved his head to see over the horizon, men in plate and ringmail riding roughshod on their destriers. They were in a tight and menacing formation.

Michael tried to move with all his might but to no avail. “Get up, c’mon, stand on your feet and live,” his inner voice screamed, “LIVE!!”

A man rode in front of the company to meet the boy lying in the fork in the road. As he approached further, Michael thought he was some demon from the shores of hell; his helm was a snarling hound, he wore a black plate with bronze inlays and was adorned with a red cloak. He dismounted from his courser, and he towered over the boy as he stood seven feet in height. He rolled Michael to his back, and an immense agony went across his body causing him to pass out.

The man in black pressed two fingers on Michael’s wrist, the pulse was strong. “Take this man in irons!” He commanded.

Two soldiers placed restraints on his wrists and feet and hoisted him on the back of their destriers. They rode out hard into the pandemonium of the sun.

Michael was surrounded in darkness, his hands were bound in cold steel, and his ankles were in shackles. Am I going to die in this dumb place?

The darkness was lifted off from Michael’s lapis eyes, he saw the man in black holding a head on a spike and had his mad dog helm under his arm. Michael spat, “He’s no kin to me.”

“Good,” the Man in Black said, “My scouts seen you ride with those low-life degenerates. I’ll give you a choice: bread and salt or the rope.”

“My choice was already made when those rat bastards left me to die.”

“Wise decision, boy.” The man in black snapped his fingers, and a handmaid came in with a plate of hard bread and salt and a horn of wine. She placed it near Michael’s feet. She unlocked his bindings and left out where she came.

The man in black put on his snarling hound helm, and exited from the tent, leaving the boy alone in silence, in bitterness.

I hope some escaped the reach of the hangman's noose.

***

Ezekiel, the captain of the Raiders, rode through the tall brown grasslands, riding the great pastoral plains with his men. Extended his hand to touch the tall grass with the wind at his back. It was twilight when the division set upon the bandit’s encampment. It was abandoned and in disarray.

Ezekiel raised a gauntlet fist in the air to signal his men to dismount and search for what was left behind. And what was left behind was only ashes; the tents were cleared, the horses had their throats slit, and the food they stole was burned. The man named Mifune walked to the bodies of kidnapped ladies and girls locked in a wooden cage, with cuts and slashes all over them. Evidence of a great violation.

“My God…” Mifune said.

Afterward, Mifune came upon a ruined tent. He found a journal beneath the bedroll and a bastard sword. The metal was blackened steel engraved with a bronze rippled pattern and a red ruby-encrusted hilt. He eased the sword on his back and looked through the journal. Mifune rubbed his chin with his left hand, skimming through its contents.

Elsewhere, Ezekiel's armor softly clinked as he moved about the abandoned camp, the hairs raised on his neck. A lance from the shadows jabbed out bouncing off his plate, another thrust was about to land but Ezekiel caught it in his iron hand and snapped it in two. He seized the attacker by his throat and hoisted him off the ground. The assailment was barely a boy of sixteen or seventeen, fear was written in his grey eyes. His attempts to scream were stifled as the grip tightened. The boy dropped to the dirt.

Ezekiel’s long shadow loomed over the boy. He pointed the blade of his greatsword to the side of the boy's neck. He was crying.

“Boys shouldn't play at war.” Ezekiel said scowling.

“Please don't. They’re heading North to Fort George.” The boy frantically confessed. “They're not far off.”

Ezekiel in a clean stroke swapt the boy's head off, his lifeless body arched forward as streams of blood soaked into the ground. Mifune walked and stood to the side of Ezekiel.

Stolen novel; please report.

“What’s the next move?” Mifune asked.

“We mount up and we’re bringing the cold steel of the Soldier King’s justice.”

Mifune grimly nodded. “Good.”

***

Michael tore a piece of hard bread and dipped it into his wine. Thankful he gets to see the sunrise tomorrow. He heard a familiar voice calling his name. A distant memory when he was a child.

Michael, the voice called out softly, Michael, your father loves you very much. He closed his eyes, leaned his head against the wall, and took in his dark surroundings. He fell asleep for a few hours then he woke to a swelling pain on his cheek. He saw his father’s sword beneath his feet alongside his journal and the towering figure of a man loomed over the young man. He was a tall, dark, handsome man, with broad shoulders and chest, with a fine set of deep sapphire eyes, his black hair dropped to his shoulders, and his beard was well groomed and trimmed. He wore a studded leather vest with a griffith emblem engraved on the left pectoral and beneath was a fresh linen shirt. He adorned a red half-cape conceling his curved sabre and scabbard.

“Call me, Toshiro.”

“Name’s Michael. Are you my executioner? Come to behead me with my father’s blade?” Michael smiled a bitter smile.

“No,” Mifune said in a deep, throaty voice, “Right now, you’re a lost child in the enormity of creation, looking to lay your claim in it but I can teach you. On how to fight and above all how to suffer like a man of this world. Or I'll be your executioner.”

Michael studied Mifune. "You’re poetic, aren't you?" Michael grabbed his father’s blade and rose to his feet. Those sons of bitches left me for dead. And I can't go back home. I can't face him. “I'd like to keep my head on my shoulders.”

“Good, follow me.”

Leonhart obliged Mifune, they went up the stairs. The campfires illuminated the starry night sky and the smell of cooked meat was in the air. Men were chattering and chortling among each other as they stoke the fires, Michael only caught a tale of how a lone swordsman slaughtered over seventy men to cut down this Storm Lord who threatened the world with his hordes. Lightning struck the mountain twice, heaven and earth were the color, a smoky white on the downpour so the man says.

Mifune had to pull Michael away from the tale. They continued walking down the rows of tents, and bedrolls. The pair went past an impressive pallivion on a high hill overlooking the camp and the river.

“Who's living there?” Michael inquired.

“Our company leader, the Soldier King, Charles Stuart.”

“Soldier King? A rather pretentious title if you asked me.”

“And nobody asks you, boy. Do you think we follow him blindly? Do you think we follow a stranger into the pandemonium of the battlefield? He knows me and as I know him. You ain’t going to find another man in this company that will tell you different.” Mifune said with heat in his voice.

Michael studied Mifune. “I'm curious, why do you follow him?”

“We have an arrangement he agreed to honor. Now c'mon, we're almost there to that place.”

“What place?”

Mifune ignored Michael's question as they pressed forward to the edge of camp. They reached a courtyard for archery and swordplay. It was sparsely attended, few men trained while others observed and made idle conversation. Michael spotted the man in black with a wooden greatsword, made short work of three men who had the misfortune to be his sparring partners for that night. The three men had scratches and bruises, breathing heavily, and flushed in the face, they could scarcely lift there practice swords and shields to defend themselves. In a desperate bid, one of them made a bull rush at Ezekiel to be sidestepped and knocked to the ground. The tip of a wooden sword pointed at the eye slit of his grey helm. He's more beast than man, Michael thought.

Mifune snapped his fingers at the wayward boy as he stood fifteen yards from the center of the training pit. Michael followed in pursuit and he stood opposite Mifune, his sapphire eyes glistening off the light of the lanterns.

“Draw your blade.” Mifune said as he took an ironclad stance still unarmed.

“What? Are you half-mad?” Michael said in astonishment.

“Draw your blade. Come at me with the intent to kill.” Mifune said with ice in his voice, his eyes fully fixated on Michael Leonhart.

The men began to gather around, Ezekiel was among them, they were gathering in anticipation as if it was ceremony. Michael took notice of this as he readied his father’s blade in a wide and open stance. He paced steadily with his sword at his side, he swing his sword in an upward arc. Mifune deftly sidesteps the strike and countered with a rear right hook to the body. Michael keeled over and groan in pain

“Show me something, boy.” Mifune said.

And Michael did, he rained down steel on Toshiro Mifune. He was hacking, slashing, faster and faster but he was only hitting air as Mifune sidesteps, pivoting, skipping, dodging every savage blow, and moving offline into different angles. Michael kept pace with this elusive man. He’s only toying with me, Michael realized. He pressed his slashing flourish, his blood boiling as the inferno within him rages on, pushing Mifune back.

“Is this a fight or a dance?” Michael demanded, huffing and puffing.

“You would’ve died a thousand times over if this was a real duel with swords out.” Mifune said dryly.

Mifune rebounded off his backfoot. “You’re a criminal!” he jabbed him in the jaw. “A boy playing at sword and lance.” Mifune landed clean with a lead body hook. “A disgrace to your kinsmen!” A rear body hook hit home causing Michael to keel over and stagger back. “You're nothing but a disappointment.” Mifune ended this fight with a thunderous lead left hook to the head. Michael's world was spiraling into blackness, and he awoke less than a minute later, the man who whipped him was standing over him offering a hand. Michael accepted. “Welcome to the Warrior’s Sons, Leonhart.”

Michael saw the crowd dispersed as Mifune disappeared into the night leaving the boy alone under the pale moonlight. He stared into the tranquil night sky. He took a deep breath. Born again as a Warrior’s Son?