by Raige » Wed Jan 12, 2005 12:03 am
As soon as the troop of men had stopped them, Raige already had one hand on a throwing axe, ready to pull it from its ring and let it fly at the first sign of aggression. Raige let Iseide do the talking, although he knew that an assault was inevitable as soon as they had seen his face. He waited impatiently, feeling his heart start pumping faster, the adrenalin begin to flood his body. He would allow Iseide to try to talk them out of this...but he was like a loaded weapon. Locked, loaded, and ready to fire.
As soon as the man raised his hand to slap Iseide, Raige let his axe fly. It embedded itself squarely in one of the troop's face. Raige quickly got his feet out of their stirrups, balanced himself on his saddle, and leapt at the next pair of troops, hands speedily drawing his shortswords as he did so. As Raige flew at them, the two soldiers drew their swords, and both swung at Raige once he was within range. Raige parried them both, inverted his grip on his swords, and plunged them into both men's backs as he went by.
He hit the ground and rolled, two more throwing axes in hand before he stood. He turned and immediately released them. Both found home in a single soldier's back, knocking him from his horse as though he had been plucked from it and tossed away by the hand of the gods. The remaining six remaining soldiers dismounted, probably to give themselves a stable working area; Raige couldn't help but grin. These men, even though they outnumbered him, would never defeated him. Not in open combat, on solid ground. Raige drew his longswords slowly, their harmonious singing as they were drawn from their sheaths combining with the war drum beat of his heart, to make a deadly song that only he could hear. Raige changed his stance, digging his heels into the ground a bit, and grinned at the six. Then, he was charging them, and his twin longswords became a living whirlwind of death. Two more of the soldiers had fallen before the other four could react.
Just then, somehow through the roar of blood rushing in his ears, and the pounding of his own heart, Raige heard gasping. He dared a glance to his right, saw Iseide kneeling in the snow. Blood was staining her pants and the snow around her. The man she had been fighting was dispatched, but she was obviously hurt. Raige looked back to the four he was now facing.
"I'm giving you all one chance to live," he growled. Raige held his swords out in front of him, then dropped them to the snow. "Turn now, and forget about us. Do it not, and die."
Seeing him with no weapons bolstered the soldiers' confidence, and they charged him as one. He sidestepped the first attack, dodged the second, leapt over the third and rolled under the fourth. The men turned, and Raige was upon them, in their midst, gouging out eyes, breaking knees, sending well-placed kicks and punches to vulnerable areas of confused men. Raige caught one man in his arms and promptly snapped his neck. Another, he grabbed by the throat, and with a snarl, ripped it out. The third, Raige tripped and went to the ground with him, only his knee was atop the soldier's nose, so when head struck ground, knee struck nose, and when head tried to bounce off the ground, knee drove nose into brain. The fourth man, seeing the carnage about him, dropped his weapon and took off running. Raige, snarling like a madman, went to one of the first bodies he had dispatched, yanked a throwing axe from the corpse, took aim, and hurled the deadly projectile toward the fleeing man. Fortunately for the soldier, he never saw it coming. One minute he was running, the next, he was facedown in the snow, an axe lodged deeply into the back of his skull. Raige took several deep breaths, forcing himself to calm down, to let his killing rage go.
"You've had worse, Iseide. Much worse."
Raige whipped about, saw Iseide pressing into her leg wound, trying to stop the blood flow. Raige rushed to her, knelt down in front of her, examining her wounds. Working quickly, he pulled his knife from its sheath on his thigh, untucked the layers of his clothing, and cut a long strip from his undershirt. He stuck the knife into the ground, and began wrapping the leg above the wound. He tied it tightly, then regained his knife and cut another strip from his shirt for her arm. This strip was merely going to be a bandage, the cut wasn't very deep, although it was long and ragged. She didn't need a tourniquet for this arm, like her leg. He wrapped the strip about her arm, tying it in place. Raige picked up his knife and replaced it in its sheath, then stood and lifted Iseide off the ground.
"I can walk, you fool! Get your weapons, I can walk on my own!" she snarled at him.
"Sure you can."
Raige, ignoring her protests, carried her to her horse, and seated her upon it. He handed her reigns to her.
"Stay up there, you stubborn woman. I'll collect my things, then we'll be off. There's a town, roughly 3 miles down the road. I happen to have a contact there, he'd be willing to help you."
Without waiting for a response, Raige went about the small battlefield, gathering his fallen weapons. He cleaned them on the corpses' clothing where he found them, and returned them to their rightful places. He even snagged a few coin purses, and put them in his own on his belt. That task completed, he remounted himself, and led the way down the road.
It was only three miles, but to Raige, who was worried about Iseide's leg, it seemed to take forever to reach the small town of Gallion. When they arrived, Raige hurriedly led them to the house of his contact. He dismounted and tied both of their horses to the tethering post, then went to help Iseide dismount. To his surprise, she was already down, although she was only standing on one leg. She looked at him with defiance in her eyes, and he merely shrugged and lifted her off the ground, carrying her bodily over his shoulder. He reached the door and knocked twice, thrice, and twice. The door opened, and he stepped inside.
The warmth hit him in the face like a punch, stining his somewhat frozen skin. Raige carefully set Iseide down, who promptly punched him in the arm. Raige frowned at her, then looked around for the old man who had been his friend and confidante for close to 8 years now.
"Ah....always in trouble, young one. Forever in need of some kind of help."
The voice was soft, kind, and sounded ancient, as though it were time itself's voice. Raige smiled and looked about.
"Where are you, Hadar? Come out, my friend here is wounded."
From behind them, even though both had been sure no one was there, Hadar stepped from the shadows, causing Iseide to nearly jump from her skin. Raige, who was far too used to Hadar's tricks to be fooled, grinned as the old man came shuffling around into the firelight for them to see. Hadar looked at Iseide's leg and frowned.
"Looks like the work of those Zandirian fools," he said. "How could you let this happen to such a pretty girl, Raige? You ought to be ashamed. Come, come child, sit, sit. Old Hadar will have you fixed up in no time at all."
While Hadar busied himself Healing Iseide's wounds, Raige kept himself occupied by bringing in more firewood for the old man. Not that he needed help with the chores around the place, but Hadar liked to pretend that he was feeble and helpless, and Raige had learned long ago to play along.
In no time at all, Iseide's leg was healed as though it hadn't even been scratched, her arm was mended as well, and Hadar was telling Iseide stories of Raige's early misadventures and training while the three of them sat around Hadar's table, drinking tea.
Raige, who knew these stories because he had, of course, lived through them, soon grew bored and excused himself, and sat in a chair by the fire. The old man's voice was soothing, and, when combined by the comfort of the chair and the warmth of the hearth, Raige soon found himself drowsy. Before he knew it, he had dozed off completely.
Taking notice immediately, Hadar broke off from his story in midsentence and turned a serious look upon Iseide.
"Listen to me, young lady," he whispered. "Raige is a very special man, and not only because of his talent of the arts of war. His heart is pure, although it has been buried for some time. There is a secret within him, something even he does not know about. You and you alone can help him release this secret. You must, if he is to protect you the way the gods intended."
"But, Hadar, we won't be working together much longer. After our mission is completed, I doubt we'll see each other again. How am I to help him then?"
Hadar chuckled, as only old men can do. "My dear girl, I have Seen things. You must help him unlock his secret, so that he may help you."
"For the mission?"
"Bah. This...mission. Raige would be able to help you with this mission if he were blind and had but one arm. No...there are dark times ahead. You will need him, Iseide. And he you."
The two sat silently for some time, Iseide taking in what Hadar had told him, Hadar....thinking about whatever it is that his kind think of. Suddenly, Hadar broke the silence with a loud yawn.
"There is a spare room upstairs. You two may sleep there, if you are going to stay the night. And for the sake of the gods, don't leave him sleeping in that chair. He'll snore so loudly the entire town won't be able to sleep a wink!" His eyes sparkled merrily as he said this, smiling at Iseide. "I am retiring now, I should hope to see your beautiful face in the morning, child. Good night."
Quitters never win, winners never quit, but those who never win AND never quit are idiots.
For every winner, there are dozens of losers. Odds are you're one of them.