"You there?! Get back into formation, damn ye!"
"What in the creepin' FUCK?!"
Strong, mailed hands grabbed the Raggedy Man by the tunic and yanked him forwards. A mustache that belonged on a walrus bristled under wide, glaring eyes used to command. "Mind your tongue in battle, man! And where in damnation is your pike?!"
"My... oh."
Kasoria looked around and took in the turgid field. The block of men stretching from one wooded side to the other, front ranks hidden behind locked shields, ten-foot pikes sticking out from between them. Perfect formation. Almost like a painting... or an illustration. The thought popped into Kasoria's head as he looked to the other side... and heard the banshee wail of a thousand barbaric bastards from across the sea.
This... I read him this!
"S-Sorry, sir!" He managed to stammer, knowing he had to spew out something halfway convincing, dream or not. "I-I-I-lost it! Still got my blades th-"
"Well, what bloody good is that?!" The sergeant (for no-one but sergeants could bellow that loud) snapped with a glance at the gladius in Kasoria's hand. "Fates, get behind the line and be ready for the charge! We'll discuss this later, trooper!"
Mercifully, the big man tossed the smaller one towards the army of Etzori, banners flying high from the middle of their formation. No more lies needed, thank Fuck. Kasoria scuttled across the grassy ground and took in more and more of this weirdness. Suits of armor without blood or grime. Faces clear of sweat and dirt. All of them steadfast, jaws set, eyes shining with subdued courage. No-one shitting or praying or cursing or hiding piss running down their legs.
Only a child could think of war like this. And we haven't even got to-
"Here they come, men!"
Kasoria turned to look but didn't need to be told who it was. The thunder of hooves, the screaming of foreign tongues, the curved, gleaming blades in the sun. This was the legion of Warlord Shakrare,
just as he'd told Martyn about over an arc ago. He remembered that night, like he remembered all of them. Those stolen, precious breaks and trials where he could be with his son. Indulge the boy's curiosity and fantasy about what it was like to be a soldier.
Feed the lie, you mean. Because damned if you were ever a fucking trooper.
"Stand fast!" The Sergeant shouted, taking up position and catching a pike in the same instant. Kasoria nestled himself in the middle ranks, finding a spot for himself behind the hedgehog of spears and pikes and shields and armor. "Break and the spirit of Etzos breaks with ye!"
The green of the field was wiped away now; filled instead with the smear of hundreds of charging horsemen. Even from here, Kasoria could make out faces, mounts, weapons, rotten teeth and topknots, leather armor and trophy heads slapping into the sides of saddles. A child's imagination bringing very real nightmares to life, and yet... and yet there was something... almost sanitary about them. Uniform in a way he knew no mob of bandits or reavers never could be. They came on like a grisly tide, a stain upon a clean country, and Kasoria remembered just in time to-
"TAKE COVER!"
-as a cloud of arrows was loosed from the rear ranks of the horde. Damnit, he'd fucking well told the boy all about this! He should be one step ahead! Instead he was ducking under his neighbors shield just as the flurry hit them. There was a weird
TOK-TOK-TOK sound as hundreds of arrows smacked into wood and metal. Men went down around him, wounded or dead, but... no blood. No gore. No screaming or begging or crying. These men, these figments either died quickly and quietly like good heroes, or shrugged off their wounds like even better ones. Huddled under his cover, Kasoria took the moment to grimace.
First time is really going to be a shock for the boy.
"BRAAAAAACE!"
Dream or not, Kasoria did as he was ordered, and congratulated himself on not being within the first few ranks. Able defense or not, standing upright in front of several thousands tons of horse meat and screaming savage hurtling along at forty miles an hour was going to leave a mark, no matter how big or well-drilled you were. Yet as Kasoria peered over the heads and shoulders of the others, he saw men fall and heard men scream, but... very little blood. No gaping wounds or shrieking horses. No arterial sprays or body parts twitching on the ground. The first ranks absorbed the charge, losing men but keeping formation... and slowly, the rest of the block started to feed men into the gaps.
"Move, move!"
One opened up in front of Kasoria, and the Raggedy Man surged forwards over the weirdly-bloodless body of the man before him. An unhorsed barbarian was yelling at him in a language he was sure no-one on Idalos spoke; just the gibberish Martyn's mind could craft. As long as it sounded sharp and aggressive and mean, that would do-
-especially when it came with a scimitar slashing towards him-
-Kasoria weaving away from the blow, slashing low at the same time, ripping open the raider's thighs down to the bone, sending him to his knees with a shriek, but still strong and battle-crazed enough to backhand at him-
-only for Kasoria to step into the blow, his own backhand knocking the scimitar away, left hand snatching the dagger from his boot-
SHUNK
-slamming it into the side of the man's neck, ripping it out with a twist, readying himself for the-
Blood?
The savage coughed and gurgled and there was a red trickle from the wound... but that was all. Kasoria swore the man seemed to sigh as he fell over, quite gracefully, joining the carpet of still and dead and clean bodies. All around him men fought and died, but... Fates, they were all fighting the same way. Either wild and childish, all strength without skill, or the careful, precise, drilled katas he'd taught his son. The pikemen were different, keeping their distance, jabbing away until their weapons were knocked aside or broken or stuck and then came out the swords and Kasoria was still craning his neck searching for-
The horns blew. Their echo had not faded before Kasoria realized what that meant. He remembered how the story, how the true history of this battle ended. He looked to the wooded flanks-
Which gleamed and shone with burnish steel armor. A whole line of it, solid ranks of armored knights with lances raised. Another blast of the horn and they started to trot. The lances came down a hundred feet from the roiling, embattled, disorderly horde of Eastern invaders. From within the unwashed mass, Kasoria could hear a single, baritone voice bellowing orders for retreat or resistance, and knew that was Shakrare himself... and if he knew his son-
"FOR ETZOS!"
Kasoria turned as if he knew exactly where to find his son. Saw a charging knight with lance lowered and face twisted into a shout. Plunging through dark ranks of shaggy human monsters, through the press of the hordes, and into the personal guard of the Warlord himself.
"Martyn?"