Soldier's Ways
Thirteenth Day of the Eighth Month 293 AC
The ancient red dragon Amrelath, once called the Accursed, had to admit to himself if not aloud that he was rather impressed by what the work of men's hands and minds had done with the passing of the aeons since his imprisonment. He would have assumed that without dragons to give their mayfly lives some purpose and direction men would have drifted back to the state of blissful savagery in which his kindred had first found them, dwelling in tents, caves, and tents, covering their nakedness with the hides of beasts.
The way all these 'legionnaires' marched in neat lines ready to fight and die for a dragon's war, the way they wore his mark upon their arms not with sullen frowns but with a smile, with pride. Perhaps in some small way the passions that inspired wyrms to greatness dwelt in the hearts of men also, he reasoned as he listened to the marching songs of the men below:
Tongues of fire in the sky flaring,
News of foe-men near declaring,
To heroic deeds of daring,
Call you Dragon's Men
For the first time in life or death Amrelath could understand what might drive some of his kindred to lay with mortals and sire children upon them beyond simple lust. He might almost pity that they would never live to see more than a moment in the world's life, though the feeling was as brief as the touch of rain on molten stone.
Groans of wounded slaves dying,
Wails of wives and children flying,
For the distant succor crying,
Call you Legionnaires
One of the war-beasts dared to approach him, this one with a boar's head, the commander of the scouting wing: "Lord, we are nearing the ruins of the old fort. Should we fly ahead and make it ready for you in some small way?"
Amrelath snorted, dark smoke wafting from his nostrils: "So you expect me to fly in circles while that ungainly mount of yours labors through the air to get to the fort, and then you will waste your time and mine pretending you are a domestic?" Seeing the confusion in the man's eyes the dragon corrected himself to the use of the newer word: "A
servant."
"Beg pardons, lord," the man said, and to his credit his voice did not shake as a wisp of dragon-fear stole over him.
"I have been sent here to help make soldiers of you, to teach you how to fly and to face sorcery, to know your
fears and fight despite them. Do not waste your time and mine trying to serve in a manner ill-befitting of your calling." Much to his surprise Amrelath found he meant that more deeply than just because it was what his lord would wish to hear said. It was quite enjoyable to make the wheels run smooth like a finely-tuned mechanism of flesh and steel, far grander than any single mortal being, born or made.
Short the sleep the foe is taking,
Ere the morrows morn is breaking
They shall have a rude awakening,
roused by you King's Men
The old border fort that was the destination of this particular march had stood here since before what the mortals grandiosely called the Century of Blood, though to a dragon's reckoning it was scarce more than a spirited series of skirmishes. It had been built of the local limestone that almost seemed to meld into the slopes of the Painted Mountains to either side, partly because it was becoming part of the mountain, by crumbling. Learning how to make it livable would be a valuable lesson.
2x Construct Training Center Progress: 13+18 = 31/40
***
Out of the corner of his eyes the dragon saw a shadow... he heard the hiss of an arrow cutting through the air a moment too late to turn away and let it glance off his belly scales. Spellsteel bit between the smaller scales of his upper wing joints, and with that steel came magic... familiar blackness calling to him, death close as memory, as close as nightmares...
No, he roared to the heavens, the fire within him welling up to eat at the shadow that tried to gnaw at flesh and spirit.
Amrelath's head snapped to the side to see the assassin standing on a cracked rooftop of the old fort. He was wearing long brown traveler's robes common to these lands, though the bow in his hands and the ruby goggles on his eyes gave lie to the notion that there was anything common about him.
Another accursed arrow was already in his hands, but this time the dragon was ready, twisting aside to let it fly harmlessly by.
"Now you die, little man," the dragon roared, like the sound of stone and fire vented from the depths of the earth, but even as he prepared to breathe out a torrent of flame he saw his foe reach for a silver talisman and he knew it for what it was, a means to escape his fate...
That was when the legionnaire who had spoken to him along the journey crashed into the assassin with his beast, the word of command lost in a shout of pain as the beast's jaws clamped about his calf.
Most useful indeed, the dragon thought even as most of his attention was on clawing and crushing the assassin with his weight that he might capture him.
OOC: The Ghiscari may be vile, but they are not idiots to just wait around to get eaten by dragons. The assassin up there used artifact arrows that carry the spell disintegrate as cast by a level 13 caster. Verses for the Legion song were taken from Men of Harlech if anyone's interested.
