Bailey's War

[Treshure 5817]

This was never Bailey’s war.

 

The cardinals of the church spoke of religious persecution, oft in the early days. The militiamen and the military officers were thinned in rank considerably, and to their own tale, it was by the brutality they had endured. For Courland, sacrifice for Courland. It was a cardinal’s war. It was an officer’s war - it was never Bailey’s war.

Alas, the boy was infatuated. The true tales of the battlefield, something transpired to veterans alone, died off every few decades. With this death is a renewal of nationalism and gusto, something attractive to the boy and his swashbuckling hopes and dreams. So when the recruiting sergeants came marching through the merchant’s district, beckoning all young blood to join them on the Church’s newly christened crusade, how could he say no?

 

Bailey was wearing a stark green uniform, freshly sewn with a side cap sitting atop a mess of raven hair. His boots were newly issued and recently polished, yet to march out from the city it was made within. His gloves were white and without blemish, worn tight and without wear. His sword was standard issue Courland steel. His armaments were standard issue iron armor: an eagle stamped into the centre chestplate. Every man, in line, uniform and ready to march outward towards the frontier.

 

--

 

“How’d you get here?”

The unsteadiness of the cart wagon made the conversation rolling and jolting, the mass gathering of boys dancing from side to another as an armada of fresh recruits, shifting across the green prairies. Bailey looked around several times before realizing the boy was talking to him. “Enlisted, like anyone else,” Bailey replied. “And you?”

 

The boy who spoke grinned toothily, his teeth stained yellow. His face was rendered unattractive through heavy scarring and disfigurement, but his eyes shone truly as any else’s. “Warn’t be telling the truth if I said like you.” He looked around as if in awe of the scene. “Convicced. Stealin’ bread and the likes. My hand, or the war.” He looked at his clean uniform. “I chose the war. Wasn’t any bad of a situation, looks like.”

Bailey leaned back in his seat, observing the others assembled, rolling and jolting in silence. Their eyes were downcast. Their faces weren’t nearly as cleaned and groomed as Bailey’s. None of them were as beautiful as he. The boy looked up, eyeing the thief. “What is your name?” he asked with a neutral tone.

The thief glanced at Bailey, smiling with a blind innocence. “Erik.”

“Well, Erik, I think I’d do better to stick around you in this war,” added Bailey with the ghost of a smile.

Erik’s lips curled upwards, his eyes shining with a jejune pride. “Alrigh’, then.”

This was never Bailey’s war.

--

 

The cold had arrived. Swathes of frosty clouds drifted aimlessly across the sky, seeding the air with a biting chill unknown to the fresh bloods. Off in the distance bore the deep, resounding beats of war drums. Cries of war sounded in the night as the ensemble of carts rolled in the twilight, slowly edging towards the battlefield. Before long, Bailey had woken to a deathly quiet frontier of rotting corpses and abandoned flags.

 

The war camp stirred lightly upon dawn. Erik rolled over in his bunk to observe the chatter. His eyes drifted over to an awake Bailey, the two boys judging their next move. Erik rose first, pulling up long green trousers with a worn leather belt to secure them. Hustling from the tent, Bailey soon followed after to retrieve breakfast and their first orders.

 

“They’re advancing on us.”

The chatter around the fire snuffed out, now attentive eyes trained on the captain. He was a burly man of two meters, stretched tall and wide. Despite a tired face and deep boring eyes, his voice carried a militant sharpness and edge over the congregation.

The captain extended out a hastily scribbled map over a wooden table. It was a few moments before Bailey realized it was their position, with thick red arrows closing in from all directions. “We’ve been cut off from the King’s army. We hoped that you new recruits could bolster the veterans in combat, but…” The Captain’s voice trailed off. “They did not return from last night’s engagement. You’re all that is left of the 41st.” His eyes lifted towards the centre of the camp, where a proud eagle standard was erected, five feet tall and lifted onto the commander’s tent.

 

“We may as well be dead man walking in this camp. I’ll give you all an hour before we march to battle. If we can push through their center and break through the back, we may be able to find Tobias’s main entourage before it is too late.” The Captain retrieved the map, nodding to the men. A battle was imminent.

After the meeting broke, Bailey ran across the camp to catch up to Erik, already halfway into his chainmail. “You’re not really going out there, are you?” asked Bailey, exasperated.
“You ‘eard the Cap. We’re going off to fight”, responded an indifferent Erik.

“We’re going to get killed out there! You saw the report, there’s no chance!”

Erik slid his arm through a chainmail sleeve, staring at Bailey with those deep, empty blue eyes. “I’ve been waiting a long time to die.”

This was never Bailey’s war.

--

 

He heard them coming long before he saw them. The ground trembled to drums, the rhythmic shaking of thousands of boots gradually encroaching on Bailey. The 41st’s weaknesses were accounted for, assessed, and now taken to a measure whereas there would only one outcome.

“Arrows!”

The thin, scraggly line of the 41st immediately crouched, heaving up thick oaken shields before an onslaught of arrows met them, pelleting in by the hundreds before a moment of silence.

“Advance!” The men heaved upwards through the snow, trudging forward before a shifting blackness overtook the sky once more. “Arrows!”, screamed the Captain. The Courlanders were far too slow to react this time. Guttural screams mixed in with the ‘thud’ of the arrows, crumpled cloaks of men being left behind as the advance orders began. Bailey was placed in the centre, guarding the eagle standard in a thicker band of men. Erik lay to his right with feverish eyes placed onward towards the approaching Ruskans.

“Shields, down, charge!”
The line broke in a silent sprint. The winter winds had taken from them their breath and fortitude, leaving only the feverish desire to survive. Bailey saw and heard nothing until the two lines clashed, Ruskan and Courlander cleaving away at each other at an indistinguishable mass of flesh and steel. The men collapsed around Bailey like clockwork, leaving only a few distinguished recruits and Erik left with him, fighting on all sides. Spears jabbed in and out of his immediate surroundings, some finding air and others flesh.

 

A flash of gold and white briefed Bailey’s vision. It was only a moment before he realized the standard bearer was fighting fiendishly for his life - and losing. The standard loosed from the bearer’s hand, tumbling directly onto Bailey. He lifted his hands clumsily, eyes wide as the eagle fell towards him. Though as the shaft met his palm, he was faced with an enormous weight. Bailey, in that moment, realized his inexorable weakness. The 41st eagle standard bore into him, and in a second of great frailty, he fell with it.

 

An eon passed to Bailey, the standard barely out of his grasp as he lay on the bloodied snow. Erik swept by, a lone hand gliding down to grab and lift the standard. His tuft of straw hair disappeared once more, thrust deep into the heart of the battle. All that filled Bailey’s vision now were daggers and swords and shields and arrows. A man leaned over his face with unfamiliar eyes and unfriendly colors, poised with a sinking, dripping weapon.

 

This was never Bailey’s war.

 

 

[Paleo 298]

Moved to The Great Library. It shall be sorted into the appropriate category shortly.

 

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