The 8000 Army

-

Chapter One

          The sun burnt the mountains gold as it dipped behind the sleeping giants crest. It's last rays glistened in snow melts rushing descent down the unstable rocky face of the mountain range. Numerous streams branched out from the gathered snow, that seldom ever fully melted even during the height of summer, to converge in a natural formed pool before bursting over a sheer drop of kaleidoscopic rainbow delight. Their land had always been a harsh teacher with nary a moment for leniency. The rocky pool smoothed over by centuries of running water was one of the most beautiful places to swim in the entire nation, if you didn't mind the icy waters, but the climb was treacherous and many a fool had lost their life to it's lure. Particularly the boastful whom believed they could compete with the sly current and play chicken with the thunderous waterfall. An inch of a stroke and there would be no swimming to prevent the descent upon the unforgiving slices of jagged rock.

Home.

There it sat, in such a manner it appeared as though the precarious water cascaded into the Fort. Rough stone walls stood as true as the day they were mortared, to stand against all whom dare oppose the might of the King. At least a hundred years his senior, those walls encompassed the barracks of the Kings 8000. The Kings army, the defenders of the Kings law and his might should they be called upon. Except now they would have to be called the Kings 5622.

Home, it had been 10 long years since any of these men had clapped eyes on the foreboding mass of the Kings dwelling but it sung to them all. A bitter sweet lullaby that they may have once remembered their mothers sing them to sleep. A comfort as much as a tribulation.
      They would not reach the guarded entrance till the moon had risen in full to gloat in it's chilled dark sky, but they would reach it. After years of battlefields, war cries, gruesome bloodshed and the suffering of their fellow brothers in arms it was time to feel the glory of their hard earned victory against the Falsifiers. The time to rest their heads on their own humble beds without the disquiet of knowing the enemy was near and tomorrow may well be the last tomorrow any of them may greet.

Gael had been training for war the majority of his life, since he could hold a sword straight as a young boy. At the time the Falsifiers had been a small occult gathering. He had been recruited and trained as an 8000 soldier till he could be ranked at age seventeen. When most boys attentions would be veering in the direction of the fairer sex, Gael was immersed in tactical strategy, military resourcing and combat principals. By his twenty first birth year he was Commander of The 8000 and the Falsifiers occult gathering had already become an insurgence of believers worshipping a false God determined to over throw the King. The regular army and the Enforcers had quelled the uprising attempts against the crown but barely a year in his role as Commander, Gael took his 8000 men to eradicate them. Three years it took to drive the zealots from every town, village and settlement only to face an amassed army inching over the borders of their neighbouring kingdom. The High Priest had been the sower of the occults seeds and he had been one of the last to die by Gael's hands. Now he would face his older brother, not only as the Commander of The Kings 5622 but with the gift of expanding his brothers lands beyond their severe terrain and towards the gentler climate now flying under the flag of King Aillig and his 8000.

Home. He would be home soon.

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

The 8000 Army

-
Image
Chapter Three                   Gael was used to minimal sleep and with the less than hospitable accommodation of the end barracks, he did not feel the necessity in sleeping late. As the sun warmed the stone of the Quad, Gael jogged the perimeter with an increasing dismay that the moonlight of the previous night had been masking the severity of the decaying Fort. The morning soldiers on guard were no more attentive the the previous nights shift.      First and Forth corporals joined him half way through the routine exercise. On their return to the barracks they were greeted with the Fifth, Seventh and Eighth corporals. No doubt having built their own conclusions in regard to their home that no longer felt like home. They waited for Gael. Gael had no doubt that had he not left Finlay, Conall and Pike, the Corporals whom remained to regulate Medterra, they would be here to include their coppers worth.     ...
Read more

The 8000 Army

-
Image
Chapter Two         Prince Gael and the Kings 8000, reduced to 5622 of which only 3510 reached the gates of Fort Craeg before the moon rose to the zenith. His men were greeted by sleepy guards hovering round the battlements. A far cry from the diligent disciplined soldiers that normally stationed the walls, had Gael been an invading army the guards would have been long dead and the Fort over run in mere minutes. First impressions left much to be desired on his return and he could only hope that it was the wily light of the moon that painted their once immaculate precision army base into the run down relic it appeared to have become. Including the rather unwelcome welcoming committee, which did not include his brother, the King to whom these men had given 10 years of their lives defending and countless brothers of the sword. The King, who would not garner the will to rise from his warm bed to receive his army of  hand-picked prized soldiers and certainly no...
Read more